There were many floods in Nanjing in Qing Dynasty.
During the Qing Dynasty, Nanjing suffered a lot of floods. According to historical records of flood archives of southwest international rivers in the Yangtze River basin in Qing Dynasty, during the period of1736-191year, Nanjing * * * suffered 64 floods, including 2 in Qianlong, 2 in Jiaqing and 0 in Daoguang. On average, Nanjing will suffer a flood in less than three years.
When floods occur, ruthless floods not only take away people's lives and property, but also restrict social and economic development. According to the degree of disaster, the floods in Nanjing in Qing Dynasty can be roughly divided into three grades: the lighter ones are rainwater and accumulated rain. For example, according to the report of Wang Zhiyi, Governor of Jiangsu Province in the 9th year of Jiaqing (1804) in May, "there is too much rain, and the seedlings are occasionally flooded in low-lying areas near rivers, lakes and rivers"; The more serious performance is that the flood burst its banks. For example, according to the report of Liang Guozhi, the deployment envoy of Jiangning in July in the thirty-fourth year of Qianlong (1769), "Since May and June, due to the continuous rainstorm, the upstream landscape bet, the river tide flooded, and both sides of the rivers and lakes were flooded"; The most serious manifestation is that floods flood into densely populated cities. For example, according to Tao Shu, governor of the two rivers in June in the 11th year of Daoguang (183 1), "On June 14th and 19th, it rained heavily again, and rivers poured into the city. The water depth of Hiram Hospital ranged from two feet to seven or eight inches, and the houses and houses near the gate were flooded.
Close the sluice and introduce the lake into the river.
According to the literature, due to the shortage of funds, the officials and gentry before Daoguang mainly dredged the rivers in the city when dealing with floods. However, the dikes along the Yangtze River are difficult to maintain, and these dikes are often washed away on a large scale by floods outside the city.
After entering Daoguang dynasty, the flood entered a period of frequent occurrence and fierceness. In many years, the turbulent river tide and landscape not only invaded the vast areas outside Nanjing, but also spilled over to densely populated cities. In addition, the accumulated water in the city can not be discharged in time, which has brought great damage to the city. On the premise of limited funds, officials and gentry quickly focused on the goal of preventing floods from entering the city, resulting in two kinds of water control activities (ideas): closing the sluice and diverting lakes into the river.
Closing the sluice is the most effective way to prevent floods from entering the city. At that time, many culverts were built in some important water gates in Nanjing, such as Dongshuiguan and Xishuiguan. The gates were used to control the opening and closing, and the water flow in and out of the city was controlled in peacetime and disasters. For example, in the fourteenth year of Daoguang (1834), the opening and closing of the sluice played a decisive role when it entered the city to fight floods.
However, in the coming years, due to the potential and disrepair of floods, officials and gentry often choose to block the sluice instead of opening it in time, resulting in the stagnation of rivers in the city. This practice of going too far can easily lead to tragedy. According to Wang Zhengyi's Postscript of the Fourteenth Year of Daoguang in Jinling Water Conservancy, after Daoguang was blocked for eleven years, there was stagnant water in the city with more than 10,000 residents along the river, and the polluted things were dumped every day, which could not be cleaned up. At the turn of spring and summer of the following year, the river turned green and stinked, and the epidemic situation was so great that the dead could not be counted. "
Introducing the lake into the river is considered to have destroyed the "Long Mai"
In addition to closing the sluice in an emergency, there is another idea to introduce lake water into rivers. The so-called diversion of the lake into the river means that Xuanwu Lake is connected with the Yangtze River by cutting off mountains, and the relatively high terrain of Xuanwu Lake makes the lake directly enter the river, thus reducing the flood pressure faced by the city.
According to Gan's "Lock the Eyes under the White", during the flood in the 11th year of Daoguang, some people in Nanjing put forward this idea, and as a result, officials and gentry who pay attention to geomantic omen thought it would be ruined and dismissed it as "a foolish move". In the summer of the 21st year of Daoguang (184 1), the idea of diverting lakes into rivers was put forward. Cheng, then the ambassador of Jiangning, was forced to adopt it, but he was willing to persuade him to give up with Kan Yu. From a practical point of view, diverting the lake into the river is not only a huge project, but also brings negative effects such as the proliferation of foreign commanders and weakening the city defense.
In the twenty-ninth year of Daoguang, Nanjing suffered an unprecedented flood. According to Chen's "Candle Photo Record", "The light has been shining for a long time, and the flood in Jinling has never happened in a hundred years. Sailing in Tongcheng, East Garden, Wang Fu Lane and other places, the roofs are several feet higher. In the process of taking a boat, it was hung in the water by branches, and people called it crossing the sea. "
In the early summer of that year, the discussion of diverting the lake into the river resumed, and then it intensified. It is planned to start from the shore of Houhu Lake outside the toilet gate, and dig a river of more than ten miles to the west along the city wall to reach Xiaguan River. "It is planned to make the water of Houhu Lake (referring to Xuanwu Lake) gush out quickly."
At that time, Lu Jianying, governor of Liangjiang, was supervising the river project in Qingjiangpu. Yang, who worked in Jiangning for a short time, "sent members to cooperate with the director to measure outside the city and started construction in the spring." Hearing this decision, "CoCo Lee is afraid and the people are worried".
The local gentry even went to Beijing in February of the following year, hoping to ask Nanjing officials for help. Fan Xiaoyun, assistant minister, is even going to report the matter to Daoguang Emperor. Soon news came from Nanjing that Liu Jianying took the advice of the secretariat Wei Yuan when he passed Yangzhou on his way back to his mother's home, and immediately stopped Yang's action after returning to the office at the end of the month.
The germination of comprehensive water control thought
After the baptism of the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom War, the ability of local governments to control finance was greatly enhanced, and the idea of comprehensive flood control began to sprout. As recorded in "Tongzhi Shangjiang County Records": "The preparation for floods and droughts must be on the day when nothing happens. When you get to the ditch, you won't suffer from adultery; If you dig Chishan for Jurong landscape, dig white rice for Lishui landscape, and dig Yuan Wu for Beishan water, you will not suffer from floods; Qinhuai Waihe River is located in Longjiang, Beihekou and Dashengguan. Flood gates are built and sandbars and embankments are built along the river, so the tide of the river will not flow back. " It reflects the thoughts of officials and gentry on controlling floods in Nanjing from three aspects: drainage, flood discharge and flood interception.
However, frequent floods in Nanjing are closely related to the weather process beyond human control and the decline of flood storage in the Yangtze River basin. After all, this idea of water control is still a little immature. Although we can find the efforts and achievements made by Zuo and others in water control, they still can't stop the floods from invading Nanjing in the late Qing Dynasty.