Hu Zongxian (Chinese: 胡宗憲; November 4, 1512 – November 25, 1565), courtesy name Ruzhen (汝貞) and art name Meilin (梅林), was a Chinese general and politician of the Ming dynasty who presided over the government's response to the wokou pirate raids during the reign of the Jiajing Emperor. As supreme commander, he was able to defeat Xu Hai's substantial raid in 1556 and capture the pirate lord Wang Zhi the next year through ruses. Despite his accomplishments, Hu Zongxian's reputation had been tarnished by his association with the clique of Yan Song and Zhao Wenhua, traditionally reviled figures in Ming historiography. He was rehabilitated decades after his death and was given the posthumous name Xiangmao (襄懋) by the emperor in 1595.
He is a direct ancestor of Hu Jintao, General Secretary of the Chinese Communist Party from 2002 to 2012.
Hu Zongxian was born in the year 1512 in the Hu ancestral village of Longchuan (龍川) in Jixi County, part of Huizhou prefecture of the Southern Metropolitan Region (Nanzhili) at the time. Today, Longchuan is called Kengkou village (坑口村); Jixi is now part of Anhui province. At the age of 23, he passed the provincial imperial examination and became a juren (舉人). This was followed by him passing the palace examination in 1538, becoming a jinshi (進士) and paving the road to officialdom.
Hu was first assigned to be the magistrate of Yidu in Shandong province in 1540, where his administration of justice won him the love of the people, who claimed that he brought rains during a drought and magpies to eat the locusts destroying the crops. He raised a thousand volunteer troops from miners out of work and sent them to the northern frontiers under the command of the Shandong grand coordinator Zeng Xian. For this, Hu Zongxian was earmarked for promotion, but he had to retire due to the death of his mother in May 1542 to observe the three years-long period of mourning per Confucian rituals. Two years later, his father also died, and Hu Zongxian stayed at his home village for another three years.
In 1547, Hu Zongxian reemerged as the magistrate of Yuyao of Zhejiang province (modern Yuyao city, Ningbo). There, he became known for his unconventional thinking, such as when he solved the longstanding problem of illegal quarrying on Mt. Shenggui (勝歸山) north of the city by buying the mountain with his salary. His energetic governance was met with the people's approval, and he became one of the few local officials to earn the praise of Zhu Wan, the grand coordinator of Zhejiang. In 1548, Hu's likeness was carved into the cliff of Mt. Shenggui in his honour.
Hu Zongxian was summoned to the capital, Beijing, in 1548 to take a position under the Censorate. In the six years as an investigating censor, Hu Zongxian distinguished himself by not only writing memorials to the throne evaluating the performance of provincial officials but also participating in the actual administration of the provinces. During his tour of the Northern Metropolitan Region (Beizhili) from 1549 to 1551, Altan Khan broke through the defences at Gubeikou and pillaged the suburbs of Beijing. The defences of Xuanfu, where Hu Zongxian was stationed during the crisis, held fast, and Hu sent troops to relieve Beijing. He was rewarded for this, and the emperor began to take note of his abilities.
In the summer of 1551, Hu was transferred to Wuchang in the province of Huguang, where he participated in the suppression of a Miao rebellion on the provincial border with Guizhou. There, he gained firsthand knowledge of the Miao's fighting qualities, such that he called for their service during the pirate suppression campaigns a few years later. He was recalled to serve in the Censorate headquarters in Beijing in 1552. He made lasting connections with the political elite there, the most important of which was that of Zhao Wenhua, and by extension, that of Zhao's patron, the Senior Grand Secretary Yan Song, the official closest to the emperor.
At this time, the southeastern coast was under attack by the pirates known as the "wokou" who were a mix of Chinese merchants and foreign elements from Japan and Portugal violating the maritime prohibition laws. Hu Zongxian and Zhao Wenhua recommended a series of measures to counter this threat, including expanding the powers given to the grand coordinator, a position roughly equivalent to a provincial governor so that he could complete his task more freely. As a result of these suggestions, a new supreme commander position was created above the grand coordinators, overseeing the coastal provinces from Shandong to Guangdong. The Nanjing Minister of War Zhang Jing was assigned to this position in June 1554, and a few months later, Zhao Wenhua and Hu Zongxian were sent south to scrutinize his actions.
For over six months, Hu Zongxian could write nothing but reports of military failures and the serious loss of life fighting against the pirates, citing the government troops' poor discipline and leadership. Zhang Jing refused to cooperate with Zhao Wenhua, and Zhao Wenhua put his displeasure into writing by accusing Zhang Jing of deliberately delaying the operation for his own profit. However, soon after Zhao Wenhua sent out the memorial, Zhang Jing defeated the pirates at the Battle of Wangjiangjing (王江涇) on May 10, 1555, taking 1900 heads in what became the most significant Ming victory so far in the anti-wokou campaign. As it was too late to recant his earlier statement, Zhao Wenhua wrote another memorial to the throne downplaying Zhang Jing's victory while emphasizing Hu Zongxian's role leading up to Wangjiangjing, such as his ruse of placing poisoned shipments of wine on the pirates' path which killed up to 800 of their number. Zhao Wenhua also claimed that Hu Zongxian was present at the scene of battle in a suit of armour, even though he was actually at Hangzhou at the time. Hu Zongxian nevertheless went along with Zhao Wenhua and denounced Zhang Jing, adding that he had become arrogant after the victory. In the imperial court, Yan Song convinced the emperor that the victory proved that Zhang Jing had the ability to defeat the pirates but had held back until he heard about Zhao Wenhua's accusation against him. Infuriated, the emperor ordered Zhang Jing's arrest on June 5 and had him executed on November 12.
Zhang Jing's replacement, Zhou Chong (周珫), had his powers greatly limited compared to his predecessor. Instead of the six coastal provinces under Zhang Jing's command, Zhou Chong's was limited to only the Southern Metropolitan Region, Zhejiang, and Fujian. Hu Zongxian was meanwhile promoted to Grand Coordinator of Zhejiang, and was soon promoted even higher to the supreme commander in April 1556, after Zhou Chong and his successor Yang Yi (楊宜) were cashiered after less than a year in service due to their underwhelming performance.
Presiding over the wokou affair
Compared to the short appointments of his predecessors, Hu Zongxian remained in power until 1563. His longevity as supreme commander and his meteoric rise were due in part to his association with Zhao Wenhua's clique. Zhao Wenhua opposed strict enforcement of maritime prohibitions like the ones by Zhu Wan and instead favoured opening trade to solve the wokou problem. Hu Zongxian, in turn, carried out a policy of appeasement despite his subordinates' disapproval and the emperor's orders to capture the pirate lord Wang Zhi dead or alive.
Even before he had become supreme commander, Hu Zongxian sent envoys to Japan in his capacity as grand coordinator, ostensibly to request assistance from Japanese authorities but to establish contact with Wang Zhi to entice him to surrender. Drawn by the prospect of legal trade, Wang Zhi agreed to clean the shores of Zhejiang of pirates in return for a pardon. Wang Zhi also warned Hu that one of the pirate leaders in his consortium, Xu Hai, was on his way to raid Zhejiang again, and Wang was not able to stop him in time. This was alarming news to Hu as it severely disrupted his appeasement plans.