Feng Zicai

In 1867, he established his base of command in Nanning where he worked to fight bandits, rebels, the Hmong and other groups threatening the Qing Empire in south China and northern Vietnam.

On 23 February 1885 the misdeployment of Feng's troops too far from the battlefield was a major factor in the defeat of China's Kwangsi Army in the Battle of Đồng Đăng.

On 23 and 24 March 1885 Feng's forces were present at the Battle of Bang Bo, in which Francois de Negrier's 2nd Brigade was defeated at Zhennanguan on the Kwangsi-Tonkin border.

Feng Zicai's troops, stationed on the Chinese right wing around the village of Bang Bo, played an important role in the battle, defeating an assault by the French 111th Line Battalion on a position known as 'the long trench'.

Feng Zicai is known to have issued orders that any man who left his post would be executed on the spot, and several dozen Chinese soldiers who fled when the French approached the long trench were immediately shot.