Zhu Wan

[3] Zhu Wan passed the imperial examination and earned a jinshi degree in June 1521, and started his career in the Ming bureaucracy by being an apprentice at the Ministry of Works in Beijing, but he apparently disliked his position and returned home.

In December 1547, the Portuguese had plundered Zhangzhou, and in February the next year the cities of Ningbo and Taizhou were struck by an unprecedented 1,000 raiders aboard a hundred ships.

He strictly enforced the maritime prohibitions, forbidding anyone from venturing out to sea on penalty of death, and put all ships to use for defence of the coast.

[12] On 15 April 1548, Zhu Wan's fleet in Wenzhou set sail for the pirate haven Shuangyu under the command of Lu Tang and Ke Qiao (柯喬).

Lu Tang then razed the town and rendered the harbour permanently unusable by filling it in with stones under Zhu Wan's orders.

[13] Zhu Wan and his generals were greatly rewarded in silver for the victory, but he also drew the ire of his political enemies among the gentry, whose profits were directly affected by the destruction of Shuangyu.

Eventually a pretense was found to demote Zhu Wan to the temporary position of inspector general (巡視), the argument being one man cannot control two provinces at the same time.

[15] On 19 March 1549, Lu Tang and Ke Qiao ambushed two junks in Zoumaxi while they were trading with the Portuguese aboard resulting in 33 deaths and 206 smugglers captured.

Seeing that the odds were against him, especially since his backer Xia Yan had been executed in disgrace in October last year,[19] Zhu Wan wrote his own epitaph and committed suicide by drinking poison in January 1550.

The investigation confirmed the allegations that Zhu Wan had killed the prisoners without imperial authorization, and so a posthumous death sentence was handed down.