Fall of Nanjing

July 19, 1864

After an eleven-year siege during which the Heavenly Kingdom's capital had become a hunger-haunted shell, Qing forces under Zeng Guofan stormed Nanjing. Hong Xiuquan was already dead, probably of poisoning. Thousands were massacred in the aftermath. The Taiping Rebellion was effectively over; twenty million or more had perished in it.