Feng Guozhang

Feng Guozhang (; 7 January 1859 – 12 December 1919) was a Chinese general and politician in the late Qing dynasty and early republican China who was Vice President from 1916 to 1917 and then acting President of the Republic of China from 1917 to 1918. He emerged as one of the senior commanders of the Beiyang Army and is considered the founder of one of the main warlord factions, the Zhili clique, that vied for control of the internationally recognized government in China during the Warlord Era.

Feng was a first degree holder of the imperial examination and graduated from the Tianjin Military School. He served in northeastern China before and during the First Sino-Japanese War and afterward was China's military attaché to Japan in 1895. His reports on Japanese military reforms, especially on training, were given to Yuan Shikai, who found them useful, and he made Feng a member his Newly Created Army, which later became the Beiyang Army. Feng Guozhang rose through the ranks during the last decade of the Qing dynasty, serving as a division commander, the director of the military school for Manchu princes and nobles, and as the superintendent of the General Staff Council.

He led Imperial Beiyang Army troops during the Wuchang Uprising, and under Feng's command retook large parts of the tri-cities of Hankou, Hanyang and Wuchang from the rebels. By that time Yuan Shikai, the prime minister, started negotiating with the revolutionaries and later arranged the Qing emperor's abdication. Under the early Republic of China, Feng Guozhang became the governor of Zhili from 1912 to 1913 and then governor of Jiangsu from 1913 to 1917. Provided by Wikipedia