Li Xiucheng
While another commander might have tried to solve the problem through additional wagons and horses, Ward saw the rivers and canals criss-crossing the region not as obstacles, but as passageways. He quickly secured the use of several river steamers, fitted them out as mobile artillery and troop transports, and increased his army's effectiveness several times over. Li Xiucheng himself later “attributed his defeats in the Suzhou area to Western steamers. Taiping land forces could contend with "foreign devils", he believed, but rebel water forces could not."