Requesting That Yu Cheol Be Kept as Magistrate of Gunwi請軍威縣監柳澈仍任狀
臣行到軍威有縣民洪軸等三十餘人聯名呈狀內縣監柳澈本以慈詳愷悌之人專以奉公恤民爲事變生之後不離境土當賊據本邑之日定將抄卒設伏要路捕斬射殺不知其數賊退後卽入官家收聚餘糓一以爲軍糧一以救飢民親持糓物出入村落至誠賑活民賴得生者甚多一境男女莫不愛戴雖於餓饉癘疫之餘形息僅存而。天兵支待軍糧輸運之役爭先酬應不敢違令今聞與巡察使相避當爲遞去當此艱難蕩敗之日若失縣監則孑遺殘民萬無生活之路云云臣自前素聞柳澈善於居官今見民情參以物論果非虛請當此調度支待百役叢集之時善治守令不可輕遞道內賊兵猶在平時相避之法不可太拘柳澈姑爲仍任以慰一縣民情且除迎送之獘似爲便當
When I reached Gunwi there was a petition submitted by some thirty of the district's people, Hong Chuk (洪軸) and the rest, with their names set down one after another. In it they said: Yu Cheol (柳澈), the County Magistrate, is by nature a kind and genial man who has made it his whole business to serve the public good and care for the people. Even after the troubles broke out he did not leave the district's soil, and when the enemy held this district he appointed commanders and picked soldiers and set ambushes on the vital roads, and those he took and beheaded and shot dead cannot be counted. After the enemy withdrew he went straight into the government office, gathered up what grain was left, and made one part of it army provision and one part relief for the starving people; he carried grain himself in and out of the villages and with all his heart relieved them and kept them alive, so that very many of the people owe their lives to him. There is no man or woman in the whole district who does not love and look up to him. Though after the famine and the epidemic the district barely holds together, it has vied to answer every call in supporting the Ming army and hauling the army grain, and has never dared disobey an order. Now we hear that he is caught by the rule of avoidance (相避) with the Provincial Inspector and is to be replaced. In this hard and ruined time, if we lose our Magistrate, the few lonely people left will have no way at all to live. So the petition ran.
I had heard before now that Yu Cheol serves well in office, and seeing the people's mind and setting it beside what others say, it proves to be no empty word. At a time when the procuring of army grain, the supporting of the Ming troops, and every kind of corvée all press at once, a magistrate who governs well cannot be lightly replaced. There are still enemy troops within the province, and we cannot be too much bound by the rule of avoidance that holds in ordinary times. It seems convenient and fitting to leave Yu Cheol as he is for the present, both to comfort the mind of one district's people and to be rid of the waste of welcoming and sending off officials.
Interlinear notes 1
Sangpi (相避) — the rule by which kinsmen, or men otherwise connected, were not to hold posts that stood in relation to one another.