In the blink of an eye, it was mid-November. Since the fall of the Xu family, the team leader Wang Wenzhen was busy disposing of the four businesses of the Xu family. All of them were handed over to the chief flag officer Jia Hongyu, and he began to make a little money one after another.
At the same time, Wang Wenzhen moved out from Baihu Guantang and lived directly in the Xu family residence. He also changed the plaque to Baihu Mansion and lived happily in a "luxury house".
As for the Huangshan Dun, Fengshan Dun and Shagou Dun, Wang Wenzhen also arranged for manpower to reorganize them. Wang Wenzhen appointed three new flag officers, Chief Jia, one of whom was Ye Bushou Shen Tuo, who was originally from Xunshan Dun.
Shen Tuo made outstanding achievements in the battle to exterminate pirates and was promoted to a small flag officer by Wang Wenzhen. This time, there were three vacancies for chief flag officers, so Wang Wenzhen ordered Shen Tuo to be promoted to the rank of chief flag officer. The flag officer, Jia Chang, presides over Huangshan Dun.
And Liu Yan was not idle either. When he heard the news about Shen Tuo's promotion, he sent someone to send a gift of twenty taels of silver and invited Shen Tuo to come over for a drink when he had time.
Later, during this period of time, Liu Yan focused on the construction of Dapan Fort, which made the construction speed much faster. Finally, in the middle of the year, Dapan Fort was completed.
The entire fortress of Dapanbao has a circumference of more than 600 meters. It is in the shape of a traditional square and is made of rammed loess without bricks. The northern ends of the fort wall are connected to the original horse pen wall of Dapan Pier. It happened that this fire road pier could be used for keeping watch. At the same time, the urn outside the south gate was also built, and a protective trench three meters deep and six meters wide was dug.
Outside the Dapanbao Fort, the original simple training ground has been repaired. Not only has the ground been leveled, but also a gun shooting range, arsenal, barracks and other facilities have been built. Liu Yan directly built this school ground into a barracks.
According to Liu Yan's plan, Dapanbao's military strength will continue to expand, so the place where it is stationed must be spacious, and some facilities such as barracks must be reserved in advance. Therefore, the school ground here was naturally converted into a barracks. Liu Yan made preparations in advance.
At the same time, Liu Yan ordered some barracks to be built in Juntun and Haiyan Gongfang. Chen Xunqi was stationed in Juntun and Zhang Yiqi was stationed in Haiyan Gongfang. The Guards Banner led by Miao Shao was stationed in Dapanbao, and the remaining Wang Yue Banner, Wang Bo Banner, and Xu Ming Banner were all stationed in the school barracks.
As a result, the barracks everywhere were not full, and there were many empty houses. These houses were reserved for future expansion of troops.
After the construction of Dapan Fort was completed, the safety of everyone in the fort was guaranteed, and a stone in Liu Yan's heart finally fell to the ground: Dapan Fort was finally completed before the Qing army entered Shandong!
On this day, Liu Yan, accompanied by four small flag officers Wang Bo, Wang Yue, Miao Shao, and Xu Ming, inspected the built fortress wall. Then Liu Yan was surprised to find that the densely rammed walls of Dapan Fort were very strong, and their strength exceeded Liu Yan's expectations.
During the previous construction, the craftsmen invited specially purchased a lot of tung oil after consulting Liu Yan. When building the fort wall, they poured some tung oil into the wall.
When the craftsmen came to ask for instructions, Liu Yan didn't take it seriously. He just said that these were the fixed procedures for craftsmen to build fortresses. But at this time, Liu Yan was really surprised. He patted the wall hard. He was surprised to estimate that the strength of the wall was even higher than the concrete of later generations. You must know that this is the late Ming Dynasty. It is incredible to think about it. Huaxia The skills of the craftsmen are truly extraordinary!
The wall of Dapanbao is about ten meters high, with crenels and parapets built on it. The wall is dotted with shooting holes for bird gunners to shoot. There are also special places for pouring gold juice and boiling oil. The design is very scientific and greatly increases the number of people. Improved the defensive power of Dapanbao.
As for the height of the Dapanbao wall, Liu Yan remembered that at this time, the fortress walls in border towns and coastal villages in the Ming Dynasty were generally six to fourteen meters high. The height of the Dapanbao wall was ten meters, which was considered quite satisfactory. , sufficient to meet the current defense needs.
Then Liu Yan and others came to the south gate. The city gate built at the south end of Dapanbao was made of stones. Liu Yan named it "Pinglu Gate" and the inner gate "Xingtai Gate". At the top of the fort gate, there is a stone plaque inlaid with three large characters "Dapanbao" in regular script engraved in the middle. The left and right sides of the large characters are engraved in regular script vertically facing the sun, recording the time when the fort was built, generals, craftsmen and other deeds and figures.
Of course, the most important person in the record is Liu Yan. Liu Yan had read these contents in advance. Looking at the overflowing words of praise, Liu Yan just laughed it off and had no intention of modifying it. Everyone was even more happy about it. It was engraved directly on the wall.
At this time, there were more than 500 military households in Dapanbao, with a population of more than 2,000. However, the area inside the fort was still relatively loose. There were still many homesteads with no houses built on them, only white lines drawn on the ground. .
In fact, Liu Yan had read some historical materials about Ming fortresses before. He remembered that there was Weihu Fort in Pinglu, Shuozhou in the middle of Ming Dynasty. The Weihu Fort was 14 meters high and 550 meters in circumference. There are more than 500 garrison troops and dozens of horses. As for the military households in the fort, there are as many as 3,000 people.
Weihu Fort is much smaller than Dapan Fort, but it can accommodate more people than Dapan Fort. Liu Yan secretly said that he can still recruit more people to live in Dapan Fort. The current more than 2,000 people are not at full capacity. According to Liu Yan's estimate, Dapanbao can accommodate at least 3,000 to 3,300 people when it is fully occupied.
At the same time, after the fort wall was built, Liu Yan did not build the stage temple that everyone had longed for for the buildings inside the fort. Instead, he immediately had a mill built in a place named Xingye Lane in the east of the city. .
In the past, there was no mill in Dapan Fort, and military households had to go to Wangjiazhuang to grind flour. Although the distance was not very far, it was still very inconvenient. Now that Dapan Fort has been built, the construction of mills has been put on the agenda. Liu Yan's agenda.
In fact, it is easy to build a mill. There is plenty of wood and loess in the fort, but the difficulty is to build the two huge stone mills. Liu Yan left this matter to the small flag officer Miao Shao.
Miao Shao lived up to his high expectations and quickly hired several masons from Qianhu Station in front of Xiahe Village to chisel out two huge stone mills, and the mill was quickly built.
It was not until the mill was built that Liu Yan ordered the construction of a stage and a temple in the center of the street, which aroused cheers from the military households. From then on, the military households in the fort finally had a place to watch theater.
At this time, Liu Yan and others entered the Dapanbao through the gate, and passed the stage not far away. Many children and elderly people had gathered here, resting and playing under the stage.
Liu Yan looked at everyone's happy appearance, and his heart was filled with tranquility and happiness. Being able to live such a life in the chaotic era of the late Ming Dynasty is no less than a paradise-like life.
"If you want to live a life like this forever, or even a better life than now, you must have enough strength."
Liu Yan cheered up and thought to himself: "It's far from the time to live a peaceful life. We still have to continue to work hard to develop and strengthen the strength of Dapanbao!"
At this time, the two major forces, the Manchu Qing Dynasty and the Liuzhou Bandits, were like two huge mountains, weighing heavily on Liu Yan's heart. Liu Yan wished he could immediately have an army of tens of thousands of firearms to blow up these two mountains!
Thinking of this, Liu Yan took a deep breath and stopped thinking about it for the time being. He led several small flag officers all the way to the door of the general flag office. When the civilians along the way saw Liu Yan, they all saluted respectfully. Liu Yan This commander-in-chief, Commander Jia, is the god in everyone's heart and the benefactor of everyone. Without Liu Yan, these military households still don't know where to drink the northwest wind.
At this time, Chen Xun's wife Chen Jiang came over with two women. The three of them had smiles on their faces. When they saw Liu Yan, they rushed to salute.
"Wan'an, Commander A!"
Liu Yan smiled and said to Chen Jiang: "Chen Xiaoqi is stationed at the military camp during this period. Is everything okay at home? If you need help at home, my younger siblings should talk."
Chen Jiangshi suddenly burst into laughter. Liu Yan was the highest official in Dapanbao. Now that he was addressing his younger siblings in front of others, he felt a sense of glory on his face.
"Oh! Chief A is really considerate of his subordinates. We don't have any difficulties in our family. Don't worry, Chief A. I and the guy at home will do a good job and follow Chief A!"
Liu Yan nodded with satisfaction, and then told the two women to follow Chen Jiang's family and do a good job, and the two women agreed repeatedly.
Then Chen Jiang said with a smile: "Commander Jia, now that all the construction of our Dapan Fort has been completed, this is a huge event, and we are very happy to celebrate it. Why don't we celebrate with the whole fort for a day to celebrate? "
After saying that, Chen Jiangshi looked at Liu Yan with a smile, feeling a little worried that he might be a little abrupt.
Liu Yan nodded in agreement and said, "One day? I don't think so."
"Then, then half a day, half a day is enough. Let's just celebrate."
During this period of time, the military households in Dapan Fort were working and building, which was very heavy and tiring, so Chen Jiangshi's suggestion actually represented the thoughts of everyone in the fort.
Liu Yan said with a smile: "That's not what I meant. What I meant is that one day is not enough to celebrate, so let's celebrate for two days in the whole fort! At the same time, we will send people to notify the military camp and the salt drying field to let the army clearing up wasteland." Everyone from the household and the salt drying field will come back and rest for two days."
Chen Jiang was overjoyed when he heard this and said with a smile: "This is a good relationship, thank you!"
The surrounding military households also cheered happily, and then Liu Yan asked the flag officer Wang Yue to take people to prepare wine and meat dishes. Starting from the day after tomorrow, the whole fort will celebrate for two days. Every household must provide some food, so it doesn’t have to be too much. More, just have an attitude. The rest of the food, wine, meat, and food were all brought out from Dapanbao. Liu Yan asked Wang Yue to draw up the menu, and then he took the silver from Zhao Min and went to buy it.
Wang Yue hurriedly went to do it, while Liu Yan let the other people disperse, and only took Miao Shao back to the flag hall.
In the evening of that day, Chen Xun returned to Dapanbao with two Dunjun troops. He didn't even return home and went directly to the flag hall.
"Huh?"
Liu Yan, who was about to finish his meal, looked at Chen Xun and asked doubtfully, "Why are you back?"
Chen Xun said with a smile: "This subordinate is here to seize the more than 2,000 acres of cultivated land owned by the Xu family."
