A few days later, the Intelligence Department began to spread news inside and outside the capital, and Liu Yan also began to get busy, preparing to expand the artillery battalion.
During the Battle of Kaifeng, Li Zicheng mobilized more than 400 artillery pieces of various types from various places, which greatly shocked Liu Yan. For the first time, he encountered the enemy's heavy firepower that far exceeded his own. Fortunately, the bandit army lacked elite gunners. The improvised artillery and gunners were unable to exert their due firepower, and were suppressed and beaten by the new army.
However, such good luck will never happen again, and Liu Yan will not pin his hopes of winning the war on luck, so it is imperative to expand the artillery battalion.
Qian Qian was very happy when he heard the news and came up with an expansion plan in just two days.
In this plan, the artillery battalion is divided into the Huzun Artillery Chief, the Rocket Artillery Car Chief, the Folang Machine Gun Chief, and the newly added Heavy Artillery Chief (equipped with red cannons).
The establishment of all artillery commanders has been increased, and the number of artillery pieces in each team has increased from two to four. The number of artillery pieces in the Huzun gun commander, rocket launcher commander, and Folang machine gun commander has increased from 72 to 144. Doors, doubled.
The total number of heavy artillery pieces is smaller, because according to Qian Qian's plan, the artillery battalion only needs to be equipped with red cannons of more than 3,000 kilograms, which can suppress almost all opponents. Because red cannons of this caliber are , the range is about three miles, and the shells are basically six or seven pounds. Coupled with the elite gunners in the artillery camp, it is enough to suppress all current opponents.
However, the casting of the red cannon is very difficult and the success rate is very low. It is much more difficult to make than the Folan cannon and the Tiger cannon, so the number of equipment will inevitably be smaller.
The other commanders all have three posts, while the heavy artillery commander only has three posts.
Two sentries, equipped with ninety-six three-thousand-jin red cannons. Moreover, these ninety-six heavy guns must be equipped with gun carriages. Qian Qian also knew the specific structure and directly drew the diagram.
After Liu Yan received this expansion plan, he also thought about it for a long time. According to this plan, the firepower of the artillery battalion will be doubled. Although it will be of great help to the new army's combat power, the cost of maintenance will also increase dramatically.
After the expansion, the artillery battalion's strength will increase to more than 3,000, and the monthly expenses will also increase at least twice.
However, these are all money problems, which are easy to solve. With the current income situation of Qinglai Town, we can still cope with it.
Liu Yan's main consideration was the issue of artillery.
The first is the Franco machine gun. Historically, from the 15th to the 16th century, many European countries created a new gunpowder weapon, the Franco machine gun, based on learning from Chinese gunpowder and gunpowder weapons.
Compared with its prototype in its hometown in China, the famous fire gun during the Hongwu and Yongle years of the early Ming Dynasty, the Folangji has undergone fundamental changes in structure and has several advantages: First, it adopts the mother gun The structure of the gun. The mother blunderbuss is the barrel, and the barrel of the large Folang machine is five to six feet long. Its advantages are that the projectile has a high initial velocity, a long range, and a large lethality. The child blunderbuss is actually a small fire blunderbuss. Generally, five to nine are prepared, and ammunition is loaded in advance or in turn for later use. When using it, first load a sub-gun into the loading chamber of the mother gun. After firing, remove the empty gun and replace it with another sub-gun. Because the subguns can be loaded and replaced in turn, the time for loading ammunition on site is reduced, thus increasing the firing speed.
The second is that the loading chamber is enlarged, and the Franco machine
The loading chamber of a gun generally accounts for a quarter of the total length of the mother gun, and its width is equivalent to two to three times the caliber. The opening is large, making it easier to place the child gun.
Third, the tube wall is thick and can withstand greater pressure and strength, ensuring its own safety when the ammunition is fired.
Other advantages are that it is equipped with sights, front sights, rear sights and other devices, which can aim and shoot at long-distance targets; gun lugs are added to the rear of the Franco aircraft, so that the gun body can be placed on the seat. On the mount, the gun lugs can be rotated, allowing the artillery's shooting angle to be adjusted in pitch, controlling the range and improving hit rate, etc.
It is precisely because of these advantages that the Fo Lang machine gun attracted great attention from Ming Dynasty officials and the court. Historically, in the first year of Jiajing, Portugal sent five armed ships to the Pearl River Estuary in Guangdong in an attempt to occupy an island in Guangdong with the backing of force. After being refused, they opened fire to bombard the defenders. When the Portuguese ships invaded Xicao Bay, Xinhui, Guangdong, they were defeated by the local defenders and captured two ships and more than 20 cannons on board. According to the name of their country, the cannons on board were called " Folangji".
In the second year of Jiajing, he served as an inspector of Baisha, Guangdong and had many contacts with the Portuguese. He Ru, a local official of the Ming Dynasty who was familiar with the performance of the Folang machine, led experienced Guangdong craftsmen to Nanjing. At that time, the equipment was well-equipped The firearms manufacturing department in Jiangyamen began to imitate the Franco machine.
In April of the third year of Jiajing, the first batch of thirty-two large-scale Folang machines were successfully imitated.
"Da Ming Hui Dian Firearms" records the details of this batch of Folang guns. They are all made of brass, each weighing about three hundred kilograms. The mother gun is 2.85 feet long, and it is equipped with four child guns. Gunpowder can be loaded separately, taking turns
emission.
Immediately afterwards, the Ming Dynasty successively imitated various types of Fo Lang machines in larger quantities and more shapes, and equipped them with northern and coastal troops, which greatly enhanced the combat effectiveness of the Ming Dynasty's border guards.
In the process of imitation by craftsmen of the Ming Dynasty, in addition to retaining and absorbing the advantages of foreign Folang machines, they also made many new innovations and improvements to make them more suitable for the actual combat needs of the Ming army under various conditions. The Ming Dynasty imitation of Folang machines The situation of the machine is recorded in detail in "Ming Huidian" and Qi Jiguang's military book "Ji Xiao Xinshu" and "Military Training Records". "Ming Huidian" records that there are three types of imitation Folang machines: large, medium and small.
With the expansion of the artillery camp, Liu Yan wanted to replace all the Folan cannons originally equipped in the artillery camp.
The existing Folan cannons in the artillery camp are all large Folan cannons that weigh about three hundred kilograms and fire about four kilograms of shells. This type of gun fires quickly and accurately, but is slightly less powerful.
Liu Yan then made corrections to Qian Qian's expansion plan and asked the Firearms Supervision and Manufacturing Department to improve the Folan cannon and improve the large-scale Folang cannon into a cannon that can fire five kilograms of shells with a range of two miles to further enhance the strength. The firepower of the artillery battalion.
The Fo Lang cannons in the artillery camp need to be updated and replaced. Liu Yan plans to deploy all the obsolete old Fo Lang cannons in various cities such as Qingzhou Fucheng, Laizhou Fucheng, and Lingshan Guard to increase the fire protection of various cities.
At the same time, Liu Yan also went through some deliberation about the red cannon. For no other reason than that the red cannons equipped in the Ming army at this time were of various models and sizes, and Liu Yan needed to compare them. .
The so-called red barbarian cannon is a weapon led by various European countries around the 16th century in history.
The first one made was introduced to China in the late Ming Dynasty and was also called the red cannon. The so-called "red barbarians" refer to the red-haired Netherlands and Portugal.
At this time, the Ming Dynasty officially referred to all front-loaded smoothbore cannons imported from the West as Hongyi cannons. Ming Dynasty officials often covered these cannons with red cloth, so they called them "red clothes".
According to research, only a small amount of the red barbarian cannons imported by the Ming Dynasty at that time were imported from the Dutch East India Company. Later, they had conflicts with the Dutch due to the Taiwan issue. Most of them were obtained from trade with the Portuguese in Macau. The demand in the Ming Dynasty at that time was huge. , the Portuguese also acted as middlemen to sell British ship-borne cannons to the Ming Dynasty.
The red cannon is different from the Folan cannon. It has real heavy firepower and played a huge role in the wars of the late Ming Dynasty.
In the sixth year of the Apocalypse, the Ming army used the Hongyi cannon to exert great power in the Battle of Ningyuan. According to historical records, under the fierce artillery fire of the Ming Dynasty, the soldiers and horses of the Later Jin Dynasty were covered with blood and corpses. This was the first defeat for Nurhaci since he formed the army.
In the subsequent Battle of Ningjin, the Hongyi cannon once again exerted great power, and the Ming army won a great victory.
In the first month of the fourth year of Chongzhen, the Later Jin Dynasty used the captured craftsman Liu Han in Shenyang to successfully imitate the Western cannon and named it "General Tianyou Support". They also created the "lost wax method" to turn cast iron into cast iron. Steel, different parts of the cannon were treated with complex annealing and quenching procedures, making the cannon casting technology ahead of the Ming Dynasty. Because the word "Yi" was taboo for the Manchus, the Hongyi Cannon was renamed "Red Cannon".
Huang Taiji set up a new camp, Wuzhenchaoha Camp, in the Eight Banners Army. Later, Tong Yangxing was appointed as the chief military officer and Cao Zhenyan was appointed as the instructor, and artillery tactics began to be used.
It can be seen that in the late Ming Dynasty, not
Both the Ming and Qing armies attached great importance to the red cannon, and Liu Yan was no exception. In this era without explosive ammunition, the red cannon was undoubtedly the best source of heavy firepower.
After Liu Yan thought about it again and again, he decided to increase the size of the red cannon equipped in the artillery battalion from three thousand kilograms to four thousand kilograms, equipped with four-wheeled heavy artillery carts, and maneuvered by packhorses.
At the same time, auxiliary equipment such as lugs and mountain views must be added to the red cannon to increase the accuracy of the red cannon.
This red-coated cannon can shoot about eight kilograms of shells, with a range of more than three miles, and is very powerful!
After the expansion of the artillery battalion, with the blessing of such heavy artillery and the increase of various artillery, the firepower will increase to a terrifying level. Looking at today's Daming and the surrounding areas of Daming, no one will be the opponent of the new army in terms of firepower.
So Liu Yan wrote down the styles of the red cannon one by one on Qian Chong's expansion plan, then adjusted many details of the plan, and sent someone to call Qian Cong.
"Please take a look at this plan. This town has approved it and can be transferred to the Ministry of War, which will then send it to the Firearms Supervision and Manufacturing Office."
"yes."
Qian Qian grinned and said with a smile: "General Town, that's great. Now our artillery battalion can be considered very rich. There are more than five hundred artillery pieces of all kinds. If we put this in a good posture, even if the King of Heaven comes, It can’t be stopped, haha!”
Liu Yan said with a smile: "Now the artillery battalion has to use the existing artillery to maintain training. The firearms supervision department now needs to make bayonets and cast various artillery. It will take a certain amount of time. Don't worry, take your time. Come."
"In addition, having more artillery does not guarantee victory. Outside Kaifeng City, Li Chuang still has four hundred
As for the multiple artillery pieces, the result is that because the gunners are not good enough, they cannot function with just the artillery pieces. Therefore, the artillery battalion must continue to drill rigorously. The most important thing in war is people. After all, weapons are foreigners and cannot be relied on too much. "
Qian Qian immediately agreed: "Don't worry, the general, our artillery battalion soldiers have always been training strictly and will never slack off."
Two days later, the artillery battalion's expansion plan was issued by Tian Huixu, and a few days later it was sent to the firearms supervision office of Wangjiazhuang Baihu Station.
When Tan Xiaoda saw the specific plan to expand the artillery camp, he showed a shocked expression on his face, and said to Cui Mingyuan, the manager of the firearms workshop next to him: "I think the town has been stimulated by something, and it is necessary to expand so much all at once. artillery!"
At this time, some details of the Battle of Kaifeng were also spread throughout Qinglai Town, especially the matter of more than 400 artillery pieces assembled by Li Zicheng under the city.
Cui Mingyuan said with a wry smile: "I guess it was the intruders' more than 400 artillery pieces that stimulated the attack. The main town also wants to be rich."
"Then let's do it. It's going to be winter soon. The best time to make cannons is hot summer. Although it's not impossible to make cannons in winter, the efficiency is much worse. We can only spare no effort and pile up people and materials. Pile up money and fill the gap in the artillery battalion as soon as possible."
