Chapter 312
Affected by the Little Glacier weather, the agricultural production environment in Liaodong became worse and worse. From May to July, there was no rain for more than two months. This is the season when rain is most needed, but no water fell in Liaodong.
In fact, it is not just Liaodong that is affected by the drought, but also Beizhili, Shanxi, Shaanxi, Shandong and Henan. Almost the entire north has been affected to varying degrees.
According to calculations by Liaodong Agricultural College, grain production in Liaodong has been reduced by nearly one-third. Fortunately, there are many ditches in Liaodong, otherwise the consequences would be disastrous.
In Cheng Shijie's memory, the continuation of the Little Ice Age is not yet the most serious period. The most serious period was in 1660, when the temperature officially entered the coldest period. Research in the Annual Journal of the Association of American Geographers points out that the period from 1660 to 1680 was the coldest period in northern and central China during the Little Ice Age.
According to relevant historical records, in November of the Gregorian calendar in 1654 (the eleventh year of Shunzhi), the ice on the Wujiang Canal was more than three feet thick, and it was frozen from Wujiang to Jiaxing. It took strong men to cut through the ice to move 3-4 kilometers per day. In November of the Gregorian calendar, the South Canal was frozen, which was rare in history. It shows the cold weather in Jiangnan during the Shunzhi period. In addition, at that time, there were also records of the Yangtze River freezing. There are even records of snow in Guangzhou.
In this case, not only the Mongolian slaves need to go south to survive, but the Ming Dynasty also needs to go south. If only Cheng Shijie and the Liaodong Ning Naval Group have Da Yuan and Lu Song, they can basically meet the needs of survival and development. But in the entire northern Ming Dynasty, more land is needed.
Defend Liaodong, develop industry, and agriculture must migrate south as soon as possible. As for the destination of migration, Cheng Shijie thought of the Red River Plain in Indochina. The weather here is hot and the rainfall is abundant. Of course, the Annan monkeys here are not so easy to deal with. Daming In June of the fifth year of Yongle (1407), Zhu Di, the founder of the Ming Dynasty, sent troops to conquer the Hu Dynasty of Vietnam (Dayu Kingdom), changed Annan to the jurisdiction of the Han Dynasty, established the administrative envoy office at the junction of the provinces, and formally incorporated Vietnam into the territory of the Ming Dynasty for rule.
However, the Ming Dynasty's rule over Vietnam only lasted twenty years. In the second year of Xuande (1427), the Ming Dynasty abolished the Chief Secretary of Jiaozhi and officially gave up its rule over Vietnam.
The Ming Dynasty gave up its rule over Vietnam mainly because the local people were extremely resistant to the Ming Dynasty officials and troops, and they were also feeding unfamiliar wolves.
In this case, Cheng Shijie needs Vietnam, but he does not need Vietnamese. The only way is to adopt the same strategy as in Luzon for Indochina, leaving no land but no people.
As the executor of the suppression plan, Xiaoriwu soldiers are just right.
Faced with the change in strategic plan, Cheng Shijie conducted a new round of reorganization of the Little Days Mad Dog Legion. First, he selected the Little Days warriors and warriors between the ages of 18 and 30 among the more than 300,000 captured young men. In Ashigaru, every one hundred and fifty people are taken into a squad, and every three squads and one baggage squad are taken into a squadron. Each squadron has six hundred men.
For every three squadrons and one baggage squadron, there are 2,400 people in one brigade, forming a total of twenty-two brigade.
These twenty-two brigades were mixed with the death battalion and were led by Sun Kewang, Liu Wenxiu, and Li Dingguo respectively. Sun Kewang commanded the 1st to 9th brigades of the Annan Army, Liu Wenxiu commanded the 10th to 16th brigades, and Li Dingguo Commanded the 17th to 22nd Brigade.
Since the equipment of these twenty-two brigades was seriously insufficient, Cheng Shijie did not like these shabby little warriors, so he reused them and sold them to the Kumamoto clan and Fukuoka clan. Cheng Shijie planned to train the twenty-two brigades of warriors in Liaodong. , after arming themselves into an army, they then implemented the strategy of going south to Annan.
After Cheng Shijie decided to retreat, he told the Hosokawa and Kuroda clans of the Fukuoka and Kumamoto clans about the Tokugawa shogunate's preparations to aid Nagasaki.
When they heard that the Tokugawa Shogunate was sending troops, both Kuroda Yuji and Hosokawa Tadori became nervous.
Fortunately, the Ning Navy had a powerful navy and sank two-thirds of the shogunate's army troop transports on the Kyushu expedition. Seeing the good news from the Ning Navy, the Fukuoka Domain and the Kumamoto Domain could only desperately expand their armies and prepare for war.
Cheng Shijie followed suit and sold the captured equipment to the Kumamoto Domain and Fukuoka Domain at high prices. This time, Cheng Shijie's expedition did not achieve the expected results, but it also achieved rich results. He captured thirty prisoners with just a young man. There are more than 40,000 people, and they also bring more than 50,000 little warriors.
In total, the population alone accounted for 400,000 prisoners. In addition to these people, the most important silver, together with the proceeds from the seizure and the sale of weapons, totaled more than 18.5 million taels, 280,000 taels of copper coins, and 16 gold coins. More than fourteen thousand taels.
On November 19, the eighth year of Chongzhen, the Ming army boarded the ship and retreated with the captured young people and property. The huge fleet sailed to the Liaodong Peninsula and returned a devastated Kyushu Island. Little days.
Without the blocking of Ning Haijun, Tokugawa Iemitsu led six thousand banner warriors to rush to Nagasaki day and night. What they saw was only a ruins of bones and numbness, blood soaked ankles, and some burning, killing and looting. It's so exciting that the little samurai who didn't even know that the Ming army had withdrawn still continued killing people and setting fires.
The shogunate's army effortlessly annihilated these drunken men and beheaded more than 6,000 people, achieving a complete victory. However, such a victory was not what Tokugawa Iemitsu wanted.
Half of the population of Nagasaki was either killed or robbed, and the port was razed to the ground. Together with Kagoshima, Ogijo, Osumi and other cities, the number of casualties and captured people in this battle exceeded two million, and Most of them were young and strong, and such losses were enough to bring the southwestern vassals to their knees.
However, the shogunate mobilized tens of thousands of troops and spent hundreds of millions of money on a thousand-mile expedition, but did not even touch the hair of the Ming army. How could he be willing to accept such a result!
In anger, Tokugawa Iemitsu led the Hatamoto samurai to attack Kumamoto Castle. However, the Kumamoto samurai also learned a lot of real skills from the Ming army. They also learned to dig trenches and build parapets. This in itself is not difficult, but it is not difficult. Silly, you will know it just by looking at it.
The Kumamoto samurai first held the camp, no matter how provocative the shogunate army was, they did not move out. They only used cannons and crossbows to shoot at the shogunate soldiers in large numbers, repelling the shogunate's offensive. In just the first day of fighting, the shogunate soldiers lost nearly 3,000 soldiers. people!
Subsequently, when the shogunate and the Kumamoto Domain were fighting to the death, the Fukuoka Domain took advantage of the shogunate's army to fight fiercely with the Kumamoto Domain's army. The Fukuoka Domain army took the opportunity to concentrate their artillery and blast, firing hundreds of cannonballs in an instant, creating a sea of fire. In an all-out assault, the Tokugawa shogunate was completely defeated, with thousands of casualties and thousands of casualties. The survivors were driven to farmland flooded by the sea and fell into a desperate situation, forcing them to surrender in humiliation.
After more than half a month of fierce fighting, Tokugawa Iemitsu had to recognize the reality. The Kumamoto clan and the Fukuoka clan joined forces to resist the Tokugawa shogunate. To this end, Tokugawa Iemitsu had to send envoys to negotiate with the Fukuoka clan and Kumamoto clan Negotiations ended the war when the Tokugawa shogunate recognized the interests of the two feudal clans in Kyushu at the cost of their annexation of the Satsuma clan.
Since then, the Battle of Kyushu has finally come to an end.
However, the Battle of Kyushu caused Tokugawa Iemitsu to have a political survival crisis, which also made other daimyo see that the Tokugawa shogunate was too weak.
As for how Tokugawa Iemitsu stabilizes the situation in his small life, this is not Cheng Shijie's concern.
In November in Liaodong, snow has begun to fall for thousands of miles, and the wind is as cold as a blade. The Liaohe River, Yalu River and other famous rivers are covered with thick ice, especially the Liaohe River, which is almost frozen to the bottom of the river.
The Han people in Liaodong also finished a year of hard work and began to spend the winter. As early as September, they transported a large amount of coal and vegetables. Each household stored thousands of kilograms of briquettes and several jars of sauerkraut. They exchanged these things for sea salt, and then Together with the wheat and soybeans obtained from farming, the salted fish, bacon, etc. stored in daily life are enough for them to survive the long winter.
Although Shandong was affected by the disaster, the problem is that many people from Shandong worked in Liaodong. After making money, they returned to Shandong with purchased grain, canned food, salt, cloth and other materials, and their lives were not difficult.
Only the people in the south of Jifu are very afraid, especially the rich and powerful. There are hundreds of thousands of bandits gathered outside the city. Now the Dashun Army has replaced Zhang Xianzhong and become the second group of bandits. Even The new King Chuang also sent an envoy to Song Xiance. Li Zicheng hoped to become brothers with different surnames and advance and retreat together with Song Xiance.
What the people of Jinan are looking forward to the most is naturally their most disliked Haiguo Gong Cheng Shijie. They all hope that Cheng Shijie can lead an army to save them from the fire and water.
When Cheng Shijie arrived in Lushun, the current Lushun Port had also changed. Two trestles built of reinforced concrete were magnificent, and a lighthouse with a height of more than 50 meters was like a giant pillar. Every night, the guard The soldiers at the lighthouse would light the blubber, and the blazing flames could be seen for dozens of miles.
The wharf has also been expanded a lot, and dozens of huge warehouses are under construction. As long as conditions permit, merchant ships from North Korea, Xiaori, Shandong, Jiangnan and other places will enter the port every month, using cotton, raw silk, wheat beans, Medicines and other materials were exchanged for refined salt, steel products, machinery and of course meat produced in Liaodong, making Port Arthur increasingly prosperous.
This place has already shown its potential as a major international commercial port. As long as it is given another ten years, it will definitely become one of the top big cities in the entire East Asia.
Cheng Shijie was very satisfied with this. What he fought for in a war was money. Now Ning Haijun's money bag was getting bigger and bigger, and his confidence was gradually getting stronger.
The flagship Zhili docked, and Cheng Shijie jumped onto the trestle. Sun Zhidan and Yang Yunniang quickly came up to meet them, kneeling on the ground: "See you, Marshal!"
"Meet the Marshal!"
Cheng Shijie stepped forward to help Sun Zhiqian up, and said with a smile: "You, and you, do you do this to me too?"
Sun Zhilan said solemnly: "There must be a clear distinction between superiority and inferiority, and etiquette must not be abolished."
Sun Zhilan looked at the fleet of ships entering the port one after another, and asked in surprise: "Why are there so many ships? Commander, how many things did you rob in your childhood?"
Cheng Shijie waved his hand: "Not much, not much. When I was young, the place was poor. I only had tens of millions of taels of silver, three to four hundred thousand young men, and more than a dozen boats of treasures. I couldn't put it on the table."
The warships docked one after another, and a large number of soldiers, fully armed, boarded the trestle and lined up straight to the dock. In an instant, the whole dock was filled with the clang of metal clashing. It was indeed a powerful force tempered in bloody battles. As soon as they appeared , the Liaodong people present felt that they had support in their hearts.
"Yunniang!"
"Commander!"
"You ask someone to count the silver and put it into the treasury. In addition, exchange it for me two million taels of silver coins, using ten taels of silver per treasury!"
"OK!"
Cheng Shijie gained a lot of benefits from this trip, and naturally he needed to get both rain and dew.
Although Gao Qiqian was useless, Cheng Shijie still gave him a deposit check for 300,000 taels of silver. This deposit check can be withdrawn from any Liaodong Bank in Liaodong. Of course, it would be better not to withdraw it because you can earn interest. , the interest alone is as much as eighteen thousand taels of silver a year.
This account can be calculated by Qian Qian. In fact, this guy is a big accountant of Liaodong Bank. He has deposited more than 800,000 taels of silver. Counting these 300,000 taels of silver, his deposits are as high as 112,000. Ten thousand taels of silver, the annual interest alone is as much as 67,200 taels.
Of course, Cheng Shijie can earn more by lending money from Gao Qiqian. Even if the loan amount is only 80%, he can still make a net profit of hundreds of thousands of taels.
In addition to the money prepared for Gao Qiqian, there are also 80,000 taels of silver for Cao Huachun, 60,000 taels of silver for Wang Chengen, and of course, there is also money for Emperor Chongzhen. Naturally, Cheng Shijie needs to deliver this money personally.
Cheng Shijie had a brief exchange with Sun Zhidan and others on the dock and began to return home.
On the carriage, Cheng Shijie clearly felt that the population of Liaodong had increased a lot. After Liaodong passed the most difficult entrepreneurial stage, the population ushered in a new production climax.
This era is different from that of later generations. There are no entertainment activities these days, and no contraceptive measures are taken. The couple can only turn off the lights at night. More importantly, Liaodong is not like the Central Plains, which restricts common people from taking concubines. It doesn't matter how many concubines you have.
If you want, you can learn from Chen Dayong. Fifty-three concubines, even if they are one person a day, for nearly two months, the strong man will be hollowed out.
Cheng Jiayue, who was sitting in the carriage, was obviously a little unhappy. She was excited to go and make a living, but the result was good, just like when traveling in later generations, she checked in to Kyushu Island and got nothing.
However, Cheng Jialong still had some gains. He originally wanted to treat a little warrior who was over 1.4 meters tall, but Cheng Jialong actually misjudged the child. He was not a child, but an adult, at least twenty years old, but with a baby face. That's all, but the other party actually opened his mouth and bit Cheng Jialong.
In anger, Cheng Jialong raised his fist and punched the opponent dozens of times... However, Cheng Jialong changed and has not recovered until now.
Zhou Ning came to Cheng Shijie and said, "Commander, what are your plans for the Annan Army?"
"First of all, we must form combat effectiveness as soon as possible!"
Cheng Shijie sighed and said: "The weather is getting colder and colder, we must be prepared to go south!"
Zhou Ning thought for a while and said: "The method of co-organizing the Death Battalion and the Mad Dog Legion is too simple and crude. If we want to form combat effectiveness as soon as possible, we must continue to let these young warriors use cold weapons. We just have the horizontal knives and spears in our inventory. , there are many crossbows, and besides, they are used to fighting with cold weapons, if they are replaced rashly, it will definitely affect the combat effectiveness of the troops."
"What are you going to do?"
"It's okay according to the formation of the brigade, but I want to add a firearms unit of at least 4,000 people. Many of the samurai in the past are good at using iron cannons. You can consider sending the muskets in our inventory for them to use!"
It's not that Ning Haijun doesn't have fire blunderbuss, and there are a lot of them, but Cheng Shijie doesn't like them. Sun Yuanhua originally cast as many as five or six thousand fire blunderbuss, but considering that they only have an effective range of fifty to eighty steps, regardless of Whether it is the rate of fire or the range, it is far inferior to the formation-breaking crossbow equipped by Ning Haijun.
"No problem, the equipment is ready, and the auxiliary troops can be formed at any time. They will be stationed in Haizhou during this period, but we don't have much time, and the war will break out at any time!"
Cheng Shijie led Ning Haijun to quell the rebellion of the Dashun Army. If Song Xiance had no intention of proclaiming himself king now, this battle would be a formality. In other words, he would soon accept a large number of prisoners of war and civilians, all of whom were immigrants.
Some of them can move to Luzon, and the other part will be settled in the Red River Plain. When Cheng Shijie comes back from the capital, he will be dispatched, and the war will start within a month or two at most.
Very tight schedule.
Zhou Andao: "Commander, have you ever considered how many of the soldiers in the death camp are willing to continue fighting? This time they went to Xiaozhi and basically gained freedom. I suggest that the establishment of the death camp be retained and voluntary The principle is to let the soldiers make their own choices, and at the same time, we can also place the soldiers from the death camp in Annan. Compared with Shaanxi and Liaodong, Annan is like heaven and earth!"
"No problem, just do it!"
Cheng Shijie thought for a while and said, "Let Shen Mingyu and Zhang Yu come back and ask their opinions if they are willing to move!"
"I do!"
Shen Mingyu was so moved that he wanted to cry. Cheng Shijie finally thought of him. Although he had no feud with Xiaoli, the problem was that this was military merit. If he went there and improved his achievements, he could be promoted and make a fortune.
Nowadays, Jiannu is more honest than Mingzi, and he is directly suffering in Liaodong.
"Annan is miserable!"
"I'm not afraid of hardship or tiredness, I'm just afraid of being idle in Liaodong!"
(End of chapter)
