Hearing what Lu Sanhao said, a group of Jiangning soldiers stationed at the Eight Banners following E Chu looked at their general E Chu with expectant eyes.
Those who garrisoned the Eight Banners were accompanied by their families and their families. Wherever the soldiers were stationed, their families would follow them.
If the city is destroyed and massacred, then the whole family will die!
Jiangning Mancheng is the largest Mancheng (Flag City) garrisoned by Eight Banners soldiers except Beijing. Its area accounts for about 20% of Jiangning City. It is located in the area of the original Nanjing Imperial City. The outermost wall is twenty-two miles long!
The east and south sides were built using the city walls of Nanjing City in the Ming Dynasty, and the west and north sides were expanded using the city walls of the Ming Dynasty Imperial City. Therefore, Zhengyang Gate and Chaoyang Gate, which originally belonged to the Nanjing City Wall, are both part of Jiangning Mancheng!
Now that Chaoyangmen Wengcheng has been captured by Lu Sanhao and his men, it means that the first-level portal of Jiangning Mancheng has actually been opened!
But the foundation of the city of Jiangning is, after all, the Nanjing City Wall and Nanjing Imperial City, which are layers of protection. Inside the city wall is the Imperial City, and inside the Imperial City is the Nanjing Forbidden City. The layers are like matryoshka dolls.
And there is not only Chengtao City, but also Hetao River.
Therefore, the banner family members in Jiangning Mancheng can completely abandon the outermost city wall and shrink into the original imperial city and Forbidden City to defend it.
After Duolong took away most of the Jiangning banner army and the governor's pacesetters, Echu, who felt that his troops were insufficient, had already asked the family members of the bannermen who originally lived outside the imperial city to move into the original Ming Dynasty imperial city.
There are many family members of these banner people, a total of 20,000 to 30,000 people! If they stick to the inner imperial city and the Forbidden City, it will not be easy for the new Ming Dynasty's regiment training army to break through.
After all, Jiangning's regiment training army does not have many people. It currently has more than 5,000 troops. Among them, the only ones who can really fight tough battles are a thousand new Jiangning people who speak Cantonese and Hakka. With this small number of troops, it is necessary to fight hard. It is simply unrealistic to go down to Jiangning and fill the whole city.
However, the Mancheng of Jiangning could not be conquered for a while, or the attack on Mancheng caused heavy losses to the regiment training of Jiangning, which would not be conducive to the further development of the new Ming Dynasty.
Therefore, the best policy is to let the family members of the bannermen in Jiangning Mancheng leave together with Echu. You can chase him for one round, or you can not chase him, it all depends on Wang Zhongxiao's mood!
After owning Jiangning, a city with extremely important geographical location and political symbolism, the name of the new Ming Dynasty could be established! If Prince Zhu San and Lu Sanhao could capture the entire city of Jiangning before Geng Jingzhong, it would be a big peach. They could even close the city gates and prevent Geng Jingzhong's troops from entering the city.
In this case, Prince Zhu San would no longer be Ming Xian Emperor, and it would be difficult for Geng Jingzhong to become Grand Master Geng or Prime Minister Geng.
But this set of wishful thinking also counts!
He also knew that once Prince Zhu San and Lu Sanhao completely control Jiangning City and dominate the new Ming Dynasty in the future, they will soon control the entire Jiangning Mansion - Jiangning is a big mansion! Jiangning City has a population of hundreds of thousands. If several counties outside the city are included, there may be a population of one million. And if the population of one million is properly grasped, it is possible to train 50,000 to 100,000 regiments!
With so many troops, will the wealthy state capitals in Jiangnan still be the territory of the Qing Dynasty?
In addition, if Jiang Ning no longer has Geng Jingzhong and Shang Zhixin, what will they do? Back to Fujian? Or march troops to Zhenjiang, Suzhou, Changzhou and other places?
If the army led by Duolong finally suffered heavy losses in Wuhu, and the imperial court was unable to send reinforcements to Jiangnan for a while, then the governments in Jiangnan really would not have the strength to resist the 20,000 troops of Geng Jingzhong and Shang Zhixin.
If Zheng Jing from Damuan Island intervenes again, not even an inch of the prosperous southeastern part of the Qing Dynasty can be saved!
After pondering for a while, Echu had already made up his mind. For the sake of the Qing Dynasty, and also for the sake that he, a sinner of the Qing Dynasty, could have a lighter crime, he could not take care of the family members in the city of Jiangning!
They have to be left to die in the city of Jiangning. Only if they die can the Qing Dynasty gain time to rectify the defense of Jiangnan.
Echu gritted his teeth and shouted: "Lu, do you think I am a fool? Will I believe you? The whole city of Jiangning is indestructible, you can't take it down. If our family members and children abandon the fortified city, they will be chased by you." Kill, even if you can reach Zhenjiang by then, you will still be dead! Now I will go to Zhenjiang to mobilize soldiers to come back to counterattack! I don’t believe you can break through the whole city of Jiangning before I come back!"
After saying that, he did not give Lu Sanhao a chance to argue. He waved his riding crop, turned the horse around, and shouted loudly: "Let's go to Zhenjiang to mobilize troops, and then fight back!"
Although the Eight Banners garrison soldiers following him wanted to take their families away, E Chu's analysis seemed to make sense, so they followed E Chu and left.
Now it was the turn of Wang Zhongxiao, Chen Yonghua, and Lu Sanhao on the tower of Chaoyangmen Wengcheng to be dumbfounded!
This time they met a ruthless slave who did not want his home for his country!
Lu Sanhao and Chen Yonghua are not siege experts, but they also know that Jiangning Mancheng is particularly difficult to defeat! So they all turned to look at Wang Zhongxiao, who once commanded the army to capture the two fortified cities of Macau and Guangzhou.
"How long does it take to cover the entire city of Zhongshan?" Chen Yonghua asked.
"Is five days okay?" Lu Sanhao also frowned, "If we can't win in five days, Geng Jingzhong should have arrived!"
"Five days?" Wang Zhongxiao turned around and asked Liu Shuochuan, "Liu Baihu, how do you think this city should be fought?"
Liu Shuochuan has now been promoted!
He was promoted from the Foreign Affairs Commission to the General Manager of Hundred Households. What a prosperous official career!
However, it was not easy for him to get promoted. Not only did he have to change jobs to become a second minister, but he also had to participate in the Jiangning uprising - this was to rebel against the Qing Dynasty and restore the Ming Dynasty with his head in his belt!
And there’s no choice!
The day before yesterday, he had just brought Prince Zhu San, Chen Yonghua, and Wang Zhongxiao to the place, and they were immediately detained. Then a multiple-choice question was placed in front of them - either follow the third prince Zhu and become a minister of the dragon.
Or die!
Liu Shuochuan would definitely not make the wrong choice for this kind of multiple-choice question.
As a general manager, he was commissioned from a foreign country. He was not qualified to be a loyal loyalist of the Qing Dynasty!
Why don't you give it a try and if it works, then let it go?
So he immediately knelt down to Prince Zhu San, and immediately sealed a hundred households in the Jinyi Family Army, and he was currently the most senior officer in the Jinyi Family Army!
Oh, or maybe he alone is the entire Jinyi army!
After becoming a Jinyi guard, Liu Baihu immediately showed the strength that a Jinyiwei should have. Today, he is responsible for leading Wang Zhongxiao, Chen Yonghua, Wang Leiyong and more than a hundred elites, pretending to be members of the Jiangning regiment, sneaking into the Dongshui Pass of Jiangning City by waterway, and seizing it in one fell swoop!
Then he escorted General Qian, who was from the Qing army's city guard camp, to the Shuiguan city wall, followed the passage on the wall to the Zhengyangmen Urn City, and in a surprise attack, Zhengyangmen Urn City was captured again. Then they rushed straight to Chaoyangmen Urn City along the city wall. Together with Lu No. 3, who led dozens of regiments to rest in Chaoyangmen Urn City under the pretext of being seriously injured, they raided and captured this important place.
In addition to the two barbicans of Zhengyangmen and Chaoyangmen and Jiangning Dongshuiguan, the new Ming Dynasty now also controls three strongholds in Jiangning City: Jiangning Prefectural Government Office, Jiangning County Government Office, and Shangyuan County Government Office. The entire Jiangning and Hancheng may have to be busy for several days!
As for Mancheng, I'm afraid it won't be easy to fight!
"This is hard to fight!" Liu Shuochuan shook his head, "Li Zhongtang, we have made a lot of noise in Chaoyangmen, Zhengyangmen, and Dongshui Pass. It is impossible for the Eight Banners soldiers and their families in the imperial city not to know about it. A sneak attack is impossible."
The "Li Zhongtang" in his mouth is of course Wang Zhongxiao!
Wang Zhongxiao is now nicknamed Li Zhongshan, and his surname is Li. If Li Chuang is unable to do so for the time being, he should become Li Zhongtang first!
So Wang Zhongxiao gave himself the title of "Grand Bachelor" and became a high school student.
Li Zhongtang nodded slightly.
Liu Shuochuan continued: "There are moats on all sides of the Imperial City of Nanjing. As long as the bridges on the moats are blocked, it will be impossible to sneak into the Imperial City. In my humble opinion, if you want to attack the Imperial City, you can only use force or force." It's a siege. Since our manpower is a bit short, we should first capture Jiangning and Seoul, and then firmly control Taipingmen, Tongjimen, Zhengyangmen, Chaoyangmen, Xihuamen, Xiaomen, Bei'anmen and other gates throughout the city, as well as The walls between the gates will trap the family members of the bannermen and some of the banner soldiers in the imperial city, and then wait until King Geng’s army arrives before trying to attack the imperial city.”
"That's fine," Li Zhongtang thought for a while, but there was no better way at the moment, so he nodded and said, "Let's just follow Liu Baihu's method first. When the regiment training brigade arrives, let's control the original situation first. We will fill all the gates and walls of the city, then seize all the gates of Han City, and control the Longjiang Estuary and the commercial ports on both sides of the Qinhuai River in the west of the city to appease people's hearts, and then make plans."
Lu No. 3 reminded: "Shikai, if you plan like this, then the thousands of regiments in our hands will not be able to do anything else. In a few days, Geng Jingzhong and the others will arrive. By then, who owns Nanjing?" Hard to say!"
Wang Zhongxiao smiled and said: "Although Nanjing is important, it is just an isolated city. Even if we firmly control Nanjing, we may not be able to open up the situation. Maybe the third prince will still make people trapped in Nanjing, just like that prince..."
"Tai? Tai what?" Seeing that Wang Zhongxiao didn't continue, Lu Sanhao asked.
"No, it's nothing." Wang Zhongxiao said with a smile, "In short, we can't just have one Nanjing city, we must find a way to quickly expand our team, and then firmly control all the counties around Nanjing city. If we have spare power, we can continue along the The Yangtze River develops towards Taiping Prefecture, Zhenjiang Prefecture and other places.”
Wang Zhongxiao's words sounded good, but how to do it?
Seeing Lu Sanhao's suspicious look, Wang Zhongxiao said: "Sanhao, let's stop thinking so much and seize the time to control the city walls and Jiangning Seoul!"
"Okay!" Lu Sanhao nodded, "I'll send someone to Xiaoling Acropolis right away to mobilize troops!"
"When the situation in Nanjing calms down a bit, I will call all the county magistrates to the prefect's office. I have a strategy to expand the Jiangnan regiment training and I want to discuss it with everyone!"
"Expanding team training?" Lu No. 3 was a little worried, "Is it going to equalize the land?"
"No, the land is not equalized." Wang Zhongxiao shook his head and said with a wry smile, "We don't have the capital to equalize the land in Jiangnan, so we can only win over the local gentry!"
To equalize the land, we must move to equalize it!
If you want to be able to move evenly, you must be strong enough! Second, the resistance must be small enough!
Over in Guangdong, the Wang Family Army was strong enough, with an army of tens of thousands at the beginning, and Juntian started in the three counties of Xiangshan, Xinhui, and Xinning. And there are a lot of coastal "wasteland" in these three counties - almost half of the land was abolished because of the Qing court's gratifying move and sea ban.
In other words, the royal regime holds a large amount of unclaimed land that can be distributed.
In this case, Wang Zhongxiao can first use the allocation of coastal land to attract a wave of die-hard loyalists, and he can also relax the equalization of land in other areas - many "Yimen clans" who do not divide their families need not participate in the equalization. At the same time, only large landowners who hold too much land will suffer losses.
In addition, in the "inland" of Guangfu, there are also a large number of Pingnan Prince's vassals, and those lands can be used to provide generosity to others.
Therefore, the difficulty of equalizing land in Guangdong is actually not high. There are many people who support it and very few who oppose it.
But in the Jiangnan area where there are many people but little land and the gentry is powerful, it is not easy to equalize the land! Moreover, the strength Wang Zhongxiao brought to Jiangning was limited, with only about a thousand elites.
If he insists on ignoring the actual situation, he may turn the third prince Zhu into Hongjiao in Jiangning and turn Nanjing into Tianjing City.
Wang Zhongxiao is not that dogmatic, he has already thought of it!
That is to learn from Zeng Shao, the enemy of the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom, and set up a regiment in the south of the Yangtze River to train like the Hunan Army!
On the third day after Jiangning was transformed into Nanjing, except for the imperial city, which was still controlled by 23,000 Eight Banner family members and a small number of banner soldiers, the entire Nanjing city was already under the leadership of Zhu Cijiong, the Third Prince of Zhu!
Because Prince Zhu San, Lu Sanhao and Wang Zhongxiao used a trick to "half-buy and half-steal" to get most of Nanjing city into their hands, the market in Nanjing was generally maintained and the order in the market was considered to be in order.
However, because there are still Eight Banners in the imperial city who are stubbornly resisting, the Jiangnan area outside Yingtianfu is basically still in the hands of supporters of the Qing court.
Therefore, under the calm and orderly execution of Nanjing City, there are also dangers and undercurrents.
In Nanjing Yingtianfu Yamen, a key meeting that decided the survival of the new Ming Dynasty was taking place in a rare atmosphere of equality, harmony, and unity.
There is no wise tyrant like Zhu Hongwu here, and there is no heavenly father or brother descending to earth. There are only former monarchs and former ministers discussing the affairs of the country.
"The city of Nanjing has not yet been completely recovered. His Highness Prince Ding is anxious to invite you all to come to Yingtian Mansion. It is also to expand the army and prepare for war. Our territory in Nanjing is not large, and in a few days Geng Jingzhong and Shang Zhixin will return It’s not easy to gain a foothold here in Nanjing by relying on thousands of us! If we can’t gain a foothold, then isn’t our trip in vain? Everyone’s hard work over the years will be in vain!”
The person who spoke in the lobby of Yingtian Mansion, which was decorated as a conference venue, was Wang Zhongxiao. He had now taken off his official uniform of the Qing Dynasty, and once again cut out the half-truths and half-falsehoods (part of them was true, but the length was not enough, so he took it. The braids (a little bit) restored the clothes of the Ming Dynasty. However, he did not wear the clothes of a bachelor, but still wore casual clothes.
As he spoke, he looked at the grass-roots team of the Nanjing imperial court. They included Prince Zhu San, Chen Yonghua, Chang Mingyue, He Tianran, Yu Haitao, Wang Leiyong, Zhang Eryi, Zheng Desheng, Zuo Yuanyang, Wang Huaxing, Liu Shuochuan, and five Yingtianfu The magistrates of counties are those "official white laborers".
Everyone looks very excited, but also very tired.
In less than three days, they had calmed and controlled most of Jiangning City. I'm afraid they didn't sleep much. And their spirits were always in a state of excitement, right?
Of course, tension and uneasiness are also inevitable.
Because what they did this time was to go deep behind enemy lines and bloom in the center.
If you can stay in Nanjing, you will make a lot of money. Otherwise, it is inevitable that you will fail in your success, or you will be used as a wedding dress for others, and you may even lose your life.
"Zhongtang, do you want to equalize land and establish a rural army?" The question was from Jiangning County Magistrate Jingchuan. His tone seemed a bit low, and he felt that it was not easy to equalize land in Nanjing.
"No." Wang Zhongxiao said with a smile, "Jiangning League Training is running well now, so why bother creating more complications? What I mean is, let's make Jiangning League Training bigger!"
"How to grow bigger?" Lu Sanhao asked.
This is easy to say, but a bit difficult to do!
"Three ways," Wang Zhongxiao said, "One is to give high military pay! If you want people to work hard, you can't do it without giving them money!
The second is to rely on the gentry who are survivors of the former Ming Dynasty and are willing to use them to organize and train regiments. These gentry have connections and connections, and are intertwined with each other. They are definitely dissatisfied with the Manchus and can be used by us.
The third is that the Jiangning regiment training should prepare soldiers for the generals, and the soldiers will follow the generals! "
(End of chapter)
