Although Zu Dashou's troops were already like frightened birds, and they were extremely short of food and grass and did not hesitate to send troops to plunder the city, Zhu Xingfa had no idea of continuing to pursue with the main force.
The strategic goal of the Chu army's move north this time was to quickly capture Youzhou City and advance all the way to Shanhaiguan. It did not mean that they had to kill as many enemy troops as possible or capture other places.
So now for the Chu army, the most important thing is to quickly initiate and end the Tianjin battle. After the battle is over, they can go directly to Youzhou City. They can even divide their troops directly in Tianjin to attack Shanhaiguan.
Well, it is more important to advance to Shanhaiguan quickly. Youzhou City can be won sooner or later anyway. A few days earlier and a few days later will not have much impact.
As a result, Zhu Xingfa left a cavalry brigade and the 38th reinforcement regiment under the 10th Division, and together with the cavalry regiment under the 10th Division, they continued to march towards Rongcheng, pursuing Zu Dashou all the way, and continuing to pursue Zu Dashou. The cavalry under his command exert pressure to prevent them from turning back!
There are about 1,800 cavalry and about 4,000 infantry and artillery troops, which is enough to deter Zu Dashou, the frightened bird.
Another infantry regiment was left to garrison Baoding and Bazhou.
There is also a group to fight towards the line between Xincheng and Gu'an, capture and control this area, and protect the canal south of Tianjin from the flanks. At the same time, they can also threaten Youzhou City and further contain the Ming court's forces.
After all, the straight-line distance between Gu'an and Youzhou City is only about fifty kilometers. If logistical supply issues are not considered, the Chu army would only need two days to reach Youzhou City.
When Youzhou City faces such a threat, it is natural to increase Youzhou City's own defense instead of filling all the troops and artillery in Tianjin city.
This can effectively reduce the pressure on the Chu army in Tianjin.
As for the two cavalry brigades, Zhu Xingfa personally led the main force to quickly return to support the Northern Expeditionary Army headquarters, preparing to participate in the Battle of Tianjin with the main forces.
There is still a big battle waiting for these cavalry.
The number of cavalry in the Chu army was limited. In addition to the cavalry regiments of each division, there were only three brigades of main cavalry. All of them were previously transferred to the Baoding front line purely because of the threat from Zu Dashou's cavalry.
Now that Zu Dashou himself was heading west, he didn't even have enough food and grass. He had no ability to continue to threaten the Chu army's own logistics line, so there was no need to maintain so many cavalry here.
When the two cavalry brigades rushed back, General Li Chengtong along the canal also led his army to successfully capture Jinghai and was marching steadily towards Tianjin.
At this time, Hong Chengchou, who was in Tianjin, also learned that Zu Dashou was defeated and fled in embarrassment with only thousands of cavalry.
After hearing the news, Hong Chengchou didn't scold anyone, let alone accuse Zu Dashou of not fighting to the end, but choosing to lead his army to escape.
He just faced the summer shadows outside the window and sighed deeply!
The situation is difficult!
——
Just because Hong Chengchou didn't get angry doesn't mean that Chongzhen didn't get angry!
It was still four days later that Chongzhen received the news that Zu Dashou's troops had been defeated and lost troops and generals!
Don't blame Chongzhen for getting the news late, it's simply because no one informed him of the news...
For example, Zu Dashou himself was busy running for his life and looting grain and grass everywhere to maintain the rations of his four thousand cavalry and nearly ten thousand horses.
Four thousand cavalrymen are actually nothing and can't eat much, but the food and grass required by nearly 10,000 war horses is a very huge number. When converted, it is almost equal to the rations of 40,000 to 50,000 people.
This meant that Zu Dashou had to run around while collecting enough food and grass for 40 to 50 thousand people.
In such a life-and-death crisis, how could Zu Dashou have the mood and time to care about what Chongzhen and the others were thinking? He didn't even send anyone to report it.
When Chongzhen learned the news, it was reported by local officials, so there was a delay.
After learning the news, Chongzhen was furious... As usual, he scolded a bunch of ministers.
Just after he finished cursing, Chongzhen learned that the Chu bandits had captured Gu'an and were only fifty kilometers away from Youzhou City.
The Chu thieves reached Youzhou City overnight.
And this situation caused great panic among the monarchs and ministers in Youzhou City!
For a time, Youzhou was shaken, the ministers were frightened, and Chongzhen was furious...
A group of ministers began to propose that Hong Chengchou should divide his troops and send them back to the capital. Some ministers believed that Hong Chengchou had a heavy garrison of 200,000 troops in Tianjin and spent countless money and food every day. However, he had been stationed in Tianjin for more than half a month, but no one was seen. What action was taken? I suspected that Hong Chengchou was defending himself with troops.
Some people even think that Hong Chengchou has secretly talked with the Chu thieves about surrendering. Even if they haven't surrendered yet, they are definitely talking about it.
In short, with Zu Dashou fleeing without a fight and with the fall of Gu'an, a group of civil and military officials and dignitaries in Youzhou City have been panicked. There are all kinds of rumors and people with all kinds of ideas.
Faced with such a dilemma, Chongzhen still insisted on believing in Hong Chengchou at first.
However, as a group of ministers kept talking about various dangers, saying that Hong Chengchou had surrendered to the enemy, and that no matter how bad it was, they would support themselves with troops and sit back and watch the capital fall, Chongzhen's thoughts were somewhat shaken.
On July 19, Chongzhen sent people to Tianjin and asked Hong Chengchou to send some troops back to the capital to aid.
When the envoy said that there were 200,000 soldiers in Tianjin city, and that he could leave 150,000 troops to continue to defend Tianjin city, and send 50,000 troops back to the capital, Hong Chengchou wanted to beat him to death with the sole of his shoe...
Today's Tianjin front line has an army of 200,000 people!
The statement of 200,000 troops is just a claim... to boost morale and confuse the enemy. How can any of our own people take 200,000 troops seriously?
In Tianjin city, there were originally only 120,000 people at full capacity, of which 30,000 to 40,000 were young and strong civilians who built fortifications and transported heavy equipment.
The total strength of the various ministries is just over 80,000.
Previously, Hong Chengchou sent Zu Dashou's headquarters of 10,000 people to detour southward. Of the 10,000 people who attacked, 6,000 surrendered to the bandits, and 4,000 cavalry rushed all the way to the west. Now they have all reached the north of Fangshan.
Judging from the escape route of Zu Dashou's cavalry, it was most likely that they wanted to bypass the capital and then go straight to Shanhaiguan.
In this way, the remaining troops in Tianjin's front line are actually only about 70,000.
The imperial envoy wanted to transfer 50,000 people back to the capital to support the capital. If he really transferred them, Tianjin would no longer have to defend it.
Furthermore, Hong Chengchou knew very well that even though the Chu thieves had already reached Gu'an, after leaving the canal line, the Chu thieves who had reached Gu'an had limited offensive capabilities, and their troops were also limited, only three to four thousand men.
With only these three to four thousand men, there is still a lack of a large number of artillery, especially heavy artillery. It is impossible for the three to four thousand men to break through Youzhou City, which has a tall city wall and a large number of Beijing camps garrisoned.
Why did Hong Chengchou choose to garrison Tianjin? On the one hand, Chongzhen and others did not dare to send a large number of border troops into the city at that time, and only allowed Hong Chengchou and others to garrison on the outside to fight against the Chu bandits.
On the periphery, the reason why they did not choose to garrison in places such as Baoding was because they saw that the Chu bandits' operations, especially the offensive operations, relied heavily on logistics. Without the canal, the Chu bandits' ability to attack the enemy's fortresses would plummet.
Therefore, there is no need to worry that the Chu thieves will detour Bazhou on a large scale and directly attack Youzhou City in the Gu'an area.
If the Chu thief dared to do this, he would dare to directly attack the Chu thief's side and rear position.
Now, the capital side asked Hong Chengchou to send troops to return reinforcements. Moreover, he did not dispatch all the troops to return reinforcements, but only asked him to divide his troops to return reinforcements.
To be honest, Hong Chengchou was unwilling.
This is inherently a disadvantage, and there is not much certainty in holding Tianjin.
This is to divide the troops... This is not looking for death!
Therefore, Hong Chengchou found various reasons to politely refuse to divide the troops, and proposed that the troops should be used intensively, either to continue to garrison Tianjin, or to return to the capital with all the troops, and then defend the capital!
And as a result, many people are unhappy.
What do you mean, Hong Chengchou? You want to bring all the troops back. Have you already surrendered to the Chu thieves and want to take the opportunity to lead troops into the capital?
Do you, Hong Chengchou, want to do something evil?
Then a group of ministers in the imperial court started making noise again, asking Hong Chengchou to lead his troops directly back to the capital. This was not suitable. What if Hong Chengchou had secretly surrendered to the traitors? Wouldn't it be doomed for Hong Chengchou to lead his troops back to the capital?
It would not work to let Hong Chengchou continue to lead his troops doing nothing in Tianjin city. Not to mention the threat to the capital, issues such as whether to surrender to the thieves or not, the daily consumption of food and grass alone is a huge number.
Even though Hong Chengchou himself sent troops to collect these grains from the people, it did not prevent a group of ministers from thinking that they were money and grains from the court.
So much money and food were eaten by hundreds of thousands of lowly warriors and young men. What a waste...
It would be better to launch a decisive battle early. After the battle is over, there may be a lot of money and food left. When the time comes, everyone will get a share. Wouldn't it be nice?
So, after some persuasion from his ministers, Chongzhen issued an order to Hong Chengchou, asking him to eliminate the traitors in front of him as soon as possible in order to save money and food, so as to mobilize troops to return to the capital and so on.
In short, this is what it means: fight quickly, and the fight is over...
After Hong Chengchou received the new imperial edict, what else could he say... He could only sigh deeply once again, then turned around and went out. Then he went to a side hall and said to a middle-aged man in casual clothes in the side hall: "Your Majesty Awaited!"
At least some ministers of the Ming court guessed correctly. Hong Chengchou really had contact with the envoys of the Chu army and conducted serious secret negotiations on surrender!
At this time, more and more people in the Ming court contacted the Chu thieves to discuss surrendering. He, Hong Chengchou, was not the first, and he would not be the last.
But after a little contact, Hong Chengchou still didn't make up his mind to pay attention.
This is not because Hong Chengchou was worried that he would be accused of being a traitor after surrendering.
The main reason was that the conditions given by the Chu thief opposite were not very good, and they only gave him a minister with no real power, and he was still a right-wing man...
Then Hong Chengchou made some inquiries and found out that even if many officials who voted for him in the past could keep their actual posts, they would not be able to retain much of their family property. Even the family's ten thousand acres of fertile land had to be 'donated' in the end...
On the one hand, the conditions on the other side were not good, but on the other hand, Hong Chengchou felt that he still had more than 70,000 troops on hand, and he could probably fight a dozen.
Even if they fail to win in the end, relying on these 70,000 troops, they can still obtain better surrender conditions for themselves.
He actually doesn't mind surrendering!
But he was very concerned about the treatment.
Li Chengtong in the south received a clear reward from the envoy. Hong Chengchou once again refused to surrender, and also hinted that he was at least worth a minister of the Ministry of War.
In response, Li Chengtong chuckled: "What the hell does he think he is? He opened a dyeing workshop to give him some color, and returned it to the Minister of War. Get the hell out of him. I don't have a yamen like the Ministry of War in Chu!"
"Give me the order. The bombardment will start tomorrow. I want to see why he wants a Minister of War!"
