In the spring of the 24th year of Chengshun, the Chu Empire sent a huge fleet to North America.
In addition to dozens of armed merchant ships of the Oriental Trading Company, this huge fleet also has more than a dozen warships rented from the navy for escort.
In addition, dozens of transport ships from multiple shipping companies were hired.
The entire fleet reached hundreds of ships!
In addition to a large number of sailors, these hundreds of ships also carried more than 8,000 armed forces of the Oriental Trading Company, namely the First Colonial Mixed Battalion of the Oriental Trading Company and the Sixth Colonial Mixed Battalion.
In addition, it also carried tens of thousands of new immigrants in family units.
Finally, a variety of supplies are naturally indispensable, including weapons, equipment and ammunition for armed personnel, military supplies, and even war horses and draft horses.
Even some construction machinery and equipment were brought over, such as hoisting equipment for ports, including several steam engines.
This time, the Chu Empire planned to massively expand its colonial footprint in North America.
It was planned to use Seattle and San Francisco as the main strongholds, and then establish more colonial settlements in the surrounding areas to consolidate control of the areas around San Francisco Bay and Puget Sound.
Both of these bays are very large bays, and San Francisco Bay is one of the few deep-water harbors in the world. At the same time, there are many places in the surrounding areas suitable for farming and immigration.
This is also the reason why after the Oriental Trading Company arrived in North America, although it successively opened more than ten colonial settlements along the coast, it finally chose these two places for large-scale immigration development.
Currently, out of ten thousand people in North America, there are more than 5,000 in the San Francisco Bay area, and more than 3,000 in the Puget Sound area where Seattle is located.
These two places alone accounted for more than 80% of the early colonial population.
However, with a population of only a few thousand people, it is obviously impossible to completely control and develop such a large area of the local area. They still need more people!
In addition to continuing to strengthen control and development of these two areas, the Toyo Trading Company also plans to move inland along several major rivers.
Among them is the Columbia River, which is more than 100 kilometers south of Puget Sound. The Oriental Trading Company has previously tried to send ships to go deep along the inland river. After traveling for a long time, they have not yet reached the end. There is plenty of water along the way, and there are many places where the terrain is considered difficult. The price comparison is flat and suitable for farming.
This time, the Oriental Trading Company also planned to establish several colonial trading posts along the Columbia River, penetrate into the inland river and control this river, and trade with the local indigenous people.
Next, there are many rivers in San Francisco Bay. When the Oriental Trading Company conducted a small-scale exploration before, they found that there are rivers that can go all the way east and then reach an open plain area. This valley area is between the coastal mountains and Between the larger Sierra Nevada Mountains.
This long and narrow valley has a flat terrain and relatively good water resources, making it very suitable for large-scale reclamation.
Controlling two large bays, controlling the coastline, and then following the inland currents deep into the interior of North America is the established expansion strategy of the Oriental Trading Company.
This strategy also won the approval and support of the empire's top brass.
What are the more than 8,000 armed soldiers used for?
It is used to cooperate with expansion. After all, when controlling the areas around the bay and going deep into the interior, you will inevitably encounter obstruction from some indigenous tribes, and war will inevitably be inevitable.
If a colonial stronghold does not have enough armed forces to protect itself, it may not be long before it is destroyed by tribes who don't know where to come from.
At the same time, the Spaniards in the south also had a lot of objections to the Chu Empire's increasingly large colonial activities on the west coast of North America. Although they had not established large-scale colonies in this area before, in fact they had The West Coast of America is not unfamiliar.
In their early routes to Asia, they often took the North Pacific route, which passed through the west coast of North America.
It's just that the Spanish did not carry out large-scale colonization in this area for a long time in the past.
The focus of their colonial rule was in Mexico, which has more advantageous geographical conditions. Now they are relying on Mexico and continue to think about North America. The main direction of expansion is on the east coast of North America, that is, the Gulf of Mexico and the central area. area.
As for the west, there are relatively few.
However, less does not mean none!
In fact, the Spanish's colonial expansion in California has never stopped. Now that the Chu Empire has come to this place to carry out colonial expansion, there will inevitably be certain conflicts between the two sides.
Faced with this potential inevitable conflict, Toyo Trading Company naturally had to prepare in advance.
The more than ten warships rented from the Navy, in addition to escorting on the road, were mainly used to station in San Francisco Bay for a long time to guard against the Spanish.
For this reason, Toyo Trading Company also paid a large amount of military expenditures to the navy!
In fact, the combat effectiveness of Toyo Trading Company's own armed merchant ships is not bad, but compared with real professional warships, it is still inferior. Compared with the large-tonnage warships of the Spanish, it is not powerful enough, so it hired the navy in the name of leasing. Take action.
For this purpose, the Navy deployed two third-class battleships, three second-class cruisers, and twelve frigates to form an American fleet, which under the name of lease cooperated with the Oriental Trading Company to station and operate in America.
However, whether the navy's lease name or the army's so-called retired name is actually just a name, it is a kind of cover-up, and few people will really regard them as a civilian armed force.
These are all serious regular troops!
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This huge regular army carried the ships all the way east, and then arrived at Fuso Hirado, the territory directly under the jurisdiction of the Chu Empire in the Fuso area.
After fully replenishing and resting here, they continued to sail eastward along the Fuso Sea to the Edo Sea, where they carried out the last large-scale replenishment.
Then this huge fleet began to head east, taking advantage of the ocean currents and monsoons to take the North Pacific route to North America.
There will also be many islands passing along the way. Some of these islands have been opened up as supply points by the Dongyang Trading Company, but most of them are just uninhabited desert islands. For this, the Dongyang Trading Company usually directly sends people to erect a piece of the Chu Empire. The stone tablet of a certain territory is the first to claim sovereignty.
The huge fleet encountered many troubles as it headed east. After all, except for a few warships equipped with auxiliary steam engines, the rest of their ships were pure sailing ships.
The sailing of pure sailboats is greatly affected by ocean currents and wind directions, so sailing is more difficult, takes more time, and is risky.
However, this North Pacific route is already a relatively mature route for Dongyang Trading Company. It has been opened for many years and has been traveled many times. Several supply points have been established along the way, and the overall risk can be considered controllable.
However, ocean voyages in the era of pure sails were still very dangerous. When the more than 100 ships finally arrived in North America, there would probably be several fewer ships.
In recent years, the accident rate of Toyo Trading Company's ships traveling to and from North America has been around six percent. In other words, out of a hundred ships going to sea, six will eventually be lost or sunk on the way.
This situation is inevitable in modern times. If we want to further reduce the risks of ocean routes, we can only wait for ocean steamers to mature and be used on a large scale.
Because steam engines and ships do not have to worry about wind direction or ocean currents, this does not mean that they can run faster, but it means that they can avoid dangerous sea areas and dangerous weather, thus ensuring safe navigation.
For example, there are some windless zones in the depths of the ocean that make sailboats look at them with dismay, especially the Pacific Windless Zone and the Indian Ocean Windless Zone. If sailing boats enter these windless zones, they will most likely die.
But steam engines and ships don't have to worry about this and can just rush through.
The route safety advantage brought by steamships was also used by the Dachu Empire to explore routes!
While the huge fleet of the Dongyang Trading Company was heading east, a small exploration fleet of the Da Chu Empire Navy was heading east from Batavia City.
This is a small fleet composed of three ships, including a Yulin-class frigate equipped with a steam engine, the Haifeng. However, this Haifeng has been stripped of some of its artillery and ammunition, and only two self-defense guns are retained. Artillery and a small amount of ammunition freed up a lot of spare tonnage to carry coal, water, food and other supplies.
Accompanying them are the Huanghe, a comprehensive supply ship with a full load displacement of more than 1,600 tons, and the Taishan, a coal supply ship with a full load of 1,200 tons.
This small fleet, which belongs directly to the Nanyang Fleet, is a very typical exploration fleet, consisting of two wet nurses and a steam-powered frigate.
When necessary, such as when entering a windless zone, after the supplies on the two wet nurses have been replenished, they will be abandoned, and then the crew will take the steam-powered Haifeng to save their lives.
This navy's exploration fleet was ordered to continue exploring the mainland in the southeastern area of Java Island, which is what the Dutch call it.
'New Netherland' is what later generations will call Australia.
A few decades ago, the Dutch had discovered this place in the southeastern part of the Java Islands and conducted preliminary exploration of this continent. However, this place was too desolate and the Dutch did not explore it. Colonization activities were carried out in this area.
After the Da Chu Empire controlled Java Island and the surrounding waters, it was also interested in the so-called New Netherlands in the south. After all, according to the Dutch, although this place was desolate, it was very large in area, and the Dutch exploration It is only limited to some areas, and this area has not been fully explored, so it is still unknown how big this place is.
To this end, Nanyang has dispatched an exploratory fleet to conduct a comprehensive survey of this place. At least we must know how big the place is and where it leads, and then see if we can find a suitable place for immigrants to colonize, and whether there are large-scale indigenous people in the area. Is it possible to trade and so on.
In short, you need to understand the basic situation before you can make corresponding plans.
As a result, the three exploration ships sailed all the way east to Timor Island. After carrying out the last supply, they turned south and began their exploration journey.
After sailing south for hundreds of nautical miles, they finally saw a large piece of land that the Dutch called a land mass. They found a suitable place and conducted a preliminary landing survey, but they came to the same conclusion as the Dutch. This place was a bad place. It is too desolate and not suitable for large-scale resettlement.
However, this place is slightly closer to the eastern part of Java Island. It is possible to find a coastal place that is barely suitable for settlement and establish a small port as a base for subsequent exploration.
After the preliminary survey, the exploration fleet continued to set sail and sailed south along the coastline, while drawing charts along the way and the conditions of the explored coastline.
This journey was several thousand nautical miles away... At this time, the people exploring the fleet were not frustrated at all. On the contrary, they were very happy.
Because this island is larger than they expected!
Not to mention other things, the straight-line distance between north and south they have discovered so far is already more than two thousand kilometers.
Such a huge place, even if it is deserted, still has a certain value. No matter what happens, it will be great to graze here in the future, and if you look around, you might be able to find some minerals on it.
The most important thing is that they did not find large-scale indigenous people on the coastline, but occasionally saw a few uncivilized indigenous people.
In other words, there are no people in this huge place and it is completely virgin land.
If they could completely explore this continent and report it to the empire, it would be equivalent to directly opening up an entire continent for the empire.
When he thought of this, the Commander of the Exploration Fleet, Commodore Prince Shi, couldn't help but get excited... He could already think of the scene where he would expand the empire thousands of miles and get his first title.
Therefore, even though the exploration along the way was very hard, Commodore Wang Zishi still continued sailing with his soldiers with great enthusiasm.
After sailing for a long time, they found that they had bypassed the southern end of the continent, so they began to sail eastward. On the way, they discovered that there was a place at the southwest end of the continent that was more suitable for planting, and could later be used as a settlement for immigrants. use.
After continuing to sail eastward, they found more and more flat places, and also discovered several rivers deep inland. However, they were short of time, and the risk of rashly exploring unknown rivers was relatively high, so they just sent small boats. After exploring the river mouth area, we set sail and continued eastward.
Their mission this time is to thoroughly explore this unknown continent in the south, New Netherlands as the Dutch call it, at least to have a rough scope and some basic conditions of the surrounding coasts.
As for further exploration, or even inland exploration, that is not their task.
So they continued to sail eastward. After they passed through a strait, they found that there was no continent in the east and they could only sail northward.
At the same time, they discovered that there were islands on the south side of the strait, but they did not carry much supplies anymore, and they had to continue to sail north to explore. It was not known whether they could return smoothly, so they did not continue to sail south to explore, but Head north instead.
After sailing all the way north, they found that the condition of this coastal area was relatively good and suitable for farming and development. They also recorded several places suitable for berthing ships and opening up colonies for development.
After continuing to sail all the way north, they were near a strait. By comparing compasses, nautical charts, etc., they discovered that their due north direction was the island of New Guinea.
This means that they have completed the feat of circumnavigating the island of New Netherlands.
No, the New Holland Island they were detouring around was not just an island. The area was so vast that it could be called a continent!
This is a huge land of six to seven hundred square kilometers!
When the exploration fleet returned to Bada City, the news of the New World shocked the top civil and military officials of the Chu Empire in the city.
A huge island of six to seven hundred square kilometers, and no other European colonist strongholds or civilized indigenous cities have been found along the coastline, which means that this continent does not even have a master for the time being.
If the Chu Empire wanted to control this area, it wouldn't even have to fight a war and just send people there to colonize it.
Moreover, although most of this area, especially the northern and western areas, is extremely barren, there are many plains in the southern and eastern coastal areas. If developed and cultivated, many immigrants can be resettled.
Soon, news about the New World in the South was quickly sent to the native Jinling City.
After Luo Zhixue, who was in Jinling City, saw the relevant reports, he knew without guessing that this must be Australia in later generations.
Since the Dutch did not colonize here in advance and there were no civilized indigenous people in the area, Luo Zhixue was naturally not polite. He directly wrote seven names for this continent and named it Australia, bringing it under the direct jurisdiction of the empire and temporarily under the jurisdiction of the governor of Wandan.
He also instructed to carry out a more detailed survey of this area and to establish resettlement settlements in several important coastal areas.
In short, let's first occupy some important places along the coast. As for large-scale immigration and development, we can only do it slowly.
Anyway, with the place in hand, immigration and development in the future will only be a matter of words.
Luo Zhixue was in a good mood after successfully exploring Australia. Even when he went to see the Royal Ensemble of Music and Dance at night, he had a lot of fun.
It's just that playing too much is not a good thing. When I woke up the next day, my waist was a little sore... Alas, it wasn't that he didn't have enough fighting power, but that there were too many people on the opposite side.
And they didn't talk about martial arts, so they taught Luo Zhi how to fight...one after another, sometimes two or three together. Luo Zhixue couldn't hold on even if he was made of iron, let alone he was not made of iron.
Yao Luo Zhixue secretly made up his mind to restrain himself in the future. He can't ask for it when they ask for it, let alone a group of them when they come... I'm not made of iron, I will definitely not live long if things go on for a long time.
However, after secretly making up his mind, several outstanding royal dancers dressed in gauze have climbed over one after another.
Damn... I still want to come.
Damn... I really think I'm made of iron, and I have to go to a morning meeting for the staff.
A group of goblins can never destroy my determination to govern the country diligently...
Hey, these goblins' newly learned dance is pretty good... Why didn't I see them dancing last night? Take a closer look before going to have breakfast. Anyway, it won't be long before they learn it.
Hey, why did you take off your clothes just because you picked it up? Fortunately, it is summer and autumn, and the weather is warm, otherwise they would be cold to death...
No, I have to calm down. I can't be as ridiculous as last night. If I continue like this, there will be no need to hold this morning meeting.
But...these fairies no longer have martial ethics...
Sigh... It's not that I don't work hard to govern the country, it's just that I can't help it...
Let’s postpone the morning meeting until the afternoon!
As a result, the counselors and co-organizers who came to attend the morning meeting were told that His Majesty had something to do and the morning meeting was postponed to the afternoon.
However, they didn't ask much. His Majesty often postponed or even canceled various morning itineraries when he didn't have any important matters. Usually, he usually slept in at such times.
As for why he slept in late... We are not stupid, and we can guess some of it... If you look at the hundreds of concubines and a huge music and dance troupe in the harem, you will know what His Majesty's attitude towards women is.
Even ordinary people who don't know the inside story of the palace will know it just by seeing the dozens of princes and princesses that Luo Zhixue met.
Without years of hard work and enough concubines in the harem, we would not be able to give birth to so many children!
However, they are not worried that Luo Zhixue will neglect government affairs, because Luo Zhixue has never been neglected in the past!
Luo Zhixue seems to be very busy every day, but in fact his work is very flexible. Many things can take a few hours to deal with, but they can also be dealt with in an hour.
After all, he has a large Imperial Academy under him to help him handle all kinds of ordinary paperwork, and various major matters are also handled by ministers and co-organizers. Luo Zhixue is the one who makes decisions most of the time, and rarely talks about specific responsibilities. Something happened.
Therefore, Luo Zhixue's daily schedule is also very flexible. Many things can be handled personally or not.
However, in order to better understand the operation of the entire empire, and to better control the power and avoid any accidents, Luo Zhixue mostly did it himself.
After the morning council meeting and other schedules were postponed, when Luo Zhixue appeared in the outer hall after lunch time to start handling things, he adopted a quick resolution mode.
The executive meeting only took half an hour to complete. Anyway, there haven't been any major events recently, just daily matters.
Next, I met with many ministers, mainly civil and military officials who were returning to Beijing to report on their duties or who were about to go to other places to take office. This kind of thing was also a normal matter. Nothing important was discussed during this kind of interview. The main thing was to let them meet each other. Holy, just going through the motions.
Only a very small number of officials who hold important positions and bear important responsibilities will let Luo Zhixue chat for a while, but this situation usually occurs at a specific moment and will not occur in such daily interviews.
Luo Zhixue directly worked in groups of several people, giving each group only ten to twenty minutes. After quickly meeting with dozens of civil and military officials, he began to process various documents.
These documents are actually not many. In the political system of the Chu Empire, there are actually not many documents that need to be sent to Luo Zhixue. They will not be like the monarchs of traditional dynasties who need to read all the trivial memorials.
What Luo Zhixue mainly looks at are some general policy documents. He generally doesn't care about specific matters, which are handled by subordinate ministries.
For example, the Ministry of Transport on hand now has a railway construction plan for the next five years.
This plan stipulates that in the next ten years, we will continue to focus on the construction of two vertical and two horizontal trunk railway networks, and finalize a number of large-scale branch railways.
Strive to complete the construction of the main trunk railway network within ten years and initially build the railway network of the Chu Empire.
This kind of railway transportation strategic planning requires Luo Zhixue to personally review and approve it.
Most of the other submissions were also these strategic matters, and Luo Zhixue reviewed them one by one and gave advice on how to deal with them.
I continued processing until the evening and almost finished processing the report sent today.
Seeing the night approaching, Luo Zhixue recalled what the leading dancers of the music and dance troupe had said in the morning, saying that they had recently choreographed a new group dance and were preparing for a large-scale formal rehearsal tonight, and invited Luo Zhixue to come over. inspection.
They also revealed that the dance costume was a high-slit cheongsam designed for them by Luo Zhixue some time ago.
Luo Zhixue thought for a while and decided to go to inspect and express condolences to the music and dance troupe tonight. After all, they had to rehearse dance every day very hard. As a leader, he still had to pay more attention to the physical and mental health of his subordinates.
Although the condolences are tiring, who makes himself a responsible emperor?
Thinking of this, Luo Zhixue sighed: It is not easy for me to maintain the empire's thousand-year foundation!
