Daming Yuanfu

Chapter 278
Only half an hour later, Gao Wushi was led by Huang Mengyu to the gun warehouse in Datong City.

The so-called "gun warehouse" was defined by Gao Yushi himself. Huang Mengyu didn't introduce what it was actually called, and Gao Yushi didn't ask if he didn't mean it here.

This warehouse is very large, and there are not only one or two rooms, but about 20 rather large bungalows arranged horizontally and vertically. It can be seen that there are a lot of handguns stored.Of course, high pragmatism can't check one by one, but only random checks, but in order to show strictness, random checks have to be done in each warehouse.

After entering the first warehouse, Huang Mengyu began to introduce to Gao Yushi very responsibly: "Gao Shidu reads, my firearms manufacturing in Ming Dynasty has two major sources, one is made in Beijing, and the other is local self-made. Beijing made The source of the fire is mainly from the three bureaus, that is, the Armament Bureau, the Bingzhan Bureau, and the Saddle and Bridle Bureau. It is impossible to elaborate on the local self-made, as long as the government has approved it. Datong is one of the important towns on the nine borders. Firearms The source has always been complicated, there are Beijing-made ones, and there are also local ones, and now this warehouse... Liu Ping, this warehouse-"

A young eunuch came out of the few eunuchs behind him quickly, bowed and said: "Guardian, this warehouse is filled with all kinds of pistols from the Military Bureau."

Huang Mengyu nodded in satisfaction and looked towards Gao Yushi.

Gao Wushi saw that the warehouse was full of large wooden boxes neatly placed, and the firearms inside could not be seen at all, so he said, "Open it and have a look."

Huang Mengyu didn't wait for Gao Yu to elaborate, and waved at the little eunuch named Liu Ping. Liu Ping quickly waved his hand to the group of people behind him, and shouted: "Gao Shi reads an order, open it and have a look!" Liu Ping is the internal officer of the prison gun here, and he is the "leader in charge". Of course, there are also a group of people below, so it is impossible to even open the wooden box by himself.

Because Gao Yushi didn't say which one to open or which ones to open, these people didn't dare to neglect, and hurriedly opened the wooden boxes in front of and around Gao Yushi one by one.

Gao Wushi stepped forward to check it out. Coincidentally, the first thing that appeared in front of his eyes was a three-eyed blunderbuss. However, he reached out and took it and found that it was quite heavy. He guessed it was a little difficult for him to pick it up. Slightly embarrassing.

Huang Mengyu saw the opportunity quickly, pretending not to see Gao Yushi's situation, and excitedly reached out to pick up the three-eyed gun, put it in front of Gao Yushi's eyes and said with a smile: "Reader Gao, look, this three-eyed gun is ..." As he spoke, he moved his head closer to the three-eyed blunderbuss, took a closer look and said, "Sheng Zi 670 No. [-]——Liu Ping, what year should this number be?"

Liu Ping hurriedly replied: "Back to guard, this should have been born in September 44 in Jiajing."

Gao Wushi was surprised, so he leaned over to have a look, and sure enough, the words "Shengzi 670 No. [-]" were engraved on the body of the gun. He was a little surprised, and asked, "Every firearm has such a serial number." ?"

This time, Huang Mengyu didn't answer, but only gestured to Liu Ping with his eyes, and Liu Ping stepped forward and said respectfully: "Return to the words read by Gao Shi: Every firearm has a number, but the firearms produced by the three bureaus of the Beijing Camp have a serial number." The first characters are all different, and the serial numbers produced by the local bureaus are also different. The pole you see now was produced by the Jingshi Bingzhan Bureau during the Jiajing period. The first characters are all "sheng". If it was made during the Jiajing period, the first character is 'dian'. If it was produced during the Longqing period, the Bingzhan Bureau starts with the word 'Wei', and the Military Weapons Bureau starts with the word 'Ying'."

Gao Wushi nodded, and said in his heart: It seems that this management system is not very bad, it has been numbered to every gun.

He was afraid that he would make a joke or misunderstand because of his unknown knowledge, and seeing that Liu Ping seemed to be quite familiar with his "business", and Huang Mengyu asked him to answer directly several times, maybe he meant to promote him, He simply smiled and said, "Liu Ping, I think you are quite familiar with these rules and regulations, why don't you explain them in more detail—I mean the manufacture and management of firearms."

Liu Ping was secretly delighted, and hurriedly stepped forward to introduce Gao Wushi. Seeing Gao Wushi smiled and looked at himself, Huang Mengyu immediately understood that Gao Wushi wanted to fulfill his intentions, and quickly returned a smiling face to show his gratitude.

In fact, this Liu Ping is Huang Mengyu's nephew. Although Huang Mengyu is not ten years older than Liu Ping, he is the latter's uncle.However, although the two are related, Gao Yushi found out from Liu Ping's detailed introduction that this person is really "proficient in business", not just doing nothing for nothing.

According to what Liu Ping said, the production of firearms in Daming was indeed strictly controlled by the state: "All military weapons, except for the number stored for operation, are stored in the warehouse - private production is not allowed."Although in the 12th year of Yongle, the imperial court ordered all the divisions and guards in the world to set up bureaus and manufacture military weapons, but this was limited to general cold weapons.

As for firearms, the manufacture of firearms has always been prohibited at the local level. "All firearms are under the control of the Military Bureau of the Inner Mansion, and they are not allowed to be manufactured outside." Gun Bureau manufactures firearms", but the imperial court thought that "firearms were manufactured outside, fearing that they would be passed on to Xie Xie, and ordered to stop them". Therefore, before Hongzhi, the Ming court had always used Military Weapons Bureau and Bingzhan Bureau as the main firearms production departments.

After four years of Hongzhi, the imperial court successively approved the restricted manufacture of firearms in some local guards.For example, Huguang and Guangxi were approved in the fourth year of Hongzhi; self-made weapons in Sichuan were approved in the last year of Zhengtong; Zuowei in Qingzhou was approved in five years of Zhengde; Xuzhou was approved in seven years; General firearms.This is the beginning of border self-made weapons.

In the fourth year of Jiajing, Liaodong was ordered to make its own poisonous fire artillery. In 13 years, Shanxi made some firearms by itself.However, for the military weapons manufactured by the local guards, only some hand-held copper guns and general cannons used in the castle are allowed to be produced. If there is any loss or needs to be replaced, the local officials must report it before they can build it themselves.At the same time, the firearms manufactured must also prevent others from stealing or learning: "Closely close the defense, do not reveal the style, and offenders are felonies."

The imperial court also strictly controlled the raw materials necessary for the manufacture of firearms and gunpowder, such as saltpeter.First of all, set up factory bureaus in provinces that produce saltpeter to implement official sales, and private frying of saltpeter is not allowed, and offenders will be severely punished.The second is to strictly control the circulation of saltpeter.The government issued commercial quotations to merchants who transported nitrate and sold them. These commercial quotations were issued by the chiefs of the firearms manufacturing bureaus of each province, such as Fu, Yuan, and Bingdao. They stated the amount of nitrosulfur used by the bureau before allowing merchants to pay taxes and traffic. No other official documents are permitted.In order to prevent businessmen from communicating with Japanese pirates, a sea ban was also ordered, and no nitrate was allowed on merchant ships in Fujian, Guangzhou and other places.

When Gao Wushi heard this, he was a little surprised. It turns out that the sea ban is related to this?
(End of this chapter)