Back to Ming Dynasty with Industrial Revolution System

Chapter 1471 London Militia
"Shopkeeper, have you heard? The king's army is only thirty miles away from the city of London, and it will soon enter the city of London. I see that people in the city are panicking recently, and I wonder if our teahouse will be attacked."

The teahouse in the city immediately spread the news that the king was approaching the city of London. This was the news brought by the nobles who often gathered in the teahouse.

After responding to the king's call, the royalist nobles left the city of London and returned to their home county to recruit militia to serve the king.Now most of the city of London are parliamentary aristocrats and neutral aristocrats.

They believed that the Huaxia people did not intervene in the struggle between the king and the parliament, so they continued to discuss various things in the teahouse as usual.

Little did they know that this kind of place where nobles were active was itself a good place to collect information, and all kinds of news from the front came back one after another.

They all knew of the battle at Edge Hill, between the king's army and the council's army.This result has mixed feelings for Parliament.The good news is that the king did not have an absolute advantage in dealing with the parliament. The worry is that half of the people support the king. The king and the parliament are basically split [-]-[-].

A few days after the end of the battle, the news that the king's army captured Oxford and pulled out the outlying towns of London came like snowflakes, causing the whole city of London to fall into panic.

The city of London has a population of several 10, the largest city in continental Europe, and the peace in Britain for more than 100 years. At this time, the city of London has almost no fortifications, and can only use some small towns around it as barriers.And now the vanguard of the King's Army is only 7 miles away from the city of London!

Many urban civilians and nobles are spreading the word that the king's army will approach London within 3 days.

Once the king returns to the palace, he will definitely punish the parliament and the people of London who opposed it severely!
"Even if the king's army enters the city, it won't do anything to us. It's better to say that the war ends sooner. You can see that our teahouse is still lively, and the sales of other shops are bleak due to the decline in the purchasing power of the common people. For the common people, The most important things during the war are food and daily necessities. Didn’t you find that the prices of bread, cheese, and sugar in the city have risen sharply? The money in the hands of civilians is used to buy food, and the demand for porcelain, tea, and textiles will drop. .”

"And those nobles who are our big customers are not very active in buying our goods. The royalist nobles fled the city of London, and the remaining parliamentary nobles spent their money on recruiting militias, hoarding food and gunpowder. If We can sell them a large number of firearms, which can make a fortune, but our factory is on the site of the parliament, but we cannot sell firearms to the parliament, so we can only watch this profitable business for the British firearms dealers and Westerners. The firearms dealers in other countries divide it up. The pig iron and steel used by these firearms dealers are still purchased from our smelters."

The shopkeeper of the teahouse couldn't help telling the waiter about the recent depression in the business of their Chinese merchants in London when they were keeping accounts.

It’s not that the parliament intends to target their merchants from the East, but the war has reduced everyone’s purchasing power for the goods they brought. Except for pig iron and steel, which are selling well because of the war, the sales of other luxury goods have declined.

"My nobleman who fled from outside the city said that there is a general from the east in the king's army who is helping the king lead a cavalry to attack the city. That person seems to be Mr. Sun who went to support the king. The treasurer, you mean a member of the council Will our teahouse be closed down because of this incident?" asked the waiter.

The shopkeeper shook his head: "No, Mr. Sun participated in the king's army as an individual. This type of service is very common in the West. There are a large number of nobles in Britain in the armies of the Netherlands, Sweden, France and other countries. countries will not take their anger on the country because of this kind of employment behavior."

While the two were talking, there was a loud noise coming from outside the teahouse, and the noise was so loud that the British nobles, waiters, and shopkeepers in the teahouse couldn't help but look in the direction of the teahouse.

"Go out and see what's going on?" the shopkeeper said to a shop waiter.

"Hey!" The waiter opened the door and found that there were rows of civilian militias on the street. They passed the street where the teahouse was located, and the dense footsteps and voices seemed a bit noisy.

This militia consisted of craftsmen, apprentices in family workshops, and ordinary urban civilians. Only a few of them were equipped with matchlock guns, and most of them held backward weapons such as wooden sticks and spears.

"What happened here? Could it be that the King's Army is already attacking the city of London?" Seeing a huge militia team suddenly gathered in the city, the waiter thought of the King's Army less than 7 miles away from the city of London.

No one would believe that this quickly organized militia had nothing to do with the king's army that was about to approach the city.

The British nobles in the teahouse could also see the passing militia through the glass windows and the wide-open wooden door, which caused the nobles to whisper.

"The king will soon lead the knights who support him into the city of London. The parliament organized more than 5000 civilians in the city to join the main force of the Earl of Essex outside the city, planning to fight the king again outside the city of London. Defend the City of London!"

"If the tyrant Charles returns, he will definitely increase the taxation of our city of London. He has allocated the monopoly rights of many commodities to some nobles who are willing to spend money to buy them. These people monopolize industry, commerce and customs duties, so that other nobles and merchants cannot intervene. , it's really God's resentment..."

"Fight hard. Don't let the king succeed easily. The parliament must have legislative power to limit the king's abuse of his power."

Most of the teahouses were nobles from the parliamentary faction and the neutral faction. They learned that the militia formed in the city of London were going out of the city to fight the king's army, and they all stood on the side of the parliament this time.

The area controlled by the parliament represented by the City of London is economically developed and densely populated. At the same time, four fifths of England's tax revenue comes from these areas.It is not clear whether Charles I's loss of popular support in the city of London is the inevitable result of the economic development of the city of London or Charles I's own problem, but the city of London is a royal city, and its citizens have to stand opposite the king.When the city of London was in a hurry, the militia team of the city of London rushed to the front line!

"I don't know if the militia in London will affect the King's Army supported by Sun Chuanting..." The shopkeeper of the teahouse was full of worries, after all, they supported the King's Army.

(End of this chapter)