The Soul of the Han Dynasty in the Late Ming Dynasty

Chapter 407
After departing from Jinzhou, the average speed of the 68 ships in the mixed fleet reached about four knots.

Due to the calm sea, the pilot captain and sailors are experienced horses who have traveled the Japanese route at least three times, so it is possible to travel day and night.

Of course, the eighteen warships are the largest in the "Red Banner Army" navy with the largest displacement and the most artillery. The largest one is of course the flagship, reaching 880 tons.

This warship is equipped with 32 Franji [-]-pound guns on both sides, [-] on the left and right sides, and eight [-]-pound front-mounted Hongyi cannons are on the bottom gun deck, four on the left and right sides.

Both the bow and stern guns are front-mounted Hongyi cannons with an effective range more than double that of the rear-mounted guns of the Francophone. There is one 32-pound and two 24-pound heavy guns at the bow, and two [-]-pound guns at the stern.

The muzzle can be rotated [-] degrees left and right, which means that the bow and stern guns can join the battle group when the battle line is fired.

Warships with a displacement between [-] and [-] tons are equipped with different equipment. The caliber of the artillery is doubled, and the number is about [-]. Warships of [-] to [-] tons are equipped with about [-] artillery pieces.

The tonnage of the battleship used by Huang Han is close to 850 tons, which is equivalent to the number of artillery fire of Huang Yong's flagship, but the forty guns on both sides are all rear-loaded [-]-pound guns with sub-guns, and they need to be pulled back to the gun compartment after firing. Loaded front-loading eighteen-pound Hongyi cannon.

At this time, Asia was the only warship equipped with about forty guns, and it was also one of the few first-class warships in Europe. After all, it will be 20 years later to line up the battle line and strike the enemy ship with absolute firepower.

That was in the first Anglo-Dutch war 20 years later, the British issued the "Maritime Operations Doctrine", which stipulated that all warships of each squadron must try their best to maintain the front line with their squadron leaders.

This is the origin of the "battle line". The warships arranged in battle lines to bombard enemy ships naturally have the name of battleships.

In the following years, the British divided the battleships into different levels. The first-class battleship with a capacity of 900 people had a three-layer gun deck, equipped with more than [-] artillery pieces, and had a displacement of about [-] tons.

The so-called naval battles in Asia are still very primitive. The warships all adopt the tactics of big ships hitting small ships and using fire boats to burn the enemy's big ships.

Most of the warships of the two sides approached and dispatched infantry to join the ship. They had to test the personal force and courage of the fighters at sea. It was still face-to-face hand-to-hand combat to determine the outcome.

The naval battles in Europe are different. Firepower has gradually attracted attention. Mutual bombardment is the main part of the war. The last thing is to approach the enemy ship and send infantry to join the gang to fight for the spoils.

At this time, when the Spaniards and the Dutch fought naval battles, in order to maximize their benefits, they always carried a large number of infantry for the boarding battle to seize the ship. Too many warships full of infantry were destroyed by artillery fire, resulting in horrific casualties.

Now the No. [-] sea power in Asia is naturally Zheng Yiguan Pirate Group. He has now changed his name to Zheng Zhilong, and his subordinates are called Shibazhi.

There are Zheng Zhihu, Zheng Zhibao, Zheng Zhiwan, Zheng Zhifeng and other Zheng brothers as confidantes, commanding thousands of warships and armed merchant ships. It is said that there are as many as [-] to [-] people.

In the first year of Chongzhen, the Zheng Zhilong Pirate Group was recruited by the Ming Dynasty and became a nominal naval division of the Ming Dynasty. Zheng Zhilong obtained the official status of a coastal defense guerrilla.

In addition to Zheng Zhilong's navy, which is also a soldier and a thief, there are also Zhejiang, Guangdong, Denglai, Tianjinwei, Shanhaiguan and other water battalions, including Huang Yong's Lushunkoushui battalion, which also belongs to Daming's maritime forces.

It's just that Ming didn't pay attention to the development of the navy at all. In fact, there was no way to develop the navy at the end of the Ming Dynasty when corruption was rampant, because it was even more uncontrollable.

Maritime smuggling is lucrative and convenient. It is not uncommon for civil and military generals in command of the navy to use the country's warships to make a fortune for themselves.

In the end, the navy invested by the country was not trained and became a private transport team. When it encountered powerful pirates, it had no power to fight. As a result, the entire army was wiped out or captured by pirates to enhance its maritime strength.

At this time, the Wa Kingdom had not completely controlled the four major islands. The main island, Kyushu, and the three islands of Shikoku were basically transformed into kings, and they also stepped out of the Warring States Period and ushered in peace. No one has been able to fully control that big cold island.

The strength of the Wa Kingdom is limited. In the Wanli year, the Battle of Wenlu and the Battle of Qingchang were launched. The Korean history books of Lee's family called it the Imjin Patriotic War.

For this reason, Toyotomi Hideyoshi fell ill and soon died of illness. The general Tokugawa Ieyasu took the opportunity to seize power and established the Tokugawa Shogunate.

The current population of the Wa country may be between 500 million and 800 million. Since the Tokugawa shogunate has lasted for three generations, the attacks between the daimyos have stopped, and the Warring States period of this country has gone. Recovery productivity was developed.

The most intolerable thing in this country now is the infiltration and spread of Catholicism. Conflicts between Christians and shogunate troops occurred frequently in Kyushu Island. Therefore, the Tokugawa shogunate hated the trade from Xiyi and was happy to communicate with the Ming Dynasty.

At this time, the Wa country admired the Han civilization, and hoped to obtain goods such as porcelain, silk, cloth, tea, books, etc. from the Ming Dynasty. When the Tokugawa shogunate closed the country and restricted the merchants of the Western Yi, it did not restrict the merchants of the Ming Dynasty and allowed the Wa country to trade with Daming.

When Huang Han's fleet set off, they did not carry much food, and the first planned supply point was the largest seaport in Jeolla Province in North Korea.

There was no accident. Although Huang Han's force was strong enough to go ashore and ransack this seaside city of North Korea, he resisted the impulse. Under the horrified eyes of North Korean soldiers and civilians, the strong and powerful Deming fleet used some porcelain They exchanged rice, bacon, eggs, fruits and vegetables.

It wasn't until the huge and invincible fleet left that the Koryo sticks at the port cheered. They swarmed up and commented on the porcelain left by the fleet. Finally, they all agreed that the exchange not only did not suffer losses, but also made a lot of money.

Leaving Jeolla-do and going further east, you come to the waters of the Godo Islands. There are more natural seaports on the islands, and they are traditional hiding places for pirates.

This is the characteristic of pirates and sea-ship activities. It is really an endless sea. It is a sea area without islands or continents within hundreds of nautical miles. In this era, there are few sea-going ships.

There are many merchant ships and cargo ships in the sea area with many islands, so there are also many pirates. This is similar to the prairie. Only where there are many sheep will there be a large number of wolves, tigers and leopards.

(End of this chapter)