Daming kill

Chapter 236 Make persistent efforts
On July 16rd of the [-]th year of Chongzhen, Li Ping, who was pretending to be sick in Fuchi, suddenly received an urgent report that the peasant army in Wuchang suddenly poured out from July [-]nd and went south in a large scale, seemingly intending to leave Wuchang.

Since the peasant army marching southward by land and water, covering the sky and covering the sun, and reaching tens of miles from the beginning to the end, the possibility of fraud is very low.

Shocked, Li Ping quickly made a decision and ordered Ma Yong to immediately command the Second Regiment and the first part of the Third Regiment to launch a tentative attack on Wuchang County with the cooperation of the artillery battalion directly under it.

Because the attack was tentative and knowing Li Ping's previous predictions, the troops led by Ma Yong started the tentative attack the day after they arrived in Wuchang County on the evening of July [-]th without adequate preparations. Siege.

But what is unexpected is that on the first day of the siege on July [-]th, the troops actually bombarded the gate of Wuchang County with cannons and quickly occupied the city, and captured the false magistrate in the city.

Since the siege of the city was not organized before the attack, and the cavalry unit only sent one company to take on the cover task, the main reason was that it would go so smoothly. Many peasant troops ran away as soon as the city was breached, resulting in a very low total number of enemies wiped out. , less than 300 people.

Surprised, Ma Yong immediately organized an interrogation of the captives and got an answer quickly.

It turned out that most of the troops in Wuchang County, which originally had nearly [-] guards, were secretly transferred away a few days ago. The remaining troops in the city were less than [-] and almost all of them were recruits.

As for Zhang Xianzhong's southward move, the remaining defenders in the city, including the false county magistrate, knew about it no earlier than Li Ping. This also caused the defenders who found themselves to be abandoned to panic and have no fighting spirit.

However, for the sake of safety, Li Ping did not order the troops to continue to follow the trend, but asked the troops to organize defenses on the spot.

But in the next few days, the peasant army in Wuchang City was completely indifferent to the fall of Wuchang County, and Zhang Xianzhong's army that went south showed no signs of turning around.

Based on this, Li Ping officially issued an order for the entire army to attack Wuchang City on July [-], while he himself continued to pretend to be sick in Fuchi, only conducting remote command.

However, in order to strengthen command and control, Zhou Wen was appointed as Ma Yong's deputy by him again, and Shi Lei was also appointed as Duan Qiang's deputy.

On July [-], the naval battalion under Yan Ming's command took advantage of artillery to destroy more than [-] Peasant Army boats and captured more than [-] boats in the Jinshazhou area of ​​the Yangtze River. do.

At the same time, all the pontoon bridges on the Xunsi River connecting Jinshazhou and the mainland were destroyed.

Subsequently, the navy battalion shelled the peasant army stationed on Jinshazhou, and covered the three infantry battalions of the second regiment to land on Jinshazhou.

Since Zhang Xianzhong's adopted son Sihu who was stationed at Jinshazhou died directly from the shelling, and many of his troops were also frightened by the unprecedented shelling. The landing of the second regiment did not encounter any resistance, but easily occupied the entire Jinshazhou sandbar.

On July [-], Zhou Peng, who was transferred from the deputy chief of staff of the brigade to be the head of the Second Regiment, commanded the other two battalions of the Second Regiment and a company of temporarily assigned cavalry to land in Hanyang and march towards Hanyang County.

Their task is to lead and prepare for the attack on Hanyang County.

But what is surprising is that more than 1000 peasant troops in Hanyang County actually went out of the city to fight.

Zhou Peng then arranged the only two blunderbuss companies in a straight line to fire a salvo, and at the same time ordered the cavalry company to attack the right wing of the peasant army.

The peasant army collapsed immediately.

Zhou Peng took advantage of the situation to organize troops to cover up and kill, and quickly occupied Hanyang County.

At this time, Xie Fengzhou, the highest civil official and governor of Huguang, who was left behind by Zhang Xianzhong in Wuchang, and Zhang Qizai, the highest military general, were all terrified. They did not take any response to Li Ping's military actions in the past two days.

Xie Fengzhou even committed suicide on the night of the [-]th.

Xie Fengzhou is a native of Jiangxia. He was originally appointed by Zhang Xianzhong as the governor of Wuchang. However, Li Shirong (the person who advised Zhang Xianzhong to attack Wuchang) who was appointed by Zhang Xianzhong as the governor died of illness within a few days. Xie Fengzhou took over as governor, but his Life is obviously not very good.

Seeing that things were not going well, Zhang Qiyu led thousands of peasant troops in the city to open the security gates and fled south after setting fire to the Yellow Crane Tower and the clan mansion on July [-].

Because the enemy fled too quickly and suddenly and had a large number of troops, the three infantry battalions deployed on Jinshazhou did not attack to intercept or pursue them.

Many of the First Regiment, the Third Regiment and a Cavalry Battalion assembled outside Wushengmen (North Gate) in Wuchang City are still organizing to disembark. They originally planned to attack Hanyang County first, but since Hanyang County has been conquered this It was temporarily adjusted to station troops outside Wushengmen under the cover of the navy battalion to prepare for attacking Wuchang City.

At this time, it was too late to react even if I wanted to.

They just broke into the city quickly after discovering the anomaly, and then occupied the entire Wuchang City.

Li Ping was startled that Wuchang was taken down so easily.

But after thinking about it, he decided to continue to pretend to be sick, and to pretend to be more serious.

After learning that Li Ping's troops captured Wuchang, Yuan Jixian, the right servant of the military department who had been depressed in Guangji County, was overjoyed.

He had been persuading Zuo Liangyu to send troops to attack Huangzhou's capital city before, but Zuo Liangyu always used the excuse that Zhang Xianzhong's strength had not been greatly damaged and he could not advance lightly. However, not to mention the Xishui River and even Bashui on the side of Huangzhou Fucheng.

Even after hearing the news that Zhang Xianzhong's army had left Wuchang and went south, Zuo Liangyu still didn't move, saying that he wanted to prevent fraud.

This directly turned Yuan Jixian's anxious face green.

You must know that at this time, even the governor of Fengyang, Ma Shiying, has reached out his hand and made great achievements, but Yuan Jixian has not made any achievements. explain.

Li Ping's great victory in Daye County, Yuan Jixian, who is a fastidious person, is not ashamed to put gold on his face.

Facing the chaos in Huguang, Ma Shiying, the governor far away in Shouzhou, Fengyang Prefecture, did not sit idly by. Instead, he sent Huang Ding, a student from Lu'an, to sneak into the villages in Macheng to seek Liu Qiao (who sent a concubine to Zhang Xianzhong through Zhou Wenjiang) and the largest landlord in Macheng who provided a large amount of gold and silver support to save his life), Tian Shenglan, Zhou Congji, etc. persuaded Zhou Wenjiang to go anyway.

Zhou Wenjiang, Minister of the Ministry of War of Zhang Xianzhong and magistrate of Macheng, went anyway. He not only led the soldiers and horses of various villages who were still willing to be loyal to Daming to behead Fang Zixiong, the thief general, but also sent the thief who first went to Qianshan, Anhui to seek Zhang Xianzhong's support and was later appointed as the captain of Macheng. Tang Zhi was caught.

Tang Zhi was actually the highest military attache of the Peasant Army in the Macheng area, and Zhang Xianzhong left him 4000 troops when he left Macheng.He has been working hard to eliminate those cottages that are unwilling to submit to the peasant army and has achieved great success. It can be said that his hands are stained with blood loyal to the Ming forces.

Tang Zhi was killed shortly after he was caught.

The change in Macheng must have had a certain impact on Zhang Xianzhong, and played a certain role in fueling his departure from Wuchang.

Moreover, under the influence of the Macheng Change, the armed landlords in Huang'an County (now Hong'an County) in the northwest of Macheng quickly re-occupied the county seat and killed the pseudo-prefect. Even Huangpi County (which was later abandoned by Li Zicheng's troops) also After Zhang Xianzhong's army went south, it was quickly reoccupied by the armed forces of the Ming landlords and gentry.

But all of this has nothing to do with Yuan Jixian, it is Ma Shiying's credit, including Tang Zhi's head, who was passed to Shouzhou to report victory.

So, how could Yuan Jixian not be in a hurry, and how could he not be overjoyed when he learned that Li Ping had occupied Wuchang.

At this time, Yuan Jixian didn't care about Zuo Liangyu anymore, but quickly ran to Fuchi by boat, and then rushed to Wuchang after meeting Li Ping in a hurry.

Zuo Liangyu also looked puzzled.

He really didn't expect Zhang Xianzhong to be so weak, let alone Li Ping to be so bold.

At this time, Zuo Liangyu finally lost his temper, and hurriedly ordered all his ministries to march from Jiangbei to Wuchang.

However, Zuo Liangyu was still a step too late. Huangzhou Fucheng, which was demolished by Zhang Xianzhong, was first captured by Yi Daosan, the head of Baiyun Village who discovered Wuchang and the entire Jiangbei Great Change, and Huang Yuankai, the false prefect, escaped.

In desperation, Zuo Liangyu could only unite with the Qihuang villages in the mountains to the north to attack other small counties.

At this time, Li Ping also had to issue another urgent order.

All the troops occupying Wuchang City were ordered to withdraw from the city to garrison Hanyang, while he himself continued to pretend to be sick in Fuchi.

On July [-], the army led by Zuo Liangyu finally arrived in Wuchang City by boat and then took over the whole city.

Perhaps also anxious and angry, Zuo Liangyu then ordered Wang Yuncheng, who had just disembarked, to organize a cavalry raid on Jinkou, dozens of miles south of Wuchang City.

The peasant troops who fought for Zhang Xianzhong in Jinkou were defeated, and Deng Yuncheng, the puppet general, was killed.

This also became Zuo Liangyu's only victory in the entire Wuchang Incident.

With the capture of Wuchang and the capture of a large number of fake officials, the main reason why Zhang Xianzhong suddenly left Wuchang gradually surfaced.

It turned out that after Zhang Xianzhong broke through Hanyang, Li Zicheng was already very unhappy (his plan to go north had been decided), in order to scare Zhang Xianzhong away, Li Zicheng directly posted a bulletin to let the people know: "Whoever can capture and offer loyalty will be rewarded with a thousand gold."

But unexpectedly, Zhang Xianzhong then captured Wuchang, and Li Zicheng was even more angry and disturbed.

This time, Li Zicheng directly sent an envoy to congratulate Zhang Xianzhong, and said in the congratulatory letter: "The old Hui who gathered together for righteousness has surrendered to me, and other leaders such as Cao Cao, Ge Liyan, and Zuo Jinlong were all killed by me. it's your turn!"

Frightened, Zhang Xianzhong immediately dispatched [-] cavalry with a large amount of gold, silver and jewels picked from the palace of Chu to present Li Zicheng with heavy gifts for peace, but Li Zicheng detained the envoy and refused to answer.

This made Zhang Xianzhong very worried.

At this time, Zhang Xianzhong experienced the defeat of Daye County again, and his elite troops from Macheng, which is also the largest in number, also lost their morale even more because of the loss of Macheng.

As a last resort, Zhang Xianzhong could only choose to leave Wuchang and issue an order to attack Yuezhou, in order to break away from contact with Li Zicheng's troops and hope to regain the morale of the army by falling into a major city with less strong guards.

For this reason, Zhang Xianzhong wantonly expanded his troops, and recorded men under 20 and over [-] around Wuchang as soldiers, and finally the total strength of the troops that went south from Wuchang was close to [-].

And with Zuo Liangyu occupying Wuchang, Li Ping couldn't stay in Fuchi any longer, unless he planned to give up his plan to enter Sichuan.

On July 25th, Li Ping, Gao Lei and Zhao Lanyue boarded the boat at the wharf in Fuchi.

Song Baolai, who came back from seeing Shi Ming and Zhao Jin long ago, was not on the same boat with them, and he would stay for a few more days to make the final touches.

Watching the scenery that he had lived for half a year fade away, Li Ping, who could only sit in the cabin and look out the window secretly in order to pretend to be sick, couldn't help worrying about gains and losses.

He left too much painstaking effort here, and he gave up as soon as he said it. It is impossible not to be unwilling in his heart.

And people are always afraid of change, especially if he chooses an uncertain path full of huge risks.

Maybe going with the flow is also an option.

But Li Ping knew that he would be even more unwilling. He didn't want to live by idling, and he didn't want to face China's sinking. He really didn't try anything.

And Zhang Xianzhong is his touchstone, and Sichuan is the only opportunity he can think of at the moment.

If in the end he can't even beat Zhang Xianzhong to the death and is unable to occupy Sichuan, then no matter how ambitious he is, it will no longer be meaningful.

It's just that, he and they may die, or die earlier, and even a second of life is what people are greedy for.

Li Ping didn't know whether his arbitrary decision was right or wrong.

On the deck of the cabin, Gao Lei and Zhao Lanyue also looked at the familiar mountains and rivers in the distance for a long time and remained silent. They were more afraid of changes, and they knew clearly what Li Ping's choice meant.

But they never expressed any uneasiness or opposition to Li Ping, but chose to support and follow Li Ping's arrangement.

……

On July 16, the 27th year of Chongzhen, Li Ping arrived in Hanyang, and then lived directly in the military camp outside Hanyang County.

He didn't go to see Zuo Liangyu, he continued to pretend to be sick.

(End of this chapter)