Haisheng Mingdi

Chapter 356
Nanjing, Xiaoling.

Zhu Yihai summoned Zhu Shengli and Zhu Chenggong, two of the surnames given to the country. Facing these two young people, Zhu Yihai was very kind and held each other.

"My Xiaoling ascended the throne, but now I don't have a son. It's a pity. My previous three sons all met with misfortune, but now I love Erqing and want to adopt him as my adopted son. I don't know if Erqing is willing?"

The two young men were outstanding for a while, especially after being in the imperial camp at Zhu Yihai's side, they were highly valued and showed their talents.

There have long been rumors that Zhu Yihai plans to choose Zhu Chenggong as his son-in-law. Although there is no follow-up to this matter now, the two of them really impress Zhu Yihai.

"Would you like to?"

Both of them were surprised.

Adoption of adopted sons was not uncommon throughout the Ming Dynasty. For example, Zhu Yuanzhang, the founding emperor of the Ming Dynasty, had more than [-] adopted sons, including Zhu Wenzheng, Li Wenzhong, Mu Ying, He Wenhui, Xu Sima, Pingan, Zhu Wengang, and Zhu Wenjin. , King Kong slaves, buying donkeys and so on.

Let’s talk about why Zhu Yuanzhang accepted so many adopted sons. In fact, there are many reasons. First, it is an important way for the generals to cultivate the power of their cronies, or because of years of wars and turmoil, there have been many orphans, some are relatives, and some are orphans who died in battle. There are also some poor orphans, etc., who are adopted because of pity.

Zhu Yuanzhang's adoptive sons all became his confidantes. In the early days, he was a confidant guard, and later sent out to lead troops to fight, and even guard one side, all of which made great contributions to the Ming Dynasty.

Zhu Yuanzhang also often let an adopted son stay as the supervisor of the army every time he laid down a piece of land.

For example, Muying and Tang Hezeng guarded Zhenjiang together, Xu Sima assisted Chang Yuchun in guarding Wuzhou, Zhu Wengang and Geng Zaicheng guarded Chuzhou together, Jingangnu and Yexian guarded Quzhou together, etc.

The use of adopted sons to monitor and control the generals was also due to the severe and unpredictable war situation, and it was a relatively common practice at that time.

Now that Zhu Yihai wants to accept Zhu Chenggong and Zhu Shengli as adopted sons, it also has a lot of meaning.

After all, the two are not ordinary people. Zhu Shengli was originally Li Guo's adopted son, an orphan in war. When Li Guo joined Lu Jianguo, he was given the name Li Chixin and commanded the loyalty camp. He came to court and left his adopted son Li Laiheng as a guard when he left. In fact, it is also a show of loyalty to send hostages.

Li Laiheng was young and capable, and he was rewarded by Zhu Yihai with the surname of the country, which can be regarded as the end of the adoptive father-son relationship with Li Chixin, but after all, he came from Yuan Shunying, and has a closer relationship with Zhongzhen Town.

Now Zhu Yihai wants to accept him as a foster son, of course it is not easy.

The two young men were very excited, it was a rare honor to be the adopted son of the emperor, and there was no reason to refuse.

"If you want, you can kowtow and offer tea to me!"

The two young people then formally worshiped Zhu Yihai as their adoptive father.

"The central army of the imperial camp has two steps, two waters, one cavalry and one cannon, six towns with [-] soldiers, plus [-] auxiliary soldiers. The troops left behind in Jiangning and Zhenjiang are very abundant, so I plan to form the imperial camp Huguang camp and Fujian and Guangdong camps. , each of the two battalions drew [-] combat soldiers and [-] auxiliary soldiers from the six towns, making a total of [-] infantry, [-] sailors, [-] cavalry, [-] artillery, and [-] auxiliary soldiers.

"Victory, you are the admiral of the Huguang camp, with a total of 160 people in the water, land and horse infantry. You will set up twelve battalions. You will go up the Yangtze River and go to Changsha to garrison. The Qing army has now abandoned Changsha and gathered in Wuchang, dividing troops to garrison Jingzhou, Xiangyang, make every effort to restore the two cities, and divide the troops to Yuezhou. Huguang is still corrupt, but we can't let them breathe. Master Zhu is currently encircling and suppressing the rebels in the three towns of Zhongwu, Zhongyong, and Zhongyi in Hengzhou, Guilin and other places. After you pass by, your main task is to contain the Huguang Qing army and not let them recover with peace of mind."

"Can you bear this burden?"

Zhu Shengli was very excited to be directly awarded the title of admiral, especially the admiral was the imperial camp.

This trust is remarkable.

After the collapse of Huguang, most of the loyal, military, loyal, loyal and loyal either surrendered or rebelled. Now the Jianghan Plain is almost lost. Retreating to the mountainous areas, we must prevent the Tartars from advancing and suppress the rebels. Fighting on two fronts, we have to face vacillating places Chieftains, Zhu Dadian is also very difficult. Even Zhang Mingzhen, the admiral of Liangjiang, led troops to reinforce, but the place is far and backward, and it is not easy to encircle and suppress.

If the pustule is not picked clean, there is no way to compete with the Qing army in Huguang.

Of course, for Zhu Yihai, the biggest problem in Huguang now is that the various people there are not reliable now.

Even if the three loyalists who have rebelled and surrendered are eliminated, the remaining Zhongkai Zhongzhen may not be completely credible. These are all local warlords, especially the town of Zhongzhen, which is Shunying.

With the previous lessons, now Zhu Yihai still believes in his imperial camp the most.

This time sending the young tiger Zhu Shengli back from the Shun camp, Li Chixin from the Zhongzhen camp, Gao Bizheng and the others would have a big reaction. After all, Zhu Shengli is Li Chixin's adopted son, even if it's not the case now, But there is still such a layer of origin.

Now Zhu Yihai needs to send his own central army to Huguang, but also not to irritate the local army there too much, especially the loyalty camp from Shunying. Zhu Shengli's identity is quite good.

The 8000 troops are not too many, and even if they are newly expanded, they are already an imperial army that has won many victories and even severely damaged the Tartars. very strong.

With these 8000 people as the foundation, Zhu Yihai's authority as the Son of Heaven can be truly established there.

With governors such as Zhu Dadian, Du Yinxi, and Xu Qiyuan, it will be possible to change the possibility of Huguang breaking away from central control, and even in this kind of war, the possibility of forming a local warlord that cannot be lost.

One of the biggest reasons for the failure of the emperors of the Nanming Dynasty was that Tian Zikong had only the name of emperor, and the local area was basically reduced to the separatist control of warlords.

There are many reasons for the collapse of the lake before, but the most important one is that although the five loyalists have a large number of people, their composition is complicated. They are all Caotou kings who support soldiers, and there are not many governors who are willing to obey the imperial court or the imperial court. command.

This loss was too great. There was no way to do it at the time, but now we have to change it.

The Yuying Huguangxing Battalion will be built first, and after 8000 people have a firm foothold there, the local army can continue to be reorganized.

For example, in Huguang, five or six town generals were organized to control the number of soldiers and horses and ensure the imperial court's control over them, instead of being full of generals and deputy generals, regardless of soldiers and thieves.

"You, the admiral of the camp, have arrived there, and you must cooperate with Governor Zhu and several governors and admirals to stabilize Huguang together."

Zhu Yihai used the word "cooperate" instead of "following the dispatch of the supervisor" because Zhu Shengli was the admiral of the imperial battalion, and the imperial battalion was not even qualified to command the cabinet and the Ministry of War, and was directly subordinate to the emperor.

The governors and governors also manage military affairs, referring to the training of local, provincial, town battalion soldiers, and township valor regiments.

This is also the reason why Zhu Yihai specially set up the imperial camp in Huguang, instead of granting Zhu Shengli Huguang admirals and other official positions.

If Huguang wants to control it, it must first order and unify, but the current situation is not easy. Zhu Dadian, the supervisor, does not even have a pavilion that he can really control. The three governors of Huguang, Pianyuan, and Yunyang The situation is similar, but there are too many soldiers and horses who are loyal and loyal, and they can be expanded at will.

There are many other generals, and they are basically independent military leaders.

After the establishment of the Huguang imperial camp, it will be a system of one governor, three governors, three admirals, and several military guards to establish a real pacesetter force. These troops will be new troops that can obey the emperor's will.

The original Zhongzheng, Zhongkai, and Zhongyi parts will be standardized. For example, Zhongzhen will retain a town with a maximum of five thousand soldiers and ten battalions. The rest of the troops will be transferred to auxiliary soldiers, or Transfer to local regiment training, or simply demobilize, resettle on the spot, and keep the establishment of the Baojia militia.

The weak branches must be the backbone, otherwise authority will be difficult to carry out.

Although this road is not easy to walk, this first step must be taken.

The Huguang camp with more than [-] people is the first step. Zhu Shengli will go to the admiral's camp as the emperor's adoptive son bestowing the country's surname.

"Success!"

Zhu Yihai pulled Zhu Chenggong over, patted him on the arm and said, "You have a family background in the naval division, and you also have a lot of research on horse-style land warfare. Among the young people I personally taught, you and Shengli are the same. It's the best."

"I plan to ask you to bring [-] people to Fujian to form a camp."

Zhu Chenggong was a little silent. Compared with Zhu Shengli's joy, Zhu Shengli was very willing to go back to Huguang, especially as the admiral of the camp.

But Zhu Chenggong remained silent. He had already guessed the emperor's intention.

Eighteen years ago, when Zheng Zhilong led an army to capture Xiamen, the commander-in-chief Yu Zigao fled, and Xu Xinsu was killed, Zheng Zhilong occupied Xiamen and took Xiamen, Kinmen, Anhai and other places as his base camp.

After 18 years of operation, especially taking advantage of the collapse of the Ming Dynasty, Zheng Zhilong regarded Fujian as his private territory.

There have been more than one conflicts with the governor Zhang Kentang before. After Zhang Kentang went south with He Tengjiao and returned to Fujian for the second time, the conflict became more and more intense. Zhang Kentang was even squeezed to Taiwan Island by Zheng Zhilong.

I heard that Zhang Kentang is not going well in Taiwan. The Dutch have been operating in Taiwan for decades. They have a very complete fortification consisting of a castle as the center and multiple forts, half-circle forts, wooden fences, and trenches.

Although the Dutch army has only about [-] people, there are hundreds of cannons in the city and the bastions outside, and they also have sailing warships far surpassing the Chinese navy.

It can even be reinforced from Batavia.

Zheng Zhilong accepted Zhu Yihai's will and formed an army to conquer Taiwan. The biggest enemy he faced was not the islanders on the island, but the Dutch who occupied the Dayuan area.

Zheng was well aware of the strength of the Dutch, and had even been doing business with the Dutch, but he deliberately arranged for Zhang Kentang to take his Fubiao to attack, just to kill with a knife.

Zhang Kentang's Fubiao was also newly recruited, most of them were from the former Fujian local Ming army, many of them were guard soldiers, and their combat effectiveness was extremely weak.

"After the Fujian-Guangdong camp went south, they first stationed in Funing, then went to Penghu, where they rebuilt castles, ports, etc., and then marched into Taiwan, defeated the Dutch, and recovered the officials."

(End of this chapter)