Haisheng Mingdi

Chapter 397
Under Zhu Yihai's military merit reward system, when soldiers fight a battle, they first have to look at the scale of the battle and the results. The number of special military exploits.

Secondly, those who jumped, pioneered into the city, and broke the formation were rewarded with official silver rewards, and those who won the first rank also received military merit rewards, and they could even be promoted based on their heads.

In short, Zhu Yihai's new reward system is more generous than that of Ming Dynasty, and it can motivate soldiers better.

It is said that Zhang Dapeng and the others wiped out fifty yellow thieves. This is not a small feat. After all, they only wiped out 50 people with four people.

The yellow bandits killed were bandits from the mainland, the lowest grade, and the most worthless head work, but it is head work after all, first-class Eight Banners Manchuria, second-class Eight Banners Mongolia, Eight Banners Han Army, third-class Green Camp, fourth-class Miaoman , the fifth-class inland thieves, and the sixth-class bandits.

Zhang Xianzhong's Xiying can be regarded as the fifth-class inland bandits, while the Yellow Bandits can only be regarded as the last sixth-class bandits.

To kill the Eight Banners Manchurian Tartars, one head can be upgraded to one level, but to kill the Yellow Thieves, six heads can be upgraded to one level.

A total of [-] people were killed, but Zhang Dapeng didn't take credit for it, and carefully commented on the credit with everyone.

"I killed nine, Yang Wei killed seven, Liu Chengzu killed seven, Ma Liang killed five...

Zhang Xian killed six...
The one-armed Zhang Xian hurriedly said, "Actually, four of the six I killed were killed by Zhang Shoubei. I just made up a knife, so it can't be counted as mine."

Zhang Dapeng said, "You killed what you killed, but there is no such thing as whether to make up for it or not. This is your first-level merit, and I will count it as meritorious service."

Although Zhang Xian felt that the credit was a bit hot, Zhang Dapeng still insisted and asked Zhou Xiucai to record it truthfully.

Not only recorded the beheading of each person truthfully, but also recorded in detail the age, appearance, gender, age, etc. of the thieves each beheaded.

After the final registration was completed, Zhang Xian and the others still felt that it was not appropriate, why half of the credit for the fifty thieves was due to these cripples.

Especially the better ones were obviously just made up after being knocked down by the four of Zhang Dapeng and the others.

But Dapeng still insisted.

"Why don't we just record these young and strong men in the names of the guards, and record these old and weak women in our names?" Zhang Xian asked again.

Zhou Xiucai also thought it was good. After all, he also heard from Zhang Dapeng that the military achievements in the imperial camp were very complicated.

These yellow thieves are at most sixth-class military merit, and only the young and strong can be rewarded for promotion, while the rest of the women, children, old and weak are only rewarded with money. This is still a big difference.

"It doesn't need to be like this. I, Zhang Dapeng, am not the kind of person who is greedy for meritorious deeds. Besides, I'm just a mere thieves."

"Record it as it is."

The first-level merit is sixth-class, and the head of the Eight Banners Manzhou is 60 taels of silver.And if it is captured alive, add five taels of silver, and if it is a beheaded woman, old or young, then subtract five taels of silver.

Zhang Dapeng beheaded nine of them, all of them were young and strong, one was ten taels, and nine were 90 taels. The six-level young and strong can be promoted to one level.

This time is enough for him to go up a level.

He was on guard as a battalion officer, with five hundred soldiers and one hundred and eight auxiliary soldiers under him. According to the rules, an officer of his level could only be promoted to a higher level if his subordinates beheaded more than ten heads.

Fortunately, he killed nine of them, and 41 of them were killed by others, a total of fifty levels, which is enough to advance to one level.

The first level The first level originated from the first merit system of the Qin Dynasty. Beheading a head can be promoted to a rank, so it is called the first level, the first level of merit.

In the Shaotian Dynasty of the Ming Dynasty today, ordinary soldiers who cut off the heads of the Eight Banners and Manchuria can be promoted to one level, and can be promoted to a maximum of three levels, while beheading yellow thieves, the lowest inland bandits, requires six to be promoted to one level. .

As for rewarding silver, ten taels of silver for the head of a thief, five taels of silver for the old and the young, is actually not too much. You must know that in the Jiajing and Wanli periods of the Ming Dynasty, the first-level rewards for the Liaodong Jurchen and Southeast Japanese pirates had already reached 50 taels, or even [-] taels. One hundred taels.

Although there are many rewards, it is not easy to get the rewards. After all, you have to defeat the enemy first, then cut off the head, and you have to take it back and have it passed the inspection by the officials sent by the superior.

And in many cases, the head cannot be cut off and taken away in battle. Without the head, there is no head skill. Especially the head of the Liaodong Jurchens is even more rare, and it cannot be beaten. It is even more difficult to take away the head of others.

During the reign of Chongzhen, a small courtyard house in Beijing cost only five or sixty taels of silver. The standard given by the imperial court was basically a suite with a head.

But it is very difficult to get it, so all kinds of killing good people for meritorious service, grabbing heads in the battlefield, and even buying and selling work are serious, because heads are hard currency, very valuable, and can even be promoted.

This is like someone in later generations spending 500 million to buy a 500 million lottery ticket at someone else’s home. He has to pay taxes and donations to receive the prize. In the end, he only got more than 300 million and lost more than 100 million at once. Why did he buy it?

Because it can turn black into white, wash.

The same is true in the army of the Ming Dynasty. Some sons of aristocratic families or generals have no credit for themselves, so they buy heads with silver. Your head is originally worth 50 taels. He may give you 60 taels or even 100 taels of silver. Buy it and report it , why?
Because the first rank can not only be exchanged for silver rewards, but also save heads to advance to official ranks.

At that time, the Qi family army felt that this kind of head-level military merit was not very good, so it was specially stipulated in the Qi family army that five soldiers wearing uniforms for meritorious service should be set up in every centurion to be responsible for cutting heads on the battlefield. It is not allowed to cut off the head on the battlefield.

The heads cut off by the soldiers who took meritorious service were finally distributed according to the arms and heads of the whole team of [-] people, so as to avoid the situation of grabbing heads on the battlefield and cutting off heads to delay the battle.

Zhu Yihai originally planned to adopt it, but in the end he didn't use it right away, because he felt that although military merit rewards had many shortcomings, they were indeed very good at boosting morale.

Cutting off a head on the battlefield can replace it with a suite?

Who is not impulsive?

Let’s say that the head of an Eight Banners Manchuria is worth 60 taels, and the full salary of a first-class soldier in the imperial battalion is only four taels of silver for one month, and the full salary for a year is 54 taels. Cutting off the head of an Eight Banners Manchuria is more than a year’s worth. paid.

And a long-term worker in the south of the Yangtze River only earns three taels of silver in addition to food and lodging for a year. Cutting off a tartar's head is equivalent to 20 years' wages. Who wouldn't be tempted by such a generous return.

Many of the soldiers in the imperial camp were originally miners, fishermen, and long-term tenant workers recruited from Yiwu, Jinhua, and even Zhoushan in eastern Zhejiang. They have always had extremely low incomes and struggled to meet their food and clothing. Now there are such good soldiers. With military rewards, they will naturally work hard.

If the first-level merit is turned into the collective merit of a battalion or a sentry, and it is divided equally among everyone, Zhu Yihai feels that this will lose the meaning of the first-level merit, and it will be treated as a collective military merit. Beheading so bloody?
Yang Wei and Liu Chengzu both killed seven of them, but there were old and young among them. Ma Liang only killed five of them, which was not enough to kill six young and strong mainland thieves to advance to a higher level. Silver reward.

Yang Wei has five young and old, two old and young, which is equivalent to 60 taels of silver, Liu Chengzu has four young and three old and young, and is worth 55 taels of silver, and Ma Liang has three young and old, two old and young, and is worth 40 taels of silver.

The one-armed Zhang Xian killed six of them, although four of them belonged to Zhang Dapeng's knife, but after all, it was his beheading.

Zhang Dapeng still asked Zhou Xiucai to follow the reward standard for imperial soldiers, so there were six young and strong, 60 taels of silver, and it was even enough to be promoted to a higher level.

For the other group of people, you have two and I have one, and almost everyone has a share.

Fifty yellow thieves, twenty young and strong, thirteen women, seven old people, and ten teenagers and children, this is a small team under the banner of the king of the yellow thieves, Yuan Tao.

Zhou Xiucai recorded it, and couldn't help but ask, "Is there not so much money to reward?"

Twenty young and strong are worth 200 taels of silver, and the remaining thirty are counted as five taels, which is 150 taels, for a total of 350 taels of silver.

Zhang Dapeng said, "They're all worthless things, and they're not real Jianzhou tartars. They're only 350 taels of silver. The gold and silver we seized is more than that."

Zhou Xiucai said, "A capture is a capture, and a reward is a reward, right?"

He felt that these seized gold and silver properties, weapons, knives, guns and even tents, pots and pans, etc., were registered in the register. As for the gold and silver, they must have divided them into four, and at most they would give some to everyone.

But now Zhang Dapeng wants to directly take the seized rewards, and all the rest must be registered.

This made him admire the Imperial Forest Army of Lord Long Live even more.

There are military officers in this world who are neither afraid of death nor greedy for money?

If there were a few more soldiers of the Ming army in Sichuan, how could the yellow thieves harm Sichuan for ten years?How can we let the western thieves wait and enter Sichuan again and again to make trouble?
No wonder the emperor raised the flag in eastern Zhejiang, and he was able to turn the tide and help the building collapse in a short period of time. Just looking at the officers and soldiers of the imperial camp like Zhang Dapeng, you can see a group.

Zhou Xiucai suggested that it is better to adjust it.

For example, in the beheading of Yang Wei and Liu Chengzu, those young and old people were replaced by young and strong?Ma Liangque's level and the young and old in it were also replaced by young and strong, so that they could all make up the number of heads needed to advance to a level.

Military merit is rare, and promotion is even more difficult.

Zhang Xian and the others are also willing to help make adjustments. In fact, they are not willing to take this first-level work, and they are willing to give it to Zhang Dapeng and the others.

Liu Chengzu and Ma Liang were a little moved. They were originally Shizhubai soldiers under Qin Liangyu. Make some contributions, and now when an opportunity arises, no one will be tempted.

Zhang Dapeng did not directly refuse.

Yang Wei, who followed him from the east of Zhejiang, said that as the imperial guard of the emperor and the army of the imperial camp, he is still the head of the team. kind of thing.

(End of this chapter)