The room goes through the late Ming Dynasty, and the back door leads to North America at the beginni

Chapter 114: Iron Mountain Temple Story, Iron Mine Production

Tieshan Temple is two or three miles away.

Liu Sheng was riding on a big black horse and looking through a telescope.

Speaking of which, he had actually been to Wugang City once before traveling through time, and had a rough tour around the Tieshan Temple.

In later generations, the Tieshan Temple Fair had a glorious period. At its peak, there were 20 visitors.

Because later generations of Tieshan Temple added a new legend during the Anti-Japanese War - more than 1000 soldiers fought bloody battles with the Japanese invaders here, and eventually all died.

In order to commemorate these fallen soldiers, local people built a monument next to Tieshan Temple.

It is a pity that when Liu Sheng came to visit, the Tieshan Temple was destroyed due to the mining of iron ore from the mountain during the large-scale steel smelting, and it no longer exists, leaving no story.

At this time, Tieshan Temple not only existed, but the related stories were not too old.

Putting away the telescope, Liu Sheng said loudly to several generals and guards gathered around him: "The Tieshan Temple was built only about a hundred years ago. It is said that the locals commemorated a general from the Jiajing Dynasty.

At that time, Japanese pirates were raging and the Ming Dynasty lacked soldiers and armor. A general named Yang Tu was ordered to mine and smelt iron.

General Yang can fight, but cannot make iron.After receiving advice from the locals, he successfully found high-quality iron ore suitable for making weapons.

Unfortunately, two years later, Emperor Jiajing sent eunuchs to check on the progress of the ironmaking.The eunuch wanted to ask for a huge bribe but failed, so he held a grudge. After returning, he falsely accused General Yang of exploiting iron and steel, causing harm to the country and the people.

Emperor Jiajing was furious after hearing this and did not distinguish the truth from the false. He ordered the iron yard to be demolished, dismissed the craftsmen, and arrested General Yang for questioning.

General Yang saw that the emperor was fatuous and treacherous ministers were in power, which caused the iron smelting industry to be abandoned halfway. He was filled with grief and anger, and he crashed to death on a boulder on the top of the mountain.

The local people remembered his injustice and steadfastness, so they buried him on the northern slope of Tieshan, calling it the 'General's Tomb'.

The general's wife came thousands of miles away with her young son to find her relatives. When she heard the bad news, she cried bitterly for three days and three nights in Iron Mountain and died.

The local people felt sorry for the general's wife, so they built a temple on the mountain, called it "Grandma Temple", and held regular temple fairs to commemorate her. "

Hearing this story, the generals and guards either sighed or felt indignant——

"Some of the dog officials in the imperial court are really useless. They killed all the officials who were serious about their work!"

"I told you that the Ming Dynasty should have died long ago!"

"When we come to the capital in the future, we will definitely kill all those dog officials who harm people!"

"With so many bad officials under his command, Emperor Chongzhen is not a good person!"

"···"

The audience cursed angrily for a while before Liu Sheng waved his hand and said, "Okay, let's go over and take down the Tieshan Temple Market in front of us."

In later generations this was Wugang City, but at this time there was not even a town, let alone a city.

That is to say, Tieshan Temple has been holding temple fairs for about a hundred years. Coupled with the numerous iron mines and iron-making workshops in the surrounding mountains, a market was formed under Tieshan Temple.

Liu Sheng looked through the binoculars and found that the market was quite large, with about four to five hundred households.

In later generations, the iron mountain was dug away, but at this time it was still a relatively gentle hill.

The market is located in the northeast of Tieshan, next to a small lake. It has a [-]-foot-high wall and a [-]-foot-high gate tower.

There were thousands of rebels, and they came from the plains, so it was naturally impossible to hide them from the other side.

Therefore, the village gate is closed at this time.

Liu Sheng didn't want to lose his few troops in the village, so he asked the artillerymen to line up five army cannons more than a mile away from the village, aiming at the gate tower of the village.

These five 120 mm caliber artillery are not only 3.3 meters long, but because they are made of 15 mm thick steel pipes, they can withstand much greater chamber pressure than iron-cast Hongyi cannons of the same caliber and length.

Therefore, the dosage can be larger and the range can be further.

In addition, the black gunpowder used was prepared using some later theories and techniques, and is of higher quality than the current black gunpowder, so the longest range is close to four miles!
The effective range is also three miles away!

At this time, Liu Sheng asked these cannons to fire at a distance of more than a mile, purely to allow the gunners to fire more accurately and to give a greater deterrent to the market in front of them.

Unexpectedly, the artillerymen were preparing to light the fire, and the gate of the village opened.

A man dressed as an archer ran towards this side on horseback.

Liu Sheng signaled the artillery not to fire for the time being.

Soon, the archer ran to a place fifty or sixty steps in front of the formation and said loudly: "May I ask which general is in front of you? Why did you attack our Tieshanji?"

Liu Sheng was slightly stunned when he heard this, and then he realized that the other party mistook them for Ming Dynasty officers and soldiers.

No wonder the other party would admit his mistake.

Many of the rebels wore cloth face armor and cloth armor, a considerable part of which were captured from the Ming army, and others were made according to the Ming army's style, except that the cloth used was gray-green.

As for the flags carried by the rebels, the largest one is "Hua", followed by the flags of the standing army of the "several battalion", and the flags of the three battalions of the Guards such as "Hu Ben Camp".

Unlike the feudal armies of previous dynasties, which used the surname of the chief general as the banner, there was no banner of the Ming army.

So after the other party admitted their mistake, they felt confused and couldn't figure out what "official soldiers" were coming.

With absolute strength, Liu Sheng was too lazy to use any tricks.

He said directly: "We are the Huabu rebels, and we are here to take over the iron mines and iron fields.

If you Tieshanji are interested, you will surrender within a quarter of an hour; if not, we will fire in! "

The archers were startled, turned around immediately, and ran back as fast as they could.

Liu Sheng waited patiently for about ten minutes, and then saw the village gate opened again, and dozens of people came out.

The leader was a fat middle-aged man in a brocade robe, riding on a horse that was so heavy that the horse did not dare to trot, so it had to be held by an archer.

Arriving in front of the formation, the fat man got off his horse with difficulty with the help of the archers. He glanced at the five strange-looking cannons a few dozen steps away, and then he cupped his fists and bowed to Liu Sheng from afar.

"Tieshanji inspected Zhao Kaifu and met the leader of the rebel army."

"Are you the inspector of Tieshanji?" Liu Sheng was slightly surprised.

Unexpectedly, someone who is so fat that he can hardly ride a horse can be a patrol inspector.It should be noted that although the patrol inspector is a low-level civil servant, he is responsible for combat work such as patrolling the countryside, detecting theft, and even encircling and suppressing bandits.

Moreover, this person's dress and demeanor did not look like a patrol inspection, but more like a wealthy businessman.

Zhao Kaifu seemed to understand why Liu Sheng was surprised, and he smiled and said: "The leader obviously sees that I am indeed on patrol."

Liu Sheng no longer had any doubts and asked directly: "Is Tieshanji willing to submit to our Chinese tribe?"

"willing."

Zhao Kaifu agreed without hesitation.

Regardless of whether he was sincere or not, Liu Sheng nodded and asked again: "Tell me about the situation in the iron mine here."

"Yes."

Zhao Kaifu seemed to be very cooperative, even obviously trying to please, so he immediately explained the affairs of the iron mines in this area.

Even if there is something unclear occasionally, Zhao Kaifu will try his best to explain it clearly when Liu Sheng asks.

It turns out that from the Hongwu to Chenghua years, there had always been a government-run iron yard here, which needed to provide the Ming Dynasty with a certain amount of pig iron, wrought iron, and steel every year, and the excess was sold to the private sector.

But not long after Emperor Hongzhi succeeded to the throne, the court closed the iron yard here on the grounds of "competing with the people".

After that, the number of private mines established by powerful gentry increased rapidly, and the iron smelting industry became more prosperous than before.

During the Jiajing period, a general named Yang came here to reopen the iron farm and brought more than 2000 guard craftsmen.

Then the story of "General's Tomb" and "Grandma Temple" happened.

The government-run railway station was closed again.

It was not until the early years of Chongzhen that wars inside and outside the imperial court continued, and the demand for armor increased greatly, so the iron yard was reopened here, which continues to this day.

In addition to the history and current situation of the government-run ironyard, Liu Sheng was most concerned about two things - whether there were imperial troops stationed at the government-run ironyard and how much iron it could produce each month.

According to Zhao Kaifu, the imperial court sent a garrison to be responsible for the defense of this place, with a recruitment of one thousand soldiers.

However, nearly half of the remaining 500 people were auxiliary soldiers, with less than [-] combat soldiers and only a few dozen servants.

He also didn't know how much iron the government-run ironyard produced each month. Only the ironyard supervising officials and mine supervisors knew.

After learning this, Liu Sheng asked with a smile: "I don't know the output of the government-run iron yards, but you, the inspector, should have some idea of ​​the output of the private iron yards, right?"

Hearing this, Zhao Kaifu was shocked and a little surprised.

Unexpectedly, the rebel leader in front of him seemed to be a knowledgeable person.

Liu Sheng was not actually knowledgeable. He only knew from later generations that in the middle and late Ming Dynasty, the scale and output of private iron smelting far exceeded that of the government-run iron yards, and the iron smelting technology was also quite advanced.

The government-run iron farm here has only been open for about ten years, and it was opened during the Chongzhen period when the court was dark and the officials were corrupt.

You can think with your fingers that most of the supervising officials and mine supervisors here will join forces with local gentry and powerful people to harm the public and enrich themselves.

Therefore, no matter how much iron material is produced by the government-run iron works, it will definitely only account for a small portion, while private mines will account for the majority.

Zhao Kaifu continued to smile apologetically, but his smile became a little stiff.

He cupped his hands and said: "The leader doesn't know. There are dozens of large and small private iron mines in this area. Although I am on inspection, it is impossible to know all the output of each iron mine."

"You really don't know anything?" Liu Sheng's smile became gentler.

But it made Zhao Kaifu feel very dangerous.

His scalp was numb and he said: "I really don't know the details. I only know that the iron class collected about 21 kilograms of pig iron last year."

One year of iron training is only 21 pounds?

Liu Sheng frowned.

20 kilograms sounds like a lot, but if you convert it into units, it means that the pig iron earned from iron lessons per month is only about nine tons.

Could it be that the iron tax rate is very low at this time?

Thinking this way, Liu Sheng asked again: "How much is the iron tax rate?"

Zhao Kaifu didn't dare to lie, so he replied: "Ten taxes and two taxes."

The tax rate of [-]% and [-]% is quite high, far exceeding the [-]% tax and [-]% set in the early Ming Dynasty, but considering the court's demand for iron during the Chongzhen period, it is understandable.

If we use this tax rate to extrapolate the output, we can know that the private iron yard here only produces 45 tons of iron per month, which is 9 kilograms.

As far as Liu Sheng knows, folk iron smelting technology has been quite developed in the late Ming Dynasty. There are "Dajian furnace" and "bottle furnace" similar to small blast furnaces in the south. A furnace can smelt more than 3000 kilograms of pig iron in a normal day and night, and the highest record is Six thousand pounds!

Even if the iron smelting technology here is not as good as in the south, it's not too bad, right?

Dozens of private ironworks only smelt a total of 9 kilograms of pig iron in a month - who are you fooling?
Liu Sheng estimated that there must be many private mines that underreported their output and paid less iron taxes, and there were even many illegal mines that did not pay taxes at all.

However, it is not easy to find out this kind of thing, and it is not suitable to do it now.

Therefore, Liu Sheng took a deep look at Zhao Kaifu and said, "Okay, let's lead the way to the government-run iron yard."

Zhao Kaifu's heart trembled when Liu Sheng saw him, he lowered his head and said, "Yes."

Then, with the help of the archers, they got on their horses, and with dozens of archers, they first bypassed Tieshanji and headed south.

In order to avoid an ambush, Liu Sheng sent out his guards from Shengjie Battalion and Xiaoqi Battalion to spread out within five or six miles to investigate the enemy's situation; at the same time, he called Zhao Kaifu to his side and rode with him.

After traveling south for six or seven miles, I saw a place with more than a dozen lines of black smoke.

"Commander, please look, there is a government-run iron yard ahead." Zhao Kaifu introduced with a smile.

Liu Sheng looked around and saw a Ming army camp next to the iron yard, but it was arranged in a mess.

The rebels had already appeared in sight, but the Ming soldiers who were responsible for guarding the gate seemed not to have seen them.

　First more.

　　
　
(End of this chapter)