Rise of the 1630s South America

Chapter 1623 Placement and Situation

"This time I went ashore to play. Generally speaking, it went smoothly, but people are not as easy to catch as before." Major Zhou Yafu, with a big beard, unbuttoned the chest button of his military uniform and said while fanning the wind with a fan.

Sitting opposite Major Zhou Yafu is his brother Zhou Yu, who is also a lieutenant commander, and currently serves as the commander of the Cape Verde Squadron of the First Fleet.However, although there is a commander in the name, the size of this Cape Verde squadron is pitifully small. There are only two "Star" class light cruisers and two old and soon to be decommissioned "Madao" class sail escort gunships (It was decommissioned at first, but later due to the insufficient number of ships, it was re-serviced with life extension treatment), and it can also fight against nearby pirates and maintain the safety of the lower channel, which is also praised by merchant ships from the east coast and other countries passing by.

In addition, the Cape Verde Squadron will occasionally send the Marine Battalion that has moved to this place to practice by war to go ashore to play with the local black uncles. After two or three years, they have robbed a lot of slaves, livestock and gold dust , How much subsidized the household.Especially those black slaves. At a time when domestic labor is becoming more and more scarce on the east coast, these slaves captured by the Marine Battalion are basically sold at low prices to the three major domestic mining bureaus in Ping'an, Tieling, and Changshan. The miners with a very high death rate have greatly supported the economic construction of the Great East Coast.

I don't know how many times the Marine Battalion has gone ashore this time, but Zhou Yu also knows that after today, the Marine Battalion may move to Huaiyuan Island again, and join the Caribbean Fleet of the First Fleet (with two "Star" class light cruisers, A "Jiqi"-class escort gunship) to clean up the pirate forces around the island. In addition, some remaining aborigines in the inland central part of the island are also very rebellious. This troop with only three compendium companies is also needed to go to clean up. To ensure the stability of the lives of immigrants.

"I have asked you to go ashore several times to scan. Those with poor brains and weak legs and feet have probably been taken away by you long ago. If it is easy to catch people in the seaside area, I really doubt the IQ of those black people. Has it fallen to a terrible level?" Zhou Yu, who was wearing a sky-blue naval officer uniform, glanced at his elder brother and said with a smile, "Well, it's boring to say this. This time you will be transferred to the Caribbean again soon. Well, it's really busy."

"Is there any way, it's delicious in front of the emperor's food." Zhou Yafu said angrily: "But this is also good, avoiding the army who may come later. Henghai Island, Jianchang Island, and Nankang Island are too I'm too small to accommodate too many people. I don't like them now, and I guess they're annoying to see me. As the saying goes, I hate seeing each other, so I might as well pack up and leave. Speaking of which, the Caribbean Sea is close to the Spanish mainland. It's also a good place to make a fortune. The pearls, corals, gold, and precious stones there are very famous. I have to go and see them. The only thing I need to worry about is that there will be no boats. By the way, there should be one next month. A few ships are returning from the Ottoman Empire, right? Maybe they can pick up our camp in the Caribbean Sea, anyway."

"I'm afraid the ship next month won't work." Zhou Yu shook his head and said, "Don't say whether their ships will miss the schedule (it's very common to miss the schedule when sailing at sea), even if they don't miss the schedule, they will arrive on time. The anchor at Henghai Port probably won’t be able to carry the personnel and supplies of your marine battalion to the Caribbean Sea. There is no other reason, I guess there is no space.”

"No space? How much Turkish goods did they import?" Zhou Yafu didn't realize it for a while, and asked stupidly: "No! I have a blank recruitment order from the Ministry of the Navy. As long as the ship has space, my son will We will be able to board the ship, and those people can't help but disagree!"

"You think too much, brother." Zhou Yu laughed and said, "It's not a question of willingness or not, but I guess that the paddle boat is really fully loaded and there are no vacant seats, because the Ottoman Empire and the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth. The war has probably been going on for some time, and it is time for the Crimeans to transport the first batch of slaves to Kaffa or Haji Port to deliver with our people. You think, ships full of goods and non-nationals, How much space do you have? Can you change the route without authorization to send your people to Huaiyuan Island? Think too much!"

In fact, although the Polish-Turkish war predicted by Zhou Yu has officially broken out, this is only limited to the extent that Turkey declares war on the Poles. As for the big fight, there is no such thing as yet.Ottoman Grand Vizier Ahmed Koprulu had just assembled the 20 troops he had assembled, and the supplies were only ready to be sent to the coastal area of ​​the Doroshenko-controlled area in Western Ukraine. Thoughtful Ottoman army - there are private soldiers led by the Serbian lord, there are Hungarians who please the Ottoman Sultan, there are Greek and Bulgarian soldiers recruited in the Rumily area, there are troops from the Grand Duke of Moldavia, and there are tribal soldiers from the Arabian Peninsula , Egyptian Mamluks, Cossacks who defected to the Ottomans, and Crimean Tatar cavalry. There are only a few real Turkish soldiers, because even the world-famous Ganishari Army and Spasi Cavalry Army are based on their sources. There are many complex foreigners-they have not yet started to march into Poland, so it is impossible for the Crimeans to get a lot of Slavic "trophies" so quickly.

However, Zhou Yafu felt that what his younger brother said made sense. After all, the Ottomans had declared war on Poland for several months.So after thinking about it, he could only frown helplessly and said, "That's it! Then you can find a way to send me around the Gulf of Guinea. It hasn't been mopped up there yet, so there should be some trouble. As far as your squadron four Let’s send them in turn, I really don’t want to meet those guys, and go to Guinea to make a fortune by the way.”

"Alright, but I can only take out two old 'Madao'-class escort gunboats for you, and I can almost transport a company and some equipment at a time. The aborigines over there should not be very strong. The Portuguese, The Dutch and the British have been capturing black slaves there for many years, and they have never stopped. If you go ashore, you will fight steadily along the coast, and wait for the follow-up troops to arrive before thinking about other things. It is probably not a big problem. If I can be pushed into the sea like this, then I have nothing to say." Zhou Yu nodded, which was considered to have approved what Zhou Yafu said, only to see him say again: "It's fine if you leave, there are five or six hundred people, People eat horse chews, and the burden of several islands to support you is not small. If two or 600 people come later, the food, fruits and vegetables on this island will be a little tight, but there is not much shortage of salt. How much do you need for that stuff? How many there are, there are many on Salt Island (Sal Island)."

……

On September 1672, 9, the gunboat "Golden River Tiger" of the Cape Verde Squadron returned to the Cape Verde Islands from the coast of West Africa. The big ship with the flag sailed slowly from the south.After hearing the news, the captain, Major Zhou Yu, immediately went to Cambridge to watch with binoculars, and found that they were a troop carrier and a "grocer"-class fresh water supply ship. He guessed in his heart that some troops might have come from the mainland.

Major Zhou Yu's conjecture was quickly confirmed, and the two ships also quickly spotted their cruising warship, so after spending a few hours, they finally approached and sent a small boat to make contact .At this time, Major Zhou Yu learned that it turned out that this was a fleet transporting the infantry battalion of the Zhongguo Army, including about [-] officers and soldiers and their equipment, ammunition, and military supplies. The water supply ship behind was full of food and drinking water , alcohol and medicines.

The two ships have a total transport tonnage of more than 2000 tons, but they can only transport supplies and equipment for more than 500 soldiers and themselves. This shows how difficult it is to fight across oceans in this era, otherwise the east bank dispatches a team every time. Two to 3000 people can't wait to send out all the navy's water supply ships, ammunition supply ships, troop carriers, coal carriers, repair ships, and medical ships. Nearly 2 ton of every 1 tons of the fleet's tonnage is for the support ships. Tonnage, there is no one - of course, this is not a bad thing. It is difficult for the army on the east coast to go to Europe, and it is equally difficult for the Europeans to go to the east coast.

As for the domestic plan to transport 6-8 battalions of tens of thousands of people to Europe to help in the war, that is simply a joke!Because even if all the ships of the First Fleet of the Navy are collected, it is barely enough to transport people, and 20-30 merchant ships have to be recruited from the South China Sea Transportation Company to be able to take shape. How is this possible?At the same time, it is also an irresponsible approach, because this is tantamount to sending the essence and backbone of the East Coast Army to an unknown road, not to mention how long their absolutely inferior troops can survive under the attack of more than [-] invincible French troops-if only If there are thousands of people, the whole army will probably be wiped out in one battle in the field, and a dozen in the city defense battle-just say that the tens of thousands of miles of distant sea routes in the past few months, if something happens accidentally, the army will be destroyed. Just throw them all into the sea to feed the sharks. This is not sensational, but something that may indeed happen.

So, now you can understand why the Ministry of War has not been very active in sending the main force of 6-8 battalions to Europe.Speaking of which, it was only the guys on the executive committee who were blinded by greed and greed for profit that really thought about it for a while. In the end, they were tricked by the army and turned into a de facto military expansion. , The experienced older generation of executive committee members is gradually withering, and now there are more and more incompetent people who are in the position of vegetarians-their only saving grace is probably that they live long enough to get their chance to be in charge, but they may It is better to give way to the capable second generation as soon as possible if you destroy the country because of your own stupidity.

Well, let's get down to business and continue talking about the delivery of the Zhongguo * Army infantry battalion.

At noon on September 1672, 9, under the guidance of the "Golden River Tiger", the two ships adjusted their sails and slowly sailed into Henghai Harbor, and anchored in this relatively good harbor. More than 2 officers and soldiers of the Infantry Battalion of the Zhongguo Army who had changed into khaki reserve uniforms also took the opportunity to disembark to rest. It was devastated along the way, and I heard that 500 to 80 people were lost due to illness, which was also miserable.

Because Henghai Island is a key transit node, there is a small health center on the island, which can receive and care for more than 30 patients at the same time.In addition, various medicines are relatively sufficient, so it is possible to accommodate some officers and soldiers who suffer from various diseases due to long-distance travel. After all, they used to be landlubbers.

The Jianchang and Nankang islands next door also quickly received orders.Some grains are produced on these two relatively rainy islands, so under Zhou Yu's order, some supplies such as grains, oils, fruits and vegetables were transported by small wooden boats to supply the army's needs; Some large pieces of marinated fish were used to supplement protein for the officers and soldiers of the Zhongguo Army. Of course, all of this is not free.

In this way, the first batch of hundreds of people from the Loyalist Army were resettled, and the two ships belonging to the navy did not delay. After a little maintenance, they were fully loaded with salt produced in the Cape Verde Islands -The salt here is not small in the local market on the east coast, because it is better than the salt-cured fish produced in Yancheng County-began to cross the Atlantic Ocean, preparing to return to the mainland, and continue to load the remaining officers and soldiers.

And in the first ten days of October, another water supply ship and a troop transport ship arrived at Henghai Port, and sent 10 people from the Infantry Battalion of the National Defense Army to the shore, along with a large amount of supplies. In addition, there are nearly ten war horses, which are estimated to be the daily rides of the officers.

In mid-November, heavyweights finally arrived in the Eastern Cape Verde Islands: Lieutenant Commander Yang Liang took all 11 people from the Third Mixed Battalion and a Black Eight Banners Heavy Infantry Battalion on ships of the Navy Fleet (also requisitioned four Civilian ships, for which the military department and the South China Sea Transportation Company have been arguing for a while) arrived at Henghai Island, which made the number of soldiers on the east coast of the island exceed 1450, and it felt a little overwhelmed. Both are still weak.

Therefore, another Black Eight Banners heavy infantry battalion that arrived in early December was assigned to the adjacent Jianchang Island. pressure.At this time, some news from Europe gradually reached here through the returning east coast merchant ships, the most important of which was the news from France-it is said that Louis XIV said to the left and right at a public banquet: "If the United The province is 'making trouble' with us as it did with Spain before, and I'm going to send my men with hoes and shovels to throw Holland into the sea (meaning dig the seawall of Holland).

In addition, news came from the Spanish court: the special envoy of King Louis XIV of France went to Madrid, requesting the Kingdom of Spain to open the Spanish Netherlands to the French army.In return, once they conquer the United Provinces, the Dutch will be forced to agree to abandon the previous treaty and allow the trade on the Schelde River in the South Netherland to reopen, so that the economy of Amsterdam will show a serious decline, and the economy of Antwerp will A rapid recovery will greatly increase the income of the Spanish royal family.

News came from England: King Charles II had handed over a huge sum of money a few months ago - I don't know where the money came from - and handed it over to his younger brother, the Duke of York, to help him recruit sailors, Renovate ships, purchase cannons, and prepare for battle; the news from Sweden came slowly, but it was shocking enough: The Kingdom of Sweden has officially announced its withdrawal from the Triple Alliance of Britain, Holland, and Sweden because they need the help of the French to resist Denmark and Sweden. Military pressure from the German princes.

Almost all news is not good for Holland!This made the people on the east bank quickly realize the major changes in the situation. The war may be imminent, and it will definitely break out within half a year to a year!

(End of this chapter)