Rise of the 1630s South America

Chapter 2378 Cedar Fort

July 1699, 7, Cedar Castle, sunny.

Wearing a pair of overshoes made of whale skin, Wei Chengwu stood in a mud pit full of stagnant water, and with a hammer in his hand, he tapped on the hull of a ship.The shoes made of whale skin are the back, and there is something cold-proof inside, which is very warm to wear.And even in the extremely cold weather in winter, this kind of shoes will not crack or deform, and it is really the first-class shoemaking material in the bitter cold place.

The ship they are repairing is the naval transport ship "Baiyang", a three-masted sailing ship with a displacement of more than 500 tons, rented by the Bank of Taiwan, and then assigned to the "Northern Kamchatka and Aleutian Expedition Team" led by Wei Chengwu use.There were more than 30 naval officers and soldiers on board, and now they are working together on secondment in the Bank of Taiwan.

Of course, the Navy is not the only one seconded by the Bank of Taiwan.In this expedition team, there are also more than 300 soldiers from the reserve garrison from the counties of Sakhalin and Ezo, and 300 Mongolian cavalry from the Manchurian pioneering team (arrived last year).These soldiers are now organized into the Aleutian advance detachment, stationed in the bitterly cold place of Cedar Fort.

Today's Cedar Fort has a total of 600 soldiers, nearly 150 sailors (including naval officers and soldiers), more than [-] mineralogists, zoologists, doctors, veterinarians, grooms, cooks, cooks, guards, Taiwan Bank staff, repair craftsmen The total number of talents is still quite a lot.

Cedar Fort was roughly built before the winter of 1697, helping the first group of people who landed to survive the harsh winter in the Aleutians.In the summer of 1698, the landing personnel used the wood and other building materials brought in and spent five months renovating it. Now it is a fortress with a circumference of more than 500 meters.More than 20 cannons were installed on the city wall, and some fortifications were built on the outside of the city wall. With the newly added ammunition and food, it was already impenetrable—of course, this was only the case in this sparsely populated Aleutian land. In other places, such a rough and narrow fortress would be ridiculous.

In 1698, due to the massive effort spent on building forts and dry docks (used to winterize ships), the number of people going out to explore was seriously insufficient, and only one expedition by land and sea was hastily prevented.Among them, there were not many land expeditions, led by a lieutenant, they marched along a river in front of the fort, while investigating, drawing maps and collecting specimens, and finally returned to the station before winter came.

The sea expedition was led by Captain Wei Chengwu himself.At the helm of the twenty-horsepower clipper, all steam and steel, they sailed along the coastline, taking water depths and drawing maps.There is no doubt that this is a hard and tedious work, and a lot of their manpower was used to build the fort and the dock, and the work was not completed until winter came.Therefore, in the summer of this year (1699), with the arrival of another twenty-horsepower steel clipper, Captain Wei Chengwu felt that the matter could not be delayed any longer, so he sent two trusted officers to take the The team, aboard these two steel clippers, explored and mapped in different directions.

As for himself, he stayed in Cedar Castle to handle other affairs.With the steel clippers, map surveying will become more efficient, and it is no longer necessary for him to go out in person. It is better to stay in Cedar Fort to handle daily affairs.The so-called daily affairs are actually very simple, including but not limited to training soldiers, fishing and drying nets, repairing ships and so on.Of course, the most important thing is to organize a new expedition as soon as possible, a sea adventure!

He has some guesses about where they are now.After all, latitude can be measured independently. Although there is no longitude to accurately locate (they have been lost in the sea, it is no longer reliable to use time to measure longitude), but at around 59 degrees north latitude, they know that they are located on a piece of land—— Obviously, the place where they are currently located is not an island-in the case of the west coast, the general positioning can still be done.After all, he has a map that only he himself and several captains and navigators can read.What needs to be done now is to survey the water depth, terrain and vegetation near the coastline, and draw a more accurate map to prepare for more in-depth exploration in the future.

Wei Chengwu is now repairing ships with ordinary craftsmen.There are only a few hundred people in Cedar Castle, and life is hard. Everyone has to become a generalist.Wei Chengwu thought that as a leader, he also had to set an example, so he occasionally appeared in various workplaces to undertake some work.For example, a few days ago, he and his men handled the salmon and seals they caught, and today he came to repair the "Bai Yang", which did improve morale to some extent.

According to the plan we got when we contacted last year, if all goes well, a merchant ship full of flour, spirits, medicines and winter supplies will come over in mid-September to replenish Cedar Castle's inventory.They haven't grown food yet—in fact, they can't grow it—except for fishing, hunting and gathering, all food is transported by ships from across the strait.After the arrival of this shipment of food, the inventory is almost sufficient, and then they can do some more important things.

He calculated the current resources at hand, personnel and supplies were not counted, the most important thing was transportation.Regardless of land transportation, there are only two hundred or so healthy horses (some of the sick horses have been slaughtered and marinated as food reserves), and some sleds made after arriving here, which is nothing.To explore this ghostly place, you mainly rely on boats, both big and small!

There are only two big ships now, one is the rented naval transport ship "Bai Yang", which weighs about 500 tons, and is currently being maintained; the other ship is the 250-ton transport ship "Chukochi", which is owned by the Taiwan Bank. It is moored in the river port and ready to depart at any time.In addition, there are two more important ships, the steel clippers.The tonnage of this kind of ship is very small, it can only seat 40 to [-] people, and it carries very little baggage, but the hull is made of steel, and it is fully steam-powered. The speed is not slow, and the draft is not deep. A sharp weapon, although deep sea navigation is not very convenient.

Next, Wei Chengwu plans to personally lead the team, take the "Chukochi" armed transport ship, go to the eastern continent, and find a suitable place to build a winter camp, in order to establish a more stable stronghold after the spring of the next year.The place of Cedar Fort (located in the town of Dillingham, Alaska later) is really inconvenient. If it wasn't for a sudden storm and time didn't allow them to find a new foothold, wouldn't they This river port may have been chosen for the first outpost on the American continent.

It's a pity that there is no if in the world. The reality is that they wasted the entire voyage of 1698 in Cedar Castle.It is already the voyage date of 1699, time is precious, and there is no need to waste it.Moreover, Wei Chengwu was a little worried that Cedar Fort was no longer safe.This is not groundless!In fact, the all-steel clipper Cicada, which went out last year to survey the hydrology of the coastline, has spotted some fishing boats operating near the Aleutian Islands, and some islands even have towns or winter camps.Looking at the style of those fishing boats and towns, it doesn't seem like the technology that countries with a very low level of civilization can have.What does this mean?It shows that the top-secret information of the National Intelligence Agency is correct, and there is a civilized country in the northwest corner of the American continent!

This discovery made Wei Chengwu very disturbed.He doesn't know how big the country is, how big the population is, and whether its military strength is strong or not.But he can't afford to gamble!In case the navy of this country is very powerful—no, it doesn’t need to be too powerful, just a few reasonable warships can blow up their weakly armed transport ships—that will be enough to deal with them. An expedition team hanging overseas poses a huge threat.Even if you can escape, but the expedition mission has undoubtedly failed, it is very worthless.Therefore, how to covertly bypass this country's fishing boats or naval patrol ships, enter the mainland beyond without anyone noticing, and establish a stable stronghold is actually a very challenging thing.

Wei Chengwu pondered, this matter cannot mobilize many people, and the best way is to use the "Chu Keqi", a small ship, to carry some personnel and materials there.Even if it is only possible to build a winter camp, it is good, at least the target is small and not easy to be discovered.The best choice for a winter camp is a river port deep inland like Cedar Castle.At worst, it must be a hidden harbor hidden under complex terrain (such as island groups or tortuous waterways). In short, safety comes first.

The only worry is that I don’t know how far that unknown country has developed in Northwest America. In case their development near the coastline has been very deep-this is very possible, from the Aleutian Islands to the south The entire Gulf of Alaska is very rich in fishery resources, and the output of shrimp, crab, and salmon is very large, just like the Sea of ​​Okhotsk opposite it - there are many towns and ports, so if they pass by so rashly, if they are unlucky, there is a high probability of being hit by others things.In fact, Wei Chengwu is now doubting whether Cedar Fort has been discovered by others, but the other party has not announced it.

But this is also something that can't be helped, the task assigned by the superior must be completed!The Blackwater Management Committee and the Bank of Taiwan have poured a lot of effort and money into this. If they can't come up with a satisfactory answer, one can imagine what kind of trouble he will encounter in the future.There has been news before that his military rank, Wei, is expected to be raised, from captain to major, which is something he has always dreamed of.However, the Ministry of the Army has always given clear rewards and punishments. If he did not make any actual achievements, then he would have to suffer in the position of captain, or even go back to sit on the bench. That was something he did not want to face.

"We must investigate everything in this country!" After putting the hammer aside, Wei Chengwu lit his pipe and thought quietly: "Success or failure depends on one stroke! We will start in late July, and we can't delay any longer!"

(End of this chapter)