Rise of the 1630s South America

Chapter 401 Chaos (Twelve)

Five sailboats with steam engines are mooring at the wharf of Yantai Port. The steam engines have started to pressurize slowly, and the sailors are loading the last batch of supplies on board with the assistance of dock workers on the shore.Zamparini said hello to his fellow countryman, Naval Sergeant Rossetti, and then sat on the bow deck, blowing the fresh sea breeze, silently watching the soldiers who were boarding the ship and Soldiers.

"I don't know what's going on in my hometown. It should be winter now, and the vines in the house should have all withered." An Dahai moved over and sat beside Zamparini, and took out a pack of vines from his pocket. He grabbed a pinch of the free low-quality shredded tobacco distributed by the Ministry and stuffed it into the pipe. A recruit with an immature face next to him hurriedly lit a cigarette for An Dahai.

"Seriously, Lin Xiaohu, are you sure you're 17 years old?" Zamparini also lit a pipe for himself, then squinted at the recruit who was lighting An Dahai's cigarette and asked, "I heard that Lianbu Lin The chief secretary is your uncle? Could it be that he joined the army through the back door? You remind me of that poor guy Liu Dayou."

"I didn't think Liu Da had it for a while." An Dahai took a puff of cigarette, narrowed his eyes and looked into the distance, as if caught in some kind of memory.

"It must have been several years. We were all first-year private soldiers at that time." An Dahai said in a low voice, "That time we went to attack the Xhosa tribe. The Xhosa were very brave, and we were forced into Liu Dayou just died in hand-to-hand combat. He is a good guy, and he is always kind to others, which is really a pity. By the way, I went to see him at his house the year before last."

"How is his family doing now?" Zamparini suddenly became interested and asked.

"It's not bad." An Dahai leaned on the railing. At this time, the ship had already started to move away from the pier. It was turning around and preparing to cross Kongtong Island and head out to sea. "His mother's eyes are completely blind. The old chief Anda once took her to the county hospital. Unfortunately, the doctors can't do anything, and she is recuperating at home. Her brother-in-law from your hometown has now found a job. Chief Anda introduced her , went to work as a handyman in a glass factory, and his income was not bad. His sister is still growing soybeans at home, and they used Liu Dayou's pension to buy all those lands. If they usually herd sheep, their income is still so-so They now have two sons and daughters, the eldest son is very cute, with a tiger head and a tiger brain, I bought him a wooden saber toy, the little one seems to like it very much..."

"That's good, that's good." Zamparini let out a breath, and said with peace of mind: "Everyone goes out to fight, who knows when they will die. Today it is someone else, and tomorrow it may be me. Well done, I feel relieved. Hey, Lin Xiaohu, did you hear what I said, be smart when you go to the battlefield, don't f*cking rush to the front again. It seems that if you don't do this, you can't prove your bravery. I don't want to hand over your ashes to Secretary Lin one day, and I'm afraid I won't have a good life in the future."

Lin Xiaohu's face turned red all of a sudden, but he didn't say anything for a while because of the authority of the officer, but the stubborn look in his eyes seemed to show that he was not convinced.An Dahai laughed, patted his shoulder and said nothing.

The ship left quickly, and this time all the five sailing boats of the navy stationed in the port were dispatched to transport people to the Laizhou Bay area that they had agreed with Guo Sheng, and at the same time handed over their weapons and equipment.If it weren't for several other ships carrying the 102nd company and some Eight Banners warriors and volunteer soldiers to the west coast of North Korea to "borrow food", then it is estimated that Mo Ming would bring all the ships on board.Because according to the agreement, Guo Sheng needs to pay five thousand stones of grain (about 350 tons) and about [-] strong men and women for the large amount of weapons and equipment, equipment and luggage handed over to him by the people on the east coast.

This guy Guo Sheng has been in Shandong for more than two months, he has almost tortured the gentry from the four prefectures of Jinan, Dongchang, Qingzhou, and Yanzhou. Contributions.In addition, he also occupied the government treasuries of Linqing, Jining, Jinan, Qingzhou, Dezhou and other places, especially the inner treasury of King Heng of Qingzhou, and a large amount of silver and grain were confiscated.The people on the east bank only asked Guo Sheng for five thousand shi of grain, which is already a great deal of face, and no lion opened his mouth.You must know that these prefectures in Shandong are still very rich. At the end of the Ming Dynasty, the large landlords in Shandong along the canal collected more than 5000 shi a year in rent, which is staggering.Of course, the landlords in Shandong still cannot compare with their counterparts in the south of the Yangtze River. According to historical records, Qian, a landlord in Suzhou at the end of the Ming Dynasty, "collected 3 shi per year" (about 97 to [-] tons) without paying a tax of one or two taels of silver. Compared with them, the landlords and gentry in Shandong were far inferior.

Although the current situation in Shandong is chaotic, the harvest of grain stored in various places is limited.But Guo Sheng must have a lot of grain on hand, otherwise he would not have stayed for more than half a month after receiving Li Zicheng's news, and collected mules, horses, and carts to transport the grain, fodder, gold and silver back to Shaanxi. , It's really a lot of harvest!Li Zicheng has decided to withdraw the main force to the junction of Shaanxi, Shanxi, and Henan, and then fight against the Qing army.With the one hundred thousand troops gathered at hand, together with the more than one hundred thousand people who are suppressing the Muslim rebellion in Gansu and Qinghai, these people's food and fodder consumption cannot be supported by the barren land and the poor people in Shaanxi, Gansu and Hanzhong. , Gather more supplies before retreating now, so that we can persist in Shaanxi for a longer period of time in the future.Therefore, Mo Ming asked Guo Sheng for [-] shi of grain, which is really nothing. According to the analysis of the staff, the total amount of grain on hand by Guo Sheng is likely to exceed [-] shi, maybe as much as [-] shi, and in all, [-] shi It means nothing to him.

The fleet sailed at sea for two or three days, and finally arrived at a certain place in Laizhou Bay on June 6. The liaison staff who went ashore in a small boat quickly met with the people sent by Guo Sheng with the assistance of Li Zhengang. Connected to the head.In fact, Guo Sheng's people are easy to find, because Guo Sheng sent a full 26 or 1000 people to escort some carts to load the weapons and equipment he had dreamed of.For this reason, Guo Sheng even left the oil side near Linqing and withdrew his main force to the Qingzhou area to ensure that these vital weapons can be safely retrieved, even if he gave up the attack on Linqing. —In history, he failed to capture Linqing in the end.

Guo Sheng "coerced" more than [-] elites to Qingzhou Mansion. He was so frightened that the landlords and gentry who had just expelled the Dashun forces in Qingzhou were out of their wits.Unexpectedly, Guo Sheng ignored these people, and directly drove a large number of people across the city and headed for Laizhou Bay. These gentry were lucky and couldn't help wondering whether Guo Sheng had been planning a while ago. Withdrew to Shaanxi, why are you rushing in that direction now?It's really strange.

Zamparini walked onto the beach wearing muddy leather shoes, and quickly called the 20 brothers in the platoon to stand guard with guns on the shore.After a while, more soldiers from the 104th company also boarded the beach. After a little formation, they lined up in three rows with guns, facing the inland direction.Landing together with them were hundreds of soldiers from the military team. They were wearing cotton gloves and carrying hemp ropes on their shoulders. Under the leadership of Jin Wugui, they were ready to start transporting food.

Dozens of cavalry came galloping inland from the coast, and Zamparini and others standing in the first row immediately raised the bayonet-loaded 32-C flintlock rifle obliquely forward under the order of Mao Desheng.The opponent's cavalry stopped about 200 meters away from the people on the east bank, and then several officers stepped out and negotiated with the liaison personnel of the people on the east bank.Because of the distance, Zamparini still couldn't hear what they were talking about, which made him a little disappointed.

But the answer was revealed soon, and the officers of the Shun Army needed to check their cargo.Jin Wugui of the Army Corps led people to unload boxes of supplies from the ship, and inspected each box with the officers of the Shun Army.Muskets, infantry bows, leather armor, sabers, armor, and spears, the officers of the Shun Army watched with joy.When the soldiers dragged two 4-pound guns, four 6-pound guns, and four 8-pound guns from the soft sandy mud to the flat ground after a lot of effort, the officers of the Shun army immediately buzzed. With a bang, there was a heated discussion around these old artillery decommissioned from the East Coast Artillery Corps.

They have never been in contact with such a light artillery. These artillery can be dragged and walked with only one or two horses. It is very convenient and is definitely a must-have weapon for marching and fighting.Guo Sheng's troops are also equipped with a few artillery pieces, but those artillery pieces can only be regarded as "large-caliber" firearms by the standards of the East Bank, which is far from the standard of artillery pieces, but they are small-caliber and can explode at any time. Guo Sheng still regards the things in the chest as treasures and will not use them easily.Now with the light army field artillery of the Dong'an people, the combat effectiveness of Guo Sheng's troops will rise in a straight line, and they will no longer be helpless against the Manchu cavalry.

In addition to the artillery, the people on the east bank also handed them the shooting table of each artillery they compiled, and explained the meaning of each data in the shooting table to their artillery officer in detail.In addition, a large number of explosive bombs, solid iron balls, tin-lead bombs (heated to make hot bombs), barreled gunpowder, cannon brushes, cleaning rods, gunpowder weighing instruments and other items were also handed over to them.For this reason, the artillerymen of the Shun Army had to send more than a dozen people here to receive emergency training from artillery officers on the east coast.

At the same time, the sailors and military men also began to load about 2 shi of grain and more than 3 strong men and women brought by the Shun army.Due to the large number of people and materials, people on the east coast may need to transport them 6-27 times to transport them all. On June [-], the first batch of more than [-] Ming people boarded the ship, and then the five motor sailing boats set off at full power and headed straight for Dabo Port.

(End of this chapter)