Siberia has gradually warmed up in May on the lunar calendar, and the daytime temperature has returned to above freezing.
A Tsarist Russian army of more than 30,000 people is advancing mightily. They are marching from Tulun to Irkutsk in the southeast direction.
Wearing brown and gray uniforms, Tsarist Russia's Siberian Army Divisions lined up in neat five columns. Most of them had switched to rifled guns with longer ranges.
This was the only support Alexander II gave them, and it was all the output of Moscow's arsenal for half a year.
In this Crimean War, Tsarist Russia suffered a big loss in terms of muskets.
Tsarist Russia never felt that its army was inferior to the armies of Britain and France. In fact, no matter in terms of the size of the army, combat skills, and the bravery of the soldiers, Tsarist Russia's army was far behind.
Otherwise, they would not be called the "European Gendarmerie". To be a European Gendarmerie, it is impossible without a certain amount of force support.
But when the Tsarist Russian army was charging and was sniped by the coalition's rifled guns at a distance of 500 yards, the Russian commander could only watch his soldiers die in vain.
They simply couldn't get within the range of their own flintlock guns, and they couldn't engage in hand-to-hand combat with the coalition forces.
The soldiers in the fortress can still rely on the fortifications to resist. However, the reinforcements have been unable to open the way into the fortress.
Because if reinforcements want to enter the fortress, they must engage in field battles with the coalition forces. In field battles, the range disadvantage of guns will be highlighted.
Therefore, after Alexander II succeeded to the throne, he ordered military factories in various places to fully produce rifled guns.
With sample guns captured on the battlefield, Tsarist Russia's military-industrial system was operating at full capacity, producing hundreds of thousands of rifled guns in half a year.
Alexander II was more enlightened and humble than his father Nicholas I.
He dared to face the problems that existed in Tsarist Russia and was able to learn from the enemy with an open mind. He even ordered the army to learn the tactics of the coalition forces.
You must know that during this period, the army was very conservative. The line tactics they used had hundreds of years of history. Battles seemed like a ritual to them.
Those soldiers wearing red jackets and blue trousers ride on tall and strong Don horses. These are the infamous Cossack cavalry.
There are not 10,000 Cossack cavalry here, and several thousand-man teams have been separated from them as outposts to explore the situation north of Lake Baikal and in the direction of Irkutsk.
There was even a team of two thousand people who crossed the East Sayan Mountains and entered the Tangnu Ulianghai area.
At this time, at the junction of the south of Tulum and the Tangnu Ulianghai, a caravan of twenty camels was running away with all its strength. Behind them was a Cossack cavalry company of a hundred people.
Some of these cavalrymen held their sabers high, and some held their muskets as if they were taking aim. They blew whistles and surrounded the camel caravan from behind.
The pennant with the word "Sheng" written on the carriage illustrates the identity of this carriage team.
In the past, even if they encountered Rakshasa cavalry here, they would have been blackmailed at most.
Dashengkui's business can go all the way to Moscow, so naturally this trade route has been opened.
Since the founding of Dashengkui during the Kangxi period, it has been developing trade routes in the north.
They drove the market to the entrance of the herdsmen's tents with the help of camels.
This business organization is definitely a business legend in Chinese history.
Starting from three hawkers and one camel, Dashengkui once developed into a super business with six to seven thousand employees.
There are 20,000 caravan camels, and the activity areas include the four major parts of Khalkha, Khovd, Ulyasutai, Kulun, Kyaktu, all alliance banners in Inner Mongolia, Xinjiang Urumqi, Kuqa, Ili and Russian Siberia, Moscow
etc.
At its peak, it almost monopolized the market in Mongolian pastoral areas, and most of the Mongolian princes, nobles and herders were its debtors.
Until the rise of Dong Shuheng's Huaihai Group and the establishment of Great Wall Company.
Only then did it threaten Dashengkui’s commercial dominance on the grassland.
At the beginning, Dashengkui took some measures to target the Great Wall caravan entering the grassland market.
Because Great Wall's products are more competitive than theirs.
Dashengkui's main products on the grassland are brick tea, raw tobacco, silk and satin, cloth, sugar, ironware, boots, wooden bowls, medicinal materials, livestock, frozen mutton, fur, etc.
Not counting goods sold in the south, many of the goods they bring north are imported from the south.
In other words, the source of goods they sell is in the hands of Dong Shuheng.
In addition, the caravan protection capabilities of Huaihai and the Great Wall are very strong.
Therefore, even if Da Shengkui bribed the horse thieves outside his mouth, he would be unable to reach the Huaihai and Yellow River caravans.
And their actions were noticed by Dong Shuheng. Dong Shuheng had no mercy for such people.
Several acts of revenge made Da Shengkui completely submissive.
They had to spend a large amount of money to invest in Great Wall Group as a sign of goodwill, and at the same time gave up 20% of their shares to Dong Shuheng.
Dashengkui is different from other Shanxi firms in that it adopts a joint-stock system, but its share capital is very special. In addition to silver shares (also known as financial shares, which are shares formed by the investment of funds by financial owners (shareholders)), Dashengkui has never set up
Therefore, Dashengkui has never had external equity investment), and Shen shares (also known as "Ding Shen shares") are shares formed through equity incentives for shopkeepers and clerks. This is the so-called "Investors are bank shares, and contributors are Shen shares."
”.
After Dong Shuheng studied the structure of Dashengkui, he admired his founder quite a lot.
None of the founders came from wealthy business families. They were not among the Eight Great Merchants of Shanxi, but they did what the Eight Great Merchants could not do.
Dong Shuheng readily accepted the 20% stake.
This is not to send beggars away, this is the heyday of Dashengkui. His total assets are said to be hundreds of millions of taels of silver, and the two achievements are 20 million taels!
Dasheng Kui once made a bold statement that fifty taels of silver ingots from the Silver Casting City in his hands could be transported from Kulunpu to Guihua City.
By accepting Dashengkui's shares, Dong Shuheng is equivalent to accepting Dashengkui.
From then on, Dashengkui continued to take the retail route, while Great Wall Group set up business stations in some large cities and became Dashengkui's supplier.
At the same time, Dashengkui continued to retain trade routes to Tsarist Russia.
Dong Shuheng needs to understand the situation in Tsarist Russia through Dashengkui.
In the process of the Renaissance Army capturing Kyaktu and taking over the entire Outer Mongolia, Dasheng Kuidu played a very important role.
The Baath Army's territories east of Lake Baikal and in the Far East are also open to Dashengkui's retail fleet.
However, before the Manchu Qing Dynasty was destroyed, Dashengkui's attitude towards the Renaissance Army was still somewhat ambiguous.
It was not until Dong Shuheng took control of the capital.
Wang Tingxiang, the current boss of Dashengkui, came to Dong Shuheng to pay homage to the dock.
In Dong Shuheng's mind, famous family enterprises like Dashengkui need support.
It contains a lot of exploration results of national enterprises, and its organizational structure and operation model are all successful models.
From Wang Tingxiang's mouth, Dong Shuheng learned more about Dashengkui's inside story.
Although this business also curried favor with the Manchu government and even contracted the tax revenue of the Mobei grassland.
But under the background of this era, it is understandable for Dashengkui to make such a choice.
It is normal for business groups to be attached to the political power.
Dong Shuheng doesn't mind giving Dashengkui more room for development.
Dong Shuheng and the Great Wall Group of northern businessmen do not have the energy or ability to build a retail organization like Dashengkui.
The existence of the Great Wall Group is mainly to increase a channel for southern goods to enter the north.
There is also the idea of extending the original power of the Huai Navy to the north.
Now that the north has been unified.
Dong Shuheng decided to shift Great Wall's main business to industrial creation.
The Great Wall Group has gathered a large amount of capital from northern businessmen and has strong strength.
Just in May, Dong Shuheng asked Liu Wenjin to preside over the capital expansion and reorganization of Great Wall Group.
The reorganized Great Wall Group will invest in mines and build industries in the north.
It was during this expansion that Dashengkui invested five million silver dollars and became the third largest shareholder of Great Wall.
The Chinese government still holds 60% of the shares and is the largest shareholder.
This group is still considered a state-owned holding company.
After the reorganization, Great Wall will only remain a large shopping mall outside the city. It will no longer be involved in the retail field and draw a clear line with Dashengkui.
At the same time, with the support of Dong Shuheng, Dashengkui integrated his own bank accounts to create "Longsheng Bank", becoming the second national commercial bank after Yangtze River Bank.
In order to establish this bank, Dashengkui paid 10 million taels of silver and 500,000 taels of gold as reserves to the FCB.
In return, Longsheng received a second national banking license.
Not only that, Wang Tingxiang also saw the opportunity of Zuo Jigao's expedition to the Western Regions, and extended Dashengkui's business from the grasslands to the southwest to the Western Regions.
Dashengkui's caravan following the West Route Army indeed brought great convenience to the West Route Army.
After Qi Bin entered Culun, Dasheng Kui's chief shopkeeper in Culun immediately contacted Qi Bin and not only sent supplies to the mission's guards.
He also handed over the information from various ministries in Dashengkui's hands to Qi Bin.
Dashengkui's pack team has gone deep into every pastoral area, and the information they have is more detailed than that of the Intelligence Department.
This provides an important reference for Qi Bin to judge the status of each department.
Riding a brigade to the west, Da Shengkui's men also helped lead the way.
In Mobei, besides the heads of various tribes and temples, Dashengkui is undoubtedly the third important force.
In the past, the Manchu and Qing court only wanted to make money through Dashengkui. But Dong Shuheng knew how huge a role this kind of commercial organization with a somewhat complete retail network could play on the grassland.
The herdsmen live in no fixed place, and even the kings of each Khan tribe may not be able to find all of their tribes.
But the guys at Dashengkui can know where the tribes they often visit will settle down.
This is the foundation of Dashengkui in the past two hundred years.
After all, the pack team of more than a dozen people could not outrun the Cossack cavalry of hundreds of people.
The caravan guards made the final resistance. In the past two years, they had made good friends with the Renaissance Army, and the caravan guards also used flintlock rifles.
After releasing the falcon that carried the message, the guards hid behind the hump and launched a final counterattack against the Cossacks.
This group of Cossacks obviously wanted to be silenced. At the beginning, the caravan sent people to negotiate, but they were hacked to death before they could say a word.
Before dying, the man's last words to his companions were "Run".
The leader of the pack team knew that something big must have happened.
Otherwise, these Tsarist Russians would not kill the caravans casually.
Now Tsarist Russia is at war with Britain and France in the west, and their ports have been blocked. Silk, tea and other commodities can only be obtained from the land route in the east.
Even if there is a war, the Tsarist Russians still want to drink tea. The most likely possibility for them to do this is that they are going to fight.
Only then would they risk running out of tea.
The team leader placed the news on the falcon's leg. The news would be passed to Tangnu Wulianghai's cabinet and then to Culun.
After spending so long on the grassland outside the Great Wall, Dashengkui knew that the grassland was too big and it was inconvenient to deliver messages, so they established an emergency rapid message delivery system.
These messenger hawks are very precious, and ordinary messages will not be conveyed by them.
There is a story in the history of Dashengkui. Dashengkui specially set up dog stocks for this purpose.
It is said that a disaster occurred in Kulun and the price of food soared. In order to report this information to the headquarters, the Kulun branch asked a dog to carry a letter to Guihua City. When the headquarters received the letter brought by the dog, it immediately made a large purchase.
Food was hoarded and huge profits were made.
In order to commemorate the success of this business, a dog was given special shares. Another story is that once, a manager of Dashengkui Company fell ill on the way across the grassland, so he asked a dog to return to the main office to report the news, and he was saved.
This manager's life is worth his share to the dog.
This shows how difficult it is to deliver messages on the grassland.
Therefore, it is not surprising that Dashengkui established his own messaging system.
But this time the Cossack cavalry was faster than Dashengkui's reaction.
Basically none of the caravans that entered Siberia this year came back.
Dashengkui suffered heavy losses!
When Tangnu Wulianghai's cabinet compiled the news from various sources and confirmed that the Rakshasa people were attacking in large numbers, the Cossack cavalry team had already crossed the Sayan Mountains.
This time the Tsarist Russian attack was more brutal than before. In the past, they mainly focused on robbery, but this time they not only robbed, but also killed everyone who saw it.
Just like locusts.
There are more than a thousand people in the Uriel tribe, and they are under the jurisdiction of the ten chiefs of Wulianghai.
There are more than 300 men in the tribe who can shoot volleys, but now 200 of them have been transferred away by General Ulyasutai.
But spring has come, and many livestock are about to give birth. They can only stay in the grazing land and wait for the animals to give birth before moving to summer pastures.
The lives of herdsmen are very closed. Without the intervention of external forces, their lives will remain unchanged.
But this external force came at the wrong time.
One fine morning, the women of the tribe carried clay pots and began to look for milk-producing cows to milk. The men were counting the cattle and sheep in the corrals, preparing for a new day of grazing.
The children also hid in the tent and slept in their dirty sheepskin quilts.
Suddenly, a whistle came from behind the mountain in the distance. More than a hundred Cossack cavalry wearing black hats and red coats appeared on the hillside.
The shepherd girl who was the first to notice the situation dropped the clay pot in her hand and screamed in surprise.
The men also discovered the situation.
In this place bordering Tsarist Russia, the steppe people all know the existence of Cossacks, and their appearance means death.
The men looked for the nearest war horse.
Mounting their horses, they ran towards their tents, where they had their bows and arrows.
The women also ran towards the war horses, and they rode back to their tents to find their children. On the grassland, children were also the wealth of the tribe, because they represented hope.
The women put their children on their horses and ran in the opposite direction. Yes, they were running away.
There were only a hundred or so men left in the tribe who could not defeat the same number of Cossacks.
Their fight is just to buy the woman and child time to escape.
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