Chapter 296 Surprise Attack Thousands of Li Sea Territory
The Ming Dynasty court did "attention" to firearms. The court clearly stipulated that firearms could only be manufactured by the court in the capital and distributed and used. The war had to be counted and registered and handed over. Local troops were not allowed to manufacture firearms themselves until the Jiajing period. Due to the need for war and the difficulty of transportation, there are department, border fortresses and garrisons in the area. After the imperial court license, some firearms can be made on the spot, such as the bronze general's magic gun, the pearly Folang machine cannon, the poisonous fire flying cannon, etc.
The Jin Qijia, the deputy general of Guangdong, is now facing such a problem; there are very few craftsmen in Guangdong who can make firearms. They ask the court to make and apply firearms. The time for official documents to be discussed with bureaucrats is added. I guess I will wait. The cannons requested from the court were rusted and could be transported to Guangzhou.
Yuan Jin and Li Zhong secretly hired shipbuilders from the Portuguese in Macau. Then, based on the experience they learned in the Dutch shipyard, they successfully built four Western ships in Tsimshato and the Pearl River Estuary. The plywood ship has 40 gun windows on both sides.
Originally, the warships should be launched and tried to sail and equipped with weapons for training. However, the Ming Dynasty military system was completely unsuitable for the generation and promotion of new weapons and new equipment. The conservative and conservative characteristics of the entire bureaucratic system determined the fate of these four warships.
The secretly creating a new warship was the result of Yuan Jin and Li Zhong surrendering. After he wrote to the court many times. The chief assistant Fang Congzhe has always been hesitant about sending troops to conquer Taiwan. Although he has no ability to make decisions and cannot do big things, he is a wise man. He knows the court The army was very poor in naval combat. He saw Yuan Jin and Li Zhong's memorial and thought he had caught a life-saving straw. He ordered Guangdong to deduct 30,000 taels of silver for this year's land tax. Fang Congzhe thought about it very much Simple. I thought I could fight by building a warship. I didn’t consider any problems such as weapon equipment, personnel arrangements, combat training, etc.
Moreover, after the 30,000 taels of silver were exploited layer by layer, less than half of it was left when it fell to the shipyard. Finally, Yuan Jin and Li Zhong carried forward the spirit of copycats. They had to abandon metal components in some key parts of the warship. Wooden structures replace. Save money and materials...
However, although Yuan Jin and Li Zhong built four plywood boats within three months, they could only cruise near the shipyard dock and could not go out to sea for training.
But the fact that they secretly built warships is no longer a secret.
On the second day of Quanzhou City, the last day of the 44th year of Wanli, Mai Dahai led the main battleship of the Feilong, the 20 three-masted gunboats of the Fourth War Fleet, and tens of thousands of gangs in Macau, the Pearl River Estuary, and fishermen's organization. The auxiliary fleet—a hundred fishing boats and small sailboats—appeared in the estuary of the Pearl River.
Yu Anfu, the head of the China Military Information Department of the Ministry of Commerce and Information Department of the Chinese Army, stood at the bow of the Feilong ship. He pointed to the front with great enthusiasm and said to Mai Dahai: "Brother Mai. The four official army warships. Three are at the east pier of the Pearl River Estuary. There is one at Tsim Shatou Shipyard.”
Mai Dahai smiled and said, "We are not just here for these plywood ships. The owner of the ship means to destroy all the Guangdong navy at one time without leaving a mast. Only in this way can we shock the Guangdong official army."
He raised the telescope. Now the Chinese Army has obtained the latest telescope manufacturing technology from the Dutch and has been able to produce telescopes independently. So now almost all captains of the Chinese Army's naval fleet can use telescopes.
Mai Dahai looked at the estuary of the Pearl River for a while and ordered: "All fire ships are ready. Supporting troops come forward and use cannons to open the way."
The Guangdong Navy at the Pearl River Estuary was in chaos. They discovered the sudden enemy. But the huge and excessive Feilong was too scary. Any of the other three-masted warships was better than the Guangdong Watercraft. The total of the three sailboats is still big.
Moreover, dense cannons were listed on the Chinese naval warships. The official navy had long heard of the terrible power of the Chinese army on the sea. Therefore, they were only concerned about escaping and had no courage to come to meet the enemy. The Chinese army appeared. It was too sudden. At this time, the publicity content of the "Seven Hate" and "Six Oaths" of the Taiwan Corporation had not yet been spread to the navy soldiers at the estuary of the Pearl River. Of course, the Guangdong government was even more unaware of it.
However, everyone already knows that the Chinese Company has officially started war with the imperial court.
Following the rising tide of the sea, the Chinese army warships advanced rapidly. Soon most of the official navy were blocked by the dock of the navy camp. Many navy officers and soldiers abandoned their ships and landed. They fled to the shore. The navy saw the soldiers. Without fighting spirit, the difference in strength is too great. I have to escape in panic.
The naval commander Mai Dahai was not interested in accepting these naval warships converted from fishing boats. He also lacked interest in the weapons and equipment of the naval battalion. He asked the accompanying gangs and fishermen to help the fleet land on the shore and enter the official naval battalion. After confiscating some gunpowder, he ordered the release of five fire ships.
A moment later, the navy soldiers who were fleeing their lives in the mud by the Pearl River and on the ridges of the fields found a thick black smoke rising up behind them. It was the naval camp that was burned by a fire. The newly built copycat version of the Western Sail Battleship has been killed in the sea of fire before even the weapons are equipped.
On this evening, fire and smoke rose in Jianshatou, Xin'an County.
A 200-person sailor musket team and 100 special battalion soldiers formed a night raid team. It landed on the southern beach of Shi Pai Bay (later Aberdeen) early this morning. Then it crossed the entire island. It was across the shore of Tsim Shatou. With the help of a large number of gangster sailors, fishermen and pirates, they crossed the sea and launched a raid on the Tsimshatou official shipyard after it was dark.
The Night Raid Team carried a large number of Thunderbolt Burning Rockets, as well as a large number of grenades and tung oil.
Although the Guanjun Shipyard also learned about what happened in the estuary of the Pearl River during the day, Yuan Jin and Li Zhong left the shipyard on the excuse of going to Guangzhou City for help. Therefore, the shipyard lost the command of the leader. In panic, the official army in the shipyard and The craftsmen did not do any defensive preparations at all.
Therefore, the shipyard was easily opened by the night attack team. The large number of weapons and ammunition prepared by the three hundred soldiers was of no use at all.
Yuan Jin and Li Zhong escaped early with their outstanding sense of smell and years of experience in confronting the Chinese army, resulting in the night attack team losing their main combat target.
The Guanjun Navy Shipyard was burned by fire. All the craftsmen were plundered to the Taiwan Port.
The Zhoushan Islands in Zhejiang were also seized by the Chinese army in the first month of the year. Yin Feng sent a group of craftsmen and Dutch engineers to start building a military port on Zhoushan Island.
In the first month of the 45th year of Wanli, the Chinese army took maritime power as its main force and used the maneuverability of maritime warships to launch attacks on the coastline of several governing officials south of the Yangtze River Estuary to Qinzhou, thousands of miles south of the Yangtze River Estuary.
The navy of the government and the navy in various places was almost wiped out in one month. The navy ships that survived by luck also hid in the port and were beaten to death and dared not go to sea. Although the Chinese army never treated the navy as a dish, it was still a little bit of a sudden. They were wiped out without mercy. And they had barely experienced a decent naval battle.
The thousands of miles of coastlines of the Ming Dynasty were warned at the same time. The emergency pond reported snowflakes and flew to the capital.
This was just the beginning of the war. The court began to officially declare the Chinese company as a Taiwanese pirate. It was an edict to all the people in the jurisdiction of the Thirteenth Provincial Administration of the World. No matter who supports the pirates with money or manpower, it was a serious crime of treason. Killing without mercy.
However, on the key issue of how to deal with the Chinese army's strategic initiative at sea, the Ming Dynasty court did not issue any policies. The Ministry of War issued a conscription document. The Ministry of Revenue asked the cabinet to increase taxes to be used as military expenses. Fang Congzhe to Emperor Wanli Hand over the memorial. Please send me a memorial to the internal school for military expenses. However, there was no response. The memorial was left unpublished.
Although the central department is busy, it is only due to the inertia of bureaucracy in handling emergency affairs. When the entire Ming Dynasty central organization responds to unprecedented things such as "pirate rebellion", it was completely messy and unclear. The Ministry of War Instead, a plan was launched to mobilize elite troops from all over the country to gather in coastal areas of Nanzhili, Zhejiang, Fujian and Guangdong. Strengthen the walls and clear the fields, move the sea ruins, and cut off the supply of Taiwan pirates. I want to use this kind of implementation in the early Ming Dynasty. Strict measures to ban the sea and move boundaries to starve Chinese companies to death.
The problem is that the Chinese companies are not the "Japanese pirates" who have no maritime bases in history. They are now able to not only self-sufficient in food, but also sell a large amount of rice to Fujian and Jiangnan to feed millions of mainland people. "Severe the support" The trick is simply a fantasy of officials from the Ministry of War to work behind closed doors. Even the severity of the sea ban in the early Ming Dynasty could not cut off the sales of smuggled maritime merchants. Now the Ming Dynasty's rule on the southeast coast is so weak. If you want to start moving the border again The land can only push more coastal people to the side of China United Company.
Some people also saw this within the Ming Dynasty government. The Fujian general Chen Yourong, and the general Yu Zigao, reported to the court to the court to oppose the ban on the sea and move the border. They also opposed the decisive battle with Sinochem Company immediately. But they also I can't come up with any good way to deal with the Chinese naval forces.
The Ming Dynasty also had a dark eye on the situation in Taiwan and Luzon. All information had to be collected temporarily: whether it was politics, economy, or military. Although the China United Company had been established for more than ten years, the Ming Dynasty was basically too lazy to go all out. Understand the situation of the Chinese company. Except for foresighted figures like Chen Yourong who have long started to send spies to infiltrate Taiwan. Others, whether in the military or the government, their understanding of the Chinese company is limited to the words of a few officials. After Taiwan, Luzon's businessmen had sporadic experiences. Fortunately, there was Yu Zigao. He knew enough about the Chinese company and the internal organizational structure of the Chinese army. Therefore, he had been re-activated by the imperial court.
After the first month of the year, the war temporarily stopped for thousands of miles of sea border. The north wind in winter was not conducive to the actions of the Chinese fleet. At this time, the imperial court began to mobilize troops along the coast and argue endlessly within the internal affairs. From the hiding places in the capital, Nanjing, and Fuzhou Chinese companies' hidden spies are constantly sent to Taiwan Port.
Yin Feng received a recent issue of the Mansion report forwarded by the Ministry of Military Information in Quanzhou. The central organization of the Ming Dynasty despised confidentiality work. Any kind of memorial will be published in the Mansion newspaper.
Zeng Qi came to see him, with an old face and looked very unhappy.