The Prosperous Era of Longwan

At the beginning of Shen Dynasty, that is, around three o'clock in the afternoon, it was the time for Ming Dynasty officials to get off work.

But today it is very strange that there are no scenes of officials filing out in front of the major government offices, and the gatekeepers at the gates of each government office are not surprised, because at this time they are also gathered together and chatting enthusiastically. .

"Anyway, I think the master over there in Datong is audacious, hehe. Thousands of people are running away from tens of thousands of Tatars. Are you kidding me?"

"I think so too"

As you walk past them, you can hear the crowd talking fiercely.

The inner court and outer court of the Ming Dynasty were often like a sieve that leaked air everywhere. After Zhu Xizhong entered the palace to report the information sent back by the Datong Jinyi Guards, it quickly spread from Xiyuan to the palace, then to the cabinet, and then to various departments in the capital. Big Yamen.

Now the cabinet ministers and the Six Ministries and Nine Ministers, all the big shots in the court, were once again summoned by Emperor Jiajing to Xiyuan for discussion. Following the word of the official who passed the order, the gossip was officially confirmed.

When it spread to the major yamen before, most people regarded it as fake news. It was unknown who made up the rumor to please the public.

But when the messenger and the hall officer walked out together, the clerk on duty naturally relayed what he had just heard in the duty room.

The reason why the officials in various yamen did not go off duty on time was because of this incredible news. At this time, most of the officials gathered together to discuss this important matter.

These days, although the officials in the capital are not panic-stricken, they are still more or less affected. It is foreseeable that the border town will suffer a big defeat. The Metropolitan Procuratorate and the Sixth Section are already considering who should be found to deal with this. Taking the blame for the war.

But the battle report from Datong came today, which completely overturned the judgment of all previous officials. The Ming army won the battle.

Officials from the Ministry of War gathered in front of the map to deduce, but there was too little news about that battle. They only knew the result, so naturally they couldn't draw any conclusions, so they naturally turned to re-examining the situation in the north.

The officials of the Ministry of Revenue were discussing whether the series of troop deployment orders currently being implemented could be terminated since the battle in the north had been won, and the various units that had already set out could return to their respective camps.

The army is out, and the money is spent like water.

If those naughty soldiers were not needed, it would be better to just let them go back and forth wherever they went, so as to save some expenses and relieve the financial pressure on the court.

As for other yamen that have nothing to do with the war, the discussion is the most intense, and the content is naturally whether this is true or false.

If you really win the battle, the general with meritorious service should naturally be rewarded, but if you falsely report your military exploits,

When Zhou Yan, the censor of Zuodu, left the Imperial Procuratorate, he, who was well aware of the urinal nature of his men, issued a strict order, strictly forbidding the censor to speculate on the war until reports of the Datong war were sent to the capital.

The atmosphere in the imperial court was depressed these days, and as a big boss, he naturally heard the news coming from the inner court, and the emperor was very unhappy.

At this time, what if anyone dared to jump out and accuse Datong of falsely reporting military exploits? Now that the news was delivered by Jin Yiwei, the impeachment was all out of nowhere.

Even if Datong really does such a thing, it is not just the Metropolitan Procuratorate who calls the shots. The Imperial Guards and the Ministry of War are really just decorations. The current Minister of the Ministry of War is Yang Bo, a person who can't get rid of the dirt in his eyes.

The key is that this time is very delicate. If good news comes, the emperor will be happier and the life of the courtiers will be easier.

If you have any questions, let’s wait until some time later.

With Zhou Yan's words, the Metropolitan Procuratorate became the yamen least interested in Datong among the major yamen in Beijing. The censors all had nothing to do and got off work on time.

At this time, in Xiyuan, a group of big guys fell silent at first after reading the information sent back by Jin Yiwei.

It's not surprising, the news came too suddenly, completely beyond their imagination, and they were not prepared at all.

It wasn't until Emperor Jiajing asked Yang Bo to use the battle report to re-analyze the situation in the border town that the quiet atmosphere was broken.

"Judging from the results of this battle of the Datong Army, the Anta Division we were worried about before will take advantage of the trend and attack the troops in the Yansui and Ningxia towns.

Therefore, there are two choices before Anda Khan. One is to continue to attack Xuanfu with all his strength and abandon the Datong and Hetao areas; the other is to withdraw troops from Xuanfu and attack Datong, Yansui and other towns to retaliate. "

After some comments, Yang Bo made his own analysis of the battle situation and analyzed the countermeasures that Anda Khan might take.

"Does this mean that the victory of the Datong Army completely turned the tide of the war in the north?"

Emperor Jiajing on the throne asked. Although he had already expected this, it was only when Yang Bo said it that he felt it real.

Victory would definitely alleviate or even reverse the critical situation, but the continuous accidents during this period made the situation take a turn for the worse, making him feel very uneasy.

"Yes, Your Majesty."

Yang Bo did not return to his previous position, but still stood in the middle of the hall and said: "Although the initiative on the battlefield is still in the hands of Anda Khan, there are not many choices he can make.

As I said before, either continue to attack Xuanfu, or turn around and attack Datong. Regardless of the choice, the situation is actually in our army's favor. "

There were many officials in the palace, but no matter who they were or what their motives were, no one questioned this secret report from Jin Yiwei at this time.

"That's good, Zhu Aiqing, although the military report from Datong may still be on its way, you, the Jinyi Guards, must verify the news about this battle as soon as possible."

"According to the order."

Zhu Xizhong, the Duke of Chengguo below, immediately stood up and bowed to accept the order.

"Is there any news from Xuanfu in the past few days?"

Wei Guangde only learned about this later from the visiting Lao Kan.

Wei Guangde had thought about the Datong Army's defeat of the Anda cavalry, but it was in a dream, a battle personally commanded by him.

Well, from Wei Guangde's point of view, it was already very good that Yu Dayou could withstand the attack of An Da. He was really not expecting to be able to repel the opponent.

Wei Guangde has seen the combat power of our cavalry.

In that battle, if the Datong Army had not appeared nearby at the critical moment and scared away the weak Anda Khan, Wei Guangde doubted whether he would have won the final victory.

But this time it was different. The Ming army sent out only a few thousand troops, but the intelligence said that the Tatars were pursuing more than 10,000 troops, and their strength was not equal.

Wei Guangde didn't believe that Liu Han's team could achieve such an impressive record. If he could, what would he be doing?

However, this did not affect Wei Guangde's happy mood at all. Like others, Wei Guangde was surprised, but he did not doubt it. He did not believe that the people of Datong Jinyiwei would make such a low-level mistake, nor did he think that Datong officials would choose False reporting of military exploits is courting death.

With such good news, Wei Guangde would of course put a table of good wine and food in honor of Lao Kan. He would also go back to the Hanlin Academy for duty tomorrow, and by the way, he would also go to Zhan Shifu and the Metropolitan Procuratorate.

These days, he is holding back too much at home.

Early in the morning of the next day, Wei Guangde walked out of his house and returned to the Hanlin Academy to cancel his leave and go on duty.

Regarding Wei Guangde's return, his colleagues all smiled knowingly when they saw him.

They naturally knew what happened some time ago, and they also knew the reason why Wei Guangde reported illness. In fact, this was also a rule in the officialdom. They all stepped forward to greet Wei Guangde before they dispersed.

In the following days, Wei Guangde returned to his usual life, clocking in and out on time every day. At the same time, good news from Xuanda University gradually came.

The earliest good news came from the Xuanfu, which reported that the Tatar offensive momentum had been curbed after the Anda troops broke through the Great Wall and advanced to Chang'an.

Immediately afterwards, Li Wenjin, the governor of Datong, and Liu Han, the commander-in-chief of Datong, reported the victory. The memorial to the capital on the next day gave a very detailed report on the process of the two battles of the Ming army's departure from the fortress and their return.

At this point, the imperial court was completely relieved about the war in Datong.

Although the war was not over, and the Anda tribe still occupied many Great Wall passes below the Longmen Guards and remained in the passes, the court's attention had obviously been diverted from caring about the war to how the Datong army defeated the Anda tribe in the field.

Before, everyone was just curious about why the Datong Army defeated the Anda tribe.

The earliest intelligence provided by Jin Yiwei mentioned the place name Anyin Fort, so many people took it for granted that the Ming army held on to the fort and severely damaged the main force of the Tatar siege. They may even have killed and wounded the Tatar leader, and then successfully forced Anda back. Chasing troops.

However, when the detailed battle report of Datong arrived in the capital, officials were surprised to find that the Datong army actually won the field battle.

It is really unimaginable that the Ming army defeated the dominant Anda tribe in the field, and it is even more difficult to accept than when officials knew that the Datong army had won the battle.

It's just hard to accept.

The offensive power of the Mongolian cavalry has always been a nightmare for the Ming army. Since Tumubao, the Ming army has rarely won in field battles.

There was a field battle at Yingzhou under the command of General Zhu Shou. It is hard to say whether it was a victory or defeat, but in terms of overall strategy, the Ming army should have achieved its goal.

After all, after the Battle of Yingzhou, the Mongols did not dare to break into the Ming Dynasty for more than 20 years, that is, they stayed near the border forts and did not dare to go deep.

People in other yamen were just surprised, but this was not the case when they arrived at the Ministry of War. They reviewed the process in the battle report, and two highlights caught their attention.

The first is that the concentration of firearms among the troops participating in the Ming army was very high. Although the battle report stated that the Ming army had 7,000 horse infantry participating in the battle, in fact, only 3,000 troops led by Yu Dayou actually participated in the battle.

But these three thousand men and horses were equipped with thousands of cannons and hundreds of Fran machine cannons. This configuration stunned the officials of the Ministry of War. Their proportion of firearms was very close to that of the Shenji Battalion.

The standard configuration of the Shenji Battalion in the Ming Dynasty was 3,600 infantry, equipped with 3,600 muskets; 1,000 cavalry; 400 artillery, equipped with 400 short-handled muskets, and 160 general cannons; the whole battalion had a total of 5,000 officers and soldiers. .

Although the Ming army led by Yu Dayou has not yet reached the 80% firearms ratio of Shenji Camp, it is not much different.

Of course, this is only paper data. In fact, it is questionable whether there are 3,000 officers and soldiers in the Shenji Battalion, and the cavalry is even less than half.

The second point is that Yu Dayou designed a unicycle chariot mentioned in the battle report. It is not only lightweight, but also adaptable to various terrains. It can also solve the problem of military transportation.

The one-wheel design makes it very convenient for this kind of chariot to turn on the battlefield. The frame itself is the mount of the Fran cannon. The large shield in front can also protect the soldiers behind the vehicle, and it can also be regarded as a mobile horse, because A spear head was also mounted on the front of the large shield.

In fact, in the early Ming Dynasty, the Shenji Battalion was equipped with a side chariot, with 128 of them in the entire army. However, at this time, it was equipped to protect the infantry. It could defend against the opponent's arrows, but it was useless once it got close. There's a solution.

Of course, the Ming army was very powerful at that time. When the opponent actually charged forward, the Ming army cavalry would have already charged forward.

With the decline of the Ming army's combat power, the old sidecars were no longer suitable for the changes in the battlefield situation, and gradually withdrew from the Ming army's sequence.

It wasn't until Zeng Xian, the governor of the Trilateral Region more than ten years ago, that he started to build tanks again and picked up the sidecars that had been eliminated. However, in the end, due to some reasons, these tanks failed to go on the battlefield.

Over the years, the Ministry of War has actually forgotten this matter, and they have forgotten that they can try to use chariots to fight against the Tatar cavalry. In their minds, they can only raise a large number of war horses and arm a huge cavalry force like the Tatars. , Only then can they compete with each other on the prairie.

Suffering from the financial difficulties of the imperial court, the Ministry of War knew that it was impossible to raise money, and it was naturally impossible to purchase horses. The idea of ​​forming a large cavalry regiment could only remain on paper.

In fact, after the founding of the Ming Dynasty, Ma Zheng was always taken seriously.

"Although the unicycle is good, it relies on manpower and is not suitable for long-distance combat."

"Yes, but one way is to see if we can modify the sidecars so that they can also function as unicycle chariots, and distribute a batch of them to each town."

At this time, Yang Bo, Minister of the Ministry of War, presided over a meeting with officials from the Ministry of War to discuss the gains and losses of the Battle of Datong. Naturally, the topic was brought to these two points.

Although the unicycle chariot designed by Yu Dayou has withstood the test of actual combat, in the eyes of Ministry of War officials, it is still not suitable for mass production. The disadvantage is that it is driven by manpower and is difficult to maneuver over long distances.

But they thought of the horse-drawn sidecar from the changes in the unicycle, which could actually be improved.

"The Arsenal Department will discuss with the Ministry of Industry when we have time to see if we can redesign the sidecar, and we will use this unicycle as a model to improve it."

The comments from the people below also reminded Yang Bo that there were still a large number of sidecars in the Nine-Front Army of the Ming Dynasty. Although most of them were dilapidated, the batch built by Zeng Xian was still usable.

As long as the side car is redesigned and turned into a front car, even if it is rebuilt, it is okay, as long as it is actually usable.

"It's difficult. This one-wheeled chariot is different from the past. It faces the enemy head-on. I'm afraid it won't be easy to change."

Someone immediately suggested it.

"That's simple. This unicycle chariot is simple. It's better to send it directly to all military towns and let them build it themselves. The Arsenal Department should also think about a new sidecar with the Ministry of Works."

Indeed, the unicycle is really too simple. Looking at the simple diagram, many officials feel that they can build such a one.

"What does the cabinet say about Datong's meritorious service?"

Yang Bo thought it made sense, so he didn't want to continue talking about the chariot, so he immediately asked the doctor of the martial arts department.

When Yang Bo asked, the doctor said with a bitter look on his face: "I was sent back again, it seems because of Yu Dayou's matter."