Prime Minister Bizen

Chapter 635 Imchen Japanese Invasion (24) The navy bombarded the Japanese invaders
The naval aid team also brought to Li Rusong five Hongyi cannons that he needed most, each of which was dismantled from a Portuguese ship, with a caliber of no less than 5 pounds, and each projectile had the size of a bowl. big.

Toyotomi Hidekatsu's failure to surprise Hirayama does not mean that the Ming army just let him go.

When Ji Jin led the navy to Haizhou on January 1, Yang Yuan, the former commander of the Association, had already led his troops to the other side of the Licheng River.

Compared with the Han River and Datong River, the Licheng River is a small river, but it is still a large river with a width of 10 meters, and the water depth is more than [-] meters. It is extremely difficult to cross the river.

Jinchuan City is located on the south bank of Licheng River, in the triangular area where Jinchuan and Licheng River meet.The superior geographical location makes Jinchuan City close to Jinchuan and Licheng River on the east and south sides, while its west side is blocked by the 100-meter-high Fei'e Mountain. Only the north side is flat to facilitate the formation of large corps.

It is precisely because of the geographical advantages that are not inferior to Pyongyang Castle that Kobayakawa Takakage is not willing to give up Jinchuan Castle. It took 2 months before that to build a Japanese-style mountain castle on Mount Bias to echo Jinchuan below. .

But no matter how good the city is, it is also guarded by people. The 3000 Japanese troops stationed here are [-] Japanese troops including Gong Changfang, Araki Shigeken, and others of the Tenth Corps.

When Yang Yuanchu arrived in Jinchuan, he found that Jinchuan was easy to defend and difficult to attack, but he soon learned that the Ming navy had arrived in North Korea, and immediately hoped that Li Rusong would send a navy to help him bombard Jinchuan City.

But Li Rusong had a more daring plan. He contacted Ji Jin, and under the cover of the navy, he transported Li Rubai, the Zuoxie, to the opposite bank downstream, and headed directly to Kaifeng in the south.

The location of Jinchuan City is important because the water in the middle reaches of General Licheng is relatively gentle here, and crossing the river from the upper reaches requires crossing the Feixiong Mountains. No matter which mountain pass you go out from, the first thing you have to face is Jinchuan City.

When inspecting various city defenses, he naturally surveyed Kaesong. In order to cope with the benefits of Ming army artillery, he ordered people to build a mountain city on Centipede Mountain, called Kaizi City and Kaesong Hu Chengjiao.

"Today, the navy of the Ming army can cross the Linjin River and bombard Changtuan, but can it cross the Han River and bombard Hanyang tomorrow? Then what's the point of my Hanyang defense line?"

He said to Toyotomi Hideji, "I am twice as powerful as the Ming army's sea ships, and I am twice as much as the Ming army's iron cannons. Now the two are combined to cross the river. The retreat of the Han River may be cut off, and my 10 troops may be lost here. .”

Regarding this point, Li Rubai had already discovered it when he came to Kaesong to survey the terrain.However, Takakage Kobayakawa is not a mediocre person, and Wang Jing's line of defense was originally arranged by him.

Kobayakawa Takakage, who heard the Ming army bombarded Changtan, took his entourage out of Paju to observe in person, lamenting the strength of the Ming army's warships, and more importantly, at this moment he had a terrifying thought.

The main force of the former alliance on the north side of the city fired artillery at Jinchuan City. The Ming army water boats on the Licheng River listened to the sound of the cannons like orders, and then fired a hundred cannons at the top of Jinchuan City. Even a place without a cone.

In particular, the west side of the city wall is facing the large-caliber Shenwei General Cannon. If this kind of artillery is placed on the ground and weighs several thousand catties, it is not so easy to transport. Even the main force of the Ming army does not have many guns. They are all Li Rusong's treasures. .

At this moment, they didn't know the news that the Ming army had opened up the battle and encircled Kaesong, and they never thought that their unintentional move would save their lives.

Although Li Rusong arrived 3 days later, the artillery was not transported to Kaesong. Li Rusong had to wait another 3 days, and actually launched the siege of Kaesong on January 1.

Facing the attack of the Ming army this time, Toyotomi Hidekatsu didn't want him to go to Jinchuan to guard in person, and planned to let his family's old Miyabe Mueji go as the formation representative. In the end, the minister of the palace insisted repeatedly before allowing him to accompany him.

More than 30 ships had the firepower of a salvo of nearly a hundred Shenwei generals, which really made Yang Yuan and the Japanese army in Jinchuan city feel the fire support that the Japanese army in Pyongyang had never felt.

The 3000 people from Asano Yukunaga's department were stationed here again. They had held on for 3 days before and felt that the Ming army was no more than that. Just before the battle today, they were embarrassed by the Ming army's plan to burn the city.

Kobayakawa Takakage was shocked when he saw the sharp artillery of the Ming army navy, and immediately went south to Wangjing to report the incident to Toyotomi Hideji.

However, the advantage of facing South Centipede Mountain is that cannons can be placed here to directly bombard Kaesong South City.

And 10 kilometers south of Kaifeng is Kaesong, where the Japanese army garrisoned heavy troops. The general of the Tenth Corps, Sekibaek Hideyoshi's nephew Toyotomi Hidekatsu was stationed here.

Seeing that the Patriarch was dead, the Araki army no longer wanted to fight. They fled their positions and ran towards the east gate. The Ming army officially entered Jinchuan City.

It is extremely inconvenient to transport artillery by land, but it is much more convenient to transport the artillery on the ship Ito than by land.

The movement of the west city being broken was so great that Miyabe Muneji and Miyabu Changfang, who had been dealing with the Ming army in the north city, saw it. Then they heard from the fugitives on the west side that Araki Beichu was dead, and the Ming army had entered the city. After hearing the news, I knew that there was no point in sticking to it.

It's really not derogatory. He did make a lot of jokes in the battles of Kyushu, Nooo, and Odawara before, but he is very clear about who gave him his power, so he has always been committed to Hideyoshi's orders Unswervingly completed.

Therefore, when Kobayakawa Takakage told Toyotomi Hideji about the issue of the Imjin River, although Hideji did not doubt what Kobayakawa Takakage said, his first reaction was not whether to retreat, and then he thought about how to defend Hanyang.

Since Kaesong is backed by Mt. Songak and facing Mt. Centipede to the south, although Kaesong has three city walls in east, west and south, the south wall does not have enough width for the battlefield to deploy soldiers.

At that time, Toyotomi Hidekatsu also admired his samurai way and bravery, and in addition, although Jinchuan Castle was advancing, it was only as strong as a soup when facing the enemy, so he was relieved to let him go directly to the battle.

Jinchuan City is small, and it was originally a small county under Kaijing. It is because of its superior geographical location that the wall is more than 3 meters high. In later generations, it would be the height of a floor.

Taking advantage of the Ming army's attention being attracted by the fire of Kaizi City, he led his troops to fight a bloody road from the southeast, trying to cross the Imjin River and flee to Paju.

Thousands of Ming soldiers thought they would have to fight hard at the base of the wall after crossing the river by boat, but they didn't expect the Jinchuan city wall to collapse so easily, and they rushed into the city with great morale.

———————Back to the Korean battlefield———————

Hideyoshi had made repeated orders to stick to Hanyang, because he wanted to divide and rule with Hanyang in hand with the Ming and North Korea peace talks.

Although Centipede Mountain is not high, the Japanese did have some skills in building mountain castles.The twists and turns of the winding mountain roads made it impossible for the Ming army to take advantage of its strength.On the contrary, if the Ming army wanted to attack the mountain, they would face Japanese iron cannons and bows shooting from multiple directions along the winding road.

After Li Rusong arrived, he changed his strategy, referring to the strategy of burning Mudanfeng last time, and shot Kaizi City with a fire dragon out of the water.

But now that something has changed, Hideyoshi in Nagoya has never felt the oppressive feeling of hundreds of warships crossing the river and bombarding the cities along the river. He naturally doesn't understand what Kobayakawa Takakage is worried about, and naturally he doesn't understand why Hanyang can't stand it anymore.

This time, North Korea actually gilded him and allowed him to have military merits, so that he could have the authority to suppress the retainers in the collar.

Li Rubai stormed for three days and lost 3 thousand households, 1 guerrilla and 600 soldiers, but failed to take Kaizi City.

Kobayakawa Takakage and Toyotomi Hideji knew very well that Hanyang had something to do with Bai's face, and he would never allow Hanyang to retreat without a fight.

In the absence of the main force and cannons, Li Rubai asked himself that he couldn't do it just by relying on tens of thousands of men in his hand and an equal number of tens of thousands of men on the opposite side.

I just don’t know if the Ming army who operated the guns would have some suspicions when they found that the ships had reserved muzzles and the caliber was still so suitable?

Compared to Paju, which is more than 1 kilometer away from the Imjin River, Changtuan is a city built along the river.By the time Asano Yuki ran here, Chang Tuan had already been crossed by the Ming army navy commanded by Ji Jin, and they were constantly bombarding Chang Tuan in the north of the river and the Japanese barracks in the south of the river.

Although the distance is too far and the accuracy is not very good, the psychological pressure on the Japanese troops on both sides of the North and South Straits is great.

Therefore, when the Ming court recruited maritime merchant ships, the maritime merchants unloaded their cannons in advance and delivered them to the Ming army, and the Ming army loaded their own artillery on the emplacements.

The Araki army on the west side fell to the ground with him, or was buried by the city wall. There were nearly a hundred soldiers, all of whom were beheaded by the Ming army.

It is not appropriate to say that it was changed, because the sea merchants would have carried matchlock guns and artillery for self-defense when they sailed to the ocean, but these must not be known to the court, after all, firearms were strictly controlled by the Ming court.

In addition, Li Rubai's soldiers surrounded Kaesong for 3 days to wait for Li Rusong's main force to gather. After all, Kaesong, also known as Kaesong, is the second largest city in North Korea. It is densely populated and has both urban defense and capital.

But Takakage Kobayakawa is just a foreign daimyo of the Toyotomi family. Although he knew Hideyoshi's thoughts well, he didn't give the Toyotomi family all his thoughts.

Wangjing is an important city in North Korea and has very important political significance. Neither North Korea nor Japan will allow him to lose it easily.

It's just that Toyotomi Hidekatsu never imagined that the times have changed. The Ming army directly transported the army across the Licheng River through the navy and bypassed the Jinchuan defense line.

Kaizi City was urgently built by Takakage Kobayakawa within 3 months. It is impossible to use things such as stone walls and stone screens. The overall building is still mainly made of wood, and it was quickly ignited under the fire of Ming army firearms. .

In fact, as early as a few days ago, Yang Yuan sent people to cross the river upstream, and passed through the Feixiong Mountains to the north of Jinchuan City.

Fortunately, there is an old family, Baijiang Chengding. Under his persuasion, Toyotomi Hidekatsu ordered Fengde's Shimadzu Toyohisa and others to withdraw to Kaesong to garrison.

The loss of Kaifeng directly made Toyotomi Hidekatsu's situation very difficult, and it also made Fengde, who monitored Jianghua Island, lose its strategic significance.

In the end, everyone climbed over Mount Fei'e, passed through Baizhi, and came to Shuoning, where Kuroda Nagamasa's Third Corps was stationed.Fortunately, Miyabu Muneji and Miyabe Muneji both survived, but the number of soldiers they led was less than 1500, and there were 12 important officials and samurai in the family alone.

But now that the main force of the Ming army has arrived, Kaizi City and Kaesong City have been divided long ago.

However, because Miyabe Tsutsuru was the adoptive father of Toyotomi Hideji, he was a vassal daimyo in the Hideji Independence City, and after he was granted the title of Echizen, he had already retired and handed over the family governor to his only son.

Xiuji can be said to be the longest and most well-behaved child of the second generation of the Toyotomi family outside of the Xiu family.

Seeing the dark red army coming from the north like a flood, they were driven out after a little resistance.The Ming army officially severed the connection between Jinchuan and Kaesong.

Under the artillery bombardment of the Ming army, the city wall on the north side, which had been eroded by the river all year round, collapsed. The collapsed city wall rushed into the Licheng River, creating a shoal for the Ming army to log in.

It can even be said that in Hideyoshi's eyes, all reasons are excuses. In order to maintain his authority, it doesn't matter even if all the 20 troops of Zhengchao are dead.

Although there was a water pool prepared for fire attack at the beginning of the city's construction, the fire ignited by kerosene was unmatched by ordinary people. Soon the fire in Kaizi Castle could not be controlled, and Asano Yukunaga had to order to abandon the castle and flee.

Toyotomi Hideji is still very concerned about this former younger brother, and has repeatedly told Toyotomi Hidekatsu to take care of him.

However, since the Ming army had already entered the city, their escape route to the east gate was virtually blocked, so they could only hang down through the east wall, climb over Fei'e Mountain and meet Nantiao Yuanqing who was stationed on the top of the mountain.

Taking a step back, the reason why Hideyoshi was chosen as the general during the conquest of North Korea, rather than the more skilled Hideyoshi, is to establish a dual political leader in the post-Toyotomi era.

It wasn't until later that the Xiu family saw the naval ships of the Ming army with their own eyes and captured some of them. It turned out that most of the naval ships of the Ming army that aided the DPRK were temporarily recruited and rebuilt after being loaded with artillery. .

If I remember correctly, since Jiajing, the navy of the Ming army has become more and more unbearable, and even the craftsmen who built the ship can't get together. If you want to build a ship, you have to make a decision to the Fujian private shipyard. How can he get so many armed forces? Gunboat?

In addition, he is Hideyoshi's counselor, so it is natural to give Toyotomi Hideji the most suitable advice.

The warriors originally wanted to escort Gong Changfang out through the east gate in the southeast, and after crossing Jinchuan, they went to Kaifeng and returned to Kaesong.

Although Gong Changfang is already a daimyo of 9.1 stones in Iwaya Mountain City, which is only one step away from the 10 stone country, but in fact Gong Changfang was born in the 9th year of Tensho (1581) and is only 12 years old this year. .

As a colleague of Toyotomi Hideyoshi at the beginning, and later the first generation of genealogy generations who were transferred from Oda retainers to Hideyoshi, the Miyabe family can be regarded as the diehards of the Toyotomi family, and it is for this reason that Hideyoshi assigned him to Toyotomi Hideyoshi Sheng, so that he can help his nephew more.

As the elder of the family and also Miyabe Jijun's nephew, Miyabe Muneji knew very well that there was only one long house left in the Miyabe family, so he forced the samurai to escort him away and stay in the rear.

Li Rubai arrived three days earlier than Li Rusong, and he had been doing one thing during these three days, that is, storming Centipede Mountain and eradicating Kaizi City.

Araki Shigeken and 850 men under his command were stationed on the west side. When the city wall collapsed, the palace minister's room was thrown out of the city. class.

However, Li Rusong boldly used the water army to cross the river from the lower reaches of the soldiers, directly bypassing the Japanese Jinchuan line of defense. In Kaifeng City on the second line, there were only thousands of Japanese troops under surveillance. There are 800 soldiers under his command.

I saw that early in the morning, there were more than 30 Ming warships straddling the Licheng River, all of which were anchored and lined up facing the head of Jinchuan City.

But after inspecting around, I found that Jinchuan City was easy to defend and difficult to attack. Only the north side faced the enemy, and the pressure on my own side to attack the city was too great. A plan to cross the Licheng River and attack Jinchuan City.

It even bombarded the Jinchuan city wall with giant cannons, knocking down the Jinchuan city wall, making the original strong city defense of Jinchuan city lose its effect.

Those stationed at the north gate were the womb minister's room of Jirunzhi Jirun, who was transferred to the Kyushu Chikuzen Rock House Castle, and more than 2700 people under his command.

The infantry of the Ming army took the opportunity to rush to the bottom of the city and set up a ladder to Jinchuan City. The Ming army on the other side of the Licheng River also took this opportunity to cross the river by boat.

To the southeast of Kaesong, across the river from Paju is Changtan.As mentioned earlier, this is an important city that communicates between Toyotomi Hidekatsu and Kuroda Nagamasa, but no matter how important it is, it is only a county town.

On January 1, the troops of Li Rubai and Li Ning approached Kaesong. At the same time, the navy led by Ji Jin also went up the river to help Yang Yuan attack Jinchuan City.

Could it be that not only Kobayakawa Takakage was shocked, but Hideka who was far away in Kyoto was startled when he heard that the Ming army navy joined the battle, and it was also a Ming army navy with artillery.

If he didn't have the merits of North Korea, why should he show up to challenge the Xiu family who has so many military exploits?In this case, after I left, wouldn't the Toyotomi family be dominated by the Xiu family?

As far as Hideji himself is concerned, he is not a master who accepts his fate. Odawara took orders to attack Satomie after the battle is a proof.

He will seize every opportunity to prove himself, and he is also proving to the world that there is not only one Toyotomi Hideo family in the Toyotomi family, but Toyotomi Hideji is also a character.

Therefore, although Toyotomi Hideji was a little scared when he heard what Kobayakawa Takakage said, he still mustered up the courage to ask his elder, who is also a famous wise general in Japan, "Is there a way to defeat the enemy?"

(End of this chapter)