prosperous age

Chapter 1074 1165 Heavy Fire Gun

While the soldiers were testing their guns, Li Chengliang had already pulled Liang Dingnan aside and asked, "Does Yunnan have rattan shields? The army needs a lot of equipment. I will also report this to you."

This thing is not simple as it can protect against bird guns.

"General, don't worry too much. There aren't many rattan shields in the Burmese army. The ones under the city today must be the elite of the Burmese army."

Liang Dingnan then said, "As far as I know, there aren't many rattan shields in the Burmese army, and it's really too troublesome to make them.

As for the Yunnan armory, there should be no rattan shields, as they were all prepared by the soldiers themselves.

There are not many local craftsmen who can make rattan shields. If the Marshal wants to purchase them in large quantities, it may not be enough in Yunnan alone. He must mobilize Guangxi, Guizhou and other places to find craftsmen who can make them.

By the way, there may be rattan shields in Zhejiang and Fujian. I heard that Qi's army purchased a large number of rattan shields in Fujian in the early years, so there may still be stocks there."

"Yes, I understand. I will report this to the court immediately. I hope the court can collect some rattan shields and ship them here as soon as possible to solve the urgent problem."

Li Chengliang realized that the rattan shield seemed to be something that neither the civil nor military officials in Yunnan had any idea about.

Yes, after listening to what Liang Dingnan said about the manufacturing process, it takes more than a year to prepare a set of rattan shield, which is indeed quite troublesome.

In fact, at this time Li Chengliang should have considered more about how to break the rattan shield, especially since it had a very good defensive effect against the Ming army's large-scale bird guns.

It seems that it is possible to mobilize the Portuguese cannon to attack the rattan shields.

The Ming army did have many Portuguese cannons, but if they really wanted to fight the Burmese army, they would have to concentrate most of them, which was a bit troublesome.

As for why the Ming army also wanted to equip this thing, it was actually because of Li Chengliang's competitive spirit.

No matter whether the enemy has good things or not, you have to have them in your hands anyway.

This is also the reason why Li Chengliang was still determined to collect rattan shields even though he knew that the Burmese army did not seem to be equipped with firearms.

After returning to the courtyard where he temporarily lived, Li Chengliang immediately wrote documents to Nanjing and the capital, mainly introducing in detail the role of the rattan shield he learned from Liang Dingnan, emphasizing that this thing can withstand the bullets fired by bird guns, and has a great impact on the combat effectiveness of the Ming army.

Of course, the documents sent to the capital were mainly complaints.

In a battlefield where the enemy outnumbers us, if the power of the bird gun is severely weakened, it will be absolutely fatal to the Ming army.

Now the distance at which the Ming army's bird guns can penetrate armor has been compressed to within ten steps, and they cannot even penetrate the rattan armor 100%. Only at a distance of five or six steps can they be sure to have a certain lethality.

This is almost the same as the effective range of pistols in later generations. On a battlefield where two armies are fighting, it has almost no power at all.

The documents sent to Nanjing were, firstly, to urge the replenishment of supplies and request more Portuguese cannons, and secondly, to seek the Nanjing Ministry of War to obtain rattan shields from Zhejiang, Fujian and other places.

As I said, whether to use it or not is one thing, but if the enemy has it, I must have it too.

After the document was sent out, Li Chengliang wrote to Qi Jimei, the general commander of Guizhou in Baoshan, asking him to urgently allocate a batch of Portuguese cannons and gunners from the army to reinforce the three cities of Shidian, Tengchong and Lujiang. The only thing that could destroy the rattan shields now was the Portuguese cannon.

Leaving those gunners behind would undoubtedly be a huge waste.

Qi Jimei was left in Baoshan. In fact, Li Chengliang had some selfish motives in making this arrangement.

First, they did not want to give him the opportunity to make merit. He already had an older brother who had made a name for himself in the army and was showing signs of competing with him, so naturally they could not give his brother another chance.

The second reason is that it is safer to stay in the rear. If you meet Qi Jiguang in the future, you will be considered to be taking care of his brother, and he should appreciate this.

As for whether Qi Jiguang would be dissatisfied, just look at the jobs he found for his brothers and you will know that Qi Jimei did not have the ability of his brother, otherwise he would never have come to Guizhou.

This place had just been tidied up by Yu Dayou, and some of the troublemakers had been dealt with by Yu Dayou. Now, even if some of the chieftains in Guizhou were dissatisfied, they dared not do anything and were very obedient.

The document was extremely urgent, and Li Chengliang required that the military report be sent out as quickly as possible.

The fastest way for express delivery is to cross mountains and ridges, after all, it is a shortcut. Once you are out of the mountains, you will pass through the post station and the express horse will deliver the goods to the next stop.

Working day and night for twelve hours, it took only ten days or so to send him to the capital and put him in the hands of Tan Lun.

"Go and ask Minister Yang to come over."

Tan Lun quickly read Li Chengliang's documents and frowned.

Firearms now have a high status in the Ming army. No matter whether it is the Southern Army or the Northern Army, they mostly rely on firearms to fight the enemy. In particular, Qi Jiguang, the ace god of war of the Ming Dynasty, is the general who is best at exerting the power of firearms.

Now that he suddenly knew that there was protective gear in the world that could withstand attacks from firearms, how could Tan Lun not be panicked?

Yang Wei was in charge of the Arsenal and was naturally most familiar with weapons, so Tan Lun first sought him out to ask whether the Ministry of War had any protective gear such as rattan shields in stock.

In fact, Tan Lun was no stranger to rattan shields. After all, he had commanded wars against the Japanese in Zhejiang and Fujian for many years.

However, he was not very clear about whether the rattan shield could protect against bird-shot.

For him, winning or losing is the only thing that matters, and the rest is the business of his generals.

After the money and grain were allocated, except for the standard equipment of the Ming army, all other strange equipment was purchased by the generals themselves, and he was too lazy to take care of it.

Just like the wolf-whip invented by Qi Jiguang, it is a special type of long weapon.

The wolf whisk is about 15 or 16 feet long and weighs about 7 pounds. The head of the tool is as sharp as a spear head, with dense joints and strong branches, and nine to eleven layers of branches. The entire tool is made of iron.

The wolf-whip originated from the war against Japanese invaders and can resist the cutting of Japanese swords. Although it is heavy and difficult to move, it has deep layers and dense branches and is long, making it capable of defense.

In battle, the wolf-whip is used as the vanguard, with shield on the left below, long spears on the left and right, and sharp palladiums and broadswords supporting from the back. They rely on each other, working as a whole, and win by surprise.

At the beginning, not to mention Tan Lun, even Hu Zongxian and others had no interest in this thing and were too lazy to even take a look at it.

So weird.

But it was so useful that not only did the Qi family army hire people to build a large number of them, but other armies also purchased this weapon to use against the enemy.

The same goes for rattan shields. When the subordinates reported that the shields allocated by the Nanjing Ministry of War were not good, they wanted to purchase rattan shields themselves. Naturally, Tan Lun would not interfere and approved it with a stroke of his pen.

These weapons were not made by the Ministry of Works, so they are naturally not considered standard equipment of the Ming army. They can be considered the characteristics of each army.

Not long after, Yang Wei arrived and Tan Lun handed him Li Chengliang's document and asked him to take a look at it himself.

After Yang Wei finished reading the document, Tan Lun asked, "Does the armory behind the cabinet have any reserves of rattan shields?"

When asking this question, Tan Lun could actually guess the result, but he still asked.

"I do know about rattan shields. Last year, the Liaodong Army asked the Ministry of War to purchase a batch from Fujian. I just didn't know that this thing could actually block the shooting of bird guns."

Yang Wei answered, "As for the arsenal, there is definitely none. The Ministry of Industry will not manufacture such a thing, so we can only send an order to Fujian and other places to purchase it."

Hearing that the Ministry of War had helped the Liaodong Army purchase supplies, Tan Lun immediately asked, "Have those rattan shields arrived? Have they been sent to Liaodong?"

"I'm really not sure about this, but I vaguely remember that this happened. Liaodong issued an official document at the time, and I approved it."

Yang Wei said, "I'll ask someone to check right away. If the rattan shield is still there, send it to Yunnan right away."

At this time, neither Tan Lun nor Yang Wei thought about whether the Burmese army was equipped with a large number of bird guns, and they were both shocked by this sudden news.

"I wrote a letter to Yuan Jing. Since he has been using rattan shields for a long time, he must be very familiar with it and may have a way to crack it."

After thinking about it, Tan Lun said, "By the way, let's ask the Ministry of Works to see if they have any way to break the rattan shield. Otherwise, it will not be good news for our Ming Dynasty." Tan Lun did not plan to report this matter to the cabinet, and the Ministry of War could handle it on its own.

Moreover, even if Wei Guangde was told about such a professional matter, he would not have any good solution.

As a result, the Ministry of War took immediate action. On the one hand, they traced the whereabouts of the purchased rattan shields. Tan Lun also immediately wrote a letter to Qi Jiguang, asking about the advantages and disadvantages of the rattan shields, and sent someone to deliver them to Liaodong by express horse.

At the same time, the officials in the Ministry of Industry who were in charge of weapons production also received a document from the Ministry of War, asking them to bring the master craftsman who made the bird guns to the Ministry of War.

In order to keep it secret, the Ministry of War did not spread the news that rattan shields could protect against bird guns.

His luck was still good. Half an hour later, a rattan shield was delivered to Tan Lun.

Yes, it seems normal that it took a year and a half from the time the Ministry of War instructed the Fujian government to purchase rattan shields to the time these things were transported to the north.

When the people from the Ministry of Works arrived at the Ministry of War, a rattan shield appeared before them.

"This is a rattan shield. It's not just equipment of our Ming army, but it has a very good defensive effect. It can even withstand the shooting of bird guns from ten steps away. The main reason I recruited you this time is to let you see if there is a way to solve this problem.

You should know that bird guns are now an important firearm in our Ming army, and they are equipped in huge quantities. "

When they heard that the goal was to find a way to break the rattan shield, the officials from the Ministry of Works sat there without saying anything. Instead, they looked at the craftsmen who were brought there and asked them to come out and speak.

"Sir, I don't really believe that this thing can protect against bird guns. We have also tried our iron shields, and they can penetrate them from more than 20 steps away. It is hard to believe that this rattan thing can withstand bird gun bullets."

The rattan shield was passed among several craftsmen. After everyone had seen it, one of the oldest craftsmen spoke.

"This is easy. Just find a place to try it out."

Yang Wei said, "Come on, prepare the carriage, we will go outside the city to test the guns."

This is the capital city, so of course we can't test guns here. Even if the backyard of the Ministry of War is spacious enough, we can't fire guns in the city.

If you frighten anyone in the palace, you will be blamed.

The people under the Ministry of War acted quickly. The officials all had their own carriages, so they just found two horse-drawn carriages and took the craftsmen with them. The group quickly left the Ministry of War and headed for the military camp outside the city.

There is the Shenji Camp there, and they can just dispatch a team of bird-gunners.

When the group arrived at the Beijing camp, naturally no one dared to stop them.

The leaders were from the Ministry of War, but they were their immediate superiors, so who would dare to stop such a team?

There was no need to look for the military affairs of the Beijing camp. Yang Wei directly called a team of musketeers and placed several rattan shields on the training ground.

It's not like we're moving troops out of the camp, so naturally there aren't so many rules.

After a team of musketeers fired at the rattan shields at different distances, Yang Wei led his men to get closer and saw that the rattan shields ten steps away were almost intact. At most, they could see a few dents, but they were definitely not pierced through.

There were also many such dents on a rattan shield placed ten steps away, and the degree of indentation was even more severe, but most of them had not been penetrated, with only two bullet holes.

Facts speak louder than words. This rattan shield that they looked down upon seemed to be more powerful than the shields used by the Ming army.

Moreover, the rattan shield has a certain degree of elasticity and is very capable of defending against knife attacks and arrows.

If we have to point out the disadvantage of the rattan shield, it is that once it is damaged, the damage will continue to expand and it will be difficult to repair.

Unlike a shield, a damaged shield can be repaired by replacing the iron sheet or hitting it for a while.

Several craftsmen studied the punctured rattan shield for a long time, but could not come up with any results. They could only reply to Yang Wei: "Sir, we can't think of a solution for the time being. Please allow us to go back and think about it."

"At this time, it must be kept confidential and not disclosed."

Yang Wei could only emphasize one sentence, and then everyone present was told this sentence.

After returning to the city, Yang Wei went to the Tan Mansion to report the matter to Shangshu Tan Lun.

Originally, Tan Lun was supposed to host the event in person, but due to his poor health, Yang Wei was responsible for supporting the event.

“Indeed, it only takes about ten steps to penetrate the rattan armor, which is better than the current shield defense of our army.

The craftsmen saw this and had no idea what to do for now."

When he met Tan Lun, Yang Wei told him the experimental results in detail.

"The letter from Liaodong should still be on the way. Maybe Yuan Jing has a solution. Let's wait for now."

Tan Lun said.

"The Ministry of Industry also said that they would consider increasing the production of small-sized flang machines, which can effectively attack rattan shields."

Yang Wei said again.

In the Beijing camp, after the bird guns became ineffective, they brought in the Portuguese cannons. Three small Portuguese cannons took turns shooting at the rattan shields, which could easily penetrate them from thirty steps away.

Although the small-sized falconet cannon consumes more materials than the bird gun, its performance is indeed better. However, the Ministry of Industry used to manufacture more bird guns, while the manufacture of falconet cannon had to be based on material inventory and demand.

Now that we know the defects of the bird gun, we naturally cannot continue to manufacture it recklessly.

At least until a way to increase its power is found, the production of bird guns will be controlled.

"Distant water cannot quench immediate thirst. What Yunnan lacks most is the Portuguese cannon."

Tan Lun said with a frown.

"I think Li Chengliang will mobilize troops from the surrounding garrisons. There shouldn't be any solution."

Yang Wei spoke up.

After Yang Wei left, Tan Lun thought about it and decided to write a note about the matter and asked someone to deliver it to Wei's house.

Wei Guangde saw the note at night, while washing his feet, he was looking at Tan Lun's note.

"A rattan shield?"

Wei Guangde couldn't help but touch his nose. He had a vague impression of this incident. After all, the story was adapted into a movie.

The Qing Dynasty's bird guns could not penetrate rattan shields. The same was true when Zheng Chenggong attacked Taiwan. The Dutch's matchlock guns could not penetrate rattan shields, so the shield bearers relied on rolling and jumping to dodge and got close to the enemy to hack and kill.

However, it seems that the rattan shield bearers are not omnipotent and cannot stop artillery and heavy muskets.

Thinking of this, Wei Guangde also reacted.

In order to increase the range, the barrel of the Ming Dynasty's bird gun was very thin.

The rattan shield has a certain elasticity, so if the impact force is not enough, it will not be able to break the armor.

"Increase the caliber and increase the charge."

In an instant, an idea came into his mind.