national surname chiming

Chapter 207 Zhang Xianzhong: I will do the despicable things that Shen Shuren is inconvenient to do
As a post-80s generation, Shen Shuren still remembers that when he was studying in his previous life, his junior high school geography textbook said "Dongting Lake is the largest freshwater lake in my country".

However, 20 years later, when his nephew came to ask him for his geography homework, he discovered that the standard answer had become "Poyang Lake is the largest freshwater lake in my country".

It can be seen how drastic the shrinkage of Dongting Lake will be in later generations, especially after the founding of the People's Republic of China (it is estimated that Poyang Lake may also abdicate in the future, and it will all become grasslands).

However, it is still the end of Ming Dynasty, and Dongting Lake is still "spanning seven or eight hundred miles".

Of course, modern people may not be used to this "crossing" algorithm. This is the farthest lakeshore distance from the northeast corner of the lake to the southwest corner. It is roughly equivalent to the distance from Yueyang to Changde in later generations. .

As for the straight-line distance, it is only more than 300 miles from Yueyang to Changde, and it is only more than 200 miles from Yueyang to Xiangyin County at the mouth of the Xiangjiang River in the south.Go upstream along the Xiangjiang River from Xiangyin, and within seventy or eighty miles, you will reach Changsha.

On such a huge lake, it is destined to leave plenty of room for the navy with the superior warship to play—the premise is that you can find the enemy.

Shen Lian and Li Yu led 6000 men, and after breaking through the mouth of Dongting Lake overnight, they spared no effort in manpower, sailed and oars, and sailed southward day and night. All the soldiers took turns to rest, and those who were awake helped row the boat.

The military rations and supplies carried on the ship were also very sufficient, even precious dried meat and condensed milk, so that the soldiers could recover their physical strength as soon as possible, and it was also to boost morale before the war.

In the days of marching, training, and guarding, there is no such good food to eat, and only the seriously wounded can touch it.

Dongting Lake in June, sailing from north to south is not very strenuous.Because the Yangtze River is in the summer flood season, there is a lot of water from the upper reaches, and the mouth of Chenglingji Lake is poured from the Yangtze River into Dongting Lake. This situation will not become Dongting Lake until the end of the flood season.

Therefore, the lake water in the north will naturally flow slowly to the south at the moment, and the water from the Xiangjiang River can completely offset the backflow of the Yangtze River until it is close to the south bank.

In just one day, the waterway of more than 200 miles was completed, and in the middle of the journey, Shen Lian and Li Yu really found some targets.

……

The story is divided into two parts. While Li Dingguo was holding on to Shen Shuren and Zuo Zixiong in Chenglingji and Baling, the progress made by the main force of Zhang Xianzhong's troops in the south is really exaggerated.

In fact, even as early as the day before Li Dingguo besieged Baling, that is, when Li Dingguo had just found enough ships in Yuezhou Prefecture to cross the mouth of Dongting Lake, Zhang Xianzhong had already broken through Changde Prefecture and ruled Wuling County.

It's just that it took time for the message to pass. Later, Li Dingguo crossed the lake mouth to the east, and the transmission of military information was delayed due to the alternation of water and land, so he couldn't immediately know the progress of his adoptive father.

Therefore, the entire territory of Changde had actually fallen four days before Shen Shuren's arrival.The entire siege battle lasted only a day and a half.

Zhang Xianzhong's conditions at the time were "to surrender directly, and only kill the vassal kings and officials, not the common people. If you resist for one day, you will slaughter [-]% of the city; if you resist for two days, you will slaughter [-]% of the city; if you resist for three days, you will slaughter the entire city."

This condition is very harsh, even more urgent than what Li Dingguo offered in Baling. Historically, they would only do this after the 16th year of Chongzhen. Now it is obviously to grab time, so they have made a heavy hand——

Zhang Xianzhong is very clear that all his means must revolve around the goal of winning Changsha as soon as possible.Anything that is conducive to taking Changsha as soon as possible, no matter how vicious it is, must be used.

Under the urging of local officials and local vassals, the defenders of Changde Mansion also resisted symbolically for a day at first.

But when they saw the enemy's fierce offensive, they all rushed wildly like desperately. After nightfall, some soldiers were shaken when they thought of the terrible fate that the harder they resisted, the worse they would be retaliated in the future.

However, Zhang Xianzhong did not completely surround the whole city, but only attacked the west gate of Wuling County, leaving the other three sides completely open for people to run.So that night, after confirming that there was no one outside the city, a large number of defenders opened the door and swarmed out of the city.

Zhang Xianzhong did not pursue the deserters or fleeing people. He just went to the city and killed the whole family of the local vassal and Rong Wang Zhu Youfang in Changde, including Zhu Youfang himself and his son and eldest son Zhu Cizhao.

Zhu Youfang was hacked to death with random knives, his body was dismembered and sunk in the river, and he was thrown into Yuanshui and rushed directly into Dongting Lake.Zhu Cizhao was a bit lucky, but his neck was wiped with a knife, and he didn't deliberately dismember him, leaving a whole body.

This Zhu Youtang is the fifth generation Rongwang. His ancestor was the younger brother of Hongzhi Emperor Zhu Youtang. He became a feudal clan in the Zhengde period and lived in Changde for more than 130 years.

Of course, all the wealth of Prince Rong's Mansion was also robbed, and the proceeds were worth more than one million taels of silver.Most of them were allocated to recruit the poor to expand the army, and they also took all the treasury knives, guns, weapons, and scrap iron left by the Ming army into their pockets.

I have to sigh with emotion that the vassal king of Ming Dynasty once again served as the captain of the transportation team for the thieves.

Wuling County can be regarded as Zhang Xianzhong's first prefecture-level city after his comeback.Although he was not very rich, killing all the feudal lords and rich landlords still made him fat again in an instant.

As for the threat of "slaughtering 4% of the city", Zhang Xianzhong did not strictly enforce it, because he didn't have time, so he just killed all the people in the city who had houses. The total number of dead was about [-] to [-]. .

In the end, he left Liu Wenxiu to continue to search for ships, and the poorest young man from the poorest family came here with another ten or twenty thousand mu. After announcing tax exemption for three years, he continued to march into Changsha.

Two days later, that is, two days before Shen Shuren sent Shen Lian and Li Yu south to intercept.

Zhang Xianzhong's vanguard troops successfully landed in Linxiang County, Changsha Prefecture, controlled the key point of the estuary where the Xiangjiang River flows into Dongting Lake, and also cut off the traffic from the Xiangjiang River to Yuezhou by water.

Of course, the small county of Linxiang has no resistance. With the deterrence of Wuling County being massacred before, and the news of Changsha Prefecture being blocked, and not knowing that Shen Shuren's reinforcements will come soon, the magistrate of Linxiang County pretended to abandon his official position and run away in advance. The defenders will collapse at the touch of a button.

However, by doing so, Zhang Xianzhong did not start killing in Linxiang, but only killed all the big landlords and rich people, so that the poor would not bother to kill.In this way, he has a better mass base after entering the city, and with the unspent money he just robbed in Changde, he mobilized a large amount of cannon fodder——

Zhang Xianzhong also had to pull cannon fodder locally, because he needed manpower to storm Changsha, cannon fodder to bear the firepower of the defenders, and fill pits and rivers to destroy peripheral fortifications.

The combat method and marching trajectory of crossing mountains and ridges into Changde before also brought him certain sequelae-Zhang Xianzhong's army had very few ships, except rafts and small boats, all of which were captured along the way in Changde.

Before crossing Dongting Lake, the problem caused by the lack of boats was not a big problem, and the rafts could also be used to march downstream and save energy.

But the raft could not enter Dongting Lake, it was easy to capsize, the lake water was slower than the river water, and the raft was not powerful enough.So from the moment they entered Dongting Lake, Zhang Xianzhong's troops had actually been divided into several groups.

Only the former army had enough boats to cross the lake to Linxiang, and then the fleet had to return to Changde to pick up the second batch of troops.

It is estimated that it will take three or four round trips to pick up all of Zhang Xianzhong's [-] soldiers and newly drawn young men.

This caused Zhang Xianzhong to rely only on the first batch of 2 vanguard troops. It was very difficult to break through Changsha, at least he couldn't scare the Changsha defenders.

And after landing in Linxiang and then aggressively recruiting cannon fodder, the limit on the number of transition ships can be circumvented, so that after the troops arrive at the southeast bank of Dongting Lake, they can multiply and split on the spot like a virus, and use local materials to attack Changsha.

The follow-up transport of people and horses will be slower, and it will take a few more days to assemble, so the problem will not be big.

Zhang Xianzhong's bluff finally worked.The day after the surrender of Linxiang County, Zhang Xianzhong forced Changsha with troops, besieged the north of the city, and made a pretentious attack. He also promised the terms of surrender. This time he gave the officers and soldiers a day to think about it, and the whole city would be completely slaughtered within five days, just like Li Dingguo Conditions opened in Baling.

Zhang Xianzhong dared to make such a decision because of the vastness of Changsha City and its strong guarding potential.

The prefect of Changsha has long since abandoned his official position and fled the city. Among the civil servants, only Tuiguan Cai Daoxian was the one who insisted on sticking to it.

However, after only one day of fierce fighting, Yin Xianmin, the commander-in-chief of the defenders, decided to lead the crowd to surrender, tied up Cai Daoxian and handed him over to Zhang Xianzhong——

This is by no means an insult to Zhang Xianzhong, but historically, the guard troops in the southern Huguang area were really corrupt. They hadn't fought for a long time, everyone was cowardly, and the generals were useless.

The relatively elite officers and troops in the Huguang area have been transferred to the northern region, to Nanyang, Xiangyang, Yiling, Wuchang and other places in the conflicts over the years.Those who can stay in Changsha and other places in the south are the most corrupt guards.

Even if the original historical trajectory is followed, a year later, Yin Xianmin and several other generals from Hunan will collapse at the first touch and surrender upon hearing the wind.Now it is nothing more than a change in Zhang Xianzhong's offensive line and order, which caused Yin Xianmin to vote a year earlier.

Zhang Xianzhong himself was dumbfounded by the corruption of the officers and soldiers, and overjoyed, he immediately led his troops into the city to take over.Seeing that Cai Daoxian still had some backbone, he personally persuaded him to surrender, but Cai Daoxian yelled at him endlessly.

Zhang Xianzhong was furious, he personally held the knife and smashed it several times, and then ordered his subordinates to make up the remaining number of knives, and executed Cai Daoxian Lingchi at the age of 28.

Then Zhang Xianzhong killed the whole family of Zhu Youdong, the feudal king Ji Wang who was sealed in Changsha, including his son Zhu Ciying, and robbed the wealth of Ji Wangfu.Because Changsha is richer than Changde, and King Ji has been in the vassal for two generations longer than King Rong (the first King Ji was the younger brother of Chenghua Emperor Zhu Jianshen)
The savings of Prince Ji's Mansion are naturally far higher than that of King Rong, and all the property actually has more than three million taels.In addition, all the property raided by officials and wealthy gentry in Changsha brought the total to more than [-] million yuan.

However, it was also the time when Zhang Xianzhong was on the frontal battlefield on the southern front, and he was just enjoying the spring breeze and was extremely inflated.

Near Linxiang County in the north, his supply line across Dongting Lake.The lifeline used to transport the follow-up troops stranded in Changde suddenly encountered the Shen Shuren sailor who rushed across the entire Dongting Lake.

(End of this chapter)