There is no such thing as the Kangxi and Qianlong eras

Chapter 53: There are cannons
"Anything else?"

Nie Yu asked Feng Xiuyong who had not left yet.

Feng Xiuyong nodded. "Something's going on, a big one. The General's Office is asking the Secretariat if they can temporarily postpone the land allocation and registration for the refugees, or if they can give less land to the families of the military households."

It actually involves the families of military households, so this is indeed no small matter.

This military household is not the same as that military household, but the common name for the soldiers on the Han side. The first few hundred of these soldiers were indeed lonely refugees, but those recruited later were mainly from good families.

He recruited young and strong refugees in the beginning because they had no scruples and would follow him in the rebellion without hesitation.

Later, he recruited soldiers from good families for the same purpose of fighting against the Qing Dynasty. Now that he had half of the prefecture as his base, he had to recruit soldiers from good families so that they would have something to care about. Otherwise, how could they fight so hard?

Even the earliest camp of refugee soldiers were arranged by the Secretariat. They were allowed to marry and start families if they could. This was so that they would have someone to care about, and their family line would be passed down after their death, and their land would not be confiscated.

"Tell me why?" Nie Yu asked.

Feng Xiuyong said, "Officials at the General's Mansion are worried that we might not have enough official land to distribute. While this is just speculation, it's not entirely unreasonable. Based on the current land distribution plan for refugees, the official land under the General's Mansion's control may indeed be fully distributed soon."

"Because of foreign refugees?" Nie Yu knew this was the reason without having to guess.

It's very simple. Jingzhou Prefecture occupies the heart of the Jianghan Plain. It is no exaggeration to say that it is a fertile land of thousands of miles. Before Nie Yu started his rebellion against the Qing Dynasty, a large number of refugees from various provinces poured in here every year.

Now, Nie Yu has risen up against the Qing Dynasty and occupied half of Jingzhou. He has forcibly surveyed the land of the landlords and distributed it to the tenants and refugees for settlement.

Even tenants from other counties were willing to kill landlords upon hearing the news, and clamored for the Han army from Jingzhou to come over and preside over the land distribution, not to mention these refugees (the correct term should be hooligans.doge) who were displaced and had no land or property.

According to Nie Yu's estimation, although there are a lot of these refugees, they should have been divided among the various prefectures after entering Hubei. The land in his hands should be enough for them to be divided, right?
Feng Xiuyong explained, "General, that's not how it's supposed to be calculated. Before I came here, I made a plan that I thought would be enough to sustain the initial consumption of our Han army's farming and land distribution."

"But now, the pseudo-Qing Dynasty is launching an attack on Hunan. Hunan is not a completely destroyed land, but it's almost the same. Refugees from Hunan are flowing into Hubei. Jingzhou, in particular, is located on the Yangtze River and is connected to Dongting Lake, so the influx of refugees is even greater."

"Besides...Yichang Prefecture is also in chaos!"

Nie Yu raised his eyebrows and asked, "Is Yichang in turmoil too? Is it that White Lotus sect that's rebelling?"

Feng Xiuyong nodded quickly and complimented him, "General, you're truly astute. It's true that the White Lotus Cult has rebelled. First, a White Lotus leader named Zhang Zhengmo in Changyang County, Yichang Prefecture, rebelled and captured Changyang County. He then defeated the Qing army in Yichang. The Yichang general was killed in the battle, and the White Lotus Cult in Yichang has become unstoppable. Now, the entire Yichang Prefecture has been completely destroyed. Yichang Prefect Wang Yeshan can only hold onto a corner of the city, while the rest of the city is in turmoil."

"There are also Jingmen, Xiangyang, Yunyang, and Shinan..."

Nie Yu didn't wait for Feng Xiuyong to finish reading before he snatched the document and quickly glanced at it.

Good boy, it seems that he was the one who caused this incident, because he was the one who drove Zhang Zhengmo to Yichang. Now Yichang is in ruins, and it has triggered a chain reaction. The White Lotus Sect in Shinan, Jingmen, Xiangyang, and Yunyang has all collapsed.

He even saw a familiar face here: "Wang Cong'er?"

Feng Xiuyong was stunned for a moment, then continued, "This Wang Cong'er is rumored to be the widow of the former leader of the White Lotus Sect in Xiangyang. She was only seventeen or eighteen years old, and was praised by the people of Xiangyang as 'Xiangyang Mulan'."

This nickname may seem a bit uncultured at first glance, but upon closer inspection, it does make some sense. They both drove out the Tartars and were both heroic women.

The key point is that this is a widow. According to the description in his memory, she should be good-looking... Ahem, no, why should he think about these things?
His surname is not Cao!
Standing before him, Feng Xiuyong was somewhat puzzled as to why the great general suddenly became dazed and then immediately sat up straight.

"General, because of the White Lotus Rebellion, these four prefectures and one state have become corrupt. The pseudo-Qing government in these places can hardly protect themselves, so naturally they have no way to collect and deal with these refugees. So..." Nie Yu continued, "So, we can only come to the relatively stable Jingzhou."

Feng Xiuyong corrected him, "It's not all Jingzhou. Jingzhou is only a part of it. Most of the rest are migrating to Anlu, De'an, and Wuchang. Some should have flowed into Sichuan and Yunnan."

Nie Yu nodded: "I understand what you said. Now because of these sudden increases in refugees, we don't have enough land to share?"

"It's still enough points, but it's impossible to keep getting enough points forever," said Feng Xiuyong.

Nie Yu looked at the document in his hand, thought for a moment, and then said, "Since there's still enough land to go around, let's continue with the original plan. Our current territory only covers half of Jingzhou. No matter how carefully we calculate, there won't be enough land to go around."

"What about the military land reward?" Feng Xiuyong asked.

Nie Yu's face suddenly turned serious as he said, "The military land rewards must not be reduced. Even if the land under my name is used to divide it up, the military households must not be shortchanged in terms of land, and the military households must not be shortchanged in terms of rewards."

As a general, Nie Yu had land under his name, but it was not much. Like those landlords who voluntarily donated land, he only had a few hundred acres of land, and he also had to pay land taxes to the general's mansion as usual.

At first glance, this seems a bit unnecessary. You have to pay land tax on your own land.

Isn't this just like turning your left hand to your right hand, or taking off your pants to fart?

Strictly speaking, it is true, but Nie Yu did not do it in vain. As the largest privileged class in the Han army's territory, it is almost impossible for Nie Yu to completely eliminate the landlords.

Because he himself was the largest landlord, in ancient times when productivity was severely insufficient, it was unrealistic to eliminate the landlords. Even in the early days of the Industrial Revolution, it was impossible to eliminate the landlords.

Even the beginning of the Industrial Revolution saw the massive annexation of land, with landlords and capitalism merging and hybridizing to form an even more terrifying monster.

This is what happened in the UK back then. How did they solve the problem of land annexation and deal with the landlords?

The answer is that they didn't solve the problem, so they simply increased the severity of punishment, created a large number of criminals, and then exiled them to colonies, such as Australia...

Nie Yu cannot do this now, and he cannot completely get rid of the landlords. Including distributing land to refugees, he is creating new landlords.

In order to ensure that the tax system under his rule can operate stably and that the land distribution model is not ruined from the beginning, he can only set an example himself.

Even the generals have to pay taxes honestly. Why do ordinary landlords, common people who have been allocated land, military households, and even bureaucrats in the general's mansion have to evade taxes?

To put it bluntly, it is the leadership herd effect. As a big leader, sometimes you don’t need to say anything at all. You just need to take the lead in doing something, and then the subordinate officials will know what to do?
Feng Xiuyong was quite impressed by this. He was very smart and immediately understood Nie Yu's idea. Even the general took the initiative to divide his land, so how could other bureaucrats and landlords have the nerve to hold on to this piece of land.

First, they followed the general and worked hard to distribute land to the refugees, and within a year or two, the refugees would be settled down, and they would become their basic base.

Nie Yu suddenly asked again, "By the way, how is the recruitment going?"

Feng Xiuyong quickly replied, "We have already recruited 10,000 soldiers and are now training. Thanks to the Qing Dynasty's previous accumulation of large amounts of money and food in Jingzhou Prefecture, there is more than enough for our Han army to train."

The two were talking about military affairs when suddenly someone came in hurriedly to report.

"General, the firearms workshop has produced a red cannon. Please go and see it immediately!"

(End of this chapter)