A small soldier of the frontier army in the late Ming Dynasty

Chapter 370

According to the old rules, according to the military law of the Shun Township, every time when the camp is approaching, the cooking vehicles of the various ministries and headquarters always arrive first.

Each Qianzong and Bazong of the Shunxiang Army has a thousand headquarters and a headquarters, each of which has a number of attached carriages, which are loaded with some supplies and tents in the department, as well as food and grass for the soldiers in the department for a few days.

On weekdays, the Ministry relies on these carriages for transportation tasks, and there are quartermasters who are responsible for the military supplies and supplies of the various headquarters in the Ministry. However, their identities are independent, and they are only responsible for Sun Sanjie's supplies.The firemen of the various ministries are also located here, equipped with special cooking carts, and they can cook food on the carts without using a pot. This means that the Shunxiang Army has reached a very high level of specialization.

When the Shunxiang army and most of Chen Yongfu arrived in Jiaxian County and set up camp according to their respective positions, the fire soldiers of each department were busy making dough and kneading dough, and the dough was constantly changing shape in their hands.The dough is then divided into roughly equal parts, rolled into round cakes, sprinkled with chopped green onions, finely chopped ginger, salt, and sesame oil, and baked on a pan in a cooking cart.

The sizzling sound continued, the aroma was tangy, and the golden pancakes were made like this.

According to the portion size, you can actually eat a big pancake, not to mention, there are dried meat, salted eggs and other things on the cooking cart.The drained meat pieces are boiled in boiling water, some salt, onion, garlic, dregs and other ingredients are added, and some dried vegetables are boiled together. It is very comfortable to eat a bowl of hot broth in the cold weather.

These dried meats are packed in paper bags and can be stored well for about three months.Generally, the soldiers of the Shun Township Army who went out suddenly rationed fried noodles with dried meat, or flatbread with dried meat.A bag of fried noodles can last about seven to fifteen days for a sergeant.

So it's okay to be idle, and the firemen of all ministries are making great efforts to make fried noodles.In fact, compared to dried meat, Wang Dou prefers to give soldiers more cheese and milk powder, which has higher nutrition and calories. However, the supply and demand of cheese in the Central Plains is not easy, so let’s talk about it in the future.

The fire soldiers moved very quickly. Not long after the sergeants set up their camps, their food was ready. The soldiers of all the ministries lined up to receive their meals in an orderly manner, and all officers and sergeants were like this.In the past few years since the Shunxiang Army became an army, this practice has become commonplace.

The aroma of the food made the soldiers in Chen Yongfu's army salivate. They followed the example of the Shunxiang army and lined up to receive the food.It has been stated before the expedition that their meals will be provided by the Shun Township Army, and they will accompany the army for a few days. They are never used to the Shun Township Army's behavior.

For their treatment, Wang Dou gave them meals for the junior sergeants of the Shun Township Army, a large pancake, which was not enough to add, a bowl of broth with some shredded pork in it, and no salted eggs, but the lieutenant generals of Chen Yongfu said that satisfy.

In the past, the soldiers of Chen Yongfu's battalion ate a kind of military ration called "飧饭". They cooked the rice and put it in the water to expose it to the sun. After repeated several times, they finally got some dry rice.When eating, soak in hot water and cook until soft.

In addition to the usual rations, the army's rations consisted of miscellaneous cakes, steamed cakes, plus some hard salt blocks, dried vinegar, etc., and the horses would be paired with some cheese for emergency thirst quenching.

Looking at the northern part of the Ming Dynasty, the military rations are basically the same.These types of military rations are easy to carry, but of course they don't taste very good, and at this time the army is often short of food and pay, even the above types of food are hard to eat, and the requirements of the sergeants are not so high.

Even the officers of the Chen Yongfu Pioneer Battalion are envious of the fact that the Shunxiang Army can eat enough meals and have broth every day, let alone their ordinary soldiers.In the past few days with the Shun Township Army, many people felt that the expedition was worth it for the days when they could eat enough every day.

For Chen Yongfu, everything in the Shun Township Army is full of novelty. Taking this kitchen truck as an example, it is easy to move around, and the ability to provide food is fast and good, according to his estimation.A cooking truck can provide meals for at least [-] people within an hour, meeting the needs of a sergeant.

Chen Yongfu was even more surprised that Wang Dou lined up to receive the meal by himself during the meal. His only explanation was that Wang Dou shared the joys and sorrows with the soldiers, so it was no wonder that his troops were invincible in all battles.

Of course, some officers in Chen Yongfu's battalion were not without opinions on Wang Doujun's practice of not dividing the food and grass for them to receive, but letting the generals line up for meals.He believed that this would risk making his army a vassal of the Shunxiang Army.Everyone's private thoughts are that if the Shun Township Army doesn't give them food and grass, how can they withhold food and grass to fill their own pockets?
However, Chen Yongfu was silent, and Wang Dou also said well that the sergeants concentrated on eating, marching and fighting can save time as much as possible, seize opportunities and reduce unnecessary losses.Chen Yongfu didn't say anything, and it was even harder for them to say anything.

Moreover, the cooking vehicles of the Shunxiang Army were really convenient, which greatly saved their time of "burying pots and cooking", made the marching speed much faster than before, and the soldiers also ate better, trying to maintain the ability to march and fight.

For the past few days, Chen Yongfu ate with Wang Dou, and what he ate was the meal of a senior sergeant in the army. Only his son, Chen De, led his family to escort the military and civilian husband, and fell outside the army's itinerary for a few days.

There is no way, those amateur post-military and civilian husbands, their marching speed cannot be compared with the professional Shunxiang army's luggage team.

There are many soldiers in Shun Township. At this time, camping is to occupy the west, north, and south sides of Jiaxian City. Chen Yongfu's vanguard battalion occupies the east of Jiaxian City.After dinner, Wang Dou and Chen Yongfu gathered in the county office of Jia County to discuss matters.

Half of the majestic yamen in the past has been burned down, but fortunately the lobby is still intact, serving as the joint headquarters of the Shunxiang Army and Chen Yongfu's Qianfeng Battalion.

……

Under a few candles as thick as arms, Wang Dou and Chen Yongfu sat side by side on the main seat. The remaining generals of the Shunxiang Army, Wen Fangliang, Gao Shiyin, Li Guangheng, Wen Daxing, Zhao Xuan, Sun Sanjie, Wu Zhengchun, Shen Shiqi, Gao Xun, etc. People, sit at the lower right corner of the hall.Chen Yongfu's camp has several thousand generals, and the generals sit at the lower left of the hall.

In Ming Dynasty, the left was the most precious, Wang Dou's move was also meant to respect Chen Yongfu, but seeing Wang Dou's generals gathered together, all of them were wearing excellent armor, and they also had warm red cotton and wool cloaks on them, so well equipped, The vigor is faintly compelling, but looking at his subordinates...

What Chen Yongfu feels in his heart, only he knows.

The Shun Township Army had never fought against the rogues, so they didn't know much about their combat power and tactics. Of course, Chen Yongfu had a good say in this regard.

Chen Yongfu was of course very happy that Wang Dou asked himself to introduce the situation of the rogues first. To be honest, although he was the deputy general of Henan, after he went out with the Shunxiang Army, his limelight was suppressed by Wang Dou's department.Compared with them, their sergeants are far inferior in all aspects. Chen Yongfu and others said in their hearts that it is impossible.

Looking at the generals of the Shun Township Army, the deputy chief soldier sat calmly, and said slowly: "The thieves are all over the army, roughly in the order of corps commander, Shichang, sentry commander, department commander, flag holder, and captain. The battle of the bandits , the best at ambushes, he ambushes left and right, repeated repeated, impossible to guard against."

"When fighting, there are five bandits in the formation, the hungry people are outside, the infantry is second, the cavalry is second, and the cavalry is the second. If the third level is defeated in the old camp, the cavalry will fight to the death. The old battalion fled immediately, and without losing their elite, they moved to other places, and tens of thousands of troops were gathered in a short while."

"These fine thieves, everyone has a horse, or straddles two or three horses. The officers and soldiers are no more than three steps away from the horse. It is extremely difficult to chase. If you chase closely, the food and grass are not easy. Lost every time."

Chen Yongfu said: "The thieves are good at using meticulous work. They either carry medicine bags and Cai Cai for divination, or wear yellow crowns, or perform tricks for beggars, to observe the reality of each city, or to respond to the hungry army. They are full of thousands and hundreds, and come and go In the city, I don't know if it's a thief or a soldier."

He glanced at Wang Dou: "Thousands of disaster victims in the west of the city, it is hard to guarantee that there will be many thieves in the interior, so we need to take strict precautions."

Wang Dou pondered, what Chen Yongfu said was roughly the same as what he had learned from historical materials about Li Zicheng and other peasant troops. Their general tactics were that it was difficult to confront officers and soldiers head-on, but they were very good at retreating to lure the enemy, and they were masters of guerrilla warfare.

According to Chen Yongfu, the fighting style of Li Zicheng and others was just the opposite of that of the Qing soldiers, with the hungry people at the front and the elite at the rear. With such a fighting style, it is easy to defeat their troops, but difficult to wipe them out.Seeing that the situation was not good, Li Zicheng ran away with the backbone.Anyway, the Central Plains and other places are full of fire and water, and with the backbone in hand, it is easy to gather an "army" of 10,000+ or ​​hundreds of thousands.

After listening to Chen Yongfu's words, Wang Dou deeply realized that fighting against bandits is a political issue, not a military issue.Unless he guards Henan by himself, and has a large amount of food and rice for relief, and pacifies a place to consolidate a place, otherwise the bandits will not be wiped out, and the fire will not be saved.

However, Li Zicheng and others are good at ambush, but they have been trained in the past ten years. This ability may have penetrated into the bone marrow.The Shun Township Army had never fought against them before, so it was better to be cautious before finding out their detailed tactics, and fight steadily, so as not to advance rashly.

After getting used to their tactics, find another opportunity to give Li Zicheng and others a ruthless one at a time.

"At the end of the day, it was generally found out that the bandits in Ruzhou, led by the bandit generals Li Guo, Liu Fangliang, and Hao Yaoqi, seemed to have hundreds of old camps of bandits, two thousand elite riders, and more than [-] followers. The bandit camp is chaotic, and the exact details of the formation are difficult to ascertain."

"The thieves are in a hurry to besiege Ruzhou. Qian Zuozheng, who knows the state, is very excited when he hears that reinforcements are coming. I hope our army will quickly rescue and save the people from the fire."

Before each battle of the Shunxiang Army, the intelligence in the army must be in place as much as possible to provide detailed consideration for the attack of the army.Therefore, after Chen Yongfu, Wen Daxing, the ambassador of the intelligence department of the Shunxiang Army, reported the situation of the Ruzhou army that he had found.

His Ye Bu Shou Qian Zong followed Li Guangheng, Sun Sanjie and others to Jia County early, which separated the detection of the officers and soldiers of Jia County by the sentry cavalry of the peasant army in Ruzhou.Moreover, there is another team that does not collect at night, has arrived near Ruzhou, and launched a detailed reconnaissance of the peasant army over there. It is necessary to find out the strength of the local peasant army, as well as the enemy's intelligence such as the leading generals.

However, Wen Daxing estimated that when the officers and soldiers arrived in Changga, Yuzhou and other places, the peasant army in Ruzhou might have gotten wind of the assistance of the officers and soldiers.How they will react requires the inference of the members of the staff department.

Chen Yongfu expressed his admiration for the intelligence capabilities of the Shunxiang Army. The current officers and soldiers of the Ming Dynasty are basically blind to the soldiers of the Qing Dynasty and the bandits, which is why they have been repeatedly defeated.

However, after hearing Wen Daxing's words, he still had an ugly expression on his face. He pondered and said, "Li Guo, Liu Fangliang, Hao Yaoqi? Having battled for a long time, he has outstanding strategies, and Hao Yaoqi is even a fierce general, valiant in battle. Although the intruders are not here in person, but with these three in Ruzhou, General Wang, this battle is not easy to fight."

For Chen Yongfu, he has never seen the combat effectiveness of the Shunxiang Army. He has lived in Henan for a long time, has dealt with Li Zicheng and others a lot, and knows a lot about his subordinates: "There are tens of thousands of bandits in various places in Henan Province. According to the general estimate, including the old bandit camp, there are about four to five thousand elite cavalry. The rest are either infantry or starving people under threat."

"Those hungry people are not difficult to deal with, but the thieves actually have two thousand elite riders in Ruzhou, hundreds of old camps, and more than [-] threatening followers..."

Wang Dou glanced at Chen Yongfu, and saw that he had a worried look on his face, obviously worried about the elite of the peasant army in Ruzhou.

According to Wang Dou's estimation, the strongest in Li Zicheng's army at present should be more than 1000 people in his old battalion.Those people moved to various places with Li Zicheng, and they had about ten years of fighting experience on the battlefield. They were considered professional soldiers.

In addition to these, in the past few months, the elite cavalry recruited from surrendering officers and soldiers, or local horse thieves, are considered to be brave cavalry.Then there were those who had horses, one of them was called the horse army, and the rest were infantry or hungry people.

For the officers and soldiers of the Central Plains, Li Zicheng's old battalion is much more powerful than the servants of their battalions, and the combat effectiveness of those "valiant cavalry" is now comparable to or even stronger than that of ordinary officers and soldiers.In addition, the coercive army of the rest often reached tens of thousands, and the number of people is so large that it is no wonder that the officers and soldiers of the Central Plains are often defeated.

Looking at Chen Yongfu's expression, it is obvious that he is not optimistic about this aid from Ruzhou, and everyone under his command is also worried. Unexpectedly, there are [-] to [-] thieves in Ruzhou, which is several times the number of officers and soldiers.

The generals in the Wangdou camp didn't care, they had all fought the fierce Tartars, so what are mere bandits?
Gao Shiyin stood up abruptly, clasped his fists to Chen Yongfu, and then said loudly to Wang Dou: "General, the army is on fire. The last general is willing to lead the soldiers under his command to go first. As a vanguard, defeat the thieves in Ruzhou and rescue the local people."

Wang Dou was pondering, Gao Shiyin's style is to dare to fight, he does not doubt the fighting power of his troops, but facing the bandits who are good at running around and ambush, being too fierce has advantages and disadvantages.As a striker, Wang Dou thinks that Wen Fangliang, Li Guangheng, even Wu Zhengchun and Gao Xun are good, they should be more cautious...

However, Gao Shiyin repeatedly asked, and considering Hong's morale and fighting spirit, Wang Dou finally agreed to his entreaty.He told Gao Shiyin to fight steadily, not to be too greedy for merit, if he encounters bandits on the road, he should be defeated, and not to chase too hard, lest he be caught in an ambush.

Gao Shiyin excitedly agreed.

……

The next day, Gao Shiyin led his general Qian Zong to set off and force him to Ruzhou first. Nearly a thousand of his men were veterans, and everyone had horses.The carriage accompanying the army at the Qian headquarters also has food and grass for the sergeants in the ministry to eat for a few days.Ruzhou is not far from Jia County, and Wang Dou's main force followed, so there was nothing to worry about.

Wen Daxing's Yebushu team is currently active in Jiaxian, Ruzhou, and even Yiyang and Dengfeng, ready to provide information to Gao Shiyin's vanguard.

(End of this chapter)