"Report to Futai, the Grand Canal is thirty miles ahead!"

Ma Degong's Chuanqi Tang Ma Fei also came to Gao Hongtu's horse. More than 46,000 people, including the 20th Association of the Shandong Regiment Training Army, plus Li Chengdong and Ma Degong's subordinates, marched westward from Jinan and along a small river called "Tuhe" that flowed from the Grand Canal to Bohai Bay.

The distance between Licheng from Jinan Fucheng to Dongchangfu City Liaocheng is really not far, even if you take the Tuhe River and enter the detour road, it is more than 200 miles. I walked fifty miles a day, and I walked it in four days.

However, the regimental training army of 46,000 led by Gao Hongtu and the tall governor was an "engineering team", and while advancing, it built forts and wharves along the Tuhe River - each fort was carefully selected, standing by the water, and also diverting the water of the Tuhe River into the trench, and at the same time building a wharf on the side of the Tuhe River near the wall of the fortress. As long as the earth river could be navigated, these water-based forts could be easily resupplied.

In addition, Gao Hongtu also asked Shen Tingyang, minister of Beiyang, to go to Yantou Town in Licheng County to open a "war shipyard" to build ships that could sail and fight on the Daqing River and the Tuhe River, so as to form a "regimental training sailor."

However, at present, the regimental trainer has not yet been completed, and the shipyard in Yantou Town has only opened. is the 50,000 regiments of training led by Gao Hongtu, which are also created from grass. Equipment, training, organization and other aspects are not very in place.

Fortunately, Gao Hongtu has thousands of patrol bids, and he is relatively capable up and down, so he can be disassembled to be the backbone of the regimental training army. With these thousands of backbones, plus the landlords and old fortunes of the twenty or thirty prefectures and counties of Jinan, Yanzhou, and Qingzhou all sell the face of the tall governors, and there are also refugees who ran out of Beizhili and the border prefectures and counties close to the Qing Dynasty to be requisitioned, the Shandong regiment training army has finally been supported.

By the summer of the eighteenth year of Chongzhen of the Ming Dynasty, there were 22 associations and a total of 40,000 people who could pull out the regimental training army alone!

Of course, the equipment and training of these 22 regimental training associations are not very good.

First of all, the armor rate is less than one and a half, and the total army of 44,000 people has less than 6,500 pairs of various armors, most of which are still cloth iron armor, and the number of iron pieces on the cloth is insufficient, and the defense capability is very problematic.

This is followed by the lack of firearms and their poor quality. There are no bird guns, turtledove foot guns, Hongyi cannons, and three-pounder regimental cannons.

Gao Hongtu is poor, Shi Kefa has Kong Yinzhi as the gold owner, Zuo Maodi's own family is a large landowner, Zhu Yihai and Li Shiyuan have the silver left by the Heng Palace, Su Guansheng and Shen Tingyang don't need to say it, some are money...... Gao Hongtu has no money, of course he can't afford to buy good things, and he doesn't have the technology to make it himself. So I can only make a little general cannon, attack cannon, tiger squat cannon, and three-eyed gun.

However, Gao Hongtu, the poor governor, also has his poor methods, which is to build cars, shield cars and gun cars!

Among them, more than 2,200 shield cars were built - Duoduo will "return the other with the other way", Gao Hongtu is also familiar with the Three Kingdoms, so he will also let people build shield cars. These shield wagons could not only be loaded with large wooden shields for defense, but also could carry food and supplies, which were issued to various flag teams and accompanied the army.

And the artillery carriage is the attack artillery carriage, which has built more than 400 units, and each association is equipped with 20 units.

With these more than 2,600 shield carts and artillery carriages, Gao Hongtu's army can quickly surround a car fort wherever it goes—if the 20 associations of the army get together, 2,600 shield cars and artillery carriages are enough to encircle a defensive circle of more than 2,000 steps.

With the trick of "Che Fort", which is a dumb battle, it will not be easy to deal with the 20 th Association training army with high ambitions.

In fact, the training equipment of these Shandong regiments is quite poor, and the military salary is very small (the most ordinary regimental soldiers have one or two silver a month), but their combat effectiveness is actually not weak. Compared to the generals of the Ming army, they are inferior, but ordinary weak soldiers of the Ming army can't compare to them!

It's true!

It's not that they look down on most of the Ming army in this era, they are basically unorganized, undisciplined, and spiritless "three-no-army". The ability to harm the common people is much better than marching and fighting!

The high-minded Shandong regiment training is okay in terms of organization, discipline, and spirit. The basis of the group training organization is the interpersonal relationship of the same clan, fellow villagers, and classmates.

After obtaining the power of "changing the stream and returning to the land", Gao Hongtu can use his fellow clansmen, fellow villagers, and classmates to establish a feudal regimental training system with himself as the core, and the relationship between the top and bottom is close, and they all have to listen to the words of Gao Hongtu and the tall governor!

With organization, discipline is not difficult to maintain...... Although the military salary for regimental training is very low, their families are under the control of Gao Hongtu's protégés, and they dare not slip away casually!

And the officers of the regimental training army, except for Gao Hongtu's protégés, are all from Fubiao, Shandong, and can be regarded as Gao Hongtu's personal soldiers-the tall governor who owns the territory of twenty or thirty prefectures and counties, and can still use it to feed this group of people. Therefore, the officers and backbones of the regimental training army are relatively well-behaved and listen to Gao Hongtu's words.

If you want to compare the ability to control the troops, Hong Chengchou, Sun Chuanting and Lu Xiangsheng back then were not as good as Gao Hongtu now - Gao Hongtu is the leader of regimental training in a base area!

Finally, the Shandong regiment is now defending the hometown, the ancestral tomb, and Confucius...... It's the one who knows what to fight for!

Therefore, in terms of the spirit of the troops, they are also stronger than most of the Ming army.

Even the more than 6,000 people of the so-called hundred battles led by Li Chengdong and Ma Degong, the two veteran generals, seem to be dull and difficult to control in these days when they are acting together with the Shandong regiment training army.

These "strong brigades" only protect the front and rear of the regimental training brigade, and do nothing except march, Rao is like this, and often complains bitterly, asking Gao Hongtu for this and that. From time to time, he robbed a market village and town, which was almost the same as the Tartars, which made the tall governor angry, but there was nothing he could do.

The Shandong regiment is much stronger in training, and they are all simple peasants, especially hard-working. Gao Hongtu let them do whatever they wanted, and they didn't have any requirements, they were very satisfied if they could manage three full meals and pay one or two pieces of silver every month. I don't know if this group of old peasants can fight or not, but they will definitely be able to work, and it's right to build a fortress or something.

If it weren't for Gao Hongtu's lack of confidence in the performance of his "migrant workers" on the battlefield, he would not be willing to take Li Chengdong and Ma Degong on the expedition......

Gao Hongtu gently pulled the reins, stopped the war horse under his crotch, and then asked the Tang horse sent by Ma Degong: "Where are Ma Zongrong's soldiers and horses?" ”

The Tang horse just saluted back on his horse: "Back to Futai, Ma Zongrong's former army has arrived on the east bank of the canal!" ”

Gao Hongtu stroked his beard, "Where are the Tartars' soldiers and horses?" Is it still around Liaocheng? ”

Tang Ma replied: "There is no Tartar camp on the east bank of the canal, it should have been withdrawn, and Ma Zongrong has already sent someone to Liaocheng to contact." ”

"What? Evacuated and gone? Gao Hongtu was stunned, then turned his head to look at Li Dakai.

Li Dakai was also a little surprised, "Futai...... Is the siege of Liaocheng solved? ”

"It should be ......," Gao Hongtu shook his head, "It won't be that easy, right?" ”

"Futai," Li Dakai said, "We're only thirty miles away from Liaocheng here, so let's work harder and go to Liaocheng to sleep tonight!" ”

Gao Hongtu stroked his beard and thought about it: "It is still necessary to take every step for the camp, just follow the Tuhe River here, set up a car fort, and start building the city tomorrow." ”

"Whoa!" Li Dakai saluted on horseback, and then went to command the troops to start the defense of the Chebao.

Because of the fact that the Gao Hongtu Department had to go down to build forts every twenty miles, and left the defenders of the First Association, after walking nearly 200 miles, nine castles had been built, leaving the Nine Associations to practice garrisoning. At present, there are only 11 regimental training associations and the two armies of Li Chengdong and Ma Degong, with a total strength of about 28,000 people, as well as more than 1,000 shield cars and artillery vehicles.

This point of the vehicle is no longer enough to form a circle of more than 2,000 steps, so it can only be backed by the Tuhe River, forming a huge "Moon Array".