The follow-up troops that Mo Ming said soon came. It is said that recently, the Qing army has vigorously attacked the remnants of the Shun army and the peasant anti-Qing forces such as Manjiadong in the three prefectures of Shandong, and many people have been unable to hold on and fled to Qingzhou and even Denglai Erfu. Some were co-opted by Zhao Yingyuan, while a considerable number continued eastward, heading straight to Denglai.

Yantai, as the nest of the famous Yellow Clothes Army and the Ninghai defense envoy appointed by Dashun, naturally attracted a large number of failed anti-Qing forces to vote. Mo Ming naturally did not refuse these people, the old, weak, sick and disabled were cut down to farm the fields, and the strong and capable fighters were incorporated into the army and strictly trained. In mid-to-late February, even Wang Jiazhong, who had been in Dengzhou City a while ago, did not know what the reason was, and led his army to the vicinity of Yantai to take refuge with the people on the east coast. Wang Jiazhong is also a long-famous "dramatist" on the road, if Fang Dayou, the governor of Shandong Province in the Qing Dynasty, learns to make up a playing card wanted warrant for the US military in the 21st century, Mo Ming is naturally the king, but Wang Jiazhong, Zhai Congge and others are definitely big names such as Lao K......

Wang Jiazhong's subordinates were slightly fewer than Zhai Congge, and there were still more than 1,500 people left after going to Wucunjing, and Mo Ming was ready to send them to Jeju Island as well. At that time, Zhai Congge occupied Jeju Mansion, and Wang Jiazhong occupied Jingyi County, and the two of them were one south and one north, and their control over the whole island was much stronger. Moreover, there are too many anti-Qing forces that have come to vote this time, and the people on the east coast are not ready to accept all the orders, and it is estimated that they will appoint one of the Dashun officials who voted last year as a general, and let him bring one or two thousand people to the island to enhance the influence of the people on the east coast.

The six ships of the navy were already fully loaded with 2,000 men of Zhai Congge, 2,500 men of the military team, artillery on the east coast, and a large amount of baggage to move eastward to Jeju Island. As for Wang Jiazhong's 1,500 men, as well as the 102nd Company of the East Coast Army and the 3rd Battalion of the Eight Banners New Army that are still in Yantai Port. The only way to do this is to wait for four of the transports to return. The two frigates will take advantage of their superiority in tonnage, speed, and firepower to constantly search for ships of the North Korean sailors in the waters near Jeju Island to attack and prevent them from reinforcing the North Korean forces on Jeju Island.

On 20 February, just as the four large ships carrying the landing force to Jeju Island were returning, a convoy of migrants from the east coast carrying people to Australia also sailed into the port of Yantai. There were only five ships in the fleet, all of which had already completed simple maintenance, and as for the other two, according to Captain Liu Haiyang, who led the team, the condition of the hull was not optimistic, and it was being overhauled on Rishiri Island. They may not be able to catch up with the last operation to transport migrants to Australia this season.

Speaking of transporting migrants. On this leg from Blackwater to Australia, the East Coast migration fleet has completed two shipments this season (October to April). At the time of the first transport, the seven ships that were fully loaded with nearly 7,000 people were stuffed, and the total tonnage was less than 8,000 tons, and 7,000 people were stuffed, although this proportion was much better than that of Europeans transporting black slaves (a few or even a dozen people per ton). mortality rate of 30% to half). But this is the first time that such a high percentage of transport migrants has been made. So the mortality rate is still very alarming. Although it took only 20 days to reach Jinshan Port, only 6,000 of the 7,000 people still made it there alive. The mortality rate is as high as 14%.

On the second voyage of the fleet in late December, six ships (the "Breaking Waves" were suspended for overhaul) were again full of 6,000 men, and this time the mortality rate was about 15%, which is still very high. By the time of the third voyage, there were only five ships left to move, and they had 2,000 men on Rishiri Island, and they were going to load another 3,000 men in the Yantai area, and then sail to southern Australia. If they had arrived along the way, the 1644-45 shipping season would have carried almost three convoys of 18,000 men out of the Blackwater region, and even if only half of them had arrived on the mainland alive, it would have been 9,000. This is a figure that will surprise and worry the local Ministry of Civil Affairs bureaucrats, because the impact on the east coast, which has a population of only 83,000, is obviously not small.

After supplying the two fleets with all kinds of supplies and sending them to their respective destinations, Mo Ming didn't have time to relax for a while, and an urgent report suddenly came from Qingzhou. Haoge, the prince of Qing Guosu, personally took a large number of red-coated cannons and the Eight Banners to Jinan, and the people in Jinan City were originally the blue banner generals led by Haoge, so Haoge took over the supreme command of the Qing army in Shandong on the spot, and then led tens of thousands of Qing troops stationed in various states and counties near Jinan to Qingzhou without much rest. This time, the Qing army's headquarters was huge, the smoke and dust covered the sun, and the momentum was extremely astonishing, and the originally extremely active anti-Qing armed forces in various places also disappeared without a trace.

According to the intelligence analysis sent back by the scouts, coupled with some information about the Qing army in Shandong, the intelligence staff officer judged that the total strength of the Qing army was likely to have exceeded 40,000 or nearly 50,000, and the number of soldiers should be about 18,000 to 20,000. Among them, there were 10,000 Qing troops and 2,500 soldiers; Li led 7,000 Han soldiers and more than 3,000 soldiers; Ke Yongsheng had 4,000 Jiaozhou town troops and 2,000 soldiers; There were more than 15,000 Qing troops from the Duoduo Department in Henan, of which the number of soldiers is unknown, but it is estimated that there are 2,000 Manchurian soldiers, 2,000 Han army banner soldiers, and a number of Ming army soldiers. This is the information we have before, and from the statistics here, we know that the strength of the Qing army has reached 36,000 people, and the number of soldiers is about 15,000.

And how many troops and cannons Hauge brought this time have not yet had time to find out due to the short time. However, the intelligence staff judged that the number of troops he led would not be too much, and it was likely that there were only three to five thousand troops of the Eight Banners, and the total number of coats, followers, and artillery was about 10,000. In this way, the total strength of the Qing army was as much as 50,000 or 60,000, and the soldiers were even more than 25,000, almost seven or eight times that of the people on the east coast.

Such a big gap is no longer something that the East Bank Army can fill by relying on some advanced tactical ideas or weaponry. The total number of soldiers on the east coast is only a few thousand, and only more than half of them can fight, and if they fight in the field with so many Qing troops, they will inevitably die without a place to be buried. It seems that it is better to hold Yantai Fort honestly, this fort is extremely strong, with strong firepower and special terrain, and it is difficult for the attacking enemy to deploy troops. Such a small but strong fortress castle, with two thousand foot soldiers with a mix of hot and cold weapons, can basically be defended. With the siege ability of the Manchu Qing Dynasty, even if there is an army of 100,000, there is no possibility that it will be able to capture Yantai Fort.

But before that, it's time to clean things up. For example, some of the remaining landlord armies near the Yantai Fortress, the people on the east coast did not touch them for various reasons before, but now they can no longer take care of them. One hundred percent of these landlords' armed forces will be absorbed by the Qing army and become part of the green battalion army that has conquered the whole country. Some of the gentry's food can't be kept, and they are all snatched! Anyway, judging from the current collapse of Shandong's production order, the Qing army must rob them when it comes, otherwise the Qing army will not have to eat, so keeping it at this moment will be the enemy in the future, and this will not work! As for what these gentlemen and their families ate after robbing? I'll kill you!

The population is also going to be collected! At this time, it has entered the stage of racing against time, and the displaced people will inevitably be blocked outside Yantai Fort as soon as the Qing army comes, so it will be inconvenient to collect the population in this vicinity in the future. Anyway, there are still a total of about 5,500 tons of grain and marine fish hoarded in several warehouses, and there are nearly 4,000 donkeys, mules, horses, pigs, cattle and other livestock everywhere, anyway, there are only 39,000 displaced people left in several strongholds, and Jeju Island will be taken soon anyway, and hundreds of tons of grain can be obtained from North Korea and Japan this year anyway, so what are you waiting for? Hurry up and collect more people! It's too late!

Beginning on 21 February, the troops on the east bank of Yantai Fort almost poured out of their nests and began to loot people, gold, silver, and grain in all directions. The gentry in the neighboring states and counties were also well-rounded, and they had already transferred all their assets elsewhere, allowing the people on the east coast to seize only a small amount of grain, livestock, and all kinds of supplies. One of the largest captures was probably the battle against the local squire forces in Zhaoyuan, in which the men and horses on the east coast were used together, and more than 2,000 local soldiers in Zhaoyuan were defeated in the first battle, and at the same time, they occupied the county seat of Zhaoyuan without a single shot. At the end of this battle, the people of the eastern coast carried out a bloody purge of the gentry of Zhaoyuan, and seized a large amount of gold from their Zhuangzi, the amount of which made one have to sigh at the wealth of the gentry here.

On February 23, the main army of the Manchu Qing led by Hao Ge entered the city of Qingzhou, and before they came, there were already many bandits in Qingzhou who were captured by the might of the Qing army and fled, all the way to the east towards Denglai Erfu, and the number of troops controlled by Zhao Yingyuan suddenly remained more than 10,000 people. Faced with the might of tens of thousands of troops and more than a dozen red-clothed cannons of the Qing army, Zhao Yingyuan, who felt that he could not match, took the initiative to surrender. Hao Ge pretended to allow Hou to lead his troops into the city, and then beheaded Zhao Yingyuan, Yang Wangxiu and hundreds of their backbones, and at the same time announced that he would not ask, and after dispersing some rabble, Shun Lì incorporated more than 6,000 armed forces of the Zhao department.

On 24 February, Dong Xueli, a former Shun general who had surrendered to the Qing army, led 3,000 troops from Henan to help, bringing the total strength of Hauge's forces to more than 60,000. Historically, the Manchu Qing Dynasty had only more than 20,000 troops in Shandong when they were at their strongest, and most of them soon moved to Jianghuai to guard against the Southern Ming Dynasty. Ke Yongsheng's 4,000 town army in Jiaozhou almost swept away all kinds of "anti-thieves" on the surface of Shandong at that time, and it was so easy that it was almost unspeakable. But now, under the toss of the people on the east coast, the Manchus have gathered more than 60,000 troops and more than a dozen red-coated cannons here, and they have even given up the threat of the Southern Ming and vowed to calm the situation in Shandong.

The pressure on the East Coast is unprecedented! (To be continued......)