June 2, 1645, Yantai Port. Sixteen East Coast ships are floating in the sea off the port, and due to the small dock, only eight ships are currently allowed to berth at the same time, so the 16 ships have to come in turn if they want to unload their cargo.

The first to board the dock were naturally the army brothers led by Mo Ming. More than 6,000 of them (including 2,500 military men) were very excited when they returned to Yantai Port after a two-month absence. Li Wenchang, commander of the Yantai Fort garrison, personally came to the dock to greet Mo Ming, and he was accompanied by some middle and high-ranking officers.

"Captain Mo, you are finally back, I look up and down Yantai Fort to see you return to the division, but you are looking forward to passing through the autumn water." As soon as Li Wenchang came up, he said a little numbly, which made Mo Ming have goosebumps for no reason.

Mo Ming threw the saber and gloves in Li Wenchang's arms, then took off his military hat, glanced at him, and said, "What's wrong?" Scared Hauge? ”

"He doesn't have that yet." Li Wenchang laughed, and then explained: "After you left, Haoge sent troops to attack twice more tentatively, and then saw that our army was tightly guarded and there was no advantage to take advantage of, so he retreated. At present, their main job is to build a city here, preparing to besiege us for a long time, so that Yantai Fort will lose its influence on land, and at the same time cut off our ability to obtain people and supplies. ”

"He's quite capable of carrying it." Mo Ming said with some surprise, "Forty thousand foot horses, tens of thousands of masters, and a large number of pack beasts, this consumption of materials is not a small amount. actually insisted on not running out of food until now, this Fang Dayou is really a good skill. Hehe, now Denglai and other places are afraid that they are already three feet high. ”

"Tens of thousands of people will definitely not be able to support here. In fact, we have been observing the Qing army camp with binoculars from the lighthouse these days. They must have withdrawn some of their forces and went back. Conclusions drawn from observations made at the lookout post. It is likely that the Qing army withdrew 5,000 horses and 10,000 foot soldiers. At present, the number of Qing troops here should be around 25,000, including 5,000 horses. As for Hauge himself, it is not clear whether he is still here, because we have not seen the banner of this prince for a long time. Li Wenchang reported to Mo Ming on the changes in his old opponent over the past few days.

"Twenty-five thousand people...... Mo Ming rubbed his chin with his right hand, and after thinking about it, he still shook his head: "The soldiers we can rest assured to bring into battle for field battles are only 5,000 people, and the Qing army still has a horse team of 5,000 people, as well as a semi-finished brick wall that already has a certain defensive capability, and a certain number of artillery, we may not be able to take advantage of it." And even if it can be superior, the loss of troops should not be small. If the number of dead and wounded is more than five hundred. Then it is a great defeat for us, and the local troops are not surplus, do you think they will send troops over? It's hard! ”

"That's to be cautious." Li Wenchang echoed, and then he began to complain again: "But it's also depressing to be trapped here." The immigration route was cut off, the intelligence source was cut off, and there was no way to go out to collect grain, this fortress was abandoned, and the purpose of the Qing army was achieved! ”

"Don't just see our difficulties, the Qing army is also very uncomfortable." Mo Ming said as he walked towards the city, "Mobilize tens of thousands of masters to repair the city wall. There were also tens of thousands of pack beasts transported back and forth, plus 20,000 or 30,000 soldiers. It is impossible to support the current situation of Denglai Second Mansion, even if Qingzhou Mansion is added, it is enough. Unless Fang Dayou doesn't care about the lives of the people and snatches away their last rations, he will inevitably go to the hands of those big landlords. At this time, the Manchus would tear off the veil of warmth for the landlords and gentry that they had been pretending to have, and instead hold the knife handle to forcibly expropriate money and grain. Ha Luha, in short, it's good for us. ”

While talking, the two walked to the gate of the north city of Yantai Fort, and the soldiers of the four squadrons outside the north gate were exercising. Mo Ming shook hands with all the commanders above the squad leader, and then encouraged them to train hard, and then it was their turn to follow him out to sea.

There are also many residents working on the sand bar outside the northern city, who have picked up a large amount of silt from the swamp mud on the west side, greatly improved the soil quality of the sand bar here, and then planted vegetables on it to supply the daily consumption of the whole fortress. As of early June, there were still 18,000 people in the resettlement area on Zhifu Island outside the northern city of Yantaibao and more than 3,000 on Kongtong Island. The reason why there are so few people is because after the return of the migrant transport fleet in April, a large number of people from the Yantai area were brought to the Heishui area to settle the land, because the planting of potatoes and spring wheat will start in May.

Among them, the number of displaced people in the Dabo area has now increased to more than 13,000, and they will carry out spring sowing in that black land. They live in wooden huts left behind by the older generation of immigrants, use the tools and grain left by the older generation of residents, cultivate the farmland left by the older generation of residents, and wait for the arrival of early winter. At that point, it was their turn to board the ship and sail to the New World. In addition, spring wheat is planted about half a month earlier on Rishiri Island than in Omarari, where spring temperatures rise faster and there are currently 3,000 displaced people living on the island. According to such statistics, the number of displaced people in the Far East is now only 37,000 in the hands of the East Bank, and this is still counting the nearly 5,000 volunteer reclamation personnel recruited in the county towns that have been conquered all the way, otherwise it will only be less.

Compared with the population, there are still about 3,200 tons of various types of grain stored in warehouses in Yantai, Rishiri and Heishui. There are almost everything in wheat, corn, potatoes, sweet potatoes, corn, black beans, fish and shrimp, frozen meat, and if you count calories, there must be more than 3,200 tons of wheat that can produce calories, after all, those sea fish and meat can produce far more calories than grain. These stored grains can basically ensure that everyone in Yantai, Heishui and other places can eat for three months, but this has to remove a large amount of grain to be consumed for spring sowing, so three months is definitely not enough. However, by the middle to late next month, the salmon season will arrive again, and this year there will be 7-8 more fishing boats on the east coast than last year, and the catch will increase significantly. Therefore, during this season, the East Coast people should not be short of food.

Therefore, it is important to hurry up and pull more people. Now is the time to race against time, who knows what the situation will become in the next moment, and then change a group of people to continue to attack, if the recruitment of volunteer reclamation personnel is insufficient, it is necessary to use some coercive means to pull people. For those carpenters, blacksmiths, doctors and other people who have a skill, they will not say a word of nonsense to them, and they will be forcibly taken away.

Adhering to such a purpose, Mo Ming and others immediately announced that they would be given three days off after everyone went ashore. Three days later, the 15-18 Squadron of the Advance Team will change the guard at the head of the city, replacing the 3-6 Squadron that has been stationed at Yantai Fort for a long time. Next, these troops who stayed at Yantai Fort will go to sea to fight in rotation to continue to train the combat capability of all troops.

As for the troops to fight this time, they were initially set to be about 400 people from the 102nd Company and Supplementary Company of the Army, more than 1,550 people from the First and Third Battalions of the Eighth Banner New Army, 2,000 people from the 3rd to 10th Squadrons of the Advance Team, 200 people from the Yantai Artillery Company, all 500 people from the Cavalry Brigade, 150 scouts from the security team, and 3,000 soldiers from the Sergeant Team, with a total strength of 7,800 people, including 4,800 soldiers. At that time, in addition to the two gunboats remaining in Yantai Port, the remaining 10 large ships plus four medium-sized fishing boats of 150 tons will all be dispatched, and the focus of the attack will still be on Shandong and Beizhili Provinces. Liaodong was decisively abandoned by Mo Ming because of its sparse population and difficult supplies, and perhaps only after they had achieved major results elsewhere would he lead his army to land in Liaodong for a show of military prowess out of some bad taste.

The location of the sortie was still the northern part of Jinan Province, which was between the Qing army in Yantai and the Qing army in Tianjin, and the eastern coastal prefecture and county of Hejian Province. I don't know if the Qing army in Ludao has increased its troops and deployed troops here after suffering a loss last time, if not, then it will inevitably be humiliated again. Mo Ming's plan was to operate in the coastal areas of Hejian Province and Jinan Province for a while, and then pat his ass on the boat and leave after attracting a large number of main forces of the Qing army, and then raid other places across the sea with the unparalleled mobility of the fleet, so that the Qing army could not take care of one thing and the other, and could not prevent it, completely disrupting the situation in the north and shaking the ruling foundation of the Qing court.

Mo Ming is a neat and neat person, he doesn't want to be bored in Yantai Fort and staring at the Qing army opposite. In order to completely isolate Yantai Fort, the Qing army has been building a large number of turrets in the south and began to build a large number of turrets, which are connected by two earthen walls or brick walls between the turrets. They intended to rely on these strong fortifications and artillery to form a-for-tat stalemate with the people on the east bank of Yantai Fort.

Mo Ming was a little helpless about the Qing army's actions. Since Yantai was besieged, it has become inconvenient for the scouts of the scout team to go out to collect intelligence. In the past, from time to time, some local anti-Qing forces in Shandong secretly sent people to contact and exchange information, but now they have all stopped cooking, and even the Luo Guoshi Luo from Texas can no longer get in touch with the people on the east coast, which still makes the people on the east coast more depressed. This is really a bit like the Huguenot Protestants who besieged La Rochelle with the French army under the command of Richelieu, and built 18 forts on the periphery of La Rochelle in one go, sealing the port and turning it into a completely closed area. Just because Hauge wasn't French doesn't mean he didn't have intelligence, so it's easy to understand why he built this series of turrets and walls to besiege Yantai Fort.

On the night of June 5, 1645, the army on the east coast who had already boarded the ship sat quietly in the cabin, and then 14 large and small ships quietly pulled anchor and set sail under the guidance of the two lighthouses on Zhifu Island and Kongtong Island, left Yantai Port, and headed for Bohai Bay. (To be continued......)