Zhang Shun is not very old, but he has a rich resume.

He was originally a farmer's son, of course, not a tenant farmer, his family has more than a dozen acres of paddy fields, and hired a long-term helper, although his life is not rich, but it is relatively rich, and his family can also provide him with a private school in the town to study.

He is a native of Chiayi County, or a small number of local Cantonese guests, has been oppressed by the local dominant ethnic group Fujian Zhangquan people, so the Cantonese are very united in the local area, and often have to fight with the stronger Fujian people, so that immigrants are generally keen to practice martial arts.

Later, Chen Zhouquan gained a firm foothold in Chiayi County and began to attack them, the Cantonese ethnic groups who had helped the Manchu government fight, they were the first batch of landed class to be purged by Chen Zhouquan, his grandfather was killed, his two elder brothers were killed in the Baoxiang Regiment, and he was the only one, who was forced by his parents to flee to Fengshan County.

At that time, he was only fourteen years old, with the support of relatives, all the way to Fengshan County, but on the way relatives also died, helpless he saw the government recruiting readers, he went to sign up, the conditions are really generous, as long as you can read and write, this he meets, even if the young family still did not refuse.

After that, he was assigned to Xie Qinggao's ship as an apprentice, learned astronomical knowledge, surveying and mapping knowledge, he worked very hard, and his performance was also very good, he soon stood out, and at the age of eighteen he became the captain of a newly launched old lock ship, and the official title was the general. A few years later, Zhou Dashuai, who occupied Fujian and Guangdong, continued to build battleships, and he was finally promoted to the captain of the battleship, and the title at this time was Qianzong.

But it didn't take long for him to be sent to England to learn navigation, and he was resistant at first, because he felt that he had learned a lot from Xie Qinggao, and he had learned a lot from the Dutch on the ship, so he even learned Dutch, but after arriving in England, he quickly changed his attitude.

In school, I studied theoretical knowledge and learned those battle examples, unlike other students, everyone felt that the tactics of naval warfare were too crude, basically a strong and hard rush, and there was no art of turning around the art of war of those land battles. This view is generally good, and the British Navy's code of practice is to line up in battle columns to maximize the power of artillery, which is actually born out of the army's rifle line tactics.

The reason is that after a civil war between the king and parliament in England more than a hundred years ago, since the navy was on the side of the king, and the parliament won in the end, Cromwell cut off the king's head, and then ordered the dissolution of the old navy and sent his loyal army soldiers to form a new navy.

The Army extended infantry tactics to naval warfare, so the British linear tactics were formed, which were simple and practical, but lacked flexibility.

Even the British naval instructors believed that naval warfare was a game of the brave with a strong attack and a hand-to-hand fight. When Nelson deployed the Battle of Trafalgar, he gave the captains great autonomy in the way they attacked, requiring them to give full play to the spirit of bravery, tenacity, initiative, and courage in close combat. After hearing about this plan, the captains were extremely excited, and said in unison: "It is really new, really special and really simple...... As long as we catch them, we will definitely succeed! ”

At that time, many Chinese students were interning in Nelson's fleet, and they really felt that even the best British generals had no more than the art of commanding, and they took it for granted that naval warfare itself lacked mystery.

But after studying a series of examples of famous British generals, Zhang Shun suddenly discovered that naval warfare was not only a battle of courage, but also a contest of wisdom.

He was not clever about Nelson's deployment at the Battle of Trafalgar, but he admired a number of battles that Nelson fought during his service in the Mediterranean. At that time, Nelson was often at a disadvantage, unable to compete with the Spaniards in the Mediterranean, and this was the only way to show his commanding skills. For example, he was good at using his knowledge of navigation to fight, and he used fog to ambush Spanish fleets, such as the Battle of St. Vincent.

The Spanish fleet consisted of 27 battleships and 22 smaller ships. Nelson, who had only 15 battleships, took advantage of the fog to lead his ships to suddenly cut into the two Spanish fleets, and then took advantage of the wind to outflank the rear of the enemy's main fleet and attack. It was a tough battle, but Nelson won more with fewer wins.

What Zhang Shun admired the most was that Nelson pursued Napoleon's fleet to Egypt, and then annihilated the French fleet in Alexandria, trapping Napoleon in the Battle of Aboukir in Egypt.

At that time, the commander of the French fleet stationed his warships in the Gulf of Aboukil, which was very shallow and had no effect on the French ships with a shallow draft, but the commander of the French fleet thought that it was impossible for the British to venture into the harbor, because the British battleships had a deep draft, and it was getting late, so it was very dangerous to venture into an unfamiliar harbor.

Who knew that Nelson was pressing on the French fleet, measuring the depth of the water as he went, and that Nelson had a beautiful set of French Beling atlases with detailed notes on the Gulf of Aboukil, according to which Nelson's officers surveying the sea lanes saw an opportunity.

The British observed that the French ships had only dropped their bow anchors, and that the wind was uncertain at this time, at first easterly, and then northwesterly, and that the French ships that had not dropped their tail anchors had been displaced, and that since they had not raised their booms, they were unable to adjust their positions, and the British officers concluded from the charts that there was a deep water zone between the French ships and the shore.

The ability to judge changes in the sea by observing the direction of the wind and the displacement of the enemy's fleet requires a solid knowledge of navigation and keen observation.

Nelson agreed with his men's judgment and immediately made arrangements, ordering a detachment to make a detour to the rear of the French and into the deep water channel between the French fleet and the land, so that they surrounded the French army and cut off the French fleet from the land, and the French fleet fled to land and ran aground, and then received support from Napoleon's army.

In this battle, Nelson completely destroyed the faster French fleet, which they had pursued throughout the Mediterranean, and threw Napoleon and his army into Africa. This force was not able to return to France until Napoleon came to power and signed the Treaty of Amiens with Great Britain.

After discovering these mysteries, Zhang Shun no longer thinks that naval warfare is a boring battle, but also full of art and flexibility, and you must follow the general trend and learn to take advantage of the wind direction, tides and various times and places, which is not at all easier than land warfare. From then on, he began to study harder and most up-to-date and advanced nautical knowledge, and after five years of studying in England, he was confident that he could take charge of a fleet. That's why I asked Zhan to lead the team to attack the Spanish colonies, and the sea conditions and journeys along the way were incomparable to the Pacific route. He was confident that he would be able to lead the fleet to South America safely.

Luckily, the Emperor agreed to his proposal and put him in charge of assembling the new fleet.

Zhang Shun had already returned to his original ship, and instead of the current captain, he continued to command the battleship. Half a year later, he was transferred again, because a new second-class battleship was built, and he became the captain of this battleship, and the official rank was already a staff general.

The ship is new, he, the captain, is new, the sailors and soldiers under him are all new, and Zhou Lang put him in charge of forming a navy according to his own wishes.

Zhang Shun did not ask for any sailors of the old fleet, because most of those sailors were pirates from Zhao'an, and the other sailors were also tainted with many vices, and he thought that these people were not qualified naval soldiers at all. So he recruited a group of graduating students from the seafaring study, and then recruited a large number of innocent fishermen as sailors, and began to conduct rigorous training.

Now his battleships already had considerable combat effectiveness. It's just a lack of combat experience.

Forming a new fleet, Zhou Lang asked him this week, and allowed him to draw out all the officers who had returned from studying in England. Those officers had just returned to China, and in order not to break with the old naval forces, they were placed in various positions in the old navy. But many of them have already become captains, and now Zhang Shun has transferred this captain-level officer along with the ship to become the team of his own fleet. The remaining officers were also drawn into their own fleet.

Now his fleet was formed in the name of the expeditionary fleet, and this reason was enough to convince people, and as for whether they could be convinced later, it was up to them to rely on their own efforts. In short, as long as there is a reasonable reason, Zhou Lang will support them.

Zhang Shun purged most of the old officers, but all those who did not have a relatively formal education, such as pirates, sailing and fighting with experience rather than navigation, he transferred out of his fleet, and arranged for this group of officers who had returned from studying in England, and the sailors of the lower ranks of the warships should not be pirates, and the lack of personnel would rather recruit novices than those pirates with poor discipline.

In this way, it took a month, and before the first month, he formed a small fleet composed of a second-class battleship, two third-class battleships, and ten old lockships. Then equipped with more than fifty large transport ships, ready to go to the Americas to fight.

Now this expeditionary fleet is very crude, but the composition is very pure and more professional. This is a fleet that has always been formed in full accordance with the concept of the British Navy, and whether they can give full play to their combat effectiveness, Zhou Lang is waiting and seeing.

On the sixteenth day of the first month, they set sail, and they will achieve results, and it will be at least next year for the news to come back, and in this era of outrageous speed of information circulation, everyone must be patient.

Politically, too, the Europeans have not responded to the news of China's declaration of war on Spain last year. I am afraid that the attitude of the Europeans will be transmitted back to China in about the same time as Zhou Lang's attack on La Plata.