On the other side of the strait, Hai'an Thousand Households.

Cavalry captain Zhao Congjian was dressed in a blue and white Guards uniform, leather boots with spurs, a pistol holster hung on the right side of the belt, a straight sword on the left side, a black armband on the cuffs of the jacket, and the Southern Cross Medal of the First Class, the Black War Wounded Medal and the Taipei and Hainan Service Medals hung on the left chest, and above the medals were a row of medals of various color combinations.

Behind Zhao Congjian, 20 soldiers of the Guards Battalion marched in a line carrying rifles, and the slightly special equipment made everyone in the Hai'an Institute look sideways.

The Ming army set up a communication center in this thousand-household station in the southernmost part of the mainland, which was managed by a civilian official with the rank of supervisor and discipline supervisor of the Leizhou Prefecture, and this communication station was guarded by a capital secretary and 50 officers and soldiers sent by the Fubiao Right Battalion in Guangdong.

The spurs trampled the floor loudly, Zhao Congjian walked to the door of the communication station, he smiled and said to the Tui Guan and Du Si who hurriedly greeted him: "Two brothers, I was ordered to take over the communication station. ”

"Does the chief have a warrant?"

Zhao Congjian handed over the military order stamped with the seal of the superintendent Yamen to the Tuiguan, and after the Tuiguan and the Dusi were inspected, they were ordered to hand over the management of the communication station to Zhao Congjian.

The main building of the communication station is a cylindrical stone tower, on the top of which stands a wooden stake, on which a horizontal crossbar is installed, which can be rotated around the midpoint, and under the pile, the crossbar can be turned at different angles with ropes.

A vertical arm is installed at each end of the horizontal crossbar, and the vertical arm can also be controlled to rotate by using the rope below, so that the different positions and angles of the horizontal crossbar and the vertical arm form different shapes.

Each set of different shapes represents an Arabic numeral, and communication stations like this one start from the Hai'an Institute and extend west to Qinzhou Dafeng Fort, and eastward through Donghai Island and Nansan Island to Zhanjiang Fort and Potou Fort, which extend to both sides of Guangzhou Bay.

Haibei signal communication station covers more than 600 kilometers, a total of 50 communication towers, information is transmitted through the tower pole, the personnel on duty on each tower use a telescope to observe and then pass backwards, one station after another to the end point. The communications officer at the end of the line found the corresponding kanji table according to the number he received, and translated the order.

If the weather is good and the order is short, the communication system can transmit the order to Qinzhou, the farthest away, within 2 hours.

The only disadvantage is that multiple relay stations require a lot of personnel management, and they have to be repaired several times a year after a typhoon has been raging. Also due to manpower reasons, Hainan did not set up a communication station around the island, but only covered the part of the Qiongzhou Strait in the north of the island, which has the heaviest coastal defense task.

The headquarters of the orderly was set up at his own manor outside the city, and from here orders were issued, and he boarded a speedboat at Haikou, and arrived at the Hai'an Qianhu on the other side of the strait. The order was translated into numbers at the Haian Station and transmitted to the theaters.

Zeng Ying moved to the orderly manor, where she has been living for the past few days.

The old man is old and semi-retired, and the specific affairs of the jurisdiction are in charge of the three governors, among which Zhou Luqing, the governor of Guangdong, has the highest status.

"So, what exactly is your plan? Of the officers and troops in the Gaolei Theater, only Dianbai and He and Jin Erzhen still had their strength left, and the other departments had exhausted their strength in Xinhui and this year's battles. ”

"Cabinet Department, Wang Zhihan guards the Yong'an Thousand Households, which creates a good opportunity for us."

"Well, I've seen Wang Zhihan many times, and he's a tough guy."

"Yong'an blocked Geng Jimao, He Jiuyi and Zhang Shijie Guangxi blocked the line of Guoan, so Qinlian was in the rear of the front, and Li Laiheng of Lianzhou and Li Yuanyin of Qinzhou did not participate in the battle of Xinhui, and their strength was relatively complete. After a while, it will be the autumn harvest, and after the rice is cut, the two places of Qinlian will be fully mobilized. ”

Li Laiheng and Li Yuanyin didn't pay much attention to Li Dingguo, and they didn't go to the flesh mill in Xinhui, so they didn't suffer heavy losses in the retreat stage of the Ming army.

Xie Yuanbian transferred Li Laiheng's first unit to Yong'an Qianhu Station to echo Wang Zhihan, and Li Yuanyin's first part reinforced Bobai to help the heavily damaged Chu army and Jiangxi army assist in defending the eastern flank of the Nanliu River.

These two departments still have strength, Li Laiheng can still gather up to 3,000 mobile troops, and Li Yuanyin can gather up to 2,000 mobile troops.

"The main force of Fangcheng Deng Yao went to Wuchuan to reinforce Li Mingzhong, and there are still some Tusi soldiers in Zuojiang Road."

Zeng Ying nodded, "Are you draining all the troops in Haibei, and doing your wide frontal attack everywhere like before?" ”

"No, old man, this time we will have a decisive battle with Geng Jimao."

"Do you have faith?"

"Of course, Geng Jimao learned the lesson of the last time and used a large number of troops to secure his lines of communication, on the premise that he thought we did not have the ability to fight in the field, but this time, we just have."

"When is it going to hit?"

"Wait until the rainy season is over."

"What do you need me to do, just ask."

"Half a year's military rations and horse feed, I hope the old gentleman can help me solve it."

Zeng Ying sighed, "I have to donate again from the big families in the house, so while my old bones still have some strength, let's go again." ”

"Old gentleman, hard work."

"It's you people who are fighting on the front lines who are hard work."

……

After the autumn harvest, the Ming army was fully mobilized.

1,800 people from the Guangdong Fubiao and Supervisory Divisions Battalion who stayed on Hainan Island were reinforced to the front line of Nandu River.

Li Laiheng's three-walled cavalry continued to attack the green camp besieged by Yong'an Qianhu, although the siege was not lifted, but Geng Jimao was forced to send reinforcements to Yong'an.

Li Yuanyin stayed in Qinzhou, sent his righteous brother Li Jianjie to lead 2,000 people to disembark at Haikang Qianhu, and Yuan Lijun of Zuojiang Soldier Beidao dispatched 500 Tusi soldiers to follow Li Jianjie.

Lu Zhan was guarding Dianbai Fort like an iron bucket, unable to break the large encirclement of the green battalion, so he also sent Bandus and Pedro to lead an infantry battalion to reinforce Leizhou.

He Huchen and Jin Shiying were reinforced by Li Jianjie and two standard battalions, intensified the outpost battle, and the defense line of Nandu River was impermeable, completely shielding the reconnaissance of the Tatars.

Subsequently, the 1st Mixed Brigade landed in Hai'an, carrying too many artillery and cavalry, so this time it will not land in front of the enemy.

3 infantry regiments, 1 guards battalion, 2 mixed cavalry regiments, 1 artillery battalion. Together with the Dianbai Battalion, the whole army of 10,000 people was assembled in Xuwen County to stand by.

Across the defense line of the Nandu River, the Tatars could only detect that there was a problem at most, and it was impossible to figure out that a powerful field force had come from the Leizhou Peninsula.

The combat unit is not much different from a division, and what is missing is the division's subordinate service detachment and logistics column, which fights on the Leizhou Peninsula itself, and this problem is not very obvious. The prefect of Leizhou mobilized the people, cooked for the army, and assisted in carrying the baggage.

The regimental commanders were left to organize the troops, and personally led a team of cavalry to inspect the front line of the Nandu River.

The Nandu River is about 300 meters wide, and the downstream meanders and zigzags.

The Ming army guarded along the river, and some sampan divisions patrolled back and forth on the river.

11 kilometers north of Haikang City, there is another Tongming River, that river is smaller, the widest part of the downstream is only more than 100 meters, and some sections of the river can be migrated.

The battlefield lies between these two rivers.

Hold up the telescope in order,

From the west to the northwest side of Haikang City is a continuous hilly area, not high in elevation, generally 2,30 meters, and the south and east sides were originally a rice field. After the Ming army cleared the wilderness, only a barren flat land remained.

Geng Jimao's headquarters is northeast of Daying Haikang City. The Tatar army dug two siege trenches outside the city of Haikang, one outside and one inside, and the besieging green camp barracks were inside the two trenches.

Now that the weather is gradually drying out, the ground is congested, and the terrain does not pose an obstacle to the infantry and cavalry, the ridges may have hindered the rapid advance of the cavalry artillery, but Geng Jimao may have bulldozed the ridges on the flat land north of the Nandu River to Daying in order to facilitate the wreaking havoc of the cavalry with his superiority.

In the distance, smoke rose and artillery rumbled, and the Tatars and defenders were engaged in an artillery battle.

Shou Xuan turned around and asked, "How many soldiers does Geng Jimao have?" ”

Jin Shiying kicked the horse's belly when he heard this, and went to the front of the department, "Shang and Geng have transferred a total of 47,000 people from all over Guangdong, and 30,000 have gathered in the Maoming camp, and we have more than 10,000 people in the castle by the sea, and it is estimated that there are 20,000 under Haikang City." This is the number we got from the mouths of the captives who fought with them before, and recently Shang Kexi sent reinforcements to Geng Jimao, I don't know how many people there are, it shouldn't be too many. ”

Behind Geng Jimao's battle line, the Ming army still has Yong'an, Lingyuan, Lemin, Zhanjiang four castles by the sea, and there are remnants of the Chu army and the Jiangxi army in the mountains of Bobai County, and the Tatars should send people to stay in the rear.

The Ming army did not stop using small forces to attack along the inland rivers by sampan, and Geng Jimao sent at least 3,000 people to guard his nearly 500-kilometer grain road.

"The green battalion surrounding Haikang City has at least 5,000 people, which means that Geng Fan has at least 15,000 people, we are more generous, he has 20,000 mobile troops, and if he withdraws from Haikang if necessary, he can concentrate a maximum of 25,000 people."

"Yes, 25,000 is the cap. No more will be enough for his tent. ”

"What about you?"

"I tried my best to draw reinforcements from all walks of life, and I was able to concentrate 3,000, 2,500 for Mr. He, and 2,500 for Mr. Li."

"How many cavalry are there?"

"We have 1,400 riders, and Mr. Li has 400 riders."

Most of the reinforcements drawn from various places were scattered garrisons, and the Ming army used these troops to replace the various units of the training army from the defensive fortresses and try their best to concentrate field troops.

"That's enough", Shou Xiang turned back to the horse's head and said to the Ming army generals, "Let the soldiers rest for three days, and then we will go to fight Xiao Geng." ”

The commander-in-chief agreed with a bang.