On 29 March, Zhang Mingzhen and Zhang Huangyan led more than 600 warships of the naval division to re-enter the Yangtze River, went up the river downwind, crossed Jingkou (in Zhenjiang), and reached Yizhen, where they burned hundreds of Manchu salt ships in the river outside Yizhen City. When the news reached Jiangning, Ma Guozhu, the governor of Jiangnan in the Qing Dynasty, hurriedly dispatched troops to intercept the Ming Dynasty naval division that penetrated deep into the Yangtze River. Zhang Mingzhen and others stayed in Yizhen for a short time before returning to the east, and withdrew to the Shayu Barnyard Sha, Pingyang and other places in the Chongming area.

On 18 May, Zhang Mingzhen was unable to support his troops to continue to resist the Qing Dynasty due to the shortage of soldiers and salaries, so Zhang Huangyan commanded the troops in Zhoushan, and he personally went south to Wenzhou, Zhejiang Province to buy seven ships of rice, and then went to Xiamen, Fujian Province to meet Zheng Chenggong and asked Zheng to provide soldiers, gunpowder, equipment, and other materials for Zhang's troops to persist in the struggle. Zheng Chenggong, who was in "peace talks" with the Manchu Fujian authorities at the time, agreed to Zhang Mingzhen's request in order to increase his bargaining chips, and sent Chen Hui, a loyal Jingbo, to command 5,000 sailors, 10,000 land soldiers, and nearly 100 large ships to the north to support.

Zheng Chenggong's support made Zhang Mingzhen think that the trip was worth it, and he returned to the north. On the sixth day of the first month of September, Zhang Mingzhen's troops arrived in Shanghai County, and the Qing Dynasty Shanghai magistrate was paralyzed by fright, and the people in the city clamored that Zhang Jun was the "army of kings", and responded one after another, or killed Qing soldiers, or intimidated Qing officials, or besieged Yamen. All of a sudden, Shanghai was in danger of being recovered by the Ming army. After receiving an urgent report from Songjiang Prefecture, Zhou Guozuo, the governor of Qingjiang Ning, immediately led troops to come to the aid and threatened the people of Shanghai with a massacre, which stabilized the situation in Shanghai. Zhang Mingzhen, who could not get the response of the people of Shanghai, was forced to lead his troops to retreat.

After the retreat from Shanghai, Zhang Mingzhen and Zhang Huangyan combined to believe that when they led the army into the Yangtze River again, this time it would no longer only enter the mouth of the river, but go straight to Jiangning, so as to strike a blow at the rule of the Qing court in Jiangnan and break people's hearts. December. Erzhang and others led more than 400 ships to go up the river, and on the 18th, they sailed from Sanjiang Camp through Jiaoshan and arrived at Yanziji on the outskirts of Nanjing.

The warships of the Ming army and sailors that suddenly appeared on the river outside Nanjing frightened the Qing Dynasty officials in the city and exclaimed, "Jiangning is close at hand, and the momentum is very rampant." Ma Guozhu, the governor of Liangjiang in the Manchu Qing Dynasty, and Admiral Guan Zhongzhong were loyal to prevent the Ming army from besieging Jiangning, shaking half of the Qing court in the southeast, and personally commanding the Manchu and Han soldiers stationed in Nanjing to go out of the city to intercept and kill the Ming army.

Since the army of King Lu Xing resisted the Qing Dynasty, both Zhang Mingzhen and Zhang Huangyan are good at water warfare and weak in foot warfare, especially the strength of the soldiers and horses under the command of the two is far weaker than that of the Qing army, and there is no cavalry to support them. Therefore, although Nanjing was shaken by the advantage of the sailors, under the blow of the Qing army, which was much stronger than them, Erzhang could not last on the river, let alone gain a foothold on the shore.

In view of the inability to defeat the Qing army on land and the constraints of grain and grass supplies, Zhang Mingzhen and Zhang Huangyan stayed on the river outside Nanjing for only a few days before leading their boat divisions to slowly withdraw eastward from the Yangtze River. Although this attack on the Yangtze River, like the previous two times, did not cause some casualties to the Qing army, let alone attack the government and seize the county, it had a great shock to the Qing court, and also made the coastal anti-Qing forces and the Jiangnan gentry realize the heavy threat of the Ming army's naval divisions to the Qing court.

In fact, the real purpose of the battle of the Yangtze River planned by Zhang Mingzhen and Zhang Huangyan was to test the Qing army's defense strength in the south of the Yangtze River. It also wanted to liaise with the anti-Qing and Ming people on both sides of the Yangtze River, and also wanted to echo Li Dingguo, who was attacking Guangdong, and Sun Kewang, who was in a stalemate with the Qing army in Hunan, in order to achieve the grand plan of connecting the east and the west, joining the Yangtze River, and restoring the north and south of the river.

When he entered the Yangtze River for the first time, Zhang Mingzhen sent people to secretly meet with Qian Qianyi, the former secretary of the Hongguang Dynasty Rite Department, Yao Zhizhuo, the Fengren Wubo of the Lu Jianguo Office, and Li Zhichun, a scholar of the Zuodu Yushi Jiashi Governor of the Lu Jianguo Metropolitan Procuratorate, in addition to informing them of the situation of resisting the Qing Dynasty under the rule of Lu Jianguo, and asking them to provide a certain amount of money and food support. The second and third into the Yangtze River. Zhang Huangyan even persuaded Zhang Mingzhen to disguise himself as a Taoist priest of Youfang to secretly meet with Zhang Zhongfu, the former squire of the Southern Ming Military Department, Zhu Zhou of the Ming Sect, He Wangsheng, the director of the former Ministry of War, and a large number of people who had restored the Ming Dynasty.

A part of the gentry of the former Ming Dynasty, led by Qian Qianyi, had been secretly engaged in the restoration of the Ming Dynasty in the Qing ruling area, and the main planners of building a bridge between the Yongli court in the southwest and the naval division in the southeast were Qian Qianyi and Yao Zhizhuo. Zhang Huangyan also knew that Wen Anzhi, a scholar of Yongli Imperial Court University, had been in correspondence with Qian Qianyi. Yao Zhizhuo personally brought back a large number of documents from Guizhou to the Yongli court and the Qin king. It is precisely because of the support of Qian Qianqianyi and Yao Zhizhuo that Zhang Mingzhen and Zhang Huangyan were able to enter the Yangtze River unimpeded.

As early as the third year of Yongli (the sixth year of Shunzhi of the pseudo-Qing Dynasty), Qian Qianyi proposed the foundation of Zhongxing in a secret letter to his protégé Qu Shiyun, who was left in the imperial court to stay in Guilin University, and the key was to go down the river to seize Jiangnan. Take control of Nandu in your hands.

When Zhang Huangyan secretly went to see Qian Qianyi in the second Yangtze River, Qian compared the use of soldiers to a game of chess, and he said to Zhang Huangyan: "The authorities of the people are like playing chess, and the small skills of the catalpa can be said to be big." Today, there are all, there are needs, there are urgency, and those who are good at playing are good at saving them according to the urgency of the situation. If you are in a hurry now, you will have to do it; Now you want it, that is, you have it all. The key points in the world are only four, and the Central Plains is fundamentally free in the south of the Yangtze River. Chang, Huai, Bianjing, if it is not the capital, then Xuan Xuan and the heavy troops of the southern Chu Dynasty will go all out to restore Jing and Xiang, strangle the Han Dynasty, shake Wuchang down, and the south of the river is between my fingers. Jiangnan is established, the wealth is gradually filled, and the root has been consolidated, and then the Jing and Bianzhi Feng are cleared of the river. Emperor Gao Dingding Jinling, the soldiers pointed to the north, and Emperor Gengshen escaped to Mobei, which has been effective. ”

He also said: "Wang Shi went north to Dongting first, and there was no other way to look back. But as soon as you enter the Yangtze River, there will be more rings everywhere,...... I was able to consolidate the fundamentals, recuperate, restore the Chu River, and restore the Jingque. ”

This strategic policy, which focuses on recovering the middle and lower reaches of the Yangtze River, Qian Qianyi called it "the three bureaus of the catalpa".

After Li Dingguo killed the prince Nikan of Qing Jingjin in Hengyang and defeated the elite of the Manchurian Eight Banners that went south from Beijing, Qian Qianyi saw the opportunity to realize the "three games". Although the elite of the Eight Banners who were heavily damaged by Li Dingguo was later led by Belle Tunqi and defeated the army of Sun Kewang, the king of Qin in the Southern Ming Dynasty, in the Battle of Zhoujiapu, the casualties of the Qing army were also quite large, and the morale was not high and they were eager to return to Beijing to recuperate.

After receiving Qian Qianyi's secret letter, Zhang Mingzhen and Zhang Huangyan led their troops to go all out to start attacking the Yangtze River, and continued to attack the Yangtze River three times. As a result, because of the changes in the war in Hunan, Sun Kewang hesitated and missed the great opportunity to join forces to seize Jiangnan.

One into the Yangtze River, two into the Yangtze River, three into the Yangtze River, each time into the Yangtze River represents a good opportunity to recover the south of the Yangtze River, but every opportunity is wasted, which makes Zhang Huangyan very melancholy, but also very distressed, but he never complains about others, only hates the lack of strength of his own soldiers and horses, it is difficult to hit the Qing army in the south of the Yangtze River, and then attract or contain the Qing army in Hunan, so that the Qin King Sun Kewang can be free to start advancing along the east of the river.

After hearing the news that Zhoushan was attacked again by the Qing army, Zhang Huangyan was like sitting on pins and needles, and did not want to stay in Xiamen for a moment, and after Zheng Chenggong sent Gan Hui and Chen Liu to the sea, he immediately returned to Zhoushan with the boat.

Although he had already guessed the outcome of the Zhoushan military and civilians when he was on the boat, when he really saw it, Zhang Huangyan was still difficult to control. He clenched his fists, his green tendons protruded, and after staring at Zhoushan City where there was still black smoke burning for more than ten seconds, he suddenly hid his face and cried.

Zhang Huangyan's crying made the left and right entourage all relatives, and Gan Hui and Chen Liu, who got off the boat, were also sad and very uncomfortable.

After crying for a while, Zhang Huangyan stopped crying, wiped his face with his sleeve, and asked the school official who came to greet him on the island after correcting his emotions a little: "Where is Master Hou?" The Hou Ye in his mouth refers to Zhang Mingzhen, who was canonized by King Lu when he was in charge of the country.

When the school official heard this, his face was pale, and he said bitterly: "Hou Ye is in the city." ”

"In the city?"

Zhang Huangyan just wanted to open his mouth to ask Zhang Mingzhen what he was doing when he didn't deploy the defense of Zhoushan and fell into the city full of corpses, but he was suddenly speechless. Looking at his body again, he was trembling terribly.

Zhang Huangyan's sudden tremor made Gan Hui and Chen Liu, who had just come over, stunned, and they were about to step forward to ask in confusion, but they saw Zhang Huangyan shake violently, and then strode towards the city.

"Zhang Shilang?!"

Gan Hui and Chen Liu subconsciously shouted, but Zhang Huangyan didn't hear it, so he hurried towards the city.

Seeing this, Gan Hui and Chen Liu didn't think much about it, and they hurriedly followed. Zhang Huangyan's move was too bizarre, and the two of them couldn't help but find out.

Running all the way, there were Sergeant Zhang Bu who was collecting corpses everywhere along the way. The corpses are old and young, male and female, but all female corpses, regardless of age, are all naked. Naked, with a female corpse. The body is full of sticks, the face is frightened, and the blood is flowing all over the body, which is unbearable.

When some of the sergeants saw the overseer running towards the city like a distraction, they all put down their hands and looked puzzled.

Because he ran too fast, Zhang Huangyan fell twice in a row on the road, and he didn't need anyone to help him, so he was afraid of getting up and didn't care about rubbing the sore spots, so he stumbled forward.

Not far from the city gate, Zhang Huangyan shouted loudly: "Waiting for the master, waiting for the master!" ”

At the city gate, hundreds of soldiers were carrying piles of corpses out with mules and horses, and when they heard Zhang Huangyan's shout, all the soldiers did not stop, but someone in the city suddenly wailed "Auntie" and suddenly all knelt there.

A "mother" came, Zhang Huangyan stopped like an electric shock, and looked at the city gate blankly.

At the city gate, under the gaze of all the soldiers, Zhang Mingzhen, who was dressed in plain clothes, walked out tremblingly with his mother's corpse, and the moment he saw Zhang Huangyan, he could no longer suppress the bitter cry in his heart, and "plopped" and knelt on the ground holding his mother's corpse, looking up to the sky: "Mother, mother, mother!"

After three sounds, the whole city wept. (To be continued......)