In the face of the Chinese army's large-scale attack on Taoyuan County, a group of Qing army generals felt a headache, and if they were not saved, they would accidentally put themselves in, but if they were not saved, it would be dangerous for Taoyuan to lose Huai'an.

And the distress of these generals of the Qing army is also the main reason why Shi Qingxuan did not go forward, but went to fight Taoyuan County!

If the Qing army did not dare to come, then Shi Qingxuan would first conquer Taoyuan County, and then go south to Huai'an, take Huai'an with the Fifth Army, gather the First Army and the Fifth Army and then go north to Suqian.

If the Qing army dares to come to the rescue of Taoyuan County, then Shi Qingxuan will not care about Taoyuan County, and directly turn around and kill the Qing army reinforcements, as long as the main force of the Qing army is killed, then the Chinese army will fight as much as it likes in northern Jiangsu!

A controversy in Suqian City lasted for several hours, and finally it was Seng Lingqin's father's selfie: Help!

And once it is decided to rescue Taoyuan County, then for the Qing army to come, it is not only necessary to protect Taoyuan County, but more importantly, to find an opportunity to defeat Shi Qingxuan's department in Taoyuan County, and at the worst time, Shi Qingxuan's department must be firmly dragged down.

The controversy of many generals of the Qing army is not whether to save Taoyuan County, but how to save it?

Everyone here may have high and low abilities, but they are definitely not stupid, the commander Seng Gelinqin was able to annihilate the Northern Expeditionary Army of the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom, and was entrusted with important tasks by the Qing court, his ability is naturally there, and the other major generals are also one of the few generals in the Qing court who can provoke the beam.

Among them, Du Xing'a, as the vanguard of the Qing court's elimination of the new army, naturally has a good ability to organize and train the new army. In his early years, he also fought with the Taiping Army and had quite a lot of military achievements.

Nader was also a capable member of the Qing court in organizing and training the new army.

And Hu Linyi, not to mention, fought back and forth with the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom so many times in Hubei. The reputation is not much weaker than Zeng Guofan, and there are several generals under his command.

These people can see that once their army leaves Suqian and goes south to Taoyuan, they will be overturned if they are not careful, so they are arguing very fiercely about how to rescue Taoyuan County.

In the end, it is the monk Greenqin who makes a decision: if you don't come out, you will do your best!

Monk Lingqin will take all the troops of Suqian to Taoyuan south. In addition, Pizhou and Xuzhou were each transferred to reinforce the main force of Suqian in the starry night, and then the Muyang garrison of 10,000 people also galloped to Taoyuan in the starry night, and then ordered Li Hongzhang of Huai'an City to lead the new army of Jianghuai to the north to reinforce Taoyuan.

After the monk Grinqin personally led the main force to Taoyuan. and the defenders in Taoyuan County should join forces with the outside and encircle the Chinese army under Taoyuan City!

After making this decision, Monk Lingqin felt a burst of prostration, and the next battle of Taoyuan County would not only be the battle with the largest number of commanders in his life. It is also a question about the belonging of northern Jiangsu. The battle of life and death for the survival of the Qing Dynasty.

Every decision he makes has a direct impact on the future situation in the world, and the huge pressure makes him hesitate before!

Now that the decision has been made, Monk Lingqin is not much more relaxed, because the next moment of life and death is unknown, and the pressure in the next few days will be much greater than now.

is different from the pressure of Monk Greenqin, but now Shi Qingxuan is in a good mood!

When crossing Suishui from Qingyang, he also took a dozen senior officers to climb a small hill to drink and enjoy the scenery with great interest.

At this time, just after the frost fell, golden rice fields can be seen everywhere on the plains. The rice has been ripe and bent the branches and leaves, outside the army. Vaguely in tattered rags, the peasants were rushing to harvest the paddy, and the whole family was in battle, for fear that if it was too late, the army would ruin their hard year's harvest by the army of transit.

When the army first arrived, the peasants in the fields were so frightened that they all ran away, and when they saw that this army that looked strangely dressed, with a bare head or only an inch of hair, did not look like bandits or officers and soldiers, these peasants who had never left the village in their lives naturally did not know that this army was the Chinese army.

Seeing that these armies seemed to be just passing by, not plundering the village or robbing them of the ripe grain in the fields, one by one they finally couldn't bear it anymore and ran back to harvest the grain again.

However, there are also a few unlucky people who were forcibly recruited by the Chinese army to be guides because they seem to be well-informed, but although they are forcibly recruited, they heard that as long as they mark the nearby terrain, rivers and villages, and bring these armies all the way to Taoyuan County, they will reward themselves with a few silver dollars, and they all cry and shout that they must lead the way for the army.

In these years, there are no satellites overhead, and the current Chinese army obviously does not have the ability to draw detailed military maps of various places, so except for a few places such as Su Songtai and northern Zhejiang, the Chinese army has detailed military maps, and other places are some rough maps that are not very accurate, most of them are based on the previous maps, and then simply draw, and not to a place, the Chinese army in order not to go the wrong way, the first thing the Chinese army does is to use various means to find local guides.

At the same time, although most of the Chinese people like to be the leader of the road in these years, in order to avoid a very small number of guides with bad intentions, or the guides themselves also go the wrong way, the Chinese army generally grasps more than one guide and cross-asks for directions.

Shi Qingxuan and others drank while admiring the heroic posture of their own army.

Most of the other middle and high-ranking officers who followed him were scholars, and although they could not export after several years of military career, many literati things were deeply rooted in their bones, and they also preferred to play vassal elegance.

So for a while, everyone also followed the poems, but the level of these poems is the same as Shi Qingxuan's poems, and they all belong to the level of limerick poems.

There's no way, although these generals all boast of being born as scholars, but there are not a few early students in the camp school, and there are even fewer people like that, basically they are children who have failed the exam for a long time, and the level of literature naturally can't get there, although poetry can be written, but don't expect celebrities through the ages, it's good if you don't rhyme wrong.

If you don't look at their uniforms, listen to them. I'm afraid I'll think it's a group of unlearned scholars who are engaged in a poetry meeting.

When Shi Qingxuan was wandering, the army under his command had already read Suishui, and then went straight to Taoyuan County!

And this time. The Qing troops in northern Jiangsu have been transmitted through hundreds of miles of expedited fast horses, and they already know that the main force of the Chinese army is going to Taoyuan County, and at the same time, the orders issued by Seng Lingqin have also arrived in Xuzhou, Pizhou, Muyang and other places.

The Qing army in the above-mentioned places followed the order of Seng Lingqin and sent a large army away, and the Qing army in Xuzhou and Pizhou galloped southward to catch up with the main army led by Seng Greenqin himself.

And Muyang's Qing army went straight to Taoyuan County!

But when he arrived at Huai'an City, Li Hongzhang looked at Monk Greenqin's order but was a little hesitant!

Monk Greenqin asked him to lead the Jianghuai New Army to reinforce Taoyuan County. Attacking the Chinese army under Taoyuan City with him, this is logically no problem, but the key thing is that there is still the Fifth Army of the Chinese Army outside Huai'an City.

Li Hongzhang is sure. He left Huai'an City on the front foot, and Shen Chiyun on the back foot either bypassed Huai'an City to pursue him, or directly attacked Huai'an City, and then relied on more than 20,000 green battalions under Zhang Guoliang plus other 20,000 regimental exercises and eight banners. It's really hard to say whether this can hold Huai'an City.

is different from Du Xing'a and Nader, who have not fought against the Chinese army. Li Hongzhang fought face-to-face with the Chinese army in Yangzhou, and there were more than 50,000 Qing troops in Yangzhou at that time, but they still failed to block the attack of the Chinese army.

At that time, during the defensive war of Yangzhou City, it mainly relied on his Li Hongzhang's Jianghuai New Army, as for those brave people in the Green Battalion and Eight Banners, that is, they were shaking the flag and shouting, and it was unreliable to fight.

Now that there is its own Jianghuai New Army, this Huai'an City is not as stable as Mount Tai. But it is difficult to get in with Shen Chiyun's small 30,000 people outside, but if he leaves with the Jianghuai New Army. It is estimated that most of the green camps in Huai'an City will have to escape immediately, and Huai'an City will be very dangerous at that time.

"Brother Zhang, in this situation, everything in this Huai'an City is entrusted to you!" Although he was a little reluctant in his heart, Li Hongzhang was a person who knew the overall situation, and he knew that if he didn't lead his troops north to reinforce Taoyuan County, and if he didn't defeat Shi Qingxuan's troops who had entered Taoyuan County with Seng Lingqin, Huai'an City would have to be lost sooner or later.

And now after he takes the new Jianghuai army to the north, although Huai'an City is in danger, it is estimated that it should not be a problem to drag on for a few days, and as long as Taoyuan County wins, Shen Chiyun's small 30,000 people will not be worried.

Zhang Guoliang listened to Li Hongzhang's words and wanted to say what he wanted to keep but couldn't say it, because he knew that even if he kept it, it would be impossible for Li Hongzhang to stay.

He could only grit his teeth and said: "Li Futai rest assured, with me Zhang Guoliang here, this Huai'an City can't be lost!" ”

That night, Li Hongzhang quietly went out of the city from the north gate of Huai'an City with 8,000 Jianghuai new troops, and in order to conceal it, he even strictly ordered the soldiers to light torches and leave the city in the dark!

By the time the reconnaissance cavalrymen of the Fifth Cavalry Regiment under the Fifth Army of the Chinese Army on patrol discovered Li Hongzhang's headquarters, it was already past seven o'clock in the morning, and Li Hongzhang's headquarters had already left Huai'an City six or seven kilometers, and it would be difficult for the Fifth Army behind to chase after him.

After Shen Chiyun learned that Li Hongzhang's Jianghuai New Army went north out of the city, he didn't show too much worry, he knew that Li Hongzhang went north because of the friendly First Army's move to enter Taoyuan County.

When the Hongzehu military conference was held, he and Shi Qingxuan discussed how the Fifth Army should cooperate if this situation occurred.

Soon, Shen Chiyun delivered an order, ordering the Fifth Cavalry Regiment to pursue, harass, and delay Li Hongzhang's northward march, while he himself led the rest of the Fifth Army's infantry and artillery units to launch the first large-scale attack on Huai'an City.

Although Shen Chiyun's Fifth Army is as strong as the First Army, it also has this Fifth Division, and there is also the naval artillery fire support of the First Gunboat Detachment of the Navy.

In just one day, Huai'an City, which had 40,000 Qing troops, had fallen into a crisis, and this was because Li Hongzhang did not take away all the Jianghuai New Army, and left Zhang Guoliang with two infantry battalions of 1,000 Jianghuai New Army, otherwise on the first day of attack, Huai'an City would probably be broken by the Fifth Army.

With Li Hongzhang's army going north, at this time, a series of large-scale transfers and battles were carried out between the Chinese army and the Qing army in northern Jiangsu around Taoyuan County, and it is foreseeable that the main force of the Qing army will gather in Taoyuan County, if they are allowed to completely converge, then Shi Qingxuan's 35,000 people in the first military region need to face nearly 100,000 Qing troops.

And when the time comes, will Shi Qingxuan really be able to defeat the nearly 100,000 Qing army through frontal field battles as he said? (To be continued......)