Among the conditions proposed by Lin Zhe, the matter of money is easy to discuss, but the war horse is very much needed by Lin Zhe, and in the past few months, Lin Zhe has been using various means to collect horses for military use. Where to chase novels, go fast, and go fast

Although they are all military horses, the horses in the modern army are also divided into several levels, and the worst is naturally the service horse, that is, the logistics horse, these horses are quite undemanding, they can basically pull the carriage and walk, and even mules can be used.

Then there are ordinary officers' riding horses, the requirements are average, just be able to ride, there are no big requirements for the height and weight of the horses.

The horses used by the regular cavalry are quite demanding, the cavalry horses of Western countries generally require about one meter five, the highest requirements of the cuirassier need the height of the horse to reach between one meter five and one meter six, and the ordinary light lancers, hussars, etc. are required to be around one meter five.

Of course, this is the requirement of modern Western cavalry for war horses, and this number is impossible to achieve for contemporary China, because the world knows that China uses Mongolian horses, and the average height is between 1.2 and 1.35 meters, and there are only a handful of more than 1.4 meters.

To be honest, this height number is already very, very poor for modern cavalry, the same modern hussar, people ride a tall horse with a height of 1.5 meters, and you ride a short man with a height of 1.3 meters, which wields a saber to launch a charge against each other, who has the advantage, who occupies the disadvantage has been clear at a glance.

Due to the inherent disadvantage of Mongolian horses, it is quite difficult to completely rely on Mongolian horses to build a modern cavalry with perfect troops.

If you want to truly build a modern qualified cavalry, there is actually only one way, that is, to introduce Western war horses, and then cross them with Mongolian horses to breed excellent war horses suitable for use in the Far East.

The Don hippopotamus of Russia and the Oriental horse of Japan were all created by attracting foreign horses and matching them, and their modern cavalry was based on these improved horse breeds.

This matter of improving war horses is still too far away, and it is not the turn of the current Lin Zhe to bother, limited by the problem of domestic war horses, Yu Shengjun's requirements for cavalry horses must reach a height of one meter three.

Although such a war horse is very inferior to the war horses in the West, it can barely support the cavalry of Yu Shengjun's cavalry, and let Yu Shengjun's cavalry charge with a saber.

But don't look at the height of this one-meter-three war horse is much shorter than that of Western horses, but to find hundreds of Mongolian horses with a height of more than one-meter-three in the Jiangnan area, it is not that it is very large, but it is basically impossible.

Lin Zhe searched for many months to find dozens of horses, but this batch of war horses was also killed and wounded with the destruction of the Si'an Campaign, and then a batch was captured from the Taiping army, and the number of qualified war horses reached more than 70 after replenishment.

However, this is still far from enough for the newly created cavalry company!

In order to make up enough horses for the cavalry, Lin Zhe even personally ordered that the horses of many officers be appropriated to the cavalry company.

However, this shortage of horses cannot last forever, Lin Zhe has been thinking about how to solve the horse problem!

And the most likely way is to get horses from the Jiangnan camp or the Qing army in the Jiangbei camp.

Now Huang Yidian came to the door and said that Xu Naizhao, the governor of Jiangsu, asked him to send troops to Shanghai, isn't this a good opportunity to fall from the sky, if Xu Naizhao helps, it should not be a problem for him to get a batch of war horses from other Qing troops.

He Lin Zhe is not greedy, as long as he can get two hundred horses, it is enough!

It's a pity that Huang Yidian is also a little embarrassed about this, although Xu Naizhao gave him a lot of permission before he came, but this is only limited to the silver money Fang Min, as for the war horse, to be honest, neither Xu Naizhao nor Huang Yidian thought of it in advance.

But it's okay if I didn't think of it, it is necessary to invite Lin Zhe to send troops to Shanghai, unless Lin Zhe opens his mouth, otherwise he will try to be satisfied if he can.

is still the same sentence, anyway, the money and horses given to Lin Zhe are not his Xu Naizhao's, let alone his Huang Yidian's, those are all things of the imperial court.

However, if Shanghai can't come, it will be Xu Naizhao who will be dismissed!

In exchange for Lin Zhe's personal help to Xu Naizhao, it is a cost-effective thing to exchange things from the imperial court.

So Huang Yidian just pondered for a moment, and then said: "Although the matter of war horses is a little more difficult, it is not impossible, but the number of these three hundred horses is too much, and I am afraid it will be difficult to raise them in a short time." In addition, if you want to gather this batch of war horses, you need a lot of money! ”

Lin Zhe was relieved when he heard Huang Yidian, and his face showed joy, although silver is important, but war horses are more important, if Xu Naizhao's side can support him with three hundred war horses, then it doesn't hurt to take less money.

After a simple conversation, the two sides soon reached a verbal agreement:

First, the Jiangnan battalion will give Yu Shengjun 80,000 taels of silver in ammunition and food in batches, and promise to bear that after Yu Shengjun enters Jiangsu, all the grain, grass and military supplies will be supplied by Jiangsu.

Second, the Jiangnan battalion will send 300 horses to Yu Shengjun in batches within a month to help Yu Shengjun build up a cavalry team.

Third, Lin Zhe will personally lead the army to Shanghai, drive out the Little Knife Society and promise to recapture the county seat of Shanghai within two months, and the Jiangnan battalion will also draw troops to participate in the war as appropriate.

In this series of agreements, basically the Jiangsu side is to take over all the military supplies after Yu Shengjun enters the Jiangsu battle, well, in addition to ammunition, Yu Shengjun is not free labor, you invite people to go to war, not only to give money, you also have to pay for food, Huang Yidian also promised on behalf of Xu Naizhao that Yu Shengjun will persuade the Jiangsu gentry to give Yu Shengjun the greatest support after entering Jiangsu.

As for saying that the Jiangnan battalion sent troops to support Yu Shengjun's battle, to be honest, Lin Zhe did not report his expectations for this, not that he thought that the Qing army would not send troops, but that he thought that it would not work for the Qing army to arrange troops, and maybe it would be in the way.

This agreement is just a verbal agreement between Lin Zhe and Xu Naizhao, and naturally there will be no formal documents such as jiàn, and the two parties will implement it quickly after they agree.

Xu Naizhao was probably afraid that the knife in Shanghai would continue to grow bigger, so he soon sent people to gallop there day and night, and sent the first batch of 40,000 taels of military expenses, as for the follow-up 40,000 taels, it will be drawn in batches after Yu Shengjun enters Jiangsu.

As for that batch of war horses, Xu Naizhao's side still needs a certain amount of time, and it is agreed that Yu Shengjun can directly go to Suzhou to receive the first batch of more than 100 war horses in half a month, and the follow-up war horses will continue to be delivered.

Since he took the money, Lin Zhe is not easy to delay, after all, this time it is considered to be doing things with money, and since Xu Naizhao has already sent the money, he naturally can't delay anything.

Moreover, in fact, even if he didn't make any deal with Xu Naizhao, based on the strategic security considerations of encircling northern Zhejiang, he still had to march into Shanghai.

So on August 15, Lin Zhe, who had already taken the money and was fully prepared, led the army north!

This time he went north, Lin Zhe did not take all the troops of Yu Shengjun with him, he only took all the troops of the First Infantry Corps, three companies of the Second Infantry Regiment, the Second Artillery Company equipped with six twelve-pounder guns, the Third Artillery Company equipped with five six-pounder guns, three companies of the rebuilt baggage regiment, and one hundred and fifty cavalry companies that had not yet been fully formed.

The total strength is about 1,400 people, which can be regarded as including most of the elite troops of the current Yu Shengjun.

Also remaining in Huzhou were three companies of the Second Infantry Regiment, the Third Infantry Regiment, which had just been formed for less than half a month and was still in its initial training, and the First Artillery Company, which was equipped with five mountain-splitting guns.

The First Artillery Company is currently equipped with two 800-kilogram mountain-splitting guns and three 500-kilogram mountain-splitting guns in the near future, but a large number of artillery and officers of this artillery company have been transferred to the Third Artillery Company.

In addition, there is also a baggage company that is also in training, and a small group of cavalry with more than ten horsemen who are not yet fully formed.

The total number of Yu Sheng's troops left behind in Huzhou is about 1,000 people, which can be regarded as new troops, and they still need a lot of time to train, even if they are taken to Shanghai, it will have no effect.

The troops sent to Shanghai plus the troops left behind in Huzhou, that is to say, so far, Yu Sheng's army has expanded to three infantry regiments, three artillery companies, one cavalry company, and one baggage regiment, and at present there are about 2,400 people under the current strength.

However, at present, Yu Sheng's army is still in the process of expansion, and some of the troops are not yet fully established, and if all the troops are fully established, the total strength of Yu Sheng's army will reach 2,700 people, with more than 2,000 rifles, 18 large and small artillery, 250 horses on horseback, and more than 300 mules and horses for service.

In order to maintain an army of this size, only the salaries of the personnel and the chewing of mules and horses cost about 20,000 taels of silver per month, not counting the war expenses.

In fact, the first batch of 40,000 taels of silver military expenses given by Xu Naizhao to Lin Zhe was actually just enough for Yu Shengjun to maintain the needs of the army for a month.

When Lin Zhe led the army to leave Huzhou, something very funny happened in Huzhou City, and a large group of officials and gentry in the city were extremely worried that the Taiping army would come after Lin Zhe left.

Qu Shengchao even lowered his face and complained to Lin Zhe, saying that Huzhou's defense was tight, and asked Lin Zhe to take pity on the people of Huzhou and leave more troops in Huzhou.

This situation is in strong contrast to the situation when Lin Zhe first arrived in Huzhou, when the gentry in the city were extremely repulsive to Lin Zhe.

Lin Zhe naturally didn't care about the life or death of the people of Huzhou, especially those gentry, but Huzhou was the northwest gateway of northern Zhejiang, and Lin Zhe naturally couldn't abandon it.

Although most of the thousands of people he left behind were new soldiers, and the number of troops was not much, if the Taiping army came to attack, it would naturally not be possible to go out of the city to fight in the field, but if they were defending the city and just hiding behind the city wall and firing guns, it was estimated that it would be difficult for the Taiping army to defeat even if there were five or six thousand people.

Judging from the current movements of the Taiping army, it is very unlikely that the main force of more than five or six thousand people will be assembled in the area north of Huzhou again.

After all, although the Qing army in the Jiangnan camp of the Qing army is not very good in combat, it can also contain a large number of the main forces of the Taiping army, and it is quite difficult for the Taiping army to transfer troops from southern Anhui to attack northern Zhejiang.

After leaving 1,000 recruits to defend Huzhou, Lin Zhe led the main force of more than 1,400 people to Shanghai. xh118