With the end of the first imperial examination, the students who officially became Jinshi after participating in the palace examination became the officials of the new generation of the empire, for the one hundred and fifty new Jinshi to think, the Organization Department enriched them to the central institutions for study, but in order to show attention, they are generally served as section chiefs and deputy section chiefs below the ministries for administrative study, and at the same time, they will also rotate multiple departments according to their individual performance, and after the end of the half-year study period, they will be entrusted with important responsibilities and enrich the important organs, At the very least, they will start as section chiefs in central agencies or be sent to other local agencies to take up key positions.

Some of them were hired by the Organization Department and were sent to various local governments, generally serving as section chiefs at the county level, or in the prefecture or provincial yamen.

There are also some people who return to their hometowns, either to hold public office or to study hard to prepare for the next examination.

However, there are also a small number of people who continue to stay in Nanjing, like Chen Luoyun, to prepare for the entrance examination of the Imperial University.

Even when the imperial examinations were being held in Nanjing, and the education reform and control reform were carried out, the Chinese army did not stop their offensive.

On the 10th of September, the 1st Division of the main force to the north conquered Fengyang and controlled all parts of Fengyang Mansion in one fell swoop!

In the direction of Lu'anfu, after a month-long rest and replenishment, the third division of the Chinese army and other troops launched a strong attack on the city of Lu'an, after more than ten days of fierce fighting, a large number of killing and wounding Chen Yucheng's living forces, although it has not completely taken the city of Lu'an, but the other division has already conquered Huoshan County in the south of Lu'an City, and pulled out one of the two major strongholds of Chen Yucheng's department in the direction of Lu'an.

Under such circumstances, it is not far off for the Third Division to take Lu'an.

In the direction of Anqing. The Second Army of the Chinese Army is gathering the whole army to storm Anqing, and at the same time, the navy has also sent many warships to participate in the battle. In order to provide naval artillery fire support, Anqing's 50,000 Taiping troops suffered heavy casualties. It's already precarious.

In southern Anhui near the direction of northern Jiangxi, the war tends to be calm, this is mainly a pass through southern Anhui, that is, Jiujiang, and although Jiujiang is temporarily controlled by the Taiping army, but there is Lin Chengting's Zhenhu army in the south, and there is a Hunan army in the southwest, and many forces converge, plus part of the main force of the Fourth Army has entered the northern Jiangxi region from the direction of Weizhoufu. There were several skirmishes with the Zhenhu army, which made the situation somewhat complicated.

In this case, in order to avoid unexpected situations, the Supreme Command has repeatedly postponed the plan to march into Jiujiang, after all, the Chinese army is now fighting in all directions, and now the core is in the direction of northern Anhui, and most of the military's materials are also supplied to northern Anhui and northern Jiangsu, which makes it difficult for the Fourth Army, which is responsible for the offensive in northern Jiangxi, to obtain a large number of supplies, and has to postpone the Jiujiang attack.

It didn't go well over there in northern Jiangxi. Although Chen Yuntao, commander of the Third Army, was a rising star among many high-ranking generals of the Chinese Army, he was a veritable junior. But on the Fujian side, it is a good fight.

The Third Army under Chen Yuntao only had the 10th Infantry Division and the 8th Auxiliary Defense Division of the Royal Army, as well as two auxiliary defense regiments organized and trained on the spot in Fujian, with a total strength of only about 13,000 troops.

Moreover, the main force of the 10th Infantry Division is only more than 6,000 people, which is 2,000 fewer than the 8,000 men of other Royal Army divisions.

However, he was cautious with his troops. And there are no too strong enemies on the Fujian side, so it is more stable to fight steadily. And on September 9th, it conquered Fuzhou, the capital of Fujian Province, forcing more than 10,000 Qing troops defending the city and the surrounding areas to flee to Quanzhou in embarrassment.

But the Third Army had just taken Fuzhou. It was upon learning the news that Lin Chengting's Zhenhu army had already taken Shaowu Mansion, and went straight to Yanping Mansion along Shaowu River and other tributaries of the upper reaches of the Min River.

If Shaowu is the western gateway of Fujian, then Yanping Mansion, especially the city of Yanping Prefecture, is the strategic center of Fujian, and its military strategic position is actually more important than Fuzhou.

Because Yanping Mansion City is built at the intersection of the three tributaries in the middle reaches of the Min River, Shaowu to the north, Jianning to the northeast, a large area of Yanping Mansion to the southwest, and Tingzhou Mansion and Longyan Prefecture to the west.

Taking control of the city meant gaining an active strategic position in Fujian Province, based on this, Chen Yuntao did not care about pursuing the remnants of the Qing army that had fled to Quanzhou, but left a small part to defend Fuzhou, and personally led the main force of the 10th Division north along the river, striving to take Yanping before the arrival of the Zhenhu army.

If Yanping was taken by the Zhenhu army in advance, then Chen Yuntao also got an order from the headquarters in advance, that is, regardless of whether it was the Zhenhu army or the Qing army, as long as they were hindered from controlling Yanping, then they would not hesitate to launch an attack to seize the strategic place of Yanping, otherwise the city of Yanping would be controlled by the Zhenhu army, and the so-called Fujian strategy of the Chinese army would be a joke.

In order to cooperate with the army's operations, the navy also dispatched two Xingwu-class river gunboats and more than 10 small boats captured from the Qing army's naval division to the north to shoulder the task of covering the logistics supply of river transportation and providing naval artillery fire support.

Although the current Imperial Chinese Navy is still very weak, the main force of inland river operations is only a dozen Xingwu-class river gunboats, and the main force of the far sea is only six small ships of several hundred tons of sail-steam hybrid power, but the scope of activity is quite extensive, basically the Chinese army hits there, and the traces of the navy's river gunboats will appear there.

At present, the navy has set up a number of inland gunboat detachments, and its first gunboat detachment is responsible for fighting in the lower reaches of the Yangtze River and the Beijing-Hangzhou Grand Canal.

The 2nd Gunboat Detachment was mainly active in the middle and upper reaches of the Yangtze River, and it was they who participated in the shelling of Anqing.

There is also the Third Gunboat Detachment that went south to Fujian, although the scale is the smallest one, but it is enough to support the Third Army of the Army when it enters the Minjiang River.

In addition, the navy also used the speed of the Xingwu-class gunboats to transmit battle reports and other confidence, and although it could only be used along the river, it was relatively fast and convenient to transmit information about the areas around the Yangtze River. As for the overland route, you can still only use the traditional post station fast horse.

And the more advanced telegraph, although it is said that the European side has already used the telegraph on a large scale. However, there is still no large-scale application in China, and some foreign companies in the business zone have confidently built some short-distance telegraph lines for internal communication. The yamen of the business zone is also beneficial to promote this means of communication, but at this stage, the construction of cable telegraph for China, the technical level is still relatively high, and the investment is also large, and it is difficult to apply it on a large scale in other places in a short period of time except for places like business zones.

Fast horses and steamships have become the main mode of information transmission in the Chinese Empire at present!

Although the current Imperial Chinese Navy is small, it still undertakes a relatively heavy task, not only to provide naval artillery fire support for the army, but also to escort logistics materials for the army. Liaison and communication matters.

On September 22, Chen Yuntao, who was sitting on the Xingmeng of the Navy's Third Gunboat Detachment, frowned as he looked at the battle report sent back from the front.

"I didn't expect this town Hu Army to move so fast, and it has already taken Yanping City!"

At this time, the colonel of the navy on the side, the commander of the third gunboat detachment, said to Meng Bing: "How many people are in this town?" ”

Chen Yuntao handed the battle report in his hand to Xiang Mengbing: "Look, there are at least 8,000 people coming!" ”

"Eight thousand? How could there be so many, did he Lin Chengting send the main force to Fujian, and didn't he want Jiangxi? Xiang Mengbing was a little puzzled.

Although Xiang Mengbing is only a naval officer, he is like most of the middle and senior officers in the current army. In fact, he was born in the army in his early years, and he is no stranger to army affairs.

Lin Chengting's Zhenhu Army can be regarded as the new army unit that imitates the Chinese army the most among the many new armies in China, except for the fact that it is helpless in terms of weapons. Except for the use of smoothbore foreign guns instead of mini rifles, all other aspects can be regarded as a copy of the Chinese army, from the army establishment to the style of military uniforms. It's all the same as the Chinese army.

The new army, which was modeled after the Chinese army, was much higher in combat effectiveness than the old army in the past. But the relative military expenditure is also large, the Qing court. It took a few years of hard work to train only a few tens of thousands of people, Li Hongzhang used to have the strong support of the Qing court to train the Jianghuai New Army of more than 10,000 people, and then without the military support of the Qing court, he only relied on Li Hongzhang himself to collect military funds in the Huai'an area, let alone expand the army, and it was extremely difficult to even maintain the current 8,000 remnants.

His Lin Chengting's new army also spent a lot, and he only controlled Jiangxi Province, strictly speaking, only the central and southern regions of Jiangxi, and northern Jiangxi was still in the hands of the Taiping army.

This does not determine that the new army in Lin Chengting's hands will be maintained at about 10,000 at most, and it is absolutely impossible to exceed 20,000.

Now I heard that the Zhenhu army alone has 8,000 people in Yanping Mansion, could it be said that Lin Chengting sent the main force to Fujian? Don't want Jiangxi anymore?

Chen Yuntao said: "Look at it again, these 8,000 people can't all be the main force of the new army, most of them are the old army!" ”

Chen Yuntao paused and continued: "Didn't you say some time ago that the Zhenhu Army had trained some patrol troops, I think it should be these people!" ”

Xiang Meng Bingyi was a little surprised when he heard this: "Patrol Army? Did you also learn from our Auxiliary Defense Force? ”

Chen Yuntao nodded!

Xiang Meng Bing saw Chen Yuntao affirming this, and immediately shook his head slightly: "This Lin Chengting is good at learning, he learned from us to run a new army before, and now he is here to learn from us to build a cooperative defense army!" ”

Chen Yuntao laughed: "If he Lin Chengting hadn't been good at learning, he would have been wiped out by us in northern Zhejiang, and he can still bounce in Jiangxi now!" ”

Chen Yuntao said well, Lin Chengting's ability to command the war is very loose, but he has an advantage that is difficult for others to have, that is, Lin Chengting never sticks to one style, this person is good at learning, and he is also good at thinking of some more peculiar things, and there is also a very important point that this person's mind is extremely tenacious and has been defeated repeatedly, but he has been defeated again and again and will never give up.

At the beginning, he was beaten by Yu Shengjun, and when he turned around, he immediately took the enemy as his teacher, first learned the tactics of line line operations, then dug trenches and chest walls, and then came over ruthlessly and simply imitated Yu Shengjun to establish a new army.

Now that he saw that the auxiliary defense force on the side of the Chinese army was very useful, he immediately learned it without saying a word and established the so-called patrol army.

This time, the main force of the troops sent by Lin Chengting to Fujian to fight was actually less than 3,000 troops of the New Army, and there were also 2,000 patrol troops brought from Jiangxi.

However, Chen Yuntao now has a total of about 10,000 people under his hands, and it will be difficult to win Yanping! (To be continued......)