The appointment and dismissal of officials carried out by the Organization Department in September was not limited to several prefectures in Fujian, but also included newly occupied areas such as southern Anhui, northern Anhui, and northern Jiangsu.

At the same time, with the expansion of the newly occupied areas, the area controlled by the Chinese Empire has expanded from Su Songtai and northern Zhejiang at the end of last year to the entire Zhejiang Province, most of Jiangsu, most of Anhui, and most of Fujian.

In other words, it is not far off for the Chinese empire to expand its control zone to four provinces!

Due to the increasing size of the control area, it is difficult to continue the model of provinces directly under the central government, so it is inevitable to restore the previous provincial administrative institutions.

To this end, the Organization Department has already made preparations to organize the provincial administrative organs, and the provincial organs that are scheduled to be established will continue to follow the model of the central ministries and the prefectural and county organs to establish the models of the departments under the jurisdiction of the provincial governments.

As for the candidates for governors of various provinces, Lin Zhe already has several candidates.

First of all, the governor of Jiangsu Province, the southern Jiangsu region of Jiangsu Province, and the Yangzhou Prefecture in the north of the Yangtze River are the core ruling areas of the empire, and their importance is more important than that of Zhejiang Province, so the candidates for the governor of Jiangsu Province must be extremely outstanding in loyalty and ability.

And considering these, there are few people who can reassure Lin Zhe, one is Bi Yutong, but this person is already the prime minister of the cabinet, and it is impossible to serve as the governor of a province.

There is also Su Song Taidao Xue Huan, this person took refuge in Lin Zhe early, and there is no need to doubt his loyalty. And before Lin Zhe put him in the important place of Susong Taidao as a Taoist, it was also affirmed that his ability.

Considering the importance of the Susongtai region in Jiangsu province. It is also natural for Xue Huan, Su Song Taidao, to be promoted to the governor of Jiangsu.

Lin Zhe, the governor of several other provinces, also drew up several candidates, some of which were local. There are also cabinets, such as Jiang Daoquan, Minister of Education, and Guo Longyun, Minister of Industry and Commerce, although Jiang Daoquan is full of qualifications and ability, but he is now the Minister of Education, according to the traditional language, the Minister of Rites, the position is not only noble, but also ranked high in the cabinet. At this time, he was transferred to serve as the governor of Zhejiang, Fujian, Anhui and other places, and he was suspected of being demoted.

Guo Longyun's words, this person in the cabinet is relatively low-key, he was a Jinhua Mansion before, in 1854 self-recommended into the Lin Zhe shogunate, for a long time for Lin Zhe to catch the knife to exchange official documents, but also frequently responsible for the development of the business area, although low-key but the career is very smooth, has a short acting Shanghai county. When Lin Zhe regained Fuzhou that year, he also served as the prefect of Suzhou for a short time, and he was very good at developing industry and commerce.

After the establishment of the empire, a cabinet was formed, and he was appointed as the co-minister of the Ministry of Commerce and Industry. Mainly responsible for textile and other light business affairs.

Although the officials within the empire are generally mixed, with a large number of unqualified former purge officials, this is generally limited to officials below the prefectural level. Because in order to win over the former Qing officials, most of the officials such as the prefect and the prefect are retained in their original positions.

But most of the officials at the provincial level were sent by the empire. Therefore, the vast majority of the provincial officials on the ground and the members above the cabinet co-organizer are the team of the Yu Shengjun era. And they are all capable people who have climbed up step by step in the huge Yu Shengjun system.

Although the Chinese Empire was established for a short time, the history of Yu Shengjun has been several years, from 1853 to the present, there are more than four years, and in these four years, there are not only a large number of talents recruited by Lin Zhe himself, but also many talents who have taken the initiative to take refuge.

Just like Zeng Guofan had a shogunate, Lin Zhe also had a large number of staff under him, and a large number of people who were disappointed in the imperial examination, or who were unsatisfactory in the officialdom, ran to Lin Zhe's side and tried to make meritorious contributions.

As a result, there are a large number of old staff members among the officials of the empire, especially among the core elites.

Guo Longyun is one of them!

In order to select the governors of the four provinces, Lin Zhe also took a lot of thought, and finally it was preliminarily planned that Xue Huan, the former Susong Taidao, would serve as the governor of Jiangsu Province, Guo Longyun, the former co-minister of the Ministry of Industry and Commerce, would serve as the governor of Anhui Province, Yan Duanshu of Hangjiahu Dao would be promoted to the governor of Zhejiang, and Chen Xiangmeng, the co-director of the Ministry of Civil Affairs, would serve as the governor of Fujian Province.

Among them, Chen Xiangmeng, the co-minister of the Ministry of Civil Affairs, like Guo Longyun, was born in the Lin Zhe shogunate, and his fame is not even a person, but just a living member.

However, the original Hangjiahu Daoyan Duanshu is a little different, because this person is the highest-ranking official in the former Qing Dynasty, and this person was the last governor of Zhejiang appointed by the Qing court. After He Guiqing was killed in Hangzhou, the Qing court appointed Yan Duanshu as the acting governor of Zhejiang, and the commander of the Qing soldiers continued to resist in southern Zhejiang, and was later captured in Jinhua Mansion.

Later, when he saw that the general trend was inviolable, especially after seeing the strong combat effectiveness of the Chinese army, he felt that it was not necessarily a bad thing to stay in the Chinese army, so he simply shaved his head like other demoted officials, and then became an imperial official.

First of all, he was appointed as a member of Hangjiahu Dao, during which the organization department said to him that "he is old and steady, and he is better than talking extravagantly", that is, this person is pragmatic and not false, although there are criticisms, but it is also normal. Considering that Yan Duanshu had served as the prefect of Hangzhou, Hangjiahu Dao, Ningshaotai Dao, and Zhejiang according to the inspection envoy in Zhejiang in the pre-Qing Dynasty in the past, he was very familiar with the situation in Zhejiang, so he was promoted to serve as the governor of Zhejiang this time.

It can be regarded as a reward for his initiative to surrender to Cheng, after all, he was the governor of Zhejiang before he surrendered, if his official position has not been promoted back after surrendering, how can others take refuge in your Chinese Empire.

After Lin Zhe drew up the candidates for the governors of the four provinces, the Organization Department was to formally determine the administrative organs of the governors of the provinces, and at the same time, the candidates for the governors of the four provinces were also personally summoned by Lin Zhe.

Perhaps stimulated by the formal establishment of the governors of the four provinces on the cabinet side, the Fujian side was the first to receive good news, and Chen Xiangmeng has not yet arrived. Chen Yuntao conquered the city of Yanping Mansion and annihilated more than 3,000 enemies. The rest of the Zhenhu army fled to Shaowu Mansion.

Chen Yuntao's Third Army has been attacking Fujian for more than half a year, and now it has finally taken Yanping. After taking Yanping, it means that the initiative to completely control the entire Fujian strategy, relying on Yanping can attack or defend the Zhenhu army in the west, and without the threat of the Zhenhu army in the west, Chen Yuntao's third army can continue to go south to Quanzhou and other places, and it is not far off to completely control the whole province of Fujian.

Good news came from Fujian, but it was a little slow in northern Anhui, Anqing was unable to take it for a long time, and Lu'an seemed to be vulnerable, but the third division still failed to take it.

The situation was somewhat better for the 1st Division that went north. After taking Fengyang Fucheng, the first division had already begun to march east into Sizhou, and the reason why the first division entered Sizhou in advance without waiting for the third division was because the Qing army had more and more reinforcements to northern Jiangsu.

Shen Chiyun's Fifth Army, which was outside Huai'an, was already facing great strategic pressure, and Shen Chiyun had repeatedly asked the headquarters to end the war in northern Anhui as soon as possible and reinforce the direction of Huai'an in northern Jiangsu.

However, although the Third and Second Divisions were unable to take Anqing and Lu'an for a long time, and even if they were taken now, it would take a long time for these troops to be reinforced to the northern Jiangsu region, and it would take at least half a month or even more than 20 days to go there.

In this case, in order to relieve the pressure on the Fifth Army. Therefore, the 1st Division, the 2nd Cavalry Regiment and the 9th Auxiliary Defense Division of the First Army marched eastward to Sizhou, leaving the 16th Auxiliary Defense Division and the newly formed 18th Auxiliary Defense Division to garrison Fengyang Mansion and continue to engage the various units of the Twist Army.

Speaking of the twisted army in northern Anhui, it gave the Chinese army a headache. Although the scale of these armies is not large, and their combat effectiveness is not good, even the auxiliary defense army can easily defeat Amen. But those who enter are for the people, and those who come out are twisted. When the Chinese army fought over, it was broken into pieces and went as good people, but the main force of the Chinese army left. Immediately, these civilians turned into a twisted army, attacking the supply lines of the Chinese army and small-scale garrisons everywhere and looting military rations and property.

As a result, the Chinese army was extremely passive in the face of the Twist Army, and now it can only stick to various cities, but it is difficult to completely exterminate the Twist Army active in the countryside.

Now that the 1st Division and the 9th Auxiliary Defense Division of the main force are gone, the 16th and 18th Auxiliary Defense Divisions, two units of the Auxiliary Defense Division with weak combat effectiveness, are left, and it will be even more difficult to deal with the Twist Army.

However, although the Twist Army is a headache, it is not a concern for the overall situation, and there is nothing to do about them now because the strategic focus of the Chinese Empire is on the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom and the Qing Army.

Northern Jiangsu, Anqing and Jiujiang were the key areas of the Chinese Empire, and after the Chinese Empire cleaned up the Qing and Taiping armies in these areas, it would be able to completely encircle and annihilate these twist armies.

When the 1st Division and the 2nd Cavalry Regiment and the 9th Auxiliary Defense Division marched east into Sizhou, Shi Qingxuan, who was outside Lu'an, was also under great pressure.

The delay in taking Lu'an has already made him urged several times from the command!

"We can't wait any longer, now that the thief army in the city has reached the point of exhaustion, we only need one last light blow to be able to completely defeat them, and then capture Chen Yucheng alive!" A colonel said this, Shi Qingxuan felt the pressure from above, and these officers of the Third Division felt the pressure even more.

One by one, they shouted that they would immediately launch a general attack and break through the clouds of Lu'an City!

Shi Qingxuan, facing the angry subordinates, also knew that he couldn't continue to drag on, otherwise the headquarters would be seriously dissatisfied with him, and it would not be impossible for the emperor to remove him and let others lead the Lu'an war.

So when his subordinates spoke one after another, he also said: "All departments are ready, tomorrow we will launch a general attack, I don't believe that this Lu'an City is iron!" ”

In order to break it with one blow, Shi Qingxuan also said to his subordinates: "In the past, when we fought, we always thought about how to avoid casualties, but how can there be immortals in war, for the empire, for Your Majesty is the honor of my generation of soldiers, I hope that tomorrow in the battle, you don't think about how to reduce casualties, but think about how to take this damn Lu'an City!" ”

In the past, when the Chinese army was fighting, especially in siege warfare, it was rare for the Royal Army to go directly, and it was to let the Auxiliary Defense Army go first, in order to reduce casualties, but in the long run, this led to the fact that when facing the fortified city, the Auxiliary Defense Army could not fight and suffered heavy casualties, while the Royal Army did not dare to go in person for fear of casualties.

So much so that the siege war dragged on for longer and longer.

Now, Shi Qingxuan wants to change this situation, tomorrow the siege will not only be on the defense army, but also the third division, the royal army, will also go into battle in person. (To be continued......)