On the seventh day after Sun Xiangbing left Smithland, the New Virginia Regiment of the Union Army led by Burnside finally arrived five kilometers east of Smithland, which by the standards of this era was already an attack front.

Seven days seems to be a long time, but considering that when Li Yongji got the news, the two sides were two hundred kilometers apart, plus it was ice and snow, and the size of the troops was large, so according to the standards of this era, the New Virginia Legion could march nearly two hundred kilometers in seven days, which was already quite rare.

You know, during the Civil War, the standard requirement of the Union Army was that the infantry could march up to 30 kilometers a day, but that standard was a normal road march in normal weather, considering that the troops here were larger, with a lot of heavy equipment, plus the snow roads were slippery, and the weather was not good, it was really rare to be able to walk 200 kilometers to get here in seven days, at least for now, if other Union troops came over, I am afraid it would not be better than this result.

In fact, the reason why the New Virginia Legion was able to rush over in seven days was entirely because of the high morale of this unit, and the reason why the morale was high was not only related to the agitation of Burnside, but also related to the composition of this army.

As mentioned earlier, the New Virginia Regiment is a model unit specially established by President Lincoln, and most of its personnel are young and middle-aged, with an average age of 26 years old and young people everywhere.

Moreover, the composition of these young people is also relatively simple, most of them are from Pennsylvania homesteaders, and they are basically middle- and lower-class homesteaders, although the literacy rate is not high, but compared with urban people, in addition to being more hard-working, but also more simple. Or rather, it's easier to brainwash.

Although this unit was also formed under the condition of compulsory military service, the soldiers of this force were not as resistant to serving as soldiers as urban residents because they came from the vast rural areas.

Although the United States of America was defeated on the front line one after another because of the intervention of Chinese mercenaries and Britain and France, forcing Lincoln to increase conscription, the resistance of urban people was more than that of rural people.

After the introduction of compulsory military service, the city people were the first to implement this decree, because the city population was more concentrated. Better statistics and management.

Comparatively speaking, the vast number of rural or suburban people in the United States, because the administrative organs of the United States are not large enough, the manpower is not enough, and the efficiency is low, and the management cannot be managed, so the compulsory military service system is basically useless for the rural areas, and at most it has some effect on the suburbs of the big cities.

Due to better statistical management of urban residents. Therefore, compulsory military service is implemented far more vigorously in the cities than in the rural areas, but the urban dwellers are different from the rural people in that they do not have land and rely on the sale of their labor. They work in factories in exchange for wages, and then use their wages to buy necessities.

In addition, the families of urban residents tend to be relatively small, unlike rural families, which have a large family of children, so urban residents have strong labor. The importance is far greater than that of the strong labor force in the countryside, and it is likely that a young man will be forcibly pulled away, and a family will be destroyed.

Although Lincoln encouraged women to work. Let women replace some men's jobs in order to alleviate the labor shortage after compulsory conscription, but this practice still cannot dispel everyone's resentment, so urban residents are very resistant to being soldiers, but their small arms can't twist the thighs of the government, so they are forced to become soldiers.

On the contrary, the situation in the rural areas is different, and although it is difficult to implement the compulsory military service system in the rural areas, the enthusiasm of the rural people for joining the army is higher than that of the urban residents.

Let's put it this way, the American society in this period was still a primary industrial society, or a period of transition from an agricultural society to an industrial society, coupled with the lack of rich colonies in the United States, so it still followed the scissors model of industry.

The so-called scissors model industry, which is to exploit the peasants to develop industry, is similar to the sheep cannibalism movement in the United Kingdom.

To be more specific, it means that the agricultural products of the United States are extremely cheap, but the industrial products are very expensive, and then the scissors gap between the expensive industrial products and the cheap agricultural products is implemented, and then the capital and labor are accumulated for the development of industry.

Needless to say, not only can factories accumulate capital quickly, but workers often earn more than farmers, so normally speaking, farmers are happy to go to the cities to become workers, and when most of the farmers go to the cities to become workers, urbanization begins.

At this time, the United States of America, before the Civil War, had been taking the road of urbanization and expansion, but it was limited by capital, technology, population and market, coupled with social system and traditional thinking, so the development speed was not fast, and it was not in a hurry.

In other words, during this period, most American farmers were not willing to go to the cities, and there were many obstacles to their entry into the cities, in addition to poor infrastructure, the lack of attraction to work as workers was also a big reason.

The reason why it is not attractive is that the United States is still sparsely populated at this time, and farmers often own a lot of land, so although the price of agricultural products is not high, when the amount of land is large and the amount of agricultural products increases, their income is also quite good.

Therefore, if you want to get American farmers out of the countryside, you have to give them a greater temptation, and it is not very attractive to simply take the wages of factory workers, on the contrary, if you can give them more land, this attraction is different.

In the United States at this time, land was still regarded as the most important asset, a valuable asset that could be passed down from generation to generation, so American farmers loved the land more than everything else, even more than gold.

It's not nonsense, for example, the gold rush that broke out, that is, the discovery of gold in San Francisco, look at the people who went to the west to pan for gold, how many of them were farmers who really owned land? Most of them are city dwellers!

Because the gold rush did not impress the vast number of American farmers, the gold rush did not actually attract many Americans, but only provided a total of more than 100,000 people in San Francisco, which is a drop in the bucket compared to the tens of millions of American farmers.

At this time, in order to attract more soldiers, especially peasants, to join the army, Lincoln sent people to the countryside to do propaganda. Recruiting troops while propagandizing.

The propagandists told the peasants that if you only serve as soldiers, then even if you have no merit, until the end of the war, when you retire, you can be given a large tract of land free of charge in the South or the Midwest, at least three hundred acres, and everyone will have a share, and it will never be lost, and the greater the credit. The more land is divided.

300 acres of land, and there is no need to pay any registration fees, this can be seen as an upgraded version of the "Homestead Law", especially this land can only choose the barren west, but even the south can also be selected, naturally attracted many farmers to join the army.

Of course, this policy was not only effective for the peasants, but for practically all those who served in the army, as well as for the urban dwellers. Therefore, after this new homestead law came into effect, the morale of the military quickly stabilized.

Although the new homestead law can reassure people and attract more soldiers, it requires them to become qualified soldiers. There is also a long period of training, which is at least three months according to the standards of the federal army at this time.

But alas, the war didn't allow Lincoln to wait for these recruits to train for three months. So he compressed the time and asked the recruit training period to be reduced to one and a half months, that is, one and a half months after the meeting. Recruits are about to go to war.

However, Lincoln did not do this for all recruits, in order to create a few ace troops, Lincoln specifically asked General Mead to select some younger, simple-minded peasant soldiers from the recruits, and then form a new Virginia regiment, with a strength of 300,000.

General Mead did not live up to the trust, he quickly selected 300,000 young peasants, and then concentrated them in the barracks near Washington, D.C., for intensive training, even if the war was tense at front, Lincoln did not take out this army lightly and consume it, but let this army train for three months step by step.

During these three months, the soldiers were taught patriotic education in addition to basic infantry skills. Simply put, these soldiers listened to propagandists at night, telling them why they were fighting, and explaining the history of the United States of America.

In short, the so-called patriotic education is to brainwash these soldiers so that they will cherish the country and have the enthusiasm to shed their blood for the interests of the country.

Not to mention, the repeated agitation really worked, and the young peasants really thought that they were participating in a great patriotic war, fighting to the death against the invaders, defending their homeland and protecting everyone's property from infringement.

After three months of education in patriotic ideology, the ideological outlook of these soldiers has undergone great changes; they are still vague about the country and the nation, but they regard themselves as patriots with all their hearts, and in terms of their will to fight, they far surpass other units at the same level.

As for Burnside, the troops he led are such a hot-blooded army that has always been patriotic and young!

Seeing this, you may understand why Burnside obviously ran away at first, but changed his mind halfway and asked to return to fight the Chinese, in addition to the factor of Burnside's self-exculpation, the dissatisfaction of the legionnaires is also a very important reason.

At the beginning, when Burnside abandoned the infected and fled to the rear with his troops, although the junior officers were temporarily obedient, they were reluctant to leave after walking for a while.

Because they feel aggrieved.

Why be aggrieved? Because they had arrived near Smithland, they could not attack painfully, but dug trenches on one side, clearly waiting for the other side to attack.

Well, the defensive counterattack is not bad, but wait, wait, wait, the enemy did not attack, and they themselves fled in disgrace.

Running away, they ran away, and they encountered a snowstorm on the way, and they couldn't walk, not to mention, and there were a large number of flu patients, and finally they had to abandon them and rush to the rear to station.

If at the beginning, those grassroots officials were fooled by the middle and high-level commanders, but after some marching and some calm thinking, they also came to their deaths.

They knew very well about Evansville, after all, they had come from there, so they knew how many medicines there were, and the quantity was scarce and expensive, and they were afraid that they would not be able to use it for so many patients.

The idea of returning to Evansville, getting the medicine, and sending it back is not very reliable, at least not to save everyone.

On the contrary, the Chinese are famous local tycoons, not only well-equipped, but also have more medicines, so if the Chinese are defeated, everything will be available, and colleagues will be saved.

With these ideas, these grassroots officers began to connect with each other, and then did not engage in mutiny, but played petitions, petitioned General Bernside, asked him to go back and fight with the Chinese, and they also listed the advantages of fighting with the Chinese at this time, such as weather factors.

Burnside saw that the army was unstable, and he also felt that this risk was worth taking, so for the sake of the future, he decided to take a gamble and go back to fight the Chinese!

Therefore, Burnside's decision to return halfway was not his decision alone, but the decision of the majority of the junior officers of the entire regiment, and only in this way could the whole army turn halfway and continue to advance towards Smithland in the bitter cold, wind and snow.

On the contrary, Benjamin's James River Regiment was different, although the officers and soldiers of this army also had many peasants, they were not model regiments, they had not been brainwashed and educated, their patriotism was not so strict, and their morale and consciousness were not comparable to those of the soldiers of the New Virginia Regiment.

Therefore, Benjamin was not persecuted by his subordinates, and he himself did not want to take risks, so he did not act with Burnside.

It is difficult to say whether Benjamin's approach is right or wrong, after all, if he leads troops to follow, then he will have a greater advantage in numbers, but in the face of the density of Chinese firepower, it is also very difficult to predict whether his people will be useful.

However, in the American history books of this time and space, Benjamin was nailed to the pillar of shame because of his parting ways with Burnside, believing that it was his cowardice that made General Burnside's tactics fall short.

In any case, the New Virginia Legion led by Burnside is determined to completely defeat the Chinese and the southern rebels, and obtaining drug supplies is only one aspect, the most important thing is that they want to achieve a victory, a victory over the Chinese and the allied army, and break the myth of the invincibility of the Chinese!

It was with this determination that the soldiers of the New Virginia Regiment overcame the severe cold and thick snow along the way, even if their hands and feet were frostbitten, they forced forward regardless of it, just looking at their strength, it was comparable to the Red Army during the Long March.

Therefore, from this point of view, the New Virginia Legion that is rushing is the most powerful enemy that Li Yongji has encountered since he led his troops, and the strength of this army lies not in their equipment, but in their numbers and morale!

Or to put it another way, when a large army has the determination and morale to dare to sacrifice, then at any time, it is an extremely formidable force, even if their weapons are very rudimentary in the eyes of Li Yongji.

In short, what Li Yongji faced this time was an unprecedented challenge, and the most terrible thing was that the entire expeditionary force at that time, including Li Yongji, did not realize this, and still viewed this operation with a very relaxed attitude. (To be continued......)