Chapter 291: After Hangzhou, the surname is Chen

The Battle of Shiqiao in Hangzhou completely established Chen Cao's reputation as incomparable in wisdom and bravery, and even described Chen Cao as the god of war in the Ming Dynasty under the propaganda of well-intentioned people.

Of course, this is also just a propaganda effect, and Chen Cao didn't bother to pay attention to it, but in front of him, he had to deal with the surrendered Yulin Army and Zuo Liangyu.

Before the You Shiwei brothers were captured, Zuo Liangyu had already had the idea of surrendering after leading his troops to attack Zhengyangmen several times and failed, and he also received news that his cronies and guerrilla Li Guo Ying had been killed in battle, and only more than 15,000 of the 30,000 soldiers remained, and Daniel Zhang was wounded.

If this continues, not only will it be difficult for him to protect his corporaries, but even in the end, he will have to give away all the wealth he has stolen all the way from Suzhou, so he surrendered to Chen Cao at the suggestion of his henchman Jin Shenghuan, but in order to accept the name, after discussion, Zuo Liangyu decided to give the Yulin army a fatal blow from behind.

Only then did the You Shiwei brothers just be defeated, and when Zhou Degong was preparing to save people, there was chaos behind the Yulin army, and after two hours of rushing and killing, Zuo Liangyu actually led his troops to crush the Yulin army led by Zhou Dewei around the governor's yamen and could not move.

It wasn't until the end that You Shiwei asked Chen Cao to send troops to suppress it, and the Shence army of the brigade crossed the stone bridge to finally surrender Zuo Liangyu.

"Grandpa, what should Zuo Liangyu do?"

Chen Cao was also so hungry that he had just held a leg of mutton and gnawed it clean, and was washing the greasy on his hands with the soap produced in the Shanghai factory: "How is the You family brother?" ”

Zhao Xindao: "You Shilu was seriously injured, but fortunately he saved his life, You Shigong and You Shiwei are not in big trouble, but they are tired, but grandpa, You Shigong is angry that Zuo Liangyu killed so many of their Yulin veterans, and now they are making noise in the camp to kill Zuo Liangyu to vent their anger." ”

Chen Cao's eyes lit up, and he immediately asked, "How did You Shiwei react?" ”

Zhao Xin shook his head: "I can't see that You Shiwei is a famous general in Daming, and his joy and anger are invisible." ”

"It's good that the joy and anger are invisible..."Chen Cao let out a long sigh of relief: "Go, arrest all the guerrillas, capital divisions, and garrison generals from Zuo Liangyu." ”

Zhao Xin thought that Chen Cao was going to kill and surrender, so he immediately organized: "Please also ask the grandfather to think twice, the so-called killing and surrender is unknown, not to mention that the grandfather is still under the banner of King Fu." ”

Chen Cao squinted at Zhao Xin and smiled: "You kid, I didn't say that I wanted to kill him, I want Zuo Liangyu and these people to be judged, a fair trial..."

Although You Shiwei was unwilling to surrender to Chen Cao, his brother You Shigong was a person with clear grievances, and in the end, You Shiwei first showed his loyalty to Chen Cao, and then persuaded You Shiwei, under the situation, You Shiwei also had to bow to Chen Cao.

Of course, the biggest factor that made the You brothers willing to surrender was that Chen Cao tried Zuo Liangyu and his party in Hangzhou on the third day after the war.

Originally, Zuo Liangyu also made a contribution to Chen Cao's capture of Hangzhou after surrendering to King Fu, and no matter how bad he was, he could fight a general soldier, but he was arrested in a daze, and in the end, he was tried by the old army of Yulin and the people of Hangzhou.

It turned out that in addition to Zuo Liangyu's behind, in addition to the You family brothers, when they attacked Zhengyangmen, in order to add chaos to the defenders of Zhengyangmen, they once again indulged their subordinates to rob the people of Hangzhou.

In addition, Zuo Liangyu's subordinates robbed Suzhou, set fire to Wu County, and robbed Huating, causing Huating to catch fire.

Zuo Liangyu himself, guerrilla Jin Shenghuan, Xu Yong, Daniel Zhang, and Ma Jizhong were sentenced to beheaded after the public trial, and Li Guo Ying, who died in battle, was also sentenced to beheading, but because he died, he was burned and thrown after the body was found, and he still did not die well.

Of course, Chen Cao is not uncommon for people like Zuo Liangyu, judging from their historical reputation, they know that these people are not good birds, except for Zuo Liangyu, who died before the death of the Ming Dynasty and did not lose the reputation of the second minister, several of his cronies and guerrillas were all entered into the 'second minister's biography', and Jin Shenghuan's reputation was even more stinky.

Therefore, Chen Cao did not want to recruit these people at all, and then use them, and now the composition of the new army has removed most of the hereditary officer background, and turned to the homeless and untouchable people as the main officers, and their loyalty is more reliable than these people.

The wealth of Hangzhou City is not something that Chen Cao can imagine, but now that he is under the banner of King Fu, he naturally still has to treat these people of the Ming Dynasty well and will not make radical moves.

Hangzhou is a little dilapidated, especially the Wulin Gate that was blown up by explosives, and the city walls in the left and right directions of the city gate collapsed for nearly three miles, and the remaining city walls within five miles around have cracks to varying degrees, and it is obvious that Hangzhou City needs to be overhauled.

Chen Cao's office is located in the governor's yamen, and the meeting held today is the issue of Zhejiang's subordination, and Qi Shangwen, the old father-in-law who was the former political envoy of Zhejiang, was detained by Zhang Yangming before Chen Cao started to act.

It is precisely because of Qi Shangwen's identity that Zhang Yangming also has some taboos, and has never started with Qi Shangwen, and after Chen Cao finally took over Hangzhou, Chen Cao directly appointed Qi Shangwen as the political envoy of Zhejiang, and before there was no governor, he had full authority to handle the affairs of Zhejiang.

"According to the scout report, the army from Xianxia Pass and the reinforcements from Jiangxi have entered Quzhou, and there are no more troops in Zhejiang.

Chen Cao nodded in agreement with Huang Chunyao's words, then looked around at the dozens of civil and military officers present, and said: "This duke still belongs to the old general Qi Changguo, the general of Taizhou; ”

As he spoke, he looked at Qi Changguo, who was sitting on the side, and said: "This duke appointed General Qi as the governor of Zhejiang, with full authority to manage the military affairs of Zhejiang, and all the mobilization of troops and horses is decided by General Qi." ”

Qi Changguo stood up and saluted Chen Cao: "Veteran Xie Guo's grandfather trusts." ”

Chen Cao smiled and waved his hand: "Old General Qi has a lot of prestige in Jinhua, Taizhou, Wenzhou, and Ningbo, and it is completely feasible to control the land of the four prefectures with the strength of Old General Qi;

In addition, the four prefectures of Shaoxing, Hangzhou, Jiaxing, and Huzhou are close at hand, and the troops are stationed in various important places, and as for the places of Yanzhou, Quzhou, and Chuzhou, they don't need to worry about it for the time being. ”

The territory is too big to bear, this is what Chen Cao understands in his heart, if it weren't for the fact that Nanjing was too pressing, Chen Cao really didn't want to go out of Songjiang and come to fight Hangzhou next to the pillow.

"In addition, in order to ensure the tranquility of Zhejiang, my father decided to mobilize three divisions of troops to garrison Hangzhou Mansion."

Now Chen Cao's five armies are only formed into the Dingwu Army and the Longwu Army, both armies are on the front line in Suzhou, it is impossible to mobilize them, while the troops are now disabled, Chen Cao thought about reforming the military system for the second time, but because of the pre-war Hangzhou, Chen Cao still decided to return to Shanghai and then arrange.

"This duke has decided to expand the army again, and the soldiers will give priority to the conscription of the remaining untouchables in Zhejiang, followed by the children of good families under the rule of various prefectures, the number of which is approved to be 300,000, and it must be completed as soon as possible, and I hope that all the Hangzhou officials here will try their best to cooperate."

Zhejiang's general affairs Chen Cao was handed over to the old father-in-law Qi Shangwen, and the military affairs were handed over to Qi Changguo, and Lu Xiangsheng and Sun Chuanting's troops were directly transferred to Hangzhou to garrison.

At the end of August, Chen Cao led his troops and the spoils obtained from all over Hangzhou back to Songjiang.

After arriving in Huating, the overhaul has already begun, and after boarding the train at Huating Railway Station, we will go straight to Shanghai.

Taking advantage of returning to Shanghai, the first thing Chen Cao did was to go home and quickly do a serious job with his wives and concubines, and he was sent to the Yamen of Songjiang Governor by a lot of front-line news.

"King Fu's army broke through Fengyang on August 22, and defeated the Datong border army north of Fengyang, if Qin Liangyu had not arrived in time, it is estimated that the Datong border army would have been annihilated;

The eunuch chose to surrender to King Fu at a critical moment, and opened the southern city of Fengyang, so far all the 100,000 defenders concentrated in Fengyang surrendered, and the governor Zhang Rentong, the governor Huang Kaihua, and Li Kai were all unwilling to surrender to King Fu, and all committed suicide in various mansions. ”

After listening to Zhao Xin's report, Chen Cao felt that these officials really had some backbone, and he had more contempt for Gao Qiqian, the dead eunuch.

"In addition, the official army gathered 200,000 soldiers and horses in Zhenjiang Mansion, and was originally ready to attack Changzhou Mansion, but after receiving the news of the loss of Fengyang, they evacuated 100,000 people, and now only about 100,000 remain; According to reports, these 100,000 horses are distributed in Dantu County, Danyang City and Jurong. ”

After hearing this, Huang Chunyao interjected: "The three places are the main roads to the east of Nanjing, and once they are lost, Nanjing will not be protected." ”

"Don't worry about it yet..."

Chen Cao bluntly expressed his thoughts: "First, Wujin only left the Longwu army, and the Dingwu army all retreated to Suzhou, second, now that our army has captured Hangzhou, Zhejiang Zhufu needs to be digested, our army does not have the strength to fight hard with Nanjing, and moreover, King Fu is now in full swing, and it is not bad for us, Fengyang has fallen, I estimate that King Fu will swell a lot, maybe he will send troops to Nanjing soon;

The good thing is that the troops have been trained and are no longer new recruits, and the bad thing is that the troops have been seriously reduced, and the Shenwu Army has been crippled and is in urgent need of new soldiers. ”

Several confidants present knew that Chen Cao had mentioned reorganizing the army in Hangzhou, and now that he had returned to Shanghai, it was estimated that this matter would come to an end.

"This duke decided to re-reform the military system and thoroughly improve the composition of the army, in order to achieve the goal of strengthening the army, of course, this purpose is also to fight against the imperial court in the future, and even fight against Jiannu."

Several staff members did not speak, and several important generals who stayed in Shanghai did not speak, and everyone tacitly waited for Chen Cao to announce, after all, preventing generals from sitting on the throne is something that emperors in all periods must beware of.