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Four months later

On December 19, 1867, the Shogunate faction occupying Kyoto, with the support of the 15-year-old Meiji Emperor, staged a palace coup in an attempt to implement the "Imperial Government Retro".

The so-called "Imperial Regime", that is, the emperor took back the ruling power from the shogunate, ordered the Tokugawa family to be stripped of his position as shogun, abolished the shogunate system, and demanded that the Tokugawa shogun "resign from the government and accept the land" and hand over the area under his rule.

This act is to force the Tokugawa shogunate to a dead end!

War was originally the means of seizing power that the Shogunate faction hoped for, and Saigo Takamori and Okubo Ritsu, who were born in the Satsuma Domain, once said:

"More than 200 years of peaceful habits have polluted people's hearts, and once they start fighting, they will make the world refreshed, and the Central Plains will be settled, constituting a grand event. A decisive battle is the focus of survival in death, and the most important task. ”

But the shogunate was not willing to perish and was already fully prepared militarily for the final showdown.

Using the huge amount of money obtained from the sale of Beihai Province, the shogunate built a modern army with completely Tang-style weapons and equipment, following Tang-style training and military uniforms, and hiring instructors from the Tang Empire to train them, with a total of 11 infantry divisions and two artillery divisions, totaling more than 77,000 people.

Among them

The eight infantry divisions and the two artillery divisions were all trained and armed in Beihai Province, and they were extremely concealed, so they waited for the Fallen Curtain faction to arm themselves and jump out, ready to kill a few chickens that danced the most.

On January 1, 1868, the Tokugawa shogunate issued the "Prayer Table", declaring a full-scale war on the Shogunate faction in the name of the Qing monarch's side, and the civil war broke out in the Fuso Islands, known as the "Boshin War".

The next day, the armies of the shogunate and the Sashoku clans began to march from Osaka to Kyoto, and for a time the battle clouds were thick.

The main force of the new army of the Shogunate in Hokkai Province set off from Sapporo to bypass the Japanese archipelago on troop transports provided by the Tang Empire, and finally landed in Kanagawa and Chiba Prefecture three days later, aiming at Kyoto, the stronghold of the Shogunate faction.

The new army of the shogunate army that landed was divided into two routes, one attacking north from Kanagawa and the other attacking westward from Chiba Prefecture, presenting a pincer encirclement posture towards Kyoto.

Seeing that the shogunate army was menacing, in view of the inferiority in troops and weapons and equipment, the shogunate faction relied on Kyoto to adopt a strategic defensive posture, and a great war soon broke out.

With the enthusiastic support of many wandering samurai, townspeople, and merchants, the Shogunate gathered more than 130,000 local armed forces in a short period of time, and their main equipment was still cold-armed swords and guns.

Before the outbreak of war

In 1866, the Satsuma Domain imitated the British establishment and formed a new army with more than 21,000 men as the main force, including the Lesser Clan, the Castle Brigade, and the Outer Castle Army.

It is worth noting;

The Satsuma Army imported from the United States of America a batch of obsolete equipment, namely the Sharps carbine and rifle that had been used in the war, and the technical indicators were relatively advanced.

The Sharps rifle is equipped with a longer, heavier barrel and has a precision fire range of up to 913 meters, which gives it a longer range when used by professional shooters.

The rifles and carbines, Model 1859, were adopted by the United States Army and were particularly popular with cavalry and avant-garde units because of their breech-loading options.

The U.S. Northern Army purchased more than 80,000 Sharps carbines and more than 9,000 Sharps rifles during the war. The Satsuma Army purchased about 13,000 Sharps carbines and 3,200 Sharps rifles, and gave priority to equipping the main force, which made the Satsuma Army's confidence unprecedentedly high.

It's a pity

Far from being armed with a katana, the Shogunate faced a new shogunate-style army armed to the teeth with advanced weapons, which was destined to change the course of history.

Under the pressure of an existential crisis, the shogunate not only sold Hokkai, but also carried out military reforms, and it was by no means a soft persimmon to be manipulated.

As early as December 1865, the Tokugawa shogunate issued the "Military Mandate", marking the beginning of the shogunate's formation of a new army.

The Military Mandate stipulates;

The soldiers selected by the "soldiers" were selected from among the able-bodied peasants aged 17 to 45 to ensure that the soldiers had a good enough foundation.

According to the size of the territory, one person for every 500 stone (stone, the unit of measurement of rice grain, also used to measure the size of the territory) is recruited, three people for every 1,000 stone, and 10 people for every 3,000 stone.

At the time of the formation of the new shogunate army, there were mainly two types of rifles: the Colt lever rifle and the Enfield type, and the former was gradually replacing the latter as the mainstream of the equipment of the Tokugawa shogunate army.

In terms of artillery, because the shells used in the Colt artillery were too expensive, a poor country like Fuso could not afford to use them.

Therefore, the mainstream of the shogunate's equipment is still the old-fashioned front-loading smoothbore guns pulled out of the warehouses of the Tang Empire, but new rifled guns have begun to be introduced.

At the outbreak of the war, the shogunate was equipped with only one artillery battalion, a total of 24 advanced Colt 6-pounder field guns, and the number of imported artillery shells was not large.

Tokugawa Keiki hired instructors from the Tang Empire to start Tang-style army training, and with the huge financial resources of selling Beihai Province, he formed a new army of nearly 80,000 people.

In order to enhance the shogunate's ability to attack fortifications, two artillery divisions were even formed, equipped with tatters swept from the warehouses of the Tang Empire, with a total of more than 320 front-loading smoothbore guns, firing round stone or iron bullets, and using cheap black powder.

Even so, these two artillery divisions became the treasures of the Tokugawa shogunate.

How many old-fashioned front-loading smoothbore guns are in the armament warehouses of the Tang Empire?

This has to mention the North American War that ended in 1861, in the North American War, the North and the South of the United States were equipped with a total of more than 46,000 guns of various calibers, including the guns equipped by the Northern Navy sail warships, which is extremely large.

Most of these artillery pieces were rerefined after the war, but there were still a batch of breech guns of better quality and better condition that were collected and stored by the Tang Empire, and what was sold to Fusang was the goods swept out of this batch of warehouses.

Although the technical indicators have lagged behind, it is still an advanced artillery in the civil war on Fuso Island.

February 17, 1868

Just after the Lunar New Year and Lantern Festival, which are the most important for the Chinese, the imperial capital of Chang'an City still has a festive atmosphere everywhere, with red couplets on the streets and alleys, lanterns, firecracker fragments in the streets and alleys, and imperial flags fluttering on tall buildings, all of which make people reminisce about the atmosphere of this prosperous Lunar New Year.

Cheongundae, the political center of the empire, is the official residence of the Prime Minister.

It is located on the east side of Danfengmen Square, is a piece of the palace building of the Han and Tang dynasties with hanging eaves and arches, and is composed of the main hall of three entrances and a circle of auxiliary halls around it, which is magnificent and solemn.

In the exclusive residence of the Prime Minister, Lord Palmerston, the Queen's Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary of the United Kingdom, was welcomed today, and he took a 23-day detour by train to Chang'an, the imperial capital, on his way to Canada to take the governor-general, in order to convey London's concerns.

The focus is on the current civil war on Fuso Island.

"With all due respect, the drift of Tang and France from the British Empire on the question of Fuso's internal affairs has deeply worried London, and it is willing to do its utmost to bridge their differences, with the stabilization of the situation in East Asia as its primary concern." Lord Palmerston looked worried about the country and the people, and his eyes were fixed on Prime Minister Yoo Hyun-jun to exert pressure.

After a slight pause in his tone, he continued;

"London has seen the somewhat eager disorderly expansion of the Tang Kingdom over the years.

In order to preserve the traditional friendly relations between the two countries, Her Majesty the Queen and the Prime Minister have tried to cooperate in some policies and international affairs, and your country should be able to feel this.

The British Empire, which has hundreds of years of experience in the colonial field, did not approve of His Majesty Richard's quick expansion. Downing Street would like to share our valuable experience with our friends in this regard.

On some issues

We respect Tang's choice, but we also hope that Tangguo will take into account the interests of its allies and not complicate things because of vicious competition, which is a situation we do not want to see.

……”

Let's see, the British are talking like this, and they can't get to the point for a long time.

More than half an hour later

The Prime Minister, Duke Yoo Hyun-jun, was distraught and glanced at the Minister of Foreign Affairs, Sir Luo Fengxian, and the Minister of Colonies, Count Juan Carlos, who looked up with a helpless sigh and began to study the structure on the beams.

The latter rolled his eyes directly, meaning; Isn't it clear what the British have to be virtuous?

Now the question is simple;

Both the Tang Empire and the French Empire supported the continued rule of the Tokugawa shogunate, and the British did not know what nerves they were pumping, perhaps moved by the innovative spirit of the Shogunate faction, and fully supported the local feudal forces of the Shogunate faction dominated by the "Sacho Alliance", giving money, guns, and cannons to diplomatic support.

In the original history

The British-backed Shogunate forces were first suppressed and then promoted in the Boshin War, and soon reversed the unfavorable situation in the early stage and counterattacked the shogunate army, which was defeated and retreated on the battlefield one after another, sweeping away the rotten shogunate ruling forces all the way, and finally achieving the goal of "revitalizing the imperial government".

Soon after, these tomb robbers, who were determined to learn from the West, abolished domestic maladministration, broke the feudal feudal dungeon of the feudal lords of each feudal domain, and began the "Meiji Restoration" of comprehensive Westernization, which contributed to the take-off of the Yamato nation at the end of the 19th century......

Now it is completely different, the Tokugawa shogunate, which sold off the Hokkai Province, has a lot of financial resources that can be used, and frantically purchased advanced weapons and equipment from the Tang Empire, the motherland, and cultivated a new army, and achieved great results in a short period of time.

In the current civil war on Fuso Island

The powerful shogunate army overwhelmed the army of the Shogunate faction, and the Satsuma Domain, Nagashima Domain, Hizen Domain, and Tosa Domain were beaten to the ground, and the main new army suffered heavy casualties.

The hundreds of thousands of mobs gathered in Kyoto and nearby towns were brutally bloodied by the shogunate several times, and more than 50,000 people were killed and wounded.

Next

The shogunate army will carry out a dragnet clean-up operation near Kyoto, and there will be more mobs, and the wandering samurai and townspeople will be pulled out and beheaded, which is the repertoire of the Yamato people.

Most of Kyoto had fallen under the control of the shogunate, and the 15-year-old Meiji Emperor fled overnight in fear and took refuge in the Satsuma domain.

Seeing that the situation collapsed, the big boss behind the Curtain faction, the British, couldn't sit still, and had to jump to the front desk to clean up the mess.

It's not ...... I came to discuss with the Tang Empire.

But this Lord Palmerston couldn't let go of the arrogant shelf of the British aristocracy, and he said it in a foggy way, and he didn't get to the point for half an hour, what a waste of time!

(End of chapter)