Forty-eight years of Qianlong

Chapter 83 The messenger of Sendai City

Not to mention how crazy the Ishinomaki port is, Sendai Castle (Aoba Castle), 130 miles away, has entered a state of emergency since yesterday.

Since Matsushima Town has fled back to Sendai Castle in a hurry, Ninomaru has sent more than a dozen people into the residences of various retainers in the castle town.

Because of the arrival of the Thor, the important officials of the family who were invited by Ishikawa Murabun didn't leave Aoba City, and they didn't have to go everywhere to find them.

As a result, except for those retainers who accompanied Date Shigemura to Edo Castle to attend to the account, all the family members, family members, quasi-family members, clansmen, old people, and large clans living in the castle town of this domain were all called to the survey office in Ninomaru. Council, urgently discuss countermeasures.

At the same time, the elder Ishikawa Murafumi ordered that all senior samurai (grand clan warriors) be called into the city to strengthen their guard; immediately check the various weapons stored in the clan and the horses of each samurai, and ensure that they can go out to battle at any time.

But, there is a problem.

It has been almost 1615 years since the end of the Osaka Summer Battle in 200.To put it bluntly, the warriors of the various domains are all peace-loving people, and fighting and killing is too low-level; to put it bluntly, they are rotten from top to bottom.

In the past two years, there has been famine everywhere in the Ou region. Let alone the lower-level samurai, many of them have even sold their armor to buy food; some samurai have been so depressed that they even sold their horses; the most outrageous thing is that they mortgaged their samurai swords for money. , and then take a tinfoil-wrapped bamboo piece to pretend to be a katana sword
The one-eyed dragon Masamune's father and son's ambition to compete with the Tokugawa family has been passed down to the present, and it has long since disappeared; the only thing left is to make money and enjoy it.

It is said that the most important armed force of the Date family is the cavalry composed of Dafanshi (senior samurai regiment), with as many as 600 people; these samurai are divided into ten groups, each with 360 people.

As a result, Matsushima lost nearly a tenth in one morning.

After learning the news, Ishikawa Murawen was shocked and lost his six souls; because he gave the order to ambush by the sea.

It is said that after Katayama Kanbei and his five subordinates were taken back to the official hall, they were immediately subjected to severe interrogation.A few wise men who couldn't stand the torture, resorted to everything they knew.

As soon as Matsushima-cho Fengsong heard that the people on the Thor were actually oriental faces and spoke fluent island dialect, he sent someone to report to Aoba Castle overnight.

Ishikawa Murabu, the elder of the family, judged the situation rashly and wrongly, and changed the plan proposed by Endo Morinobu, and secretly ordered the samurai sent to Matsushima to find opportunities to capture the Thor.So there is the scene of Zhao Xin shelling Matsushima Town.

In view of Ishikawamura Fumi's serious mistake, the host of this meeting became the 12-year-old Yi Dacun Yoshimura, but the person who actually made the decision was the 20-year-old Date Muru Tsune.

The preliminary results of the inventory inspection were very poor. The saltpeter stored in the family was seriously insufficient; even if it was evenly distributed on each iron cannon, it was enough to fire two rounds.

Except for the poor soil nitrate production in the two regions of Vietnam and Hida, the island countries do not produce saltpeter at all, and all rely on imports; and the import trade of saltpeter is firmly in the hands of the Tokugawa family.

Since the fight cannot be won, it can only be resolved through negotiation.However, everyone agreed that the officials of the Sendai Domain should never show up in public.The shogunate strictly forbids foreign vassals to communicate with foreign barbarians privately.Once discovered, this crime is more serious than the death of more than 200 warriors, and it is very likely that the seal will be reduced.

As for the practice of Matsushima Town, it is unfortunate that it has taken the blame for this incident.He was ordered to go back to his home in the castle town for self-defense, and was not allowed to go out. After the head of the family, Date Shigemura returned, he would discuss how to deal with it.

The retainer meeting finally decided that the old fox Endo Shouxin should be invited to lead the negotiation process behind the scenes.After all, he is in his 60s, and he is already in a semi-retired state among his retainers, so he rarely shows up.

Early the next morning, "Muradaya", the largest firm in the castle town of Sendai, sent a team consisting of a cage and more than 20 attendants, and left under the pretense of going to Ishinomaki Port to see the goods.

When the group arrived at Matsushima-cho, they found that the Thor had already left; in order not to reveal their identity, they had no choice but to go to Ishinomaki Port for a pretentious turn before returning.

At noon, the team finally arrived at Ishinomaki Port.

As soon as I entered the town, I saw a notice posted by the official hall that the big ship had actually come here.

Shouxin Endo, who was sitting in the cage, just arrived at the semi-colon of "Murataya" in Ishinomaki Port, and immediately wrote a letter in hand, ordering him to secretly invite the town to pursue.

Machi, who received the secret letter, dressed up in disguise, brought Shibata Kakuzo, the tax officer, and the owner of the winery, Katsuyama Denzo, to meet Endo Shouxin, and reported in detail the situation of the meeting with everyone on the Thor in the morning.

After listening to the situation report, Endo Shouxin did not rush to express his position, but only said that he would wait until the other party fired guns in the afternoon.

In the first Opium War in later generations, the British army divided its troops north to attack Zhoushan, Zhejiang, and the Zhoushan defenders launched a large-scale artillery battle with the British fleet.The Qing army, after firing hundreds of shells, found that only one hit the enemy ship.In the end, the Zhoushan defenders were completely defeated by the artillery fire of the British warships.

In the education and cognition that Zhao Xin received since he was a child, he always believed that the artillery of the Qing army was too poor, so it was unable to hit the British warships.

However, when he saw the "Ground Cannon Grenade Shooting Table", the ballistic calculation data, the calculation results of shooting Zhuyuan, and calibrating Zhuyuan, which were covered with half of the conference table, Zhao Xin realized that the person who failed in mathematics was Can't play cannon!
Zhao Xin's mathematical level was just a fool's errand; Wang Yuanfang and Liu Sheng had almost forgotten the calculation knowledge they mastered by rote memorization; except for Deng Fei.

Since Deng Fei knew about Zhao Xin's "cannon on board" plan, he began to use his spare time to review and recall the reconnaissance calculation skills he had learned.He thought very clearly that since there are guns, this knowledge will be used sooner or later.

At the same time, before buying artillery, Zhao Xin had prepared a lot of auxiliary equipment for artillery.

Such as drones; such as industrial-grade laser rangefinders with a range of up to 20 kilometers; and compass, and a second-hand military reconnaissance computer purchased from the Internet.In addition to the above, the most important thing is the two steering wheels he bought with Daniel before (special ranging equipment for artillery, the azimuth angle of the target is obtained by measuring, so that the artillery can be aimed at the target).

So with all these preparations, Zhao Xin had the confidence to say the words of shelling Ishinomaki Port and Sendai City.

Otherwise, Ishinomaki Port is okay to say, the big deal is to drive the ship into the port and bang; as for Sendai City, forget it, unless the Thor is launched on land. (The direct distance of D30 is 950 meters)
The previous shot in Matsushima was purely a stroke of luck.

Zhao Xin finally understood that without the establishment of a systematic level of mathematical calculation and corresponding talent training, no one can play dozens or even hundreds of cannons, especially naval battles.

At noon on the day after the ultimatum was issued, a drone rose from the Thor and came to the sky above the port of Ishinomaki.

In Ishinomaki Port, which had been notified by the government, almost all the owners and sailors of the cargo ships were evacuated. Only a few people who had not left found the black strange bird floating in the air, and they jumped off in fright. The cargo ship hurriedly ran towards the town.

And the townspeople didn't dare to stay at home after hearing the news that the barbarian ships were going to fire cannons into the port this afternoon.Almost everyone at Ishinomaki Port knew about the news that Matsushima Town was destroyed by a cannonball yesterday.

As a result, thousands of people came to a small hill a mile north of Ishinomaki Port with their hastily packed belongings.Endo Morinobu and his entourage, along with everyone from "Murataya", also came here.

At this time, the best observation position on the hill has been occupied by the practice office and a large number of samurai masters.Many townspeople had to climb to the rocks and big trees of the hills and look around.

Endo Shouxin wore a large leather hat made of bamboo and was supported by two subordinates. He found a position in the crowd where he could see the port, and waited patiently.

In the third quarter of the first day, amidst the exclamations of thousands of people on the hill, a gray-white fast boat about ten feet long sailed into Ishinomaki Port like lightning.

After the ship stopped, several people came out of the cabin and threw several large white wooden boxes stacked on the deck into the sea.

Then, the clipper quickly turned around and headed for the big ship in the distance.There was a lot of discussion on the hill.

"How can this ship be so fast!" Endo Shunobu looked at the distant clipper and was secretly shocked.Judging by the speed of the ship in front of him, the navy's Guan Ship simply couldn't catch up.

In the Edo period, the fastest speed was the "shuttle boat", with an average speed of eight knots.

In other words, the function of closing the ship is to quickly catch up with other ships and stick to it for control, and then collect money from them!The name of the ship Guan refers to the "checkpoint" on the sea.

(In the "Japanese-Portuguese Dictionary", in the translation of Guan Ship, there is a definition that directly points to: Japanese pirate ship.)
"What are they doing?"

"Why didn't the wooden box float away?"

"There should be a heavy object tied to the wooden box, so it won't float away." Someone behind Endo Shouxin said with certainty.

Before the second quarter arrived, three long chimes suddenly came from the sea in the distance, and the hills suddenly became silent, and everyone looked in the direction of the Thor.

Following Zhao Xin's order in the cockpit, Deng Fei and Wang Yuanfang, who heard Zhao Xin's order in the horn, yanked the rope hanging on the trigger.

"Tom~~! Tom~~!" Two loud bangs sounded almost at the same time, and the unloaded grenade roared towards Ishinomaki Port, two kilometers away.

The people on the hills heard a loud noise like thunder from the sea in the distance. Many people's faces suddenly turned pale, and some people knelt directly on the ground and recited the scriptures, praying for the blessing of the Buddha.

Immediately afterwards, there was a whistling in the air, and everyone was about to look up to distinguish it carefully when they heard two consecutive loud noises in the port, and two huge water columns rose into the air mixed with smoke and dust.

Just after a few breaths, two loud noises came from the sea in the distance, accompanied by the same whistling across the sky, followed by a huge explosion, and a huge water column sprayed from the sea in the port.

Those with good eyes in the crowd saw countless sawdust flying into the air with the water column, and then falling to the sea.

When the smoke cleared from the sea, someone exclaimed, "Those wooden boxes are gone!"

Endo Satoshi raised his hat and looked at the port, and found that on the sea where the wooden box was, some sawdust was vaguely floating.

On the hill where thousands of people are, there is no sound.Everyone was terrified.

Endo Shouxin's legs softened and he sat on the ground with a puff.

　Speaking of which, I wrote this chapter three times from yesterday afternoon to this afternoon.Delete write, write delete.I just don't want people to see it so watery.I wrote [-] words yesterday and felt very wrong, but I didn't know what the problem was at the time.Whenever my own feelings are particularly twisted, there is a logical problem.At this time, nothing can be written properly.

　　
　
(End of this chapter)