A small soldier of the frontier army in the late Ming Dynasty

Chapter 194
Lin Daofu said: "My lord, the way I discussed with Mr. Zhang is to implement mutual aid clubs in all parts of the state."

He had been prepared for a long time, took out a piece of paper and said: "On weekdays, when the military households are united, they can help each other when the spring plowing is busy. Regardless of labor, agricultural tools, and seeds, they can help each other. This can greatly solve the current difficulty of labor shortage. .”

He explained in detail: "The lower officials first decided to set up a farming team. Every five hundred households form a team. Each team draws dozens of laborers. It is organized by young and courageous military households, and there is a team leader. Xia When harvesting grain, help the team to plow the field and transfer labor without wages."

He went on to say: "The second is to set up a mutual aid club, which is divided into thousands of households. Anyone who has labor can join. When the spring farming is busy, the overall planning is made and the labor is adjusted. The mutual aid club gives preferential treatment to military members and helps the lonely elderly. On weekdays, members help each other, and the number of workers is divided. , If you do less work, you will be paid according to the number of hours worked, and will be settled at the end of the month.”

"The wages are divided into three grades for harvesting. For example, harvesting is the highest, followed by cutting and picking stalks, and the lowest is collecting grains and ordering beans. The wages can be negotiated within the company. Helping orphans only needs to eat, no wages, Baonei Prefecture Everywhere there are officials who teach children to go to school, and the mutual aid club can also help him plow the fields, only need to eat, no wages."

Lin Daofu was eloquent, and all the officers present were dazed, while Wang Dou nodded repeatedly.

He mused that in the early Ming Dynasty, various village groups were popular, all of which were mutual aid organizations of the people themselves, coordinating labor and cattle issues among neighbors.This kind of folk society has a long history in China. In the Northern Song Dynasty, there were various bow and arrow clubs, horse buying clubs, loyalty patrol clubs, etc. Their organization and training were quite strict. Woodcutter's argument.Later generations of China also had various mutual aid groups.

Well coordinated, this type of mutual aid can indeed solve the production problem of labor shortage.On weekdays, members of the commune help each other, do less work, and find wages according to the number of jobs. Presumably, the military households also agree. Although they spend a certain amount of wages, the sons of the family do not need to go home to work. Taking this opportunity, they can go out Fight, get rewards, and get more money and food.

Wang Dou said: "This method is feasible."

He felt a little emotional that his subordinates finally had their own thinking power, and they didn't need to be guided in everything by themselves. They also had their own governance concepts. In the future, he only needed to have a long-term vision and give them some appropriate suggestions.You don't need to do everything yourself, it's much easier for yourself.

Wang Doudao: "In addition to the Mutual Aid Society, the scale of the farming team can be expanded. Now that there are many refugees entering Baoan Prefecture every day, they can be recruited as members of the farming team. When the spring farming is busy, let them work and give them enough food. As for wages , you can figure it out."

Lin Daofu happily agreed, and the political outline he worked out with painstaking efforts was affirmed by the garrison adults, and it would be false to say that he was unhappy.Zhang Gui was also very happy, he was the one who proposed this mutual aid society, if this matter is done well, the garrison master will be aware of the details, and will definitely express his appreciation for his ability to handle affairs.

……

After the discussion, it was imperative to reorganize the personnel of the three generals and the cavalry and supply troops. Wang Dou first went to Shunxiang Fort to see Zhao Xuan's achievements in reorganizing the gun mounts and training the artillery in the past few months.

Zhao Xuan's temporary transformation training is still being carried out in Shunxiang Fort. Shunxiang Fort currently has fourteen bronze and iron cannons of Frang machine, twenty small bronze cannons, fifteen tiger crouching cannons, and 110 gunners and deputy gunners. There is also a team officer.

Now these cannons and these people are under Zhao Xuan's management, and I don't know how Zhao Xuan's training results are, so Wang Dou has to take a look to feel relieved.

The training place for the artillery of Shunxiang Fort is located in a field one mile south of the teaching ground, and a barracks was built here for the artillerymen to live in.In order for the artillerymen to be fully trained, there is a gunpowder magazine in the barracks with sufficient gunpowder and ammunition.At this time, gunpowder is relatively expensive, and there are very few people in Ming Dynasty who use it as extravagantly as Wang Dou for regular training.In order to improve the mathematics knowledge of the artillerymen, there is also an official who is proficient in arithmetic in the barracks to teach them to attend classes on weekdays.

Zhao Xuan desperately wanted to show off in front of Wang Dou, as soon as he arrived at the barracks, he summoned the artillerymen to assemble, and he said loudly: "Master Garrison is on patrol, brothers, cheer up, please have artillery."

People at this time respected the cannons very much, and called them the cannon clothes. The dozens of cannons were divided into Franco cannons, small cannons, and tiger squatting cannons were placed in three wide canopies. There was a captain for the cannon, and after hearing Zhao Xuan's order, the assembled artillery immediately started, led by Pao Zheng, and pushed out their respective cannons.

Wang Dou watched carefully, and found that the mounts of these artillery pieces had been remodeled. Some of the original four-wheeled high-footed mounts on some artillery pieces had been changed into two-wheeled mounts that were easy to move, which was no different from Western-style two-wheeled mounts. , the adjustment of the elevation angle is also quite flexible.

Even the tiger crouching cannon weighing tens of kilograms was also mounted with two rounds of gun carriage.Zhao Xuan also showed Wang Dou the whole package of tiger squatting cannon shells. Wang Dou didn't know what was inside, but the ammunition was customized and wrapped in cloth and placed in each box.

Wang Dou looked at it for a long time and said, "Try shooting a few shots."

Zhao Xuan said loudly: "Decree."

He issued a series of commands in a majestic manner, and immediately set up a series of targets in the distance.

First, the Franco cannon fired. Fourteen Franco bronze and iron cannons were lined up, which was spectacular.The loader of each gun picked up the sub-guns in the bullet box and inserted them into the thick long hole at the back of the mother gun. Then the gunners of the guns, that is, the aiming hands, used their binoculars to match the guns on the gun body. The front sight and the rear sight are used to adjust and aim at distant targets.

The gunner ignited the gunpowder on the fire door, and there was a constant bang, and the fourteen Franco cannons fired one after another, and the sound of the cannons could be heard for miles.

From long-range shooting to short-distance shotgun firing, Zhao Xuan constantly directed the gunners to adjust the shooting angle. It can be seen that after Zhao Xuan's training, these gunners have made great progress, and the accuracy of shelling has improved a lot. More leisurely.

After firing the big cannon and the small cannon, they fired the tiger squatting cannon again. The loud sound of the tiger squatting cannon, as well as the thick flame and smoke were astonishing. It is more difficult to poke the stick straight to the bottom, and it needs to be pushed in bit by bit, but compared with the loading of the tiger squatting cannon shells in the past, it is much faster to fill a layer of ammunition with a layer of soil.This is very important in actual combat.

After the live ammunition shooting performance, Zhao Xuan looked at Wang Dou expectantly, hoping to get Wang Dou's praise.

Wang Dou was pondering, Zhao Xuan's improvement of gun mounts has achieved remarkable results, but when it comes to gunner training, although it has improved compared to before, it is still too far behind to achieve what he wants.Thinking that it takes at least six years to train an excellent gunner, and most of my gunners are illiterate, I am really impatient.Moreover, it is difficult to aim and shoot artillery at this time. There is no ruler for the artillery, and no basic ranging tools. It is difficult to train qualified artillery in batches only by visual inspection.

There was also a problem with the cannon at this time.

Although all kinds of cannons in the Ming Dynasty have design drawings, the length of the cannon and the thickness of the tube are all strict standard sizes. It is difficult to cut corners and materials if you want to shoddy. Guaranteed.

However, the standardization of artillery at this time is not strict after all. The inner diameters of the same type of guns are difficult to be consistent, and the difference between the shell and the barrel is inevitable. Aiming brings a lot of trouble, basically every gun has its own temper, which also affects the results of artillery training.

After pondering for a long time, Wang Dou first praised Zhao Xuan a few words. His contribution in the past few months is obvious, and then he said: "Mr. Zhao Qian, do you know the scale and distance measuring tool for artillery?"

Daming's artillery does not have a ruler, not even a basic distance measuring tool. At this time, the gunners fire all within the direct range and rely on everyone's years of experience, so precious gunners are rare.To gain this experience, the shells needed to train a qualified artilleryman are gone, and the life of the artillery at this time is only a few hundred rounds.I am afraid that to train a group of qualified gunners, many cannons will be scrapped, and it will take a long time, perhaps up to several years. Wang Dou hopes to save some time and money.

Zhao Xuan was stunned for a moment, he didn't understand what Wang Dou meant, Wang Dou explained it in the easy-to-understand words at that time, Zhao Xuan finally understood, and he said: "I am ashamed, I have never seen this thing before, according to what my lord said, it must be Some artifacts that assist the gunner to fire."

He thought for a long time, and said: "According to what your lord said, there is a way for me to choose a few cannons and compile a shooting gauge through test firing. As for the distance measurement, I have to think carefully about it."

Wang Dou was pleasantly surprised that Zhao Xuan could figure out a way to solve the shooting scale. There are still talents in this era, and it depends on how you dig.He said: "Okay, I will leave this matter to Mr. Zhao Qian."

He pondered for a while, and said, "I have a proposal regarding gunner training."

Seeing Zhao Xuan staring at him with wide eyes, Wang Dou said: "Gunner training, in the future you don't need every gunner to teach you carefully, you just need to find a capable man from each of the Buddha Wolf Machine Cannon, the Small Cannon, and the Tiger Squat Cannon. Only those who teach can teach, and the rest are their own, let them study by themselves."

Zhao Xuan said in surprise: "My lord, in this way, won't the rest of the artillery be able to shoot accurately?"

Wang Doudao: "In the actual battle of the artillery, for each type of artillery, the capable personnel should observe the enemy's situation, and then all the artillery of this type will fire in salvo according to the direction and angle of the bombardment planned by the personnel, and the gunners of each group must not aim at each other."

What Wang Dou said was the secret of the British artillery salvo in later generations. At that time, the British fleet defeated the Spanish fleet and the German fleet. In addition to various reasons, this artillery salvo was also very important.At that time, there were a large number of excellent gunners in Spain, but each of them was in charge of a cannon, and they shot very accurately, but they could not have the power of a salvo.

For the British, a warship only needs an excellent gunner. Although the hit rate is not high, the power of the salvo is more powerful than the firepower of a group of experienced and highly skilled artillerymen of the Spaniards.An excellent gunner needs to be trained for several years. After several years of war, with the huge losses of Spanish artillery, Spain's defeat is inevitable.

This is the secret to the success of modern British artillery, and Wang Dou hopes that he can replicate it in the Ming Dynasty in the seventeenth century.

(End of this chapter)