1848 Great Qing Charcoal Burners

Chapter 144 Taking advantage of the situation
Peng Gang glanced at the wooden box, which was about half a foot square.

The wooden box was inscribed with the four large characters "Peng Gang personally opened this box," a clear indication of the deception.

Ulantai's calculations were so cunning they almost caused Peng Gang's face to fall.

Peng Gang couldn't help but chuckle.

He seriously suspected that Ulantai had read too much of his family's "Romance of the Three Kingdoms".

"Did Ulantai just send me a wooden box?" Peng Gang asked Lu Liudao, who had sent the wooden box.

"Commander Wei also received the wooden box from Ulantai," Lu Liu replied.

"Qing Yao's box is a trap. After returning to Jintian, tell Commander Wei not to open the box," Peng Gang instructed.

Ulantaisu was fond of studying and tinkering with firearms, making him an anomaly among the Eight Banners generals.

The wooden box that Ulantai gave us was most likely a bomb.

"Commander Wei also suspected that the Qing demons had ill intentions in sending the wooden box, so he dared not open it," Lu Liu said.

Lu Liu could tell there was something wrong with the wooden box, let alone Wei Changhui.

Peng Gang called Li Qi over and instructed him to carefully take the wooden box to the shooting range, find a few skilled musketeers, and have them smash the box from twenty paces away.

Li Qi took the wooden box and called over several skilled musketeers to the firing range.

With each gunshot, the wooden box lid was blown off, and a loud explosion echoed throughout the firing range.

As expected, the gift that Ulantai, a firearms enthusiast, sent was a bomb with considerable power.

If Peng Gang and Wei Changhui were to open the wooden box themselves, they would surely meet a tragic end.

Peng Gang was both amused and exasperated, unsure whether to think the Guangdong Deputy Commander was clever or foolish.

You could say he's clever, since he tried to outmaneuver him with such a clumsy and obvious scheme.

You could call him stupid, but he did manage to create a wooden box bomb that actually worked.

Perhaps this Deputy Military Governor of Guangdong still had a rather naive and vague understanding of war.

Peng Gang ordered his men to find the remains of the wooden box, especially the internal parts.

Based on the found flint, spring strip fragments, and other parts, Peng Gang deduced that this device used a spring strip as a trigger and relied on flint to ignite and detonate.

Since Wulantai wanted to play along, Peng Gang decided to play along and whispered a few words to Lu Liu.

At the same time, the women's battalion was instructed to make some white hats and white cloth strips, which were then distributed to the soldiers at the front lines to confuse the Qing army.

Before leaving, Lu Liu asked Peng Gang for the captured ceremonial guards of Zhou Tianjue, especially the sedan chair.

Peng Gang was puzzled, not understanding what Lu Liu wanted this thing for.

Only after asking did they learn that it was for Hong Xiuquan.

Peng Gang couldn't understand Hong Xiuquan's thought process. You've already proclaimed yourself the Heavenly King, yet you ride in the sedan chair of the Qing Dynasty governor and use the ceremonial guards of the Qing Dynasty governor. Aren't you ashamed?

Zijing Mountain has nothing else but plenty of timber.

It's not like there weren't carpenters in the Taiping army. Why didn't they just gather wood, find a carpenter, and make a large sedan chair themselves?

After seeing Lu Liu off, Peng Gang arrived at the General Staff Headquarters, where the five staff officers had already prepared a simple sand table.

The small blue flag on the sand table indicates that Peng Gang's main force on the western front has gained a new neighbor: Li Nengchen, the general of Linyuan Town in Yunnan.

As for the exact number of Yunnan soldiers brought by the garrison commander of Linyuan, there is no accurate intelligence to confirm it; the banner only roughly states "about 4000".

The area of ​​Qin Richang's base in Longshan and Lianhuashan on the south bank was constantly being encroached upon and compressed by the Qing army, and Qin Richang gradually found it difficult to hold on.

The waterway connecting Qianjiang to the west and east had been sealed off at both ends by the Qing army using iron chains and heavy artillery.

In conjunction with these efforts, the Qing army launched a major offensive against the Xinwei Plain.

The Qing army's strategic intentions were crystal clear.

The Qing army wanted to blockade the Taiping army in Zijing Mountain and besiege them until they ran out of ammunition and food.

"Can you analyze the Qing army's intentions?" Peng Gang asked the staff officers in the staff room who were organizing and analyzing enemy and friendly intelligence.

The staff officers put down their work and gathered around the updated sand table they had created themselves.

“The Qing army wants to surround us and trap us in Pingzai Mountain and Zijing Mountain,” Zhang Ze said first.

"So do you think the Qing army can hold us back?" Peng Gang continued with his next question.

While Zhang Ze was still thinking and organizing his thoughts, Chief of Staff Huang Bingxian pondered for a moment and said, "Whether the Qing army can trap us depends on our choices."

"Go on," Peng Gang gestured for Huang Bingxian to continue elaborating on his views.

"If we and our 70,000 to 80,000 family members were to remain in Zijing Mountain and live off its resources, we would starve to death in the mountains even without the Qing army's intervention," Huang Bingxian said eloquently.

"Although the Qing army has more troops than us, it is only about two to three times more than our army. With the current strength of the Qing army in Xunzhou Prefecture, they can only focus on guarding the key passes in and out of the mountains and the waterways at both ends of the Qianjiang River. Moreover, the walls only block three of the four sides."

As he spoke, Huang Bingxian picked up the command stick and gestured on the sand table the three walls that the Qing army was trying to purchase, which were the three lines of defense that the Qing army had deployed against the Taiping army.

The first one is naturally the eastern Xinwei Plain defense line, where both sides are currently engaged in fierce fighting and vying for the most intense position.

The second route is the Qianjiang waterway. Currently, the Qing army is concentrating its forces to drive Qin Richang's Taiping army towards Pingzaishan, attempting to sever the connection between the Taiping army and Guixian County.

The third line is the Wuxuan defense line, which Peng Gang is responsible for guarding.

The missing fourth line of defense is the Dayao Mountains to the north. Zijing Mountain is an extension of the Dayao Mountains, and the Dayao Mountains extend north of Zijing Mountain.

The Qing army did not leave the Dayao Mountains undefended not because they did not want to, but because they were deliberately leaving an opening for the Taiping army to escape.

In reality, the Qing army was eager to trap the Taiping army in Pingzai Mountain and Zijing Mountain to prevent them from wandering to other prefectures or even outside Guangxi and colluding with anti-Qing forces in other provinces.

The main reason why the Qing army did not deploy heavy troops in the Dayao Mountains to guard against the Taiping army was that it was not feasible.

The Dayao Mountains are the most malaria-ridden of all malaria-ridden areas. Malaria is deadly, and the living environment is extremely harsh, making it a sparsely populated place.

If the Qing army were to deploy a large force in the Dayao Mountains region, it would be difficult to say whether the Qing army had enough troops available for deployment, or even whether the Qing army would be willing to enter the Dayao Mountains.

Even if the above two problems were solved, the Qing army's food and supplies would still not be guaranteed.

We can't just send people into the mountains without sending food and ammunition.

Historically, when the Taiping army was besieged by the Qing army, they chose to advance north into the Dayao Mountains, capture Yong'an Prefecture (later the county seat of Mengshan County) as a resting place, and establish the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom system by appointing kings there.

"Does the Chief of Staff mean to break through the Qing army's blockade by going through the Dayao Mountains before the Qing army completes its encirclement of the Zijing Mountain and Pingzai Mountain base areas?" Qiu Zhongmin frowned.

“The Dayao Mountains are shrouded in mist all year round, and are rife with miasma. Outsiders who enter the mountains often fall ill and die. It is a dead end.”

Although Qiu Zhongmin is from Guixian County, he has never traveled far from home in his life.

But he had heard about the Dayao Mountains from the elders of the Qiu family who did business with the Yao people.

The Dayao Mountains are steep, with many mountains and little farmland. The overlapping peaks make farming difficult. Even among the Yao people, only a small number of Pan Yao and Chashan Yao from the Sheng Yao region have settled in the Dayao Mountains.

The area is extremely isolated, with only narrow and treacherous mountain roads available for passage, and the transportation of supplies relies on manual carrying.

The mere rumor sent chills down Qiu Zhongmin's spine, making him unwilling to take the route through the Dayao Mountains.

“Brother Qiu said it’s a dead end, a dead end. We can only go through the Dayao Mountains when we have no other choice.” Huang Bingxian shook his head.

"The supplies for crossing the Dayao Mountains need to be carried by manpower, and we cannot carry all of our current supplies. Moreover, as long as the main force of the Qing army is not destroyed, even if we cross the Dayao Mountains, the Qing army will still chase us. They will just surround us in a different place, but they will not change our fundamentally passive situation."

Furthermore, we can't stay in the mountains forever; the Dayao Mountains can't support tens of thousands of people.

"Then tell me, how do we become more proactive?" Peng Gang turned to look at Huang Bingxian. Huang Bingxian's thoughts and ideas were quite clear. Among the five advisors, he was the most quick-witted and the best at expressing his views.

Huang Bingxian paused for a moment, then continued.

"We have enough food to last us for another six months. We can use four months to find an opportunity to strike and eliminate some of the Qing troops. Once we have enough supplies to carry away, we can then choose an opportunity to break out."

By then, supplies and provisions will be scarce. Even if the Qing army is replenished, the new recruits will be easier to deal with than the current Qing army.

Huang Bingxian's words make sense.

The Qing army that has now been drawn from various southern provinces to surround them in Guangxi consists of the Qing court's valuable and elite mobile forces.

Although some Qing troops who had fought against Peng Gang, such as the Guizhou and Yunnan armies, performed poorly.

As the saying goes, the greatest courage is to flee at the sight of the enemy, the next greatest is to flee at the mere sound of the wind, and the worst is to flee upon mistakenly hearing something.

Even the Guizhou army, Yunnan army, and local militia of various ethnic groups that he had surrounded in Mocun with inferior forces.

Not only were they coerced by Zhou Tianjue into not fleeing when they saw the enemy, but they also engaged in a real battle with his left army.

He is undoubtedly the bravest of the brave.

If they eventually break out of Guangxi, they may find it difficult to find formidable enemies like the Guizhou and Yunnan armies of Mocun in the past.

The troops rested for more than half a month, and the missing personnel were all filled.

Peng Gang's gaze swept across the area near Dongxiang on the sand table, searching for his next target.

The Qing army closest to Dongxiang was Xiang Rong's Chu army and Zhengan soldiers.

For the past two weeks, Xiang Rong's Chu army and Zhengan troops have moved their garrison from Zhangzhong Bridge to Sanlixu.

Although Peng Gang set Sanlixu on fire when he left.

But Xiang Rong, that old man, seemed to be quite wealthy. He hired laborers to carry out large-scale construction in Sanli Market, building earthen ramparts and setting up a posture of long-term confrontation with Peng Gang.

Xiang Rong's Chu army camp was heavily guarded, and recently he had transferred more than twenty proper heavy artillery pieces from Wulantai.

In a direct confrontation with Xiang Rong, Peng Gang's artillery company's mountain-splitting cannons would definitely be no match.

If they launch a strong attack, the Chu army and the Zhengan soldiers are not weak in combat.

Even if Peng Gang's left wing army were to defeat Xiang Rong's Chu army and Zhengan soldiers again, he would still suffer heavy casualties.

Peng Gang stared at the Sanlixu area on the sand table, pondering a strategy to defeat the enemy.

Sanli Market is located on the south bank of the Yinjiang River, a tributary of the Qianjiang River. After carefully observing the surrounding terrain, Peng Gang gradually came up with an idea.

He broke off a small wooden stick and placed it at Lemei Lake, where the Yinjiang River, a tributary of the Qianjiang River, flows through the middle reaches of the river.

It is currently the rainy season in Guangxi.

If we could dam and store water at Lemei Lake, and then release it to flood Xiang Rong's Chu army camp, causing chaos in the Chu army's formation, wetting their gunpowder, and silencing their heavy artillery.

If we attack the Chu army camp again, the casualties will definitely be much smaller.

It's just unknown whether the news released by the Taiping Army that he and Wei Changhui were killed by the Wulantai wooden box bomb will lull Xiang Rong, this old fox, into a false sense of security.

　My friend's wedding has been going on these past few days, so updates have been a bit inconsistent. Sorry.

　　
　
(End of this chapter)