Chapter 158 Dongshan Island

Although it is almost time for the Spring Festival, Yu Xiaotian still ordered each fleet to start inspection of its ships. The maintenance will start immediately. If the sails are replaced, the sails will be replaced immediately to ensure that each ship is in the best condition, and each ship is required to be guaranteed at any time. Keep a backup of a certain amount of ammunition to deal with emergencies that may occur at any time.

In addition, the warehouse management department of the director also began to count the various ammunition materials and food reserves stored in the warehouse to meet the needs at any time.

And at the same time, hidden posts and hidden cards have been added throughout the coast of Nanri Island, strengthening the vigilance throughout Nanri Island.

Fishermen, including fishermen on Nanri Island, were also notified that when they went to sea, they should closely observe the unknown ships on the sea around Nanri Island. Once found, they should immediately warn or inform them of nearby patrol boats to intercept and inspect them.

In short, before the Spring Festival, a string in the sea wolf that led the war was gradually tightened by Yu Xiaotian, until the people below began to gradually feel this strangeness, and the string in people's hearts gradually tightened.

When the sea wolf secretly began to prepare for war, it was far away in the Wujiao Bay of Dongshan Island on the southeast coast of Zhangzhou Prefecture in southern Fujian. At this time, hundreds of various ships gathered.

These ships are only large and small, large with a displacement of about 400 tons, and there are also two three-masured sand boats, but most of them are still various boats with a displacement of 100 tons to 200 tons, mainly bird boats and sea vicang boats, which are more suitable for plundering at sea. It is slightly faster and relatively flexible. In addition, it also has a certain loading capacity.

So the ships used by pirates are also selected according to their needs. In Wujiao Bay, in addition to these 100 relatively large ships, there are also a considerable number of smaller ships, the number of which is not less than 100, mostly fishing boats with displacement of 40 to 50 tons or 120 tons.

These ships are nominally under the jurisdiction of Chu Cailao, but in fact, things are much more complicated.

There is a huge difference in organizational structure between Chu Cai Lao Group and Sea Wolf Group. Although the scale of Sea Wolf Group is not small, in essence, all the power belongs to Xiaotian. The rest of the people are all subordinate to his command, which is a well-structured organization.

However, Chu Cai Lao Group belongs to a relatively loose organizational structure. The main body is led by Chu Cai Lao, but there are many shopkeepers under him. These shopkeepers are actually a group of independent pirate groups. Each shopkeepers have their own subordinates, and their subordinates are not directly to Chu Cai Lao. Instead, it belongs to each shopkeeper and is under the orders of these shopkeepers.

And these shopkeepers are more like the way some shareholders buy shares. They are ordered by Chu Cai Lao's dispatch. In peacetime, they fight separately and act in the sea occupied by Chu Cai Lao. When Chu Cai Lao has something to do, they will gather them together and do some big things together.

Like before, Chu Cai attacked and plundered the coast. At the end of Wanli, he gathered thousands of people in a row of boats to attack Jieyang, and then attacked Yangcheng. Later, Jieyang was the second offender, which was the group that gathered in this way.

In fact, the number of ships and subordinates that are really directly under Mr. Chu Cai is not as many as outsiders think. The number of ships that are really directly subordinate to him is only 70 or 80, and his men are only 2,000.

However, because he went to sea early, he began to wander on the sea during the Wanli period, with a large reputation and strong strength, so a large number of pirates gathered under his men and obeyed his orders, which made Chu Cailao's strength look very huge at this time. Ordinary people really dare not provoke this man.

Even the local government along the coast of Guangdong in Fujian can't avoid it. It's easy to provoke this man for fear of attracting revenge. With Mr. Chu Cai's current strength, he really has the ability to capture a county. This is not a joke.

So he brazenly gathered here on Dongshan Island, but the Ming army on the nearby South Australia Island could only close one eye and did not dare to send troops to suppress it.

In fact, he is not arrogant. Although Daming had a deputy general on Nan'ao Island at this time, he was called the deputy commander-general stationed in South Australia. There were also officers and soldiers stationed in Guangdong and Fujian, building water villages, and sent warships.

However, after Wanli, with the gradual reduction of the Japanese disaster in the coastal area, coupled with the fact that the court and the government did not pay attention to military equipment, by the end of Wanli, the armaments in the whole coastal area, especially in the south, were basically abandoned. If this was not the case, the Ming Dynasty would still retain the same sailors under Qi Jiguang. With Lu Shi's words, the Dutch and Spaniards did not dare to be so arrogant. A small battle of Penghu became such a virtue.

So the garrison on South Australia Island is actually basically abandoned at this time. The officers and soldiers of the two battalions are seriously short. Nominally, the officers and soldiers of the two battalions are officially staffed with more than 4,000, but in fact, by this time, the shortage has exceeded 80%, and only less than 1,000 troops are stationed on South Australia Island. Although it cannot be said that they are famous. It's dead, but it doesn't have any combat effectiveness anymore.

It is said that in the era of Qi Jiguang, the number of warships of various types of warships was as high as 1,500, and there were as 1,500 soldiers. However, with the end of Qi Jiguang's era, Fujian and Guangdong basically did not build any new ships here.

The warships left at that time could only be soaked in silent decay. Later, although some ships were forced to be built to maintain, these newly built warships were also built with shipboards removed from the dilapidated old ship.

At present, the number of available warships on the island of South Australia is less than ten, and they are still some broken boats, and they are unable to do some anti-smuggling work, not to mention letting the deputy generals of South Australia lead the army to sea to suppress the old.

It can be said that after the Apocalypse, Zhejiang, Fujian, Liangguang and other coastal governments have lost their actual control of the sea. The whole sea has basically become a paradise for pirates, and the officers and soldiers can only hold a limited number of important places. Not to mention that the coast is open, it is basically the same. Otherwise, Longqing Kaihai is only a place in Zhangzhou Yuegang, but the sea merchants in other places still go straight to the sea.

And if that's not the case, this time the Dutch occupied Penghu would not have exhausted the troops and ships of Fujian Province. After fighting for a year or two, Nanjuyi reluctantly "exile" the Dutch from Penghu, which is really pathetic.

So it is not surprising that Chu Cai Lao regards Dongshan Island as his temporary nest, and even it is not impossible for him to lead his troops to capture South Australia Island.

He is the overlord here. Even if several warships of the officers and soldiers come, when he does not see such a battle of masts and sails in Wujiaowan, he will definitely be scared to turn around and leave.

Wujiaowan is very lively, and it can be said that it is even more lively on the shore. Pirates in various costumes set up messy sheds or huts on the shore, and there are no rules scattered everywhere on the shore, and those pirates are also scattered during this period, either in groups of three or five, or dozens of people gathered together, even As for hundreds of people gathered around, they either drank or gambled, and no one restrained them.

This makes it easy to think of the scene of the Journey to the West Sun Monkey's Huaguo Mountain. There is no discipline and no one to control them and let them be lively on the island.

Even the crying of women came from some places, and some pirates pressed some of the women they robbed to the ground and began to vent wantonly.

In some places, there are a large number of ragged people. These people are covered with dirt, their faces are yellow and thin, and their heads are depressed and imprisoned in some circles. There are men, women, old and young, including people wearing cloth clothes and a small number of people wearing silk brocade clothes, but they have a commonality, that is, ten I'm weak. It seems that I haven't had a decent meal for a long time.

And these people are all meat tickets. When Chu Cai's old men looted the coastal villages and towns, they were kidnapped back. After these meat tickets returned here for screening, those who had oil and water to fish will send people to send letters to their families according to the contact method of the meat ticket confession, asking them to pay a ransom to redeem meat tickets. .

However, some poor poor people are left on the island to work hard for Mr. Chu Cai and do all kinds of work for Mr. Chu until they are exhausted. Sometimes once Mr. Chu Cai needs manpower, he will directly force these meat tickets that have no money to redeem to join him.

As for the women in the tied meat ticket, not to mention, they will basically be used as tools of *, wantonly abused and abused until they get tired of playing, and then find a place to sell them. Sometimes these women will be sold to land through secret channels, and sometimes they will simply faint by the ship. Ocean, such as Manila, Batavia and other places.

There are many former businessmen in the mainland who have settled in the local area, open up wasteland or do business. They are very rich in their hands. Although they can also buy some female slaves in the local area, those black and thin South Asian women are not as popular as these women in the land. Once these If women pull them there to sell, they can often sell it at a fairly good price.

So * women are also a way to make money for pirates such as Chu Cai.

And those children who are caught will soon be put on land to enter the market and sold to some rich families as servants or maids.

In short, pirates like Chu Cailao are basically like locusts. Scraping the ground is not only robbing property, but also the local population will be looted by them.

However, in addition to some temporary residences built by these scattered shopkeepers on the island, there is also a stockade on the island. This stockade should be an abandoned barracks. In the early years, there were also officers and troops stationed on Dongshan Island to guard against the Japanese, but by now, it has long been abandoned and was occupied by Chu Cai Lao. , became his old camp.

On the second day of the National Day holiday, brothers who have monthly tickets in their hands, please help leave the monthly tickets to me! Thank you very much! In addition, thank you for the reward of Eagle Wu and Hulu Snoring Brothers! Good start! Good omen! Thank you very much!)