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With the support of naval artillery fire, Liu Meng's 40,000 troops captured Yanziji, northeast of Jinling City, in one fell swoop.
Yanziji is an important ferry and military stronghold in Nanjing. It has always been known as the first rock of the Yangtze River.
With the control of this important ferry and military fortress, the entire Jinling city was truly shrouded in the might of the 40,000 Qin troops.
The city of Nanjing is huge, with four layers of city walls: the palace city, the imperial city, the capital city, and the outer city.
The city wall of Beijing has a circumference of nearly 70 li, with Zhongshan Mountain in the east, Shitou in the west, Qinhuai River in the south, and Houhu Lake in the north. It is built with huge stone slabs and huge bricks, and is magnificent and very solid. The city base is about 45 feet wide, 90 feet at the widest point, and about 60 feet high. There are 13,616 battlements, 200 shelters, and 13 city gates.
The outer perimeter is about 130 li. Legend has it that after Zhu Yuanzhang built the capital, he took his sons to Zhongshan Mountain to observe the situation of the capital. They found that the palace was too close to Zhongshan Mountain. If cannons were set up on the mountain, the palace would be easily hit. In addition, some important commanding heights, such as Yuhuatai in the south and Mufushan in the north, were left outside the city, which was very unfavorable to the city defense.
Therefore, in the 23rd year of Hongwu, Zhu Yuanzhang ordered the construction of an outer city.
This outer city was mainly built using the loess hills outside Yingtianfu City. Only some walls were built in some weakly defended areas and 18 city gates were opened, so it is commonly known as the "earth city head". Zhongshan Mountain, Yuhuatai, Mufu Mountain, Xuanwu Lake and other places are all enclosed in it.
Hong Chengchou had only 24,000 troops in the city, and the outer circumference was more than 100 miles. In addition, there were no city walls in some places, just some loess hills, so it was difficult to defend with so few troops.
Liu Meng led his army to quickly capture the Gongyin Gate in the northeast. Hong Chengchou was forced to abandon the outer wall and deploy all his troops on the towering city walls of the capital. Anyway, he was not worried that the Qin army would bombard the imperial palace.
Liu Meng successfully occupied the outer city. He set up camp on the east bank of Xuanwu Lake and attacked the Taiping Gate, the north gate of the capital. At the same time, he divided his troops to attack the Shen Ce Gate in the northwest. In order not to disperse the troops too much, he did not send troops to attack other gates, but only sent a small number of troops to monitor.
The city wall is nearly sixty feet high and looks like a mountain. People standing on it feel like they are floating in the air.
The first problem facing the Qin army was the wide moat, the water source of which came from the Qinhuai River, Qingxi River, Jinchuan River and Xuanwu Lake. The wide moat surface, set against the tall and solid Nanjing city wall, was daunting.
But there are exceptions. When Zhu Yuanzhang built the Nanjing Imperial Palace, he took feng shui into consideration and used Longguang Mountain (now Fugui Mountain) of Purple Mountain as a backing. The eastern section of the north gate Taiping Gate had no moat because of the backing of the mountain.
General Liu Meng placed his main force outside Taiping Gate because he saw that this section of the city wall had no moat.
After the cannons were mounted, they immediately bombarded the Taiping Gate. Liu Meng did not expect that the cannons could knock down the solid and thick walls of Nanjing. He did this first to serve as a warning to others.
The outer enclosure was not completely deserted, but had hundreds of thousands of residents, including the Ministry of Justice, the Dali Temple, and the Metropolitan Procuratorate of Nanjing. They were all located by the Xuanwu Lake in the outer enclosure, and the lobby of the Metropolitan Procuratorate was used by Liu Meng as his headquarters.
It is said that Emperor Hongwu killed 200,000 to 300,000 people, and most of the executions were carried out at the Sanfasi on the east side of Xuanwu Lake. At night, there were often ghost cries outside Taiping Gate. But Liu Meng himself killed many people, so why would he be afraid of your ghost cries
Tens of thousands of Qin troops were like a black torrent, their weapons and cavalry full of murderous intent. Even ghosts and gods would flee.
The people in the outer area carried pots and drinks, and regardless of the roar of artillery fire, thousands of them came forward, put on their pigtails, changed into Hanfu, and came to reward the army with neat hats and hats, and some even offered to help the army carry arrows and stones.
Unlike the people in the outer areas who were jubilant, the people in the city were silent at this time. Hong Chengchou strictly ordered that no one should go out to the streets. The Qing army deployed troops to patrol every main street and strictly check for spies. Anyone with the slightest suspicion would be beheaded immediately.
Under this high-pressure situation, the people in the city could only hide in their homes, and there was no one on the street except the patrolling Qing army. But amid the oppression, people could not help but secretly feel happy.
The King of Qin finally fought back, finally fought back! The people of Nanjing had been looking forward to this for a long time.
When the Tartars came, Qian Qianyi and others took the lead in opening the gates and surrendering, and Nanjing did not shed much blood. But when the order to shave the hair came, nearly 10,000 people in Nanjing were killed for refusing to shave their heads. This shows that the order to shave the hair had touched people's bottom line.
The city can be conquered, the head can be cut off, but the hair cannot be shaved. If the city is conquered and the emperor is replaced, this is acceptable to the common people who are busy with their daily lives; but shaving the hair and changing clothes would turn them from Chinese people into barbarians, destroying their ancient traditions and cultural identity for thousands of years, and turning them from human beings into beasts.
People are hoping that someone can turn them from beasts back into humans, but now the only one who can bring hope to everyone is the King of Qin and his army.
And everyone will not forget that the King of Qin is from Jinling. During this period, when people walk through Shitou Lane, they can't help but take a closer look at the old house of the King of Qin.
The various "unusual" things about Qin Mu when he was a child were passed on by word of mouth among his neighbors, and his name as a child prodigy was once again talked about with relish. Some even said that when his mother gave birth to him, the whole house was filled with golden light.
In short, people were eagerly looking forward to it. Now, the Qin King's army has finally fought back, and the end of the Tartars has come. Listen, there are booming cannons from the Taiping Gate, and the death knell of the Tartars has sounded.
In the small courtyard inside Sanshan Gate, Huang Lianshan was extremely anxious. Hong Chengchou didn't care and strictly prohibited everyone from going out to the streets, which greatly restricted his actions. At this time, two members of Yebushou were arrested. No one knew what happened.
Although everyone has been communicating through a single line to prevent the entire system from being exposed after someone is arrested, now the communication channel between these two people has been cut off, so others don't have to worry about being exposed.
However, the time when these two people were arrested happened to be when the army was besieging the city. This was obviously planned in advance. Hong Chengchou might have other conspiracies.
At this critical juncture, the streets were blocked and no one was allowed to enter or exit. How could Huang Lianshan not be extremely anxious
He had been running Jinling for nearly two years, waiting for this day. If he failed in the end, even if Qin Mu did not blame him, he would find it difficult to accept such a result.
After finally waiting until dark, Huang Lianshan couldn't wait to release a few carrier pigeons, which quickly climbed over the back wall and disappeared into the night.
At this time, Hong Chengchou, after using all kinds of torture to get what he wanted from the two Ye Bushui, put on armor himself and brought his personal soldiers to the tower of Taiping Gate.
After nightfall, the Qin army's attack finally stopped temporarily. Looking around, there were camps stretching for ten miles outside Taiping Gate. Torches were lit on both sides of Xuanwu Lake like a sea of fire. The strong smell of gunpowder still filled the air above the city walls. The corpses on and under the city walls had not yet been buried, and the wounded were groaning like ghosts.
Bai Jiantu, who was in charge of guarding the Taiping Gate, came over and asked anxiously, "Master Hong, did you gain anything?"
Hong Chengchou didn't even make the slightest movement until he entered the city gate tower and had his personal soldiers guard the outside. Then he said softly, "There must be a traitor in the army. Don't show your hand first, so as not to alert the enemy. After the second watch, you will bring another 5,000 troops to the Zhengyang Gate in the south. I will wait for you in Zhengyang. Don't light torches when you go, try not to be discovered, have the soldiers monitor each other, and don't let anyone leave the team halfway."
Baiyintu said happily: "So it's settled. Good, good, let's discipline Qin Jun tonight."
Hong Chengchou said calmly: "It's too early to be happy now. We don't know whether Liu Meng will be fooled or not."
The lobby of the Censorate on the east bank of Xuanwu Lake was brightly lit. Liu Meng knew very well that the walls of Jinling City were high and thick, and it was impossible to break through them by normal means. He used the same trick he used under Anqing City and dug a tunnel.
But the siege during the day was real, and the artillery fire was extremely fierce. Only in this way could we put great pressure on the Qing army in the city and further undermine their morale.
In addition to digging tunnels, Liu Meng was waiting for an insider in the city. Huang Lianshan had been working hard in Nanjing for nearly two years and had placed many people in the Green Camp guarding the city. Now it depended on whether these people could play their role.
When you think of the insider, the insider will come.
At the beginning of the night watch, he suddenly saw his lieutenant general Jiang Yuan running into the hall with a letter and said to Liu Meng, "General Liu, this was just shot down from the city. It is a message sent by the insider in the city, saying that they will meet us at Zhengyang Gate at four o'clock tonight to enter the city."
"Bring it here so I can see it." Liu Meng snatched the letter and ordered, "Please ask Yan Gaofei to come over, quickly."
Yan Gaofei quickly rushed to the lobby. Liu Meng handed him the letter. He checked it and said, "This letter was indeed shot down by our people. It has the mark of "not being received at night..."
.(To be continued..)
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