Because the dock area is so close to Leizhou Peninsula, on the third day after that, some businessmen took a lucky boat and rushed to Qiongshan County in a dusty journey.

This is a group of iron merchants from Guangdong Foshan.

At this time, the iron industry there had been ordered by Governor Guangdong to be taken over by the local government. The main purpose was to prevent iron materials from flowing into the territory occupied by the Qing army.

But by this time, even the emperor, governors and even a large number of princes were captured and killed by the Qing army. To be honest, the prestige of the Ming Dynasty had dropped to the extreme at this time.

It was okay in the past. Although those businessmen risked their lives to make money, they were still somewhat afraid of government regulations.

But at this time, the entire Ming Dynasty was about to fall, so how could those merchants still fear the laws and orders of the local officials.

Besides, the officials at this time were almost always able to make money, and everyone could see that the Ming Dynasty was on the verge of collapse. If we don’t make more money at this time, after the dynasty changes, even if we want to make money, we may not have the chance.

Under such circumstances, those businessmen only need to give some money to the patrolmen guarding the traffic junctions, and all problems will be easily solved.

In the next period of time, it can be said that thousands of sails gather in Qiongshan.

After hearing the news, the merchants who came with goods made the inns in Qiongshan County become in short supply. After these merchants came here, in addition to selling the goods they brought to Chen Liuxiang, they also purchased many goods produced in the dock area.

Especially after the glass factory, salt field and soap factory in the dock area were put into full operation, Chen Liuxiang has completely liberalized the sale of such products.

You know, although there was some inventory in the dock area before, it was all from nowhere. Whether it was mirrors, salt, soap, medicated soap, etc., they were gone once they were sold out.

If it were not for the purpose of promoting modern life in the dock area and improving the sanitary conditions of the local indigenous people, and a large number of people in the house died due to disease and plague, the interim management committee would not agree to sell these things in large quantities.

It has to be said that for the people of the Ming Dynasty in this era, glassware including mirrors, salt, soap, medicated soap, toilet soap, etc. were all very attractive.

Let’s not talk about glassware. Since the continent of Europe is in the midst of the Thirty Years’ War, the number of glassware transported from the West has also decreased a lot, and crystal clear glassware has always been the favorite of wealthy businessmen in the south.

No one would be embarrassed to entertain guests in the living room without placing a few pieces of glassware produced in Thailand on the museum shelf in the living room.

In addition, since many salt fields have fallen to the Qing army, the price of salt in the Nanming region can be said to be rising steadily.

As for building new saltworks?

Haha, before the Qing army went south, those local officials had no such thoughts. Now that the war is raging, they are only thinking about how to protect their wealth, and they have no time to care about people's livelihood.

Anyway, for them, no matter how short of salt they are, they will never be short of salt.

As for soaps and scented soaps, they are basically the needs of wealthy families. As for ordinary people, they are looking forward to the price of food and the price of salt falling every day, so that the war will not burn their heads, such as washing clothes and so on.

For things, just use soap locust. There is no need to spend that wasted money.

In any case, as these merchants returned home with full loads, the name of Qiongshan County began to spread in the Nanming area.

With iron, saltpeter, sulfur, and charcoal, the second batch of recruits recruited by the military group were quickly armed.

At the same time, based on Sun Xuebin's request, the industrial group also temporarily put the issue of artillery on the research agenda.

No way, the key to developing the Shilu Iron Mine is to guard the mouth of the Changjiang River and the landing site. At the same time, the two patrol boats returning from Jiaozhi Hongji also brought back the requirements of the coal mine development team.

Prior to this, the Zheng court, which was entrenched in the north of Jiaozhi, had already had contact with the coal mine development team.

But this encounter was not pleasant.

During the negotiation process, the local government in Jiaozhi tried to arrest Chuan Zhong, but the coal mine development team, which had been wary for a long time, beat them to a pulp. Even the local county magistrate Zheng Fuyuan was arrested by the coal mine development team.

However, this also served as a reminder to the coal mine development team.

The ancients here are not something they can ask for at will. They will also come up with some conspiracies, or more likely, directly mobilize an army to conquer!

With the more than 200 infantrymen currently in the coal mine development team, it should not be a big problem to deal with more than 2,000 ancient armies on open terrain.

But if the situation escalates, in order to maintain his authority, the Zheng family in Jiaozhi will definitely not send only two or three thousand troops, and may even send more.

After all, in the first two years, he sent out 50,000 troops to attack the Mo regime in the south!

It seems that in order to drive away a group of thieves on the coastline, the Zheng regime would not mind dispatching tens of thousands of troops.

After all, Hongji is much closer than the Mo family's regime in the south.

Well, in any case, the fleet that returned with the two patrol boats brought back tangible benefits.

Thousand-ton cargo ships are filled with high-quality coal.

This was all due to the good idea of ​​Lei Jianming who was accompanying him. Thanks to the map, he easily found several large open-pit coal mines in the Hongji area. However, with just the few people in the coal mine development team, he wanted to do it in a short time.

It's simply impossible to fill a cargo ship with it.

Therefore, Lei Jianming's idea was to use food to recruit local indigenous people to mine.

The food is actually pretty good.

In this era, there were still forests everywhere in Hongji. Twenty people were sent out to hunt every day. With the reliability of the Thunderbolt 1646, they could easily harvest a large amount of meat every day. At the same time, the accompanying fishing boats could also catch a large amount of marine life.

In addition, Lei Jianming also sent a 500-ton fishing boat south to find ports to purchase grain.

After all, if you only eat fish and meat without eating staple food, not to mention the naturalized soldiers, even the time travelers will not be able to bear it.

After such a two-pronged approach, the news that a group of enthusiastic and generous maritime merchants came to Hongji Beach immediately spread.

In addition to only a dozen people defecting on the first day, in the following days, two to three hundred people defected every day. This situation lasted for ten days.

More than a thousand people were assigned to the open-pit layer of the coal mine. After the gunpowder pack made a loud noise, they would swarm up, waving their shovels to put a large amount of coal into the trolley, while more than a thousand other people

Then push the trolley along the repaired dirt road for more than a thousand meters, and push it to the steam engine crane at the temporary dock, and then the steam engine crane will send the coal into the cargo ship.
Chapter completed!