The fleet set off from Jinhai on the fourth day of February and arrived at Hecheng on the 17th, detouring to Danluo Island and stopping for two days.
The situation in the Central Plains is becoming increasingly chaotic, and trade routes are blocked. Not only Jiangdong County's cotton silk, cane sugar, japonica rice, porcelain, tea and other bulk commodities are unsaleable, but also the raw materials such as wood, iron ore, and coal that Jiangdong needs may even be eliminated.
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In addition to the Jinhai grain road, Linfu will also directly open a route between Chongzhou and Jeju.
Lin Fu plans to use Danluo Jeju Port as a transit station to dump bulk commodities from Jiangdong County to Kyushu, Honshu, Korea and other places. He is also considering importing raw materials such as timber, iron ore, and coal from Kyushu, Honshu, Korea, and other places.
Sun, Zhou and other 19 maritime merchants moved southward with more than 3,000 people, including their families and dependents, and more than 2,000 craftsmen and their families were included in the migration.
Except for the Sun and Zhou tribes, whose immediate branches are relatively wealthy, the distant branches do not receive much care, and there are many poor people.
Although Danluo is far away in a foreign land, including the craftsmen, there are still more than 30 households and more than 180 people who are willing to stay in Jeju to cultivate this wasteland obtained from the Danluo people.
In order to put off the Danluo people's vigilance, Lin Fu did not directly set up an inspection department in Jeju Port. He handed over all military and civil affairs to Ge Changgen. He transported more than a hundred high-quality horses from Danluo Island and returned to Chongzhou across the sea.
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The transportation capacity of the Blackwater Ocean Route is not only related to the total loading capacity of the ship, but also the loading and unloading capacity of the port is also a limiting factor.
The current total shipping capacity of Heishuiyang Shipyard in the open sea reaches 80,000 stone, and there are 96 large and medium-sized sea-going ships with two masts and above 500 stone.
So many ships only use the berths of Guanyin Beach and Chongcheng Port (including Nanya Pier) to load and unload rice. Even if there is no shortage of labor, even if they work around the clock, and no accidents occur, it will take seven or eight days to load and unload once.
----This does not take into account the situation of water camp warships and other commercial ships or ferries berthing and occupying pier berths.
The expansion of the port takes time. Lin Fu will naturally use the port resources of Hecheng and Jiangmen at this time, and even build an inland river terminal in Jiuhua.
In the coastal areas between the Yangtze River and the Huaihe River, due to the support of the tide, the sand and siltation near the sea are shallow, which is not conducive to the berthing of large ships. However, due to the law of tidal movement, there are also a small number of deep-water channels between the shallow siltation and the siltation of large ships.
It can be berthed directly on the shore, becoming a rare natural harbor between the Jianghuai River and the Huaihe River.
As early as thousands of years ago, local people discovered the Hecheng Waterway from the silt in the offshore sea, where fishing boats gathered and dispersed. The Hecheng Fishing Port was formed much earlier than the Hecheng Grassland, and hundreds of years earlier than the excavation of the Yan River.
Year.
After the dredging of the Yunyan River is completed, Hecheng will be connected to Chongcheng through the Yunyan River and the Xishan River waterway, which is a hundred miles closer than bypassing Jiangmen. It will become another important port fortress besides Chongcheng.
In addition to Xinchong City and Xisha Island, a considerable number of those migrating south will be resettled in Hecheng, Jiangmen, Jiuhua and other fortresses.
Lin Fu, Sun Fengyi, Zhou Guangnan and more than 200 southward movers settled in Hecheng landed at Hecheng Port. The others continued southward with the fleet, bypassing Shajiao in the southeast of Hecheng and entering the Yangtze River from Jiangmen.
Lin Fu's return journey has not yet been decided, and Chongzhou cannot arrange a reception in advance. Apart from Wang Chengfu, only Lin Mengde, Li Shuyi, Sun Jingtang, Ge Siyu and others who were organizing the dredging of the Salt River nearby came after hearing the news.
See you in Crane City.
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Compared with the severe cold in the north, Chongzhou in mid-February is no longer so cold.
Lin Fu, wearing a green shirt and jacket, stood on the seawall and introduced the people and scenery of Hecheng to Sun Fengyi, Zhou Guangnan and others.
"Compared with before the war, a rammed earth wall was built outside Hecheng Fortress. Now it has become a large city with more than 400 steps vertically and more than 600 steps horizontally, with a dock inside and a coastal port outside.
"In terms of city, Hecheng is much larger than Xinchong City," Lin Fu said with a smile, "Wang Chengfu is the inspector of Hecheng Division, so he should introduce the situation here to everyone..."
Song Xiaobo was the real chief officer of Hecheng, and Wang Chengfu's inspection of the Hecheng Division was Lin Fu's personal arrangement. He came to greet him in a polite manner, and said goodbye first in an honest manner.
Wang Chengfu bowed to Lin Fu and other princes, and said: "Although Hecheng is large in scale, it is far from a majestic city and strong. Chongzhou has heavy rains in summer and autumn, and the soil is soft. The city walls are only made of rammed earth, which is strong.
If it is not enough, it is easy to collapse, and it needs to be covered with green bricks. In addition, the seaside of Hecheng is vulnerable to strong winds and waves. Next, the seawall must be reinforced, and large areas of mixed forests must be planted inside and outside the seawall to prevent sea winds.
Ground protection and berms——When the real new Crane City is completed, it will take a long time and continuous investment."
"In addition to protecting Hecheng from wind and tide, the seawall and sea-proof forest belt can continue to extend southward. Those tidal flats that are barren and susceptible to flooding by sea tides can be transformed into fertile farmland," Lin Fu told Zhou Guangnan, Sun Fengyi and others.
Said, "I don't agree with you buying fields in Chongzhou Circle, but if you want to invest money to build seawalls and transform this large tidal flat into mulberry and cotton fields, I support it with both hands..."
In addition to the pastures, nearly half of the land in Hecheng is coastal beaches and swamps. If we really put a lot of effort into cultivating it, it would be easy to acquire another million acres of land besides the pastures.
It took half a year to reclaim Xisha Island, and nearly 160,000 acres of fertile land such as mulberry, linen, cotton, rice, and wheat were reclaimed. However, Lin Fu invested more than 200,000 taels of silver before and after, and the rice grains transported to the island alone cost 240,000 taels.
It is so huge that it requires nearly 30,000 people to work hard for a year and a half to achieve such results.
During the Central Plains and Shandong wars, a large number of refugees flocked southward and there was no shortage of labor. However, Lin Fu wanted to concentrate his resources at this time to build the Jiangdong Left Army and the Jinghai Sea Camp. He did not have the large-scale construction of seawalls and reclamation in the east of Hecheng.
The capital of the deserted beach.
Lin Fu did not want Sun, Zhou and other clans moving south to compete for land with the locals in Chongzhou, but pushing them to come to Hecheng to build seawalls and reclaim wastelands would be profitable and would not cause conflicts between clans moving south and local forces.
Lin Mengde smiled and said: "Brothers Sun and Zhou really want to go to Xisha Island first to see and fight with the sky, which will be endless fun. For a deserted island by the river in two years, we were offered 160,000 to 70,000 yuan.
The arrival of fertile fields has left many people who passed through Xisha Island again dumbfounded... Everyone in the world says that the master's plans are on the battlefield, but they don't know that the place outside the battlefield is where true martial arts can be seen."
Sun Fengyi and Zhou Guangnan were both older than Lin Mengde, so they treated each other as brothers; Sun Fengyi and Zhou Guangnan all knew that Lin Mengde was actually one of the core figures in Chongzhou, so they responded humbly: "We are deeply aware of your master's plan, and we are deeply aware of it."
I feel it.”
Although none of them have been to Chongzhou, they were deeply involved in many things Lin Fu did in Jinhai.
Among other things, Lin Fu broke with tradition and forcibly planted rice and wheat on both sides of the Guoshui River, thus increasing grain production by nearly three times, which deeply affected them.
The amount of money transferred from Jinhai to Chongzhou will be considerable. Taking the Zhou family as an example, they occupied nearly 80,000 acres of fertile land on both sides of the Woshui River after the war. Although the northern area produces less grain per mu, the price of grain is high and the price of land is high.
Not a little lower than Chongzhou. Even if the 80,000 acres of fertile land were disposed of at a low price, three to four hundred thousand taels of cash could still be transferred.
Nineteen maritime merchant clans have moved south. In addition to the previous 300,000 taels, almost one to two million taels of silver will be transferred to Chongzhou one after another.
Naturally, the nineteen maritime merchant clans would not donate the money directly to Lin Fu for no reason to build the Jiangdong Left Army and Jinghai Camp; nor would Lin Fu want the money to settle in the silver vaults of the clans that moved south.
Only when money is used can it be counted as capital and increase in value. Only then can Lin Fu continuously withdraw tax money from the increased value as funds to support the army.
The expansion of shipyards, shipbuilding yards and supporting workshops, workshops and docks will immediately require an investment of 300,000 taels of cash capital. Other workshops and factories in Chongzhou have only begun to have a foundation, and they cannot undertake hundreds of thousands of projects in a short period of time.
The injection of tens of thousands of taels of cash capital, large-scale seawall construction and wasteland reclamation are undoubtedly good areas for the inflow of cash capital.
In this way, Chongzhou can produce more food, accommodate more displaced households, and have a broader base for recruiting soldiers.
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Lin Fu, Sun, Zhou and others only stopped briefly in Hecheng and headed west along the post road on the south bank of the Yanyan River.
The dredging project of the Yan River has been going on for nearly four months. The construction sites on both sides of the river are so busy that even the urgent opening of the Tianjin-Sea Grain Road last year to solve the grain shortage in Gyeonggi Province was nothing more than that. Sun, Zhou and others were amazed.
It can be said that the opening of the Tianjin-Sea Grain Road was an emergency move by the imperial court to mobilize all the resources that could be mobilized at the time, while the dredging of the Yan River was promoted by Lin Fu alone in Chongzhou.
In addition to Xisha Island, Chongzhou resettled more than 26,000 households and more than 46,000 young men. About 5,000 young men were incorporated into the Jiangdong Left Army. The remaining young men were mobilized to work on the embankments. In addition, there are
After the war, more than 10,000 Dingzhuang refugees poured into Chongzhou, as well as more than 20,000 Dingzhuang residents in Chongzhou. There were more than 70,000 Dingzhuang people alone. Together with the old, weak, women and children who cooperated on both sides of the strait, the labor force on both sides of the Salt River reached
There are 120,000 people and more than 6,000 mules, horses and livestock.
In addition to being paid in rice grains, they are also paid by reducing taxes.
Ding Zhuang will be paid two and a half kilograms of japonica rice for each work he does. However, if Ding Zhuang works one work, he will be paid three kilograms and a half of japonica rice in this year's summer and autumn grain rent tax collection; women and children will be paid half as much;
The mules and horses participating in the dredging work were given fifteen kilograms of grass and two kilograms of feed every day, which was counted as one work.
The adoption of reduced taxes and remuneration is to encourage workers whose families have a surplus of food to receive as little pay as possible to relieve financial pressure. In fact, the county only needs to pay 20% of the interest.
Not counting the investment in mules, horses and livestock and a large number of dredging tools, the amount of money and rice distributed for work and food alone in April amounted to 200,000 shi.
Such a large-scale dredging of the Yanyan River will not only test Chongzhou's financial resources, but also its organizational and mobilization capabilities.
In two months, Chongzhou will enter the rainy season, and the Yanyan River will be dredged before then. By then, Jiyun-class warships will be able to pass through the Xishan River and Yanyan River to go deep into the hinterland of Chongzhou to participate in operations and defense.
The Xishan River and the Yunyan River have truly become Chongzhou's outer borders, and the warships of the Jinghaihai Camp can also quickly transport and penetrate into the Huaihe and Lianghuai areas through the Yunyan River, Xishan River, Beiguan River, Gaoyou Lake, Hongzepu, and the Huaihe River -
---The strategic terrain of Chongzhou will be greatly improved.
In the evening, Cao Zi'ang, Hu Zhiyong, Sun Jingxuan and others came from Chongcheng to greet them. They also brought good news: "Madam Ru gave birth to a son last night. He is fat and fat. They say he weighs eight pounds. At night
The crying was so loud that the East Government Office heard it; we came here to greet you, your grandson, Zhou and other brothers, and also to congratulate you..."