After completing the scheduled peace negotiation tasks in Jinling and Donghu, Guo Duanduo arrived in Shouchun in early December and temporarily stayed in Shouchun to coordinate the transfer of reinforcement materials.
Although the other side of Shouchun is Yingzhou controlled by Xu Mingzhen, it leads to Xuzhou, the north of Ruzhou and the Yingzhou territory through the tributary Jialu River (Chankou), and the Shaying River (Yingshui) connected with the Yellow River.
Huaikou is located in Yingzhou on the other side of Shouchun.
For six to seven million kilograms of grain and other materials every month, shipping by water is always the most trouble-free and labor-saving method.
Otherwise, not to mention the need to recruit tens of thousands of civilians, tens of thousands of mules, horses and corresponding carts to travel north and south in an endless stream, and a large number of civilians must be recruited to ensure that the post roads and horse roads along the way are smooth, which will waste people and money.
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The borrowing of reinforcements from Tangyi was extremely important for the Hehuai Allied Forces' operations on the west flank at this time, and it also involved the transit from Qiao and Ying states.
In addition, Liang Chu made a peace agreement, and some of the Liang Army in Guanzhong would return from Liangzhou on merchant ships of the Chishan Hui, and Shouchun was also the designated transit point.
As a minister-level official of the Liang Kingdom, Guo Duanduo naturally had to stay in Shouchun temporarily to supervise everything in such difficult times to avoid anything going wrong.
On the Tangyi side, Tian Cheng, who is also the governor of Shouzhou, and military intelligence staff officers such as Wang Che, who are responsible for the affairs of the Central Plains, Heshuo and other northern areas, mainly handle the handover with Guo Duanduo.
Shouchun has had a very important strategic position and military value since the Qin and Han Dynasties. It is located at the hub of water and land transportation, has a natural environment that is conducive to defense, has fertile water and soil, and is rich in products. It has always been the focus of competition among all parties during the great chaos in the Central Plains.
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The strategic status of Shouchun and Huaixi was slightly reduced after the large-scale construction of the Eastern Grand Canal in the previous dynasty and serious siltation of the Yuxi River (Ruxushui) and Anfeng Canal leading from Chaohu Lake to the Yangtze River.
If we look at it from the perspective of the entire Jianghuai and the land of Hehuai, the core of water transportation between the Hehuai and Jianghuai is still the east-line waterway dominated by Hangou (Shanyangdu), but from the perspective of Tangyi or Huaixi, from the perspective of Tangyi or Huaixi,
The Yuxi River passes through Chaohu Lake, and the Feishui River connects the Yangtze and Huaihe Rivers. This waterway can be said to be the lifeline of Huaixi.
In the past three or four years, Han Qian has spared no effort in dredging and widening the Kuanyu River waterway. After repairing the Anfeng Canal at the beginning of the year, he has not stopped dredging the Anfeng Canal and the more than 200 miles of waterway from the Feishui River to Chaohu Lake.
A regular task was assigned to departments in counties and townships along the coast for continued execution.
Han Qian wanted to further build the Yuxi River, Chaohu Lake, and Feishui River into the core waterway connecting the Yangtze and Huaihe Rivers, so that East Lake could surpass Yangzhou based on its strategic geographical location.
As the north entrance of this core waterway, Shouchun's importance in Tangyi's territory in the future goes without saying.
Of course, before that, Shouchun was the seat of Emperor Tianyou in his early years when he was appointed as the Jiedushi of Huainan. After that, it was the seat of Xu Mingzhen's appointment as the Jiedushi of Shouzhou and the seat of the government office.
The Shouchun City is vast, and the outer city is called Guo City or Luo City, with a circumference of thirteen miles and a city wall made of rammed earth.
When the Shouzhou Army withdrew, nearly 60,000 people lived in Guocheng and cultivated nearly 400,000 acres of fields inside and outside Guocheng.
The inner city is the Zicheng or the Golden City. On Thursday, the city wall is covered with bricks and stones, which is high and steep. There is a deep moat outside the city wall, which can be said to be impregnable.
Shouchun City relies on Bagong Mountain to the north, and the Beifeishui River passes around the city from the east. There are many channels to divert water into Guochun for farmland irrigation and daily life in Guochun. There are also six solid camps built inside and outside Guochun.
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More than twenty miles to the north from Shouchun City, on the northern foothills of Bagong Mountain, is the most dangerous place in the middle reaches of the Huaihe River, known as the first gorge of the Huaihe River, the Xiaoshi Mountain (Xiaishikou).
The Huaihe River flows from west to east, and after reaching the western foot of Bagong Mountain, it is blocked by the mountains, turns to the northwest, and continues to flow eastward through Xiashi Mountain.
The Huaihe River comes in a mighty way. The section of the river that flows through the Xiashikou is narrowed by cliffs on both sides and is only 70 feet wide at its narrowest point. As a result, the upper reaches of the Huaihe River flood every year in summer and autumn, and the narrow Xiashikou cannot discharge water in time.
Large-area flood detention zones are often formed in the upper reaches on both sides of the river, which severely damages agricultural production.
Xu Mingzhen built two fortified forts on both sides of Xiashi Mountain. At the same time, he built another fort at the western foot of Bagong Mountain facing the gentle slope of the Huaihe River to protect the pass between Dongxiashi and Shouchun and prevent the enemy from entering from the other side.
The Huaihe River was forcibly crossed; while Fengtai City was located only twelve or three miles east of Xiashikou.
Such a dense group of city fortresses - most of them have survived for thousands of years. Emperor Tianyou and Xu Mingzhen mostly repaired and strengthened the ruins or ruins - plus Xiashikou, Bagong Mountain,
The special geographical location and terrain of the Huaihe River, the Feishui River in the northeast of the city, and Wabudang constitute Shouchun's unique and tight defense system that is easy to defend but difficult to attack.
Before Liang Chu founded the country, they frequently fought battles north and south of the Huaihe River. For more than thirty years, Liang Jun crossed the river from Huaixi to the south many times, but never once could he successfully tear apart Shouchun's complete defense system.
If Xu Mingzhen did not take the initiative to withdraw from Shouchun City this time, Han Qian could only capture Huoqiu and Fengtai first, then occupy Bagong Mountain, cut off the communication between Shouchun City and Xiashikou, and then besiege the soldiers and civilians in the city.
Otherwise, if they really had to attack Shouchun City directly, the Tangyi Army would not know how many casualties they would have to pay.
Shouchun has crisscrossed streets and alleys inside and outside the city, with well-organized houses and numerous shops along the streets. There are also dozens of craftsmen's workshops of various sizes within Guochun.
Shouchun has long been the economic, political, military and cultural center of Huaixi.
At present, Tangyi has stationed more than 8,000 infantry and navy troops in Shouchun. Han Qian has also transferred thousands of craftsmen, craftsmen and family members to Shouchun to restore Shouchun's craftsmanship, which mainly focuses on armor and weapons.
In addition to factory production, it is also determined that a fourth comprehensive school will be established in Shouchun after the year, in addition to Qianyang, Chenzhong and Donghu.
In addition to the governor Tian Cheng, the governor Shi, Sima, Zhu Caojun and the Shouchun County magistrate were all capable officials personally selected by Han Qian. Considering that Xu Mingzhen was not so honest, Wang Che temporarily settled in Shouchun, which was a long-term undertaking.
His job was to identify how many of the 60,000 people in Shouchun were secretly sent by Xu Mingzhen to lurk in secret rooms.
After the East Lake Levee in Tangyi, a new large-scale water conservancy project, Longchishan Weir Lake, will start construction at the northern foot of Longchishan southwest of Shouchun City later this year.
Southwest of Shouchun City, that is, the Longchi Mountain area located west of Beishui River and at the junction of western Shouzhou and Huozhou, is the remnant of Huaiyang Mountain.
There are criss-crossed peaks and ridges, especially the east, south, and west sides where the terrain is higher, while the north side is low-lying and slopes toward the Huaihe River. During the summer and autumn rainy seasons, flash floods occur, causing severe flooding in the Huaibin area. Roads, houses,
The fields were washed away.
When the rainy season passes, or the rains are not strong during the rainy season, the Bei Feishui River and the streams originating from the depths of the Huaiyang Mountains will be blocked by the long peaks such as Longchi Mountain, and irrigation will not be possible there, and the water will often be irrigated.
Drought occurs.
Among the thousands of miles of fertile wilderness in Huaixi, this area between Shou and Huo was the only one that was extremely poor even in the peaceful times. Post roads and Chi roads on the south bank of the Huai River were built avoiding this area.
The Engineering and Construction Department plans to build a weir and dike in the low-lying area at the northern foot of Longchi Mountain to collect the streams and canals from the upper reaches of the mountain into a large lake artificially dammed in front of the weir and dike to regulate the water resources in the north during dry and rainy seasons so that they can be reclaimed.
Irrigating hundreds of thousands of acres of fields, effectively controlling frequent local floods and droughts
It will also ensure the cultivation and high yield of the existing farmland in the west wing of Shouchun City.
Of course, this is the first step in Han Qian's plan to control Shouzhou on a large scale. The flood detention problem of the Huaihe River passing through Xia Shikou has been left to this day since the time of Dayu's flood control in ancient times - legend has it that Xia Shikou was opened by Dayu with one axe.
This is not without a solution. Excavate a flood diversion channel on the south side of Bagong Mountain to divert water from the upper reaches of the Huaihe River into Wabu Dang downstream of the Bei Feishui River, and then from Wabu Dang into the Huaihe River waterway downstream.
Just to form a flood diversion of sufficient scale, this section of the flood diversion canal is expected to be about fifty or sixty miles. Judging from the current standards, the amount of excavation work is too huge. Han Qian will not consider this issue for the time being. He would rather build it in Xu Mingzhen
On the basis of the south embankment built in the early years, the embankment continued to be strengthened to release the retained flood water to Yingzhou on the north bank.
Xu Mingzhen cannot be said to be sinister. The Changhuai South Embankment was built by Xu Mingzhen after he became the governor of Shouzhou. Unless in the future, the flood diversion issues on both sides of the north and south banks need to be considered as a whole, and the excavation of flood diversion channels should be considered.
After regaining Shouchun, Huoqiu, and Fengtai, Tangyi did not add new counties in the buffer zone with the Shouzhou Army. However, it opened more than 20 refugee camps according to local conditions, and has already accepted people fleeing famine from the north bank.
The more than 70,000 old, weak, women and children who arrived - the vast majority of the young men were forcibly captured by the Hehuai Liang Army or the Shouzhou Army along the way - were concentrated to provide food, accommodation and the most basic medical care.
Among them, nine refugee camps are located around Longchi Mountain, housing nearly 40,000 refugees. This is to facilitate the recruitment of sufficient labor force on the spot when building the Longchi Mountain Weir Lake.
In terms of organizing poor people at the grassroots level, Tangyi has long been proficient in organizing.
Each refugee camp only dispatched a dozen staff, including chiefs, doctors, engineers, academicians, secretaries, and assistants selected from Liyang Academy, so one camp could accommodate three to four thousand people, with the elderly, weak, women and children as the majority.
The Lord’s camp is managed in good order.
In addition to building fixed enclosures nearby and transforming the living environment, a very small number of young men, the largest proportion of young women, and teenagers over fourteen years old will be organized into corps, and some basic training will be conducted to prepare them.
Preparations will be made for the Longchishan Weir Lake construction to begin later this year.
Compared with people fleeing famine and starvation, the supply of materials in the refugee camp is quite sufficient. The main labor force will initially guarantee a daily ration of one and a half pounds of brown rice - if you really go to the embankment to perform high-intensity work, the standard will be raised, and the old and weak will
and children are provided with one pound of rations per day, and the food is improved as much as possible based on local conditions, and some necessary oils and fats are provided. Junior schools are also set up in the camps to accept literacy and calculus for teenagers aged ten to fourteen years old.
Except for the refugee camp near Longchi Mountain, the establishment of other refugee camps is integrated with the construction of large and medium-sized water conservancy facilities to be started in the local area.
The technical work of providing work-for-relief services has long been abandoned by Tangyi.
Guo Duanduo was over forty years old, and his father was a guest on the staff of Liang Taizu. Unfortunately, Liang died of illness before Liang Guo was founded. In his early years, he accompanied Zhu Yu by his side.
At the age of eighteen, Zhu Yu led more than a hundred of his subordinates to lead the Luozhou governor, and Guo Duanduo was among them.
At that time, Heluo had been devastated by repeated bloody wars for many years, leaving only ruins and all counties destroyed. When Zhu Wen was granted the title of King of Liang, the Heluo area had less than 10,000 registered households. It was Zhu Yu who recruited the refugees.
Eighteen counties were established, and in just three years, more than 300,000 households were repopulated, and nearly 20,000 hectares of land were restored. At one time, all the food supplies for the Bianjing armies depended on Heluo.
At that time, Guo Duanduo felt that it was unreasonable for Taizu not to pass the throne to His Majesty.
He stayed in Shouchun for more than ten days and had passed through Huaixi before. Even though he was more inclined to His Majesty in his heart, he also deeply felt that the world is huge and there are not many people who are like each other to Your Majesty.
