At the foot of Huangzhu Mountain, a group of hungry people were dazed in separate simple wooden houses.
This simple wooden house was originally a newly built cowshed in Huangzhushan, but now it is a prisoner of war camp.
Two months ago, Prime Minister Liu Bagou proposed that the state unified the cattle in Huangzhu Mountain to keep the cattle in better condition. However, many villagers believed that the men in their families had finally robbed them from outside the mountain.
A cow comes back, and now you officials have to take it back. They will definitely not do it. The Tang Dynasty is a small country with few people, so naturally it cannot stand the torment. As soon as the villagers objected, Liu Bagou gave up the idea.
These newly built cowsheds were of no use until a large number of Ming army prisoners arrived three days ago.
The more than sixty prisoners needed a place to live and be kept under centralized custody. No other place was suitable, but this cowshed was more suitable.
Therefore, after some modifications by the prisoners themselves, these cowsheds became a prisoner camp with compartments.
On this day, Bai Yunqi had just finished the court meeting and received the "imperial edict" to officially take care of the prisoners, and then came to the prisoner camp excitedly.
As soon as he arrived at the prisoner camp, he couldn't wait to take out the recruitment note that he had discussed with Madam Bai before and announced it to the prisoners.
The recruitment conditions are very simple. As long as you are willing to surrender and join the Tang Dynasty King's Division and become a soldier of the Tang Dynasty, you can immediately receive the same treatment as a soldier of the Tang Dynasty.
What is this treatment?
One word: eat!
Two words: Eat enough!
No matter what era we are in, eating is always a top priority, especially in ancient times when food production was extremely low. Most ordinary people worked hard all their lives to eat enough, but this effort often failed to work and suffered.
Being cold and hungry is a common thing.
Nowadays, when they heard that joining the Tang Dynasty as a soldier, they would be able to have a full meal, even though they all knew that the Tang Dynasty was a group of rebels, many people were still tempted.
Although these ordinary prisoners of Ming army soldiers and Zeng Ziyun's thousand households are both hereditary, the former and the latter are not the same thing.
Hereditary officers, especially officers like Qianhu, lived a very comfortable life. Over the past hundred years, they were not only hereditary officers, but also gradually evolved into big landowners, while those ordinary soldiers gradually became
killed their tenants.
Therefore, to a certain extent, the contemporary garrison is actually a village. The thousand households are the landlords in the village, and the ordinary soldiers are tenants.
Those ordinary military households are even worse off than ordinary tenant households, because if the landlord collects rent too harshly, the tenant farmers can flee to other places to rent land from other landlords, but if they cannot, the military households will not allow them to escape.
After the mid-Ming Dynasty, ordinary military households had actually become serfs of the officers!
It may be difficult to intuitively understand how miserable the military households were, but just reading the literal meaning of how miserable the serfs were is enough.
A group of serfs heard that as long as they joined the Tang Dynasty and became rebels, they would be able to live a prosperous life. Many of them were tempted on the spot.
But still no one came out and agreed directly because they also had other worries, such as family members.
Bai Yunqi seemed to have seen their concerns and immediately said: "Don't worry, everyone, even if you join our Tang Dynasty King's Division, the Ming Army will not know about it, so you don't have to worry about the safety of your family.
And when I, the King of the Tang Dynasty, come out of the mountain, your family members will also become the people of the Tang Dynasty, and the Ming army will not be able to harm them!"
When Bai Yunqi said this, many people felt that this was really the case. They were captured as prisoners and even surrendered to the Tang Dynasty, but the imperial court didn't know about it.
At this time, although most of them still had various worries and were unwilling to agree, there were still a few people who made a decisive decision. After all, serving as a soldier is not a soldier. As long as you can have enough to eat, why not be a rebel?
At this time, a young man who looked to be only sixteen or seventeen years old among the captives stood up and said, "I am willing to submit!"
As soon as this young man stood up, more than a dozen people came out one after another to express their willingness to surrender, contribute to the Tang Dynasty's anti-thief cause, and contribute their own strength.
Although only a dozen of the more than sixty people expressed their willingness to join the Tang Dynasty family immediately, Bai Yunqi still showed a look of satisfaction.
Then it was announced that these newly surrendered people would become soldiers of the Tang Dynasty King's Standing Army, and would also be the leaders who would subsequently supervise the remaining prisoners.
Bai Yunqi organized the remaining fifty prisoners who refused to surrender into more than ten groups, and placed them under the jurisdiction of those soldiers who were the first to surrender. He also generously gave the titles of "Hundred Households" to the more than ten newly surrendered soldiers.
.
These soldiers heard it right, they are what the Ming army often calls "Hundred Households"!
Of course, the full complement of hundreds of households in the Ming army would have more than a hundred people, and a few would have dozens of people. But these new hundred households in front of them only have four or five people, and some even only have three.
Actually, he is just a corps commander.
But even so, when Bai Yunqi announced this, the dozen or so surrendering soldiers couldn't help but change their faces. This surprise came too fast. They had just surrendered and were already among the 100 households?
Wouldn't it take just a few days for them to be able to serve as commanders of thousands of households?
Not to mention, their idea is really right. The Tang Dynasty did not have many other things, but many official positions!
All civil servants were granted the title of prime minister, and all military generals were granted the title of general. This was a fine tradition of the Tang Dynasty since its founding more than a year ago.
As for the civil servants below the prime minister and the military attachés below the general, they are simply not worth mentioning.
Therefore, the thousands of households that these surrendering soldiers longed for were not a big deal. Li Xuan would be able to seal one per head tomorrow, and the supply was unlimited, so you could have as much as you wanted!
However, the Tang Dynasty was so weird, and those ordinary soldiers didn't know it. In their fixed concept, the positions of these hundreds of households were of the sixth rank, and the official officials of the court were extremely majestic.
And now, they are hundreds of households, sixth-grade military attachés of the Tang Dynasty. At the beginning, they were not able to adapt to their status as 'officials', but Bai Yunqi discovered within a few days that these surrendered
The soldiers seem to pay more attention to, and even protect the dignity and prestige of the officials than the original large group of bandits in Huangzhushan.
Especially when Bai Yunqi announced that in the future one thousand households would be selected from among the more than ten "hundred households", these more than ten "hundred households" who had just surrendered worked harder and transformed into officials more quickly.
He used various methods to force his prisoners to work.
Because the criteria for promotion are very simple, that is, whoever has the most work under his command will be regarded as the first thousand households in the Tang Dynasty.
So what appeared in front of Bai Yunqi soon was not a group of miserable serf soldiers, but more than a dozen energetic "Hundred Households".
Seeing them yelling at their former comrades and making the prisoners under their command work hard, Bai Yunqi was extremely excited, and he admired his sister, Mrs. Bai, even more.
Madam Bai had told him a few days ago that at the beginning, there would definitely not be many people willing to surrender, but Madam Bai also told him that it didn't matter.
When he asked why, Mrs. Bai said this: No comparison, no harm!
At first, Bai Yunqi didn't know what this meant, but now he understood what it meant.