Chapter 993 1084 Landing

Chapter 993 1084 Landing

Liaoluo Bay is located on the southeast coast of Kinmen, Fujian.

The fierce battle that broke out in this sea area was also the fourth naval battle between the Ming court and Western colonists.

The first one was at the end of the Zhengde period, when Emperor Jiajing had just ascended the throne. The 56-year-old Guangdong Sea Road Deputy Envoy Wang Yu was ordered to expel the Portuguese, that is, the Portuguese, and the Tuen Mun Naval Battle broke out. After this battle, the Ming court successfully recovered the Tuen Mun Island occupied by the Portuguese.

The second time was in 1522, the first year of Jiajing, when the Ming court and Portugal fought the Qiancao Bay Battle, which ended with the victory of the Ming navy.

After this battle, the Portuguese gave up the plan to invade the Ming Dynasty by force, that is, the colonial policy they were accustomed to, and changed to trade to make profits.

In the next two naval battles, the enemy had become the rising Netherlands, namely the Penghu Naval Battle to recover the Penghu Islands and the Liaoluo Bay Naval Battle.

In the first three times, although the Ming Dynasty won, they were all hard-fought victories and suffered heavy losses.

That is the Liaoluo Bay naval battle. Because Zheng Zhilong's fleet imitated Western warships, it won a naval victory with less losses.

However, the victory of the Liaoluo Bay naval battle is not limited to this.

This is the last afterglow of the declining Ming Empire. The war with the rapidly rising Netherlands almost cut off any extravagant hopes of Western colonists for China in the next hundred years.

Yes, the Dutch, like the Portuguese, came to the East Asian waters and found such rich land, so they also wanted to trade and make profits.

The Netherlands arrived in the 30th year of Wanli and began to trade in spices in Southeast Asia. In order to expand trade with China, a castle was built in Penghu in the fourth year of Tianqi.

This action stimulated the Ming court at that time, and then the Ming court surrounded Penghu with an absolute advantage in military force and a naval battle broke out. After negotiations with the Dutch, the Dutch withdrew from Penghu.

But during the negotiations, Fujian Governor Shang Zhouzuo proposed in a negotiation letter that if the Dutch were willing to withdraw from Penghu and go to Taiwan, the Fujian government was willing to guarantee commercial exchanges between Fujian and Dayuan.

But in fact, local officials in Fujian did not fulfill their promise. Due to the influence of the maritime ban, open trade relations between China and the Netherlands were prohibited in principle. The Fujian government understood this but still issued a blank check to induce the Dutch to agree to its proposal.

This also became the cause of the Liaoluo Bay Battle.

In the absence of access to Chinese ports for trade, Dutch ships could only anchor around Zhangzhou Bay and trade through smuggling with the assistance of Fujian General Xu Xinsu.

After Xu Xinsu was defeated by Zheng Zhilong, the Dutch turned to trade with Zheng Zhilong.

At this time, Zheng Zhilong was rapidly expanding his power, and Zheng Zhilong also wanted to control the trade with the Dutch, so he would naturally not easily agree to the various requests of the Dutch.

When the Dutch East India Company lost patience with China after continuously obtaining promises and paying prices without any results, after Hans Putmans reported the situation to Batavia, the decision-makers in Batavia decided to force China to agree to its demands by means of maritime plunder.

After the decision to plunder China in the sixth year of Chongzhen, Batavia sent ships to Dayuan in May to inform the upcoming operation. The team gathered six sailboats to set off, and also gathered patrols or ships on the way to fight. In the summer when the southwest monsoon blows, Chinese merchants will return to China from all over the south, and these ships will be plundered at this time.

The purpose of the operation is to plunder the coast of Fujian, China, to force the Chinese government to agree to its trade needs, and to minimize the casualties of the Chinese people during the plunder.

The result of this battle, of course, was the victory of the Ming Dynasty, or the victory of Zheng Zhilong, who has since mastered the maritime trade in the East Asian waters.

However, at this time, on this Dafu ship, no one naturally thought that the bribes or protection fees paid by these merchants to the pirates would be so powerful that a pirate navy would have the strength to fight against the Yi people's fleet and win.

After discussing for a while, several people really couldn't find a better idea.

According to Li Jin, the barbarians should be planning to take action against the Lin Feng pirate group in Daimao City soon. They must first declare their existence and their rights to the Lin Feng pirate group and Daimao City.

"In this way, I will write an official document immediately and send a ship back to let the adults know, so that he can quickly bring troops to support."

At this time, Deng Zilong said nervously.

Yes, he couldn't help but be nervous. After declaring their existence in this way, it was unknown what attitude the barbarians would have after discovering them.

You know, this is thousands of miles away from the Ming Dynasty.

If the barbarians wanted to kill them, it would be difficult for the court to produce evidence to investigate the matter after killing them.

As I said, sailing on the sea is inherently risky.

"For safety, we still have to contact the tribes on Luzon that have accepted tribute from the Ming Dynasty and ask them to dispatch troops to help us.

With their participation, the barbarians should not dare to act rashly against us.

What do you think of this strategy?"

After Deng Zilong finished speaking, he looked at the others.

Although his method was not original, everyone listened to it and nodded.

Although it was a bit risky, it was difficult for the Yi people to block the news because they had won over other forces on Luzon Island.

In this way, their safety would naturally have an extra layer of protection.

Seeing that no one objected, Deng Zilong decided on a plan.

Immediately, he wrote a letter to Yu Dayou in the cabin, informing him of his experience at sea, including his experience with Fuzhou merchant Li Jin, and the news they had heard from Manila, and even mentioned the sweet potato vine in the letter.

He did so because he was worried that something might happen to them. If Li Jin got the sweet potato vine, he would not know where to send the sweet potatoes he had grown.

Naturally, Deng Zilong also wrote in the letter about the news he had heard in the capital, which was a crop that Wei Guangde was looking for, which was very similar to the sweet potato, or sweet potato, mentioned by the merchants.

It was just unknown whether the two were the same thing.

After the letter was written, it was sealed and handed over to the captain of the centipede ship.

In the Ming Dynasty, the navy did not have a special official position, and all followed the military system of the guards.

Generally speaking, a general flag would be assigned to a small ship, while a warship with more people would be assigned to a hundred households.

The captain of a small fleet would be a hundred households or even a thousand households according to the size of the fleet.

There were quite a few sailors on the centipede ship, so a centurion was assigned to serve as the captain, and there was no official position such as the commander.

It was not until the Qing Dynasty, when there was more contact with the Western navy, that a special naval position was established.

Soon, the centurion captain on the centipede ship took Deng Zilong's letter on a small boat and returned to his ship.

Then he ordered his men to raise the sail and set sail, heading for the Fujian and Guangdong waters of the Ming Dynasty.

The advantages of the centipede ship were very obvious at this time. There were sails when there was wind, and paddles when there was no wind. In short, they could keep moving at a very fast speed and reach their destination in the shortest time.

After the people left, Deng Zilong discussed with others again.

The main content of their discussion was actually the issue of how to gather troops.

Because at this time, the Philippine Islands, or Luzon, was actually not a complete country in the eyes of the Ming Dynasty.

Yes, in the Ming Dynasty, the Philippine Islands were actually composed of two countries, one in the south and one in the north. The northern one was called Luzon, occupying most of Luzon Island, and the southern one was the so-called Sulu Kingdom, which was actually a large tribe.

However, along with the envoys of the two countries who arrived at the Ming Dynasty to pay tribute, the leaders of other tribes and their envoys were also included.

But now, there is no so-called kingdom in the entire archipelago. Most of those tribes have been conquered by the barbarians, or at least chose to surrender.

It is definitely not possible to borrow troops from Luzon or Sulu, because they no longer exist. They already know this from Li Jin.

"Then we can only contact other tribes to see if there are any tribes willing to be loyal to the Ming Dynasty."

After discussing this, everyone soon came to a conclusion.

Deng Zilong said, "According to Li Jin, most of the tribes in the west of Luzon have already surrendered to the barbarians, so we will turn our focus to the tribes in the east of Luzon, so that we can find each other as vassals of our Ming Dynasty.

Also, please note that according to Li Jin, there are actually descendants of our Han people in many tribes in Luzon.

When you go, pay attention and have more contact with them, so that it will be convenient for us to act."

So, soon, the remaining nine warships were divided into six, with two ships as a team, heading to the north and northeast of Luzon, hoping to find help from the tribes.

And their credentials were naturally only the waist badges carried by the generals.

Other things may not be understood by the locals here.

In fact, Luzon is still very unfamiliar to the Ming Dynasty, because there are actually few contacts between the two places.

As mentioned before, before the barbarians occupied Luzon, because Luzon was underdeveloped and there were no rare products, the merchants of the Ming Dynasty were not willing to come here to do business.

Of course, no one coming does not mean that there are no Chinese here.

In fact, during the Yongle period, Emperor Zhu Di of the Ming Dynasty had once appointed the Governor of Luzon, and his nominal jurisdiction included the entire Philippine Islands, namely the Kingdom of Luzon and the Kingdom of Sulu.

In the third year of Yongle in the Ming Dynasty, when Zheng He visited the Philippine Islands during his voyage to the West, he was ordered to appoint the Filipino overseas Chinese leader Xu Chailao as the Governor of Luzon, who was in charge of military, political, financial and cultural power until the twenty-second year of Yongle, serving for twenty years.

Xu Chailao's appointment as the Governor of Luzon is not a fabrication. There are many related records in the "Ming History·Biography of Luzon".

"On the tenth day of the third year of Yongle, envoys were sent to collect seals and seals to comfort the king..."

"...The king during the Wanli period was a Fujianese. Some said that when Zheng He was an envoy to Borneo, a Fujianese followed him and stayed there. Later generations took over the country. Next to the king's residence, there is a Chinese stele king with a golden seal with a seal inscription on it. The seal is in the shape of an animal. It is said that it was given by the Yongle Dynasty. People must ask for this golden seal when they get married, and they are proud of it on the back of the seal..."

There is not much information about Zheng He's voyages in the "History of Ming Dynasty", but a general idea can be seen from a few words, that is: in the third year of Yongle, the court did send an envoy to grant a governor, and there was a seal, which was handed down. During the Wanli period of Ming Dynasty, it was also regarded as a sacred object in the local area and worshiped by the people.

In the Philippines, there are actually related records in China.

The works of Professor Banga Niman of the National Sendoh Tomasi University and Dr. Bayer's writings all mentioned that "Eunuch Zheng He led a large fleet of 27,000 people to patrol Lingayuan, Manila, Mindoro and Sulu in the Philippine Islands three times in 1405, 1408 and 1417, that is, the third, sixth and fifteenth years of Yongle in the Ming Dynasty.

It is particularly noteworthy that when he patrolled Luzon Island, he appointed Xu Chailao, a native of Jinjiang, Quanzhou, as the governor of Luzon. It was in the third year of Yongle in Ming Dynasty and lasted until the Yongle Dynasty, which lasted for 20 years."

Of course, the appointment of the Governor of Luzon does not mean that the Ming Dynasty will bring Luzon under its rule.

In fact, the Ming Dynasty has always regarded Luzon and Sulu as vassal states.

With the departure of the dispatched troops, Deng Zilong would naturally not be idle. He would stay in the north of Luzon Island waiting for news, but would quietly approach the Pengasilan Bay with his Dafu ship and two gunboats, preparing to conduct a close reconnaissance.

Of course, because the remaining three navy warships were relatively large, they did not dare to get too close.

They just put away the flag of the Ming navy with the Dafu ship, disguised as a merchant ship, and pretended to be a passing merchant ship.

As for the two gunboats, they naturally could not get too close, after all, the whole ship was obviously a warship and could not be hidden.

After two days of groping forward, they finally found a huge bay at noon that day.

In fact, along the way, they saw quite a few bays, but this bay was different from the previous ones, that is, there were a large number of ships anchored in the bay.

Deng Zilong stood at the bow and carefully observed the situation in the bay with a telescope.

Although they couldn't see the Daimao City mentioned by Li Jin, there were so many ships, including several Fu ships, and it was obvious that this was their target.

Not daring to stop, Deng Zilong ordered the ship to continue moving forward, pretending that they had not noticed them at all.

You know, they were all pirates.

If they found that there were "merchant ships" passing through here, I'm afraid a large number of sea ships would chase them out in an instant.

After all, robbing at sea is their specialty, and they won't talk about fellow countrymen with people.

After leaving Pengaslan Bay, the big Fu ship turned west and made a big circle after leaving a long distance, and returned to the north of Pengaslan Bay to meet with the two gunboats behind.

They chose to dock in a small bay dozens of miles north of Pengaslan Bay. After all, they couldn't drift on the sea all the time.

Choose a berth, use a small boat as a means of transportation, leave a soldier on a gunboat to be responsible for vigilance and patrol the surrounding area, and the others went to the shore to rest.

"Li Baihu will lead the patrols these two days, and you will take over later. Your two ships will take turns to go out to sea for patrols."

After landing, they arranged people to guard the surroundings, and sent people to cut trees, set up camp, and prepare today's meals.

On the ship, there are many restrictions, and it is still very troublesome to eat hot food.

Of course, Deng Zilong and other generals are not lacking, but it is difficult for the subordinates to eat.

"Yes, sir."

The captain of the gunboat bowed and answered beside him.

"We will go to see the surrounding security situation later. Li Jin said that the barbarians have established strongholds in many places on the island. I don't know if they have discovered our arrival."

Deng Zilong stared at the dense forest in the east and said with some concern.