In July of the twenty-third year of Zhengzheng (1363), the corpse mountain and blood sea under the city of Hongdu (now Nanchang, Jiangxi) were scorched.
Zhu Wenzheng (Zhu Yuanzhang's nephew) and Chen Youliang have been fighting for more than 80 days for the control of Hongdu City.
In the past 80 days, Zhu Wenzheng with 20,000 defenders stubbornly withstood the repeated attacks of Chen Youliang's army of more than 600,000 troops.
However, Zhu Wenzheng is already at the end of the crossbow, and he hangs to death in one breath.
Chen Youliang was about to kick the door, but this kick was never kicked out.
On 18 July, Chen Youliang received a tip that Zhu Yuanzhang personally commanded 200,000 troops and marched north against the river, and the vanguard had reached the area around Poyang Lake.
Chen Youliang was very happy in his heart: "I'm afraid that Zhu Yuanzhang won't come, Lao Tzu just stewed him with a spoonful, which saves trouble!" ”
At that time, among the various forces entrenched in the south of the Yangtze River, Zhu Yuanzhang and Chen Youliang were the most powerful.
The Battle of Poyang Lake is destined to become a meat grinder on the battlefield and determine the trend of the world.
On 21 July, the two armies met at Kanglang Mountain.
According to Zhu Yuanzhang's personal soldier captain Yu Ben, he recalled-
Chen Youliang's large boat can accommodate 3,000 people, and the medium boat can hold 2,500 people, even a small boat, which is enough for 2,000 people to run on it.
In this regard, Zhu Yuanzhang's boat has become a toy.
The Ming Dynasty's own official "Ming Taizu Record" also clearly recorded: The war situation was once very tragic.
On the first day of the war, Zhu Yuanzhang was almost defeated!
Ming Taizu Record" contains:
The court sentenced Zhang Zhixiong to take the boat to be demolished by the enemy, and he was attacked by several boats, and Zhixiong was embarrassed to kill himself. Ding Pulang, Yu Chang, Chen Bi, and Xu Gongfu were all killed in battle, and Pu Lang was wounded by more than ten people. ”
Note: If the battle situation is a little better, the historian will never dare to write like this; "Ming Taizu Records" went through three revisions in the early Ming Dynasty, and this paragraph was not changed.
The first general under his command, Xu Da Battleship**, was sent back to Yingtian by Lao Zhu that night.
It should be whitewashed here, and Xu Da is most likely scrapped. ）
The generals didn't want to fight anymore.
Zhu Yuanzhang can only use both grace and power, while persuading hard, knowing the benefits and disadvantages; On the one hand, he forcibly subdued everyone as the boss and died under pressure.
The second day was damaged, even more than the first.
Even if Zhu Yuanzhang personally led the army, his subordinates couldn't help but be afraid.
Lao Zhu was furious and killed more than a dozen captains.
Gu Yingtai's "Ming History Chronicle" contains: "I am ugly, Taizu reverts to the formation of relatives, and fights with friends. Friends understand that the giant boat chain is in array, and the flag building is like a mountain. My boat is small, but there are many attacks on the back, Taizu personally commanded it, not forward, the right division is less, and he ordered to kill more than ten captains, and he is still more than that. ”
Brother-in-law Guo Xing dissuaded: "Boss, you can't solve the problem by killing people like this, in my opinion, Chen Youliang used iron cables to connect the boats together, we have only one way, attack with fire!" ”
Zhu Yuanzhang reluctantly agreed, because the success rate of the fire attack was not high.
The wind is not in the right direction. It was the height of summer in July, and the wind was southeasterly.
Zhu Yuanzhang is in the north, Chen Youliang is in the south, if he sets fire, it will only burn Zhu Yuanzhang himself.
The fire attack needs to have strong suddenness and concealment, and if Chen Youliang is allowed to discover it in advance, then everything is in vain.
Therefore, Zhu Yuanzhang improved the fire attack plan: in the previous fire attack, the ship was loaded with thatch and poured with fire oil, but Zhu Yuanzhang asked people to directly load gunpowder, so that there was no need to ignite it in advance, and then use wind power.
Someone asked: Loaded with gunpowder, if Chen Youliang sends someone to fire a volley of rockets, won't it all be scrapped?
Zhu Yuanzhang played a careful trick and asked dozens of life-size straw men to be placed on both sides of the cabin, and under the cover of night, the Han army thought that Zhu Jun was coming to jump and carry out white-knuckle warfare, so they did not prepare rockets.
By the time the Han army reacted, it was too late.
PS: Have you seen this scene anywhere? Isn't it a remake of the live "straw boat borrowing arrows"?
Chen Youliang again, he has always watched "Romance of the Three Kingdoms", right?
I'm sorry, at the time of the Poyang Lake War, Luo Guanzhong hadn't written "Romance of the Three Kingdoms" yet.
The reason why Luo Guanzhong's description of the Battle of Chibi is so wonderful is that he added many elements of the Battle of Poyang Lake to his creation.
Guo Xingjin said: "If you are not human, you don't need to die, and the size of the boat is invincible." The minister thought that it was necessary to attack by fire. ”
Taizu Ranzhi, the fate of the spring and other parts of the fishing boat, carrying reeds, put gunpowder in it.
At the end of the day, Taizu ordered to take Qizhou Shucao as a person, decorated with armor, holding a halberd, if fighting the enemy, let the daring soldiers it, and prepare to go behind. Will force the enemy boat, take the wind to set fire, the wind is fierce, must reach the enemy boat in a moment, burn hundreds of water villages, the flames rise to the sky, the lake is red, and most of the dead are dead. Youliang's younger brothers, Youren, Yougui and their Pingzhang Chen Puluo were all burned to death.
After a big battle, Chen Youliang's younger brothers Chen Youren and Chen Yougui, as well as senior generals Pingzhang Chen Puluo and others were all burned to death.
Chen You's life was great and he escaped.
Zhu Yuanzhang is not better, and he almost lost his life a few times.
After four days of fighting, Zhu Yuanzhang's generals couldn't hold it anymore, so they had the courage to continue to suggest that the old Zhu class retreat.
Zhu Yuanzhang also had palpitations because the flagship was bombed, and retreated to Zuoli to repair at night.
Chen Youliang didn't dare to act rashly, and the two sides froze at once.
According to the research of Mr. Li Xinfeng, a professor at Peking University, Chen Youliang still occupies the strategic initiative at this time
After the fourth day of the battle, Zhu Junai slowly retreated, ** trailing. Judging from the heavy losses of the Zhu army and the repeated requests for retreat of the generals, the Zhu army did not have the upper hand in the three wars, so Nanchang was not saved and gradually retreated. **Also give up Nanchang and chase Zhu Yuanzhang.
Mr. Li Xinfeng's "Chronicle Notes", p182.
At this time, Chen Youliang had two choices:
1. When Zhu Yuanzhang retreated, he turned around and pulled out the nail of Hongdu City to replenish grain and grass for backup;
2, don't care about anything, stare at Zhu Yuanzhang, kill him, and solve all problems!
Perhaps because he had full confidence in his own water army, Chen Youliang chose the second plan: to pursue Zhu Yuanzhang.
This choice seems to be fine, but over time, the problem is exposed.
In ancient and modern times, in China and abroad, the war was fought to the end, and it was all about logistics.
Zhu Yuanzhang desperately sent heavy troops to guard the mouth of Poyang Lake to prevent Chen Youliang from breaking through the Yangtze River waterway, and the support between Chen Youliang and his base camp Wuchang was cut off!
Song Lian's "Eguo Gong often meets the spring Shinto Monument" contains: "My division is out of the lake. The order is to choke the upper stream with a boat, and the generals are going up the river, and the boat covers the river, and the person who controls the mouth of the lake has five days. ”
Hundreds of thousands of people eat horses and chew, which is really an astronomical number.
After Chen Youliang confronted Zhu Yuanzhang for more than a month, Zhu Wenzheng, who was recuperating from his injuries in Hongdu City, rushed out again and burned Chen Youliang's already small grain and grass.
By the end of August, when Chen Youliang wanted to take advantage of the high wind and waves to break through Zhu Yuanzhang's Hukou defense system, it was already too late, and his pockets had already been firmly entrenched.
Not only can you not go by water, but if you want to abandon the ship and go ashore, you can't go by land.
On August 24, Chen Youliang gathered all his forces to attack again and fought Zhu Yuanzhang to the death.
When the battle is fought to this extent, the fight is who can hold out to let the other party fall first, so they no longer leave behind.
The two sides fought from the hour to the end.
The entire Poyang Lake was covered with dead bodies, and the water surface was red with blood.
In later generations, we all know that Chen Youliang received a boxed lunch.
It's a bit too sloppy, and it's a shame.
He stood at the bow of the boat to command, and the clothes he wore were different from those of others, and Zhu Yuanzhang's little soldier on the opposite side felt that this must be a big fish.
A few rapid shots came in the direction of Chen Youliang.
happened to nail an arrow into Chen Youliang's eye, and Chen Youliang was killed.
Zhang Dingbian, the first general of the Han army, gathered the defeated troops and fled back to Wuchang with Chen Youliang's body and Chen Youliang's son Chen Li.
Before long, there were pawns to run, and Yan Youliang was killed in the other boat, and he died with his eyes and skull. When the armies heard this, they shouted for joy, and they killed the enemy and fought hard, and the enemy was greatly defeated. ”
As for who exactly shot that arrow, no one knows.
If anyone is found to be doing it, they will be looked at in the head.
So no one dared to accept this reward.
Although the reward is rich, it also has to have a life flower, right?
It wasn't until more than 150 years later in the Jiajing period that Guo Xun, an old relative of the Zhu family, found someone to compile a "Biography of the Heroes", and put the credit for shooting Chen Youliang to his ancestor Guo Ying, Marquis of Wuding.
However, everyone laughed at this statement, and no one believed it.
Since then, south of the Yangtze River, no one is his opponent anymore.
In the next step, Lao Zhu moved his gaze to Zhang Shicheng in the east.
To be continued-