The situation in Shandong in September and October 1647 was a nightmare for the Qing court.

First, the famous yellow-clothed drama gang in the northern China, Mo Ming led 20,000 cavalry and artillery troops, and countless giant ships and boat troops. He conquered the two palaces of Denglai, and defeated Dengzhou and Jiaozhou. Then, the yellow-clothed thieves who seized a large amount of baggage took a day to cross the Wei River and captured Anqiu for the second time, and then the entire army headed north to conquer Linqu County, just one step away from Qingzhou.

Luke Dehun, who was stationed in Qingzhou City, led the 4,000-eight-banner soldiers who had been gathered up one after another, started a quiet war. His 4,000 horse-riding infantry fought against the Ming army, but the damage to the yellow-clad thieves was relatively serious. If he lost a thousand nationals to prevent the yellow-clad thieves from siegeing the city and siege, then Taluke Dehun's life would be difficult. Shandong has lost more than a thousand national men. If there is another mistake for the remaining thousands of people, then he should not just stop quarantining. Therefore, Luke Dehun simply pretended to die at this time, but sent troops from far away to keep a close eye on the movements of the yellow-clad thieves, and then continued to urge all prefectures and counties to step up the purchase of food and equipment. Reinforcements from all over the country gathered in Qingzhou quickly, and then slowly advanced to force the yellow-clad thieves to fight.

However, when Luke Dehun thought of this, he felt a little depressed, because according to his experience, the yellow-clothed thief would definitely retreat in this situation, and then take a boat to go away while the main forces of the Qing Dynasty were gathering somewhere, and then go ashore to plunder. This is really a headache. But what can I do? Will the yellow-clothed thief come and let it gallop? That is even more inappropriate.

No matter how distressed Luke Dehun was, the situation in Shandong was surging at this time. After the yellow-clothed thief's riot, the anti-Qing sentiment, which was suppressed because the Qing army was stationed in Shandong (90,000 people. There were not so many Qing troops in Shandong in history) broke out at this time.

Xie Qian, the "Gaoyuan thief" who had just been wiped out by the Qing army in history, was still alive. This person was originally the slave of Han Yuan, a high-ranking official of the Ming and Qing dynasties. Han Yuan surrendered to the Qing dynasty as a slave. However, his slave Xie Qian was unwilling to be a slave to the alien race. So he took advantage of the opportunity that the Qing army was repeatedly damaged by yellow-clothed thieves and pulled up a pole with a group of old brothers, and soon conquered Gaoyuan County and killed Wu Zhenhua, the magistrate appointed by the Qing court. Later, he conquered the empty new city and the two counties of Changshan, and swept away a large amount of treasury in Changshan County.

Last month, he led his army to conquer Zichuan County between Jinan and Qingzhou, and seized Sun Zhixie, a traitor who was raising money for the Qing army and transporting food and grass. Sun Zhixie died miserably. This shameless man who advised Dorgon to shave his hair and change his clothes was inserted by Xie Qian with an awl on his scalp, which was called "for you to plant hair!" Later, he was sewn on his mouth and died of Lingchi. The male family, including his great-grandson, was killed one by one, and the female family was humiliated to death, which is amazing.

When he heard that Xie Qian's troops had captured Zichuan County, Mo Ming, who had been confronting the Qing army in Linqu for many days, was overjoyed. He immediately sent someone to contact him on the mountain road and sent him a letter. At the same time, he sent thirty armor and 100 swords as gifts. He also suggested that he should not fight head-on with the Qing army and withdraw immediately if there was something wrong. It is important to preserve the vitality - in history, Xie Qian failed because he was digging tunnels by the Qing army and buried gunpowder and exploding the city walls for two months after he was in charge of Zichuan County.

At the same time, he led the entire army forward across the Shigou River and approached Qingzhou City to establish a village. He invited the Qing army to fight, so as to try his best to prevent the Qing army from sending troops to wipe out Xie Qian's troops. Luke Dehun had just gathered more than 15,000 people brought by Li Lutai, with a force of only more than 20,000, and the number was even worse than that of the yellow-clothed thieves who received reinforcements from the minions. Therefore, he did not respond positively to Mo Ming's letter of invitation to fight.

The Qing army was a turtle, and of course Mo Ming would not stare at him outside. He sent out some of the officers and scouts at his hands to contact the anti-Qing armed forces everywhere. In particular, he promoted the titles of Dashun General and Shandong Jiedushi, preparing to attract some of the "Yuyuan thieves" at the junction of Lu and Henan.

The Yuyuan thieves were a loose peasant armed alliance at this time, which was based on the old village of Yuyuan, Fan County, Puzhou, Dongchang Prefecture. Due to the long-term loss of farming, a large number of elm seeds fell into the land and took root and sprouted, and turned into an elm forest. More than a dozen armed forces led by Zhang Qi, Ren Qi (Ren Fuxing), Liang Min and others used this as a base, first resisting the Ming Dynasty and then resisting the Qing Dynasty. In short, they opposed the government. They used the complex terrain here to carry out tunnel warfare and guerrilla warfare, and had been dealing with the Qing army for several years. Because the main enemy of the Qing army in Shandong was always yellow-clad thieves, their lives were more comfortable than history. They often dispatched large groups of horses to plunder the Qing prefectures and counties. At the same time, they also cultivated "thief fields" in Yuyuan, the dangerous terrain between the mountains for a long time, leaving the thin Qing army green camp in Dongchang Prefecture powerless.

With the successive victory of the East Coast army in Denglai and other places, the Qing army in the eastern and western Shandong began to gather in the Qingzhou area, which undoubtedly created great convenience for the Yuyuan Army's operations. Although these peasant armed forces with a total of more than 100,000 and 200,000 were vulnerable in terms of combat effectiveness, they could still capture the places without any care at this time, and disrupt the Qing army's logistics.

For example, in the fourth year of Shunzhi, Shandong Governor Zhang Ruxiu reported: "I secretly illuminated the gangs in the two east, who were always cunning, and appeared in the mountains and forests, and suddenly there was no fixed... I checked the troops and horses, originally 3,000, only half of them now, and there was no more left outside the sheath of the city. The towns were far away from each other, and when I heard that the prefectures and counties had changed, they were out of the way to fight, and the provincial capital was empty. The various troops were dispatched urgently and difficult to respond, and the thieves broke the city and plundered the city, and they were always crazy."

It’s a pity that these Yuyuan Army have complex components, loose organizational structures, and many of them have the style of local gangsters. Therefore, only Ding Mingwu, who was once incorporated by Dashun, led tens of people to the east through Gaotang Prefecture and entered Jinan Prefecture through Gaotang Prefecture, and was preparing to take advantage of the Qing army's troops to head to Qingzhou to plunder in the empty Jinan Prefecture to enrich his strength. As for the others, although most of them were incorporated by Dashun when Guo Sheng entered Shandong, it was one time and another. Dashun was half-deadly hanging in this day. The name of Shandong Jiedu, which was held by Mo Dashu, was nothing to them, and that fool Ding Mingwu would go to help the yellow-clad thief.

In addition, Ren Fuxing, a veteran of the Yuyuan Army, was quite moved by the proposal of the East Coast people, because the East Coast people had already made it clear to him that it would be boring to stay in the Dongchang Prefecture area and make a small fuss. It would be better to make a big profit. Moreover, as the situation in Shandong is becoming more and more critical, the Qing court will inevitably mobilize the neighboring Northern Zhili, and Henan troops will come to suppress it - although there are not many soldiers in these provinces. At that time, 100,000 Qing troops gather, and it will be only a little bit of trouble to eliminate the Yuyuan Army.

However, Ren Fuxing's opinion was not taken seriously by others, so he had no choice but to send Du Chong, the small leader of the Yuyuan Army who was dependent on him, to lead a thousand horse teams, and more than 4,000 soldiers to the Caozhou line eastward, preparing to find an opportunity to contact the people on the east coast, and plunder the wealthy Yanzhou Prefecture and County.

In addition to the Yuyuan Army, there were also local peasant armed forces such as Zhu Langrong, the Qing Dynasty’s supervisory censor, who was called “more than fifty battalions” on the ground of Shandong, such as “the famous opera bandit in the East Province, and the storm of thousands of thieves”. In addition, there were “hundreds of people gathered together and confronted one side, and there were countless people.” It can be said that Shandong in the late Ming and early Qing dynasties was definitely a province with the largest number of peasant armed forces in China, with the most intense resistance to the government. These local anti-Qing armed forces were potential collaborators for the people of the East Coast. Even if they could not be allowed to come and surrender, they should try to maintain a good relationship so that they could fight together in the future.

On October 1, after confronting the Qing army for more than ten days, the Qing army in Qingzhou City finally moved not long after the army sent by Mo Ming returned from sweeping grain in the surrounding countryside. However, they did not dispatch to fight the East Coast people, but sent an army of about thousands of people westward to Zibo, preparing to conquer the nail stuck in the Qing army's rations.

There is a reason for them to do this, because more than 4,000 people from Xie Qian's troops, who occupied Zichuan County these days, began to frequently attack the Qing army's grain transport team from Jinan Prefecture to Qingzhou. The Qing army was unable to send large troops to escort due to the shortage of troops (there are only more than 3,000 people in Jinan) and the Qing army was able to escort it, so a large amount of baggage and grain were seized, and the losses were quite large. In addition, Mo Ming secretly sent 2,500 people from Zhai Congyan's troops and 1,500 surrendered troops a week ago, and walked west lightly to Zichuan. I believe that this time had arrived long ago, and maybe they would have the share of attacking the Qing army's grain transport team.

The dispatch of this Qing army seemed to be a signal. Tens of thousands of people on both sides who were originally playing in a quiet war immediately started to run at high speed. On October 1, General Mo ordered the entire army to be dispatched to attack Yidu County, Qingzhou Prefecture City. At this time, there were 4,000 Eight Banners soldiers, 12,000 Binzhou Town (3,000 Dong Xueyi's Ministry of Rites have entered Zibo West), and 4,000 local miscellaneous troops (Qingyang, salt dynasty, tax dynasty, and fast-acting) of Jinan and Qingzhou Prefectures, with a total of only 20,000.

As their opponent, the yellow-clothed thief, at this time, they had the regular army, the Eight Banners New Army, the stand-up team, and the mercenary. In addition, there were more than 3,000 people in the Qin Shangxing Army (including the recently incorporated surrendered army), more than 5,000 people in Chen Zhilong's army, with a total force of more than 26,000 people, and a complete range of infantry, cavalry, cannons, and baggage. Although there was a slight shortage of food, it would be no problem to persist for more than half a month. If it really didn't work, it could still slaughter livestock. Maybe the Qing army, whose food was harassed, could not consume the people on the East Coast first.
Chapter completed!