Among the armies of all dynasties, it is very important to have such an army, which is the army directly under the emperor, guarding the capital, and protecting the palace. The highest status was in the Northern Song Dynasty and . Due to the special policy of the Northern Song Dynasty, the Imperial Army in the Northern Song Dynasty was not the emperor's guard, but a regular army responsible for actual military tasks throughout the country. The "Forbidden Army" continued to be used only to emphasize the centralized management principle that the army was directly under the emperor. "It's just the name.
Then what was the guard army of in the Ming Dynasty and like? The imperial guards in the Ming Dynasty were divided into two parts. One part was the Zhili guards directly under the emperor. When it was first built, there were only twelve guards, and then gradually expanded to twenty-six guards; This is the "Beijing Camp".
The "Beijing Camp" in the Ming Dynasty was divided into three parts, namely the famous Five Army Camp, Three Thousand Camp and Shenji Camp , commonly known as the "Three Three Camps", each with its own characteristics.
The Five Army Battalion, which is composed of elite troops drawn from all provinces across the country. In the eighth year of Yongle (1410), this army was divided into cavalry troops for the Chinese army, with left and right tucks and left and right sentries, so it was called "Five Army Battalions". There is also the task of training the new army. In addition to the Beijing Guard Office, every year Ming Dynasty dispatched 160,000 soldiers from the capitals of Zhongdu, Shandong, Henan, and Daning to take turns to the capital for drills in the Fifth Army Battalion. It is the general base of national army training.
Three Thousand Battalion, although this troop is called by this name, but the number is far more than three thousand, this troop is very special, it was originally composed of the surrendered Mongolian army, the number is indeed about 3000 cavalry, and later expanded, the heyday There were as many as 70,000 people during the period, and the 3,000 battalion only appeared in the wartime formations during the Hongxi, Xuande, and Zhengtong years in historical materials. After Jingtai, the Beijing battalion was restructured into the tenth regiment battalion and the twelve regiment battalion. The designation of this unit is likely to be During the Yongle period, the front guards before the third Northern Expedition, or the forward battalion of the fourth and fifth Northern Expeditions were converted. In the 29th year of Jiajing in the Ming Dynasty (1550), when the three major battalions were restored, the Sanqian battalion was renamed the Shenshu battalion. The 3,000 Battalion generally does not go on an expedition, and is divided into five divisions, which are in charge of the emperor's flag, public uniform, military battle golden drum, imperial treasures, etc., and belong to the orthodox emperor's guard.
The other one is the most famous "Shenji Battalion", which everyone may know somewhat: it is a famous firearms unit, , but few people know that this army has a lot of connections with Vietnam , Vietnam in During the Middle Ages, the firearm technology was extremely sophisticated. After Ming Chengzu conquered Jiaozhi, he obtained a large amount of Vietnamese firearm technology. The Ming Dynasty called it "the magic machine gun method". Even the Vietnamese prince was captured by the Ming Dynasty and came back to develop firearms.
Note: Hu Yuancheng , the eldest son of Hu Jisuo, the ruler of the Hu Dynasty in Vietnam, was later captured by the Ming army and served in the Ministry of Industry of the Ming Dynasty. official position. According to the records of "Ming Shilu", Ming Chengzu ordered him to "supervise the construction of soldiers, arrows and gunpowder". This man was later called the "God of Firearms" by the soldiers of the Ming Dynasty.
"In this dynasty, firearms were used to fight captives, which is the most important weapon of war in ancient and modern times. However, the lightness and ingenuity of the weapon was actually acquired by Emperor Wen at the level of Jiaozhi. This name was changed later in the dynasty) to be an official of the Ministry of Industry, who is in charge of supervising the construction, and has passed it on." - "Wanli Ye Huo Bian"
"To the Ming Cheng Zuping intersection, he learned the magic machine gun method, and specially set up the magic machine Camp learning. Raw and cooked red copper are used in the system. Of the iron used, the soft iron is the best, followed by the west iron. The size is different. The big ones are used for carts, and the small ones are used for frames, piles, and irons. It’s great for defense, small for war, and it’s an important weapon for marching.” —— "History of the Ming Dynasty"
During this period, Vietnamese firearms spread to all parts of the Ming army, "handing guns" (guns from Jiaozhi ) was very popular, and even during the Ming and Qing Dynasties, after Western firearms had been introduced to China, China still brought firearms from Vietnam.
Ming Chengzu Zhu Di knew the power of firearms, so he specially set up the "Shenji Battalion". The battalion was equipped with muskets, firecrackers, , etc., and later added matchlock guns. It was one of the most elite firearms troops in the world at that time. After the civil engineering change in the 14th year of Zhengtong in the Ming Dynasty (1449), the three major battalions lost almost all of them. After the reform of the military system, battalions were established, and the sergeants who were not selectedReturning to the base camp, called "hometown", the battalion regiment was dismissed during Jiajing, and the old system of the three major battalions was restored.
In the early Ming Dynasty, the strength of the Shenji Battalion was: 3,600 infantry (all equipped with firearms); 1,000 cavalry; 400 artillery (managing field heavy artillery and Dalian Pearl Cannon); a total of 5,000 officers and soldiers. Equipped with firearms: 3,600 thunderbolt guns (infantry firecrackers); 1,000 catties of combined medicine; 900,000 heavy eight-coin leads; 200 rods of Dalian Pearl Cannon (multi-tube firecrackers); 675 catties of combined medicines; Artillery self-defense with hand guns); General Zhankou 160 (field heavy artillery). Of course, the Shenji Battalion was also equipped with a large number of Western firearms in the later period, such as the red cannon and the Frang machine. Anyway, any excellent firearms obtained by the Ming Dynasty were given priority to the Shenji Battalion.
The Shenji Battalion is not only the elite of the Ming Dynasty, but also the army with the highest technical level in the country, so it is particularly valued. There are many special training methods in the Shenji Battalion (usually involving some mathematical knowledge from Arabia and Europe, such as the angle of firearm attack Calculation) is a secret and will not be passed on to other troops. Unlike the Fifth Army Battalion and the Three Thousand Battalion, the Shenji Battalion must often participate in battles. Many of the children here are descendants of the capital's dignitaries, so they are quite arrogant.
The most famous of the Shenji Battalion is the "three-stage attack" tactic: the soldiers are divided into three rows, and the soldiers in the first, third, fifth, seventh, ninth, and eleventh positions of the queue shoot first, and then Fired by soldiers at positions 2, 4, 6, 8, 10, 12, etc. in line. After each shot, the soldiers in the front row immediately handed the guns back to the soldiers in the middle row, and at the same time took over the loaded guns from the soldiers in the middle row. On the one hand, the soldiers in the middle row are responsible for receiving the shot guns from the soldiers in the front row and passing them back to the soldiers in the third row to load the ammunition; The firecrackers with good ammunition are passed forward to the soldiers in the previous row, and the rotation is repeated in this way. In this way, when the rate of fire of the matchlock gun is low, it can maintain a continuous firepower output to damage the morale of the enemy and ensure the continuity of firepower. This was originally a tactic used by general Mu Ying to deal with enemy elephants when he was guarding Yunnan, and was later introduced to deal with cavalry.
The Beijing Camp was originally the most elite army in the Ming Dynasty. However, after the Tumu Fort incident, the entire army was annihilated. Afterwards, after rectification, it barely recovered. When Li Zicheng , he went to the point where he was defeated at the sound of cannons without a fight, and eventually perished along with the Ming Dynasty.
Author: Yunfan