Chapter 320 23. Modern Industry Prosperity in Hagi Fan

  "Could it be Shimonoseki!"

  Yoshida Shoin is located in the Hagi Clan, there are only two most important coastal defense passes, one is where the Hagi Clan city is located, and the other is naturally the Shimonoseki area that controls the E-Shimonoseki Strait. In the past, this place was also called Chijianguan. In the future, it will be more well-known in China as Maguan, which is the Maguan where the treaty was signed.

  As one of the most important connection points between Honshu Island and Kyushu Island, Shimonoseki and other places such as Moji and Kokura on the opposite shore also function as the gateways for the Yellow Sea to enter the Seto Inland Sea.

  In the history of the Qing Dynasty, five ports were used for trade. After the opening of the gate, European merchant ships gradually began to gather in Shanghai, the most prosperous city in East Asia. Japan followed the Qing Dynasty and was also opened by European and American powers. Then the merchant ships and warships of various countries that depart from Shanghai to Japan will naturally choose to enter the Japanese mainland through the Shimonoseki Strait.

  For places like Hyogo, Kobe, Osaka, etc., don’t they all have to go through the Seto Inland Sea to get there, of course, you can also detour from four foreign countries. But it would take a long way around this way, which is very uneconomical for merchant ships.

  Naturally, no foreign merchant ships pass through the Shimonoseki Strait, but ships heading to Edo in Kyushu and the San'in (shield) area still have to pass through Shimonoseki. Of course, the Maori family needs to set up defenses and strengthen defenses here.

  "Shimonoseki has also built a fort!" Jiang Chuan Yinglong said this.

  The shogunate has only started construction for a few months, and many designs are still on the drawings and models, but depending on the appearance of Yoshida Shoin, it may even have seen the actual fort. Otherwise, how can you blurt it out at first glance.

  "Yes! For more than a year, the feudal clan has recruited orchid scholars to build Shimonoseki fortresses. There are as many as four front and rear forts." Shoin Yoshida said truthfully.

  The fort is a real thing that exists in the world, it is impossible to hide it. And Hagi did not violate the rules of the shogunate, because before the French warship bombarded Naha, forcing the Ryukyu Kingdom to open the port. The occurrence of many "foreign disturbances" caused the shogunate not only to abolish the order to strike against foreign ships, but also to allow the coastal vassals to strengthen coastal defense.

   After that, didn’t Mizuno want to build the Shinagawa fort, but the fort was not completed, but the people were driven away. On the contrary, the Saga Clan, Kagoshima Clan, Hagi Clan, and other foreign clan in the southwest, because of the urgency of the invasion of European and American powers, the strengthening of coastal defense has been put on the most important agenda.

  I thought that the fastest man was Naomasa Nabeshima of the Saga clan, but I didn’t expect that the fastest man was actually the Moori of the Hagi clan!

  The one that is silent in the crowd, and the one that is not uniform is the one that hits the most fierce and ruthless people. Saga, who wrote to the shogunate with great fanfare, suggested how to build a fort and forged artillery, the Saga clan actually moved a little slower than the Hagi clan.

  According to Yoshida Shoin's statement, as many as four forts along the Shimonoseki Strait have been built, and a relatively adequate shore fire protection system has been formed roughly. The committee member of the Hagi Clan is really in front of the shogunate!

  "Tell me more." Tademon was still very concerned about this, and while pulling Yoshida Shoin to sit down, he asked him to speak quickly.

   "The feudal lord Nakajima Jihei was found in the mountain about three miles long from Kakeyuan to Oura, and found iron veins!"

   I don’t know if I don’t ask, Yoshida Shoin sat down and surprised Chuemon and Egawa Hideryu by the first sentence. For hundreds of thousands of years, Zhou Fang and Changmen hadn't heard of any iron ore, but they found iron ore after Lanxue Daxing in the past few years.

  The matter of iron ore is very important to Hagi. Because Hagi has coal money, it is an excellent fuel coal, and now there is iron ore...

  It’s no wonder that the future Changshu Clan will be so emboldened and will fight the Shogunate with one corner!

   "Already mined?" Chuemon asked quickly.

"Yes, Chihei Nakajima has been appointed as a small nato in the feudal clan to sort out the queen's hanger Scope, but that’s what it means here)."

   "How is the finished product?" Jiang Chuan Yinglong is more concerned about this.

  Because the shogunate only started to pay attention to steel smelting this year, the reverberatory furnace in Izu was built and put into production. If this is done more slowly than Hagi, the shogunate is really behind.

  "The ironworks bureau was newly established, and the finished product seems to be good. Nakajima also learned and translated the "Iron Manufacturing Law". It is said that he was taught by the Dutchman Pompeii."

   "The artillery used in the fort of Suxiaguan Fortress was also self-made in the Hagi Clan?"

"good!"

  Good fellow, Hafan really did it in one step. Not only did we have coal and iron, but we also cultivated new-style iron and steel technical talents, plus the artillery talents who had learned artillery casting technology from Takashima Qiuho, and now there is only one person who can make advanced firearms.

  Future Southwestern Big Four, this will really be yours to catch up with me. Even Satsuma, who is in charge of state affairs in Guangxiang, a family elder who doesn't like Western gadgets, has established an integrated pavilion and started the exploration stage of industrial foundation.

   "Do you know what the Shimonoseki Fortress looks like?" After listening to Yoshida Shoin's words, Egawa Hideryu didn't know what he thought, anyway, Tadaoemon noticed a trace of worry in his eyes.

   "The first fort is lined up with five cannons!"

  While talking~lightnovelpub.net~Yoshida Shoin took paper and pen and drew on the paper simply. The so-called first fort in Xiaguan is really to build a stone platform on the seashore of Xiaguan, and then place five cannons side by side on the stone platform.

  The shape of the fort is quite crude, and I don’t know if it will be revised in the future. However, referring to the historical situation where the Shangxiaguan Fort was violently beaten by the four-nation joint navy, it is possible that Hagi did not upgrade the first fort. Then it was bombarded by the Allied Forces of the Four Nations and destroyed it directly.

  In any case, the level of the first fort in Shimonoseki is still very backward, and it is definitely not as good as the design of the Shinagawa fort. But the second fort drawn by Yoshida Shoin grass is interesting.

  The shape of the second fort is a "Y" shape, with cannons set on both ends, probably on a promontory protruding from the mainland, or on a small peninsula. Specifically, we have not seen the real object, and it is not easy to judge.

  But this fort adopted a new type of fort construction method, and added a special turret for the cannon. The experience and learning situation in the Hagi domain is really amazing. After only the construction of the first fort, the second fort has a somewhat modern appearance. Looking back at the third and fourth fortresses, although they are not as deep as the Shinagawa fort, which is more than one meter deep, it is quite impressive.

   "The fifth and sixth forts are still being built in the domain."

  (End of this chapter)