This article mainly talks about the armor rate of the Southern Ming armies of each faction. Let's first summarize the armor and equipment of the various forces in the late Ming Dynasty: the cavalry generally has a set of cloth iron armor and a helmet, while the infantry wears cotton armor, note that the cotton armor here does not have metal armor, but a protective gear made entirely of cotton, of course, this is not all to save money, the defense of cotton armor is good, and it is light. For example, in Li Dingguo's department, the ordinary soldiers of Li Dingguo's department wrapped their heads in long cloths and covered their bodies with thick cotton armor, and the Qing side claimed that the sword could not work, and later in Guangdong, Shang Kexi equipped his soldiers with a hook and spear of one foot and five feet, which broke through the position of Li Dingguo's army and captured more than 100 soldiers alive.
Qing Dynasty green battalion soldiers during the rebellion of the three feudatories.
Let's look at Fujian and Guangdong first, Fujian naturally includes Zheng Jun, but also includes other Ming armies. Zhang Cunren, the governor of Zhejiang and Fujian, sent troops to attack a tile cottage in Daying around Quanzhou at the beginning of the fourth year of Shunzhi, there were 2,000 "local bandits" in the village, Zhang Cunren did not write the composition of this group of people in the unveiling post, the Qing army defeated this group of people at the cost of 21 killed, the Qing army claimed to have killed a total of 300 people, captured 12 horses and donkeys, 5 large flags, 25 small flags, 9 pairs of cloth iron armor, 50 pounds of gunpowder lead bullets, and 47 bird guns. The armor rate of this group was too low, the Qing army claimed to have killed 300 people, but in fact only 9 pairs of cloth iron armor were captured, and the armor rate was only 3%.
The heavy armor Zheng army written by the Netherlands.
Then let's talk about Zheng Jun, the situation of Zheng Chenggong's army is actually a bit complicated, the Ming and Zheng historical materials "The Records of the First King" recorded that "my master wears armor as much as possible, and wins in battle, only between breaths, afraid of armor covering his ears, iron armor has a sound, exquisite mixed with golden drums, hearing is not true, advancing and retreating is suspicious, so it is better to hear than to witness." It is hereby proposed to set up two kinds of red and white high moves, set up the red high recruit to enter the army, and collect the white high move. When the officials are assigned to the horses, when they enter the battle, they first run the army and waft in the middle of the army, and the three armies know what to advance and stop, and this is the military order issued by Zheng Chenggong when he attacked the Yangtze River, which shows that the armor rate of the Zheng army is really not low, and it is mostly ironclad.
The neatly draped Ming infantry in the picture of the victory of the peace.
For example, after Zheng Chenggong's fleet was hit by a hurricane in Zhoushan, a large ship lost its way and ran aground on the coast and was immediately captured by the Qing army, and the five generals and more than 200 soldiers on board all surrendered, and the Qing army captured a total of "three horses, 169 pairs of armor, 20 barrels of gunpowder, 20 rockets, 15 horse forks, 4 artillery pieces, 16 Japan bells, three saddles, 42 horse swords, 24 Yunnan knives, 3 pairs, 30 rattan cards, 36 waist knives, "More than 200 people actually have 169 pairs of armor, and the armor rate has reached 84.5%.
The Ming army in film and television dramas.
It can also be seen from the records of the Qing army's attack on the Zheng army that raised food on the spot in Zhejiang, that the Zheng army's armor rate was very high, such as "(the Qing army) attacked on both sides of the strait, bravely rushed to kill, killed more than 300 rebels with arrows, bird guns, and artillery, captured 27 alive in battle, 125 waist knives, 153 spears, and 8 flags." The remaining thieves were invincible and sailed, and the officers and soldiers were killed on both sides of the strait, and the thieves could not climb the boat, and they drowned. He still ordered the soldiers to strip and take advantage of the situation to kill into the mud, shooting the thief ships with bows and arrows and shotguns. The thief couldn't stand in time, so he first turned the cannon into the water, and then went to the water with his armor and sank to death. The officers and men flocked to the upper boat, and saw that the full house was full of grain and rice."
Green battalion soldiers of the Qing Dynasty.
But some of the Zheng army's armor rate is extremely low, for example, at the beginning of the seventeenth year of Shunzhi, the Qing army intercepted six Zheng army's catch boats in the waters of Fujian, two double-canopy ships, captured a bunch of people, seized a lot of ordnance, now take two of the ships as an example, talk about the general equipment level of the Zheng army's warships: the first boat has a total of 14 people, one of whom is unshaved, it seems that this should be a Zheng army veteran, the ship is equipped with five spears, three iron forks, seven waist knives, five pounds of gunpowder, and a dove cannon, There is a copper cannon, and there is no armor on this ship. The second ship had a cannon, five cannons, eight pigeon cannons, a barrel of gunpowder, eight knives, five helmets, four cotton armors, a horse fork, three interceptors, and four guns. Other ships had firearms, cold weapons, clothing, and food, but no armor was found.
Infantry in cloth armor.
This is Zheng Jun's situation. Let's talk about the situation of the Ming army in Liangguang, such as the Liao Du Department between the activity and the Liangguang Army, after the Liao Du Department was destroyed by the Qing army, the Qing army captured 632 soldiers alive, captured 40 pairs of iron armor, 86 iron strong hats, 802 pieces of cotton armor, 29 pairs of bows and arrows, 235 waist knives, 209 broadswords, 50 war horses, 5 cannons, 174 bird guns and three-eyed fire guns, 20 flags, and 16 bows. There are 802 pieces of cotton armor, which means that there are at least more than 800 infantry from the regular army of the Southern Ming Dynasty, and there are only 40 pairs of iron armor and 50 war horses, which proves that the cavalry of Liao Dubu is about forty or fifty.
Heavily armored cavalry in the mid-to-late Ming Dynasty.
I haven't found out where Liao Du first worked and whose subordinates he worked for. But looking at this level of equipment, it is obvious that this person's subordinates are the regular army of the Southern Ming Dynasty, and the number of soldiers is about 1,000, and it finally caused 236 casualties to the Qing army, which can be regarded as relatively combative.
The cavalry of the Qing army in film and television dramas.
Let's talk about Liangguang and Fujian, and then talk about the equipment level of the Great Western Army, one of the main forces of the anti-Qing Dynasty, the main source of information is Li Guoying's revelation of the battle of Liu Wenxiu's general Hao Chengxi: the Qing army captured two elephants in the battle of Jiapanguan to destroy Hao Chengxi's army, captured two mahouts, and captured 440 horses and mules used by the Ming army, 517 pairs of iron cotton armor, 28 iron helmets, 170 waist knives, 54 bird guns, 650 spears, and a total of 75 banners. It can be seen that the Ming army lost at least five or six hundred people in this battle, while the Qing army lost seventy-two people, with a total of 271 casualties. And some other miscellaneous armies, such as the Wu Dading Department we mentioned above, are relatively poor, Wu Dading's subordinates were attacked by the Qing army at the junction of Sichuan and Shaanxi, and a total of 51 people were killed and captured, while the Qing army only captured 17 pairs of cotton armor, and the armor rate was only 33%.
Left-hand man.
In the battle of Dingqiaokou in 1657, the Qing army captured a total of six large flags, two iron armor, two large flags, 33 large swords, 14 waist knives, 4 crossbows, 13 war horses, 132 iron strong hats, 130 leather helmets, and 102 cross-chin fire guns.
An iron helmet of the Ming Dynasty in the collection of the Shandong Provincial Museum.
In general, during this period, the cavalry of all forces was dominated by iron armor, and iron armor generally refers to cloth iron armor, which was rare in the late Ming Dynasty, and the infantry was mainly cotton armor, including the infantry of the Eight Banners of the Qing Dynasty.