Kapitel 154: Chapter 155: [Artillery and Artillery]
Then, in the name of justice, Ma Shao will implement labor reform on these white people, exploit their labor, and try to convert their thoughts, just like he did to the war criminals.
If there was a white agent or a "white traitor", things would undoubtedly be much easier. Brannan was this "white traitor".
"From today on, this fort is renamed 'Fort Western Springs' - an Apache military base and a labor reform camp."
Ma Shao then ordered the soldiers to clean up the battlefield and collect all the corpses and supplies.
"Is this the cannon from Sutter's Fort?" The most noteworthy trophies were undoubtedly the several cannons. Ma Shao asked, looking at the bronze cannons in front of him.
"Yes, Chieftain." Du Tiao said, "In addition to the one in the tower, we also found a cannon in a room, but it was slightly damaged."
The so-called cannon is actually a long-barreled cannon, and the original meaning of its name is "tube" in Latin.
Of course, later on, the meaning of cannon became gradually broader, or the distinction between cannons and howitzers became gradually blurred.
The cannon in front of Ma Shao was a standard long-barreled cannon, and its barrel was much thinner than that of other cannons.
The barrel is made of brass and has some Cyrillic letters on it.
"Is this... Russian?" He didn't understand Russian, but he had seen these strange letters before.
Du Tiao: "This brass cannon is indeed from Russia, but no one in the fort seems to know where it came from. Anyway, Sartre bought it from a captain in South America."
He added: "It may have something to do with Fort Ross to the west. That's the only reason I can think of."
Ma Shao nodded.
Fort Ross is the southernmost Russian settlement in North America, located one or two hundred kilometers west of Sacramento, close to the coast.
Ma Shao touched the brass barrel of the cannon.
For him, these trophies from Sutter's Fort were the first artillery pieces he had at his disposal.
He had always wanted to equip his troops with artillery, but it was difficult to achieve.
Buying it outright is bound to be difficult.
No matter how poor the government management level of that era was, it would not be so poor that it would not even care about the sale of artillery.
So as an Indian, if he wanted to equip himself with artillery, the more appropriate way seemed to be to make it himself.
It sounds feasible. As a man from the future, a physics teacher and a keyboard strategist, Ma Shao should be able to make at least the flying thunder cannon or the "heartless cannon".
But in the end, he did not do what is called "heartless work".
Because he knew that the performance of this super-simple artillery was actually not very reliable and was far from being as magical as some rumors said.
The operation is cumbersome, the conditions of use are limited, the accuracy and range are poor... Not to mention these, more importantly, the safety of unscrupulous cannons is also a big problem.
In real history, due to the extremely limited range and problems with the artillery itself, the operators of the Flying Thunder Cannon were always in a dangerous environment, which was only slightly better than sacrificing themselves to blow up a bunker.
Moreover, this thing is mainly used for siege, but the strategy that Apache should currently implement is undoubtedly a defensive strategy, at least there is no need for siege.
So after some consideration, Ma Shao decided not to make cannons for the time being, but to accumulate more industrial technology foundation first.
But that doesn't mean he doesn't want to have some artillery as soon as possible, in fact he plans to buy it from Mexico or Europe.
Needless to say, in Europe, ever since the United States began to seek independence, the British have supported the Indians in order to cause trouble for the Americans.
When the Anglo-American War was fought, the British even produced a trade rifle specifically for the Indians.
This rifle has undergone many simplifications and improvements. It has a simple structure, low price, and huge production volume. It has greatly promoted the popularization of firearms among the Indians, which can be said to be a well-intentioned move.
To this day, this youth version of the British rifle is one of the most common firearms among Indians.
Ma Shao believed that as long as he could get the British to pay attention to him and his tribe, it would not be difficult to obtain some arms support.
And then there are the Mexicans.
After Mexico's defeat, it will lose about half of its territory and retreat to Central America, with little or no intersection with the Apache territory.
Distance creates beauty. Without intersection, there will naturally be no conflict. There is no need for Mexicans and Apaches to be hostile to each other as they did in the past.
The Mexicans, who had just experienced defeat, definitely hated the United States more than the British, and there was a great chance of getting artillery from them.
Ma Shao already had some plans in mind for this. In fact, this is what he needed to do after his trip to California.
He observed the cannon in front of him for a while, then turned his gaze to the several white prisoners next to him.
"Are you guys artillerymen?" asked Ma Shao.
The captured soldiers lowered their heads: "Yes."
Ma Shao: "I think you should already know the punishment you will face."
"As John Sutter's accomplices, you will face at least five years of labor reform."
"If you still don't quite understand what labor reform means, you can also understand it as 'imprisonment'. In short, you have no freedom."
After a pause, Ma Shao changed the subject: "However, Apaches believe in convincing people with reason and morality."
"Our goal is not to punish anyone, at least not only that, but we also want to make the world a better place."
"So...if you can mend your ways and make some contributions, you will receive corresponding rewards, such as gold coins and reduced sentences."
A captured artilleryman hesitated, "What do we need to do?"
Ma Shao: "You just need to teach my soldiers the skills of artillery."
Artillery requires knowledge of mathematics and physics, but mathematics and physics alone are undoubtedly just paper talk.
Therefore, if you want to train a group of qualified artillerymen, you certainly cannot do it by relying on Ma Shao alone.
He needed professional artillery.
But he knew very well that teaching work could not be done by force, but depended to a large extent on the attitude of the teaching staff.
The profession of teacher can be extremely sacred, or extremely corrupt.
Whether to teach or to destroy people depends on one thought.
Therefore, in addition to some necessary compulsory measures, Ma Shao also needs to offer generous rewards as incentives, and of course a competition mechanism.
This is artillery, and the teacher's dedication is crucial.
One of the captives could not hide his disdain and said in a tone that was as normal as possible but still a little sarcastic: "First of all - you have to be able to read."
Most white people are illiterate, and universal education in the United States only became popular after the Civil War and the electric revolution.
The vast majority of Indian tribes do not even have their own writing system, so they are naturally illiterate.
These artillerymen living in California came into contact with the most primitive and backward Indians every day. They did not believe that the Indians were qualified to learn artillery knowledge.
Even as captives, they maintained this pride.
Ma Shao smiled indifferently and pointed to the Apache soldiers around him: "Every one of them can read."
"They are not very familiar with English and Spanish, but you may be worse than some of them when it comes to the language of mathematics."
The captured artillerymen were obviously unconvinced, but they said nothing.
Ma Shao only said: "As long as you are willing to serve as artillery instructors, you can be exempted from hard labor and receive a salary. Twenty dollars a month."
"Twenty dollars?" This number made the artillery prisoners' eyes light up.
Generally speaking, soldiers' income is not high, and as a private armed force in California, their income is even less.
It is even difficult for them to be considered professional soldiers. Even if they are, it was only in the past. For example, these artillerymen have served in the regular army.
But after becoming Sartre's private army, most of these soldiers took on other jobs part-time and at least kept a few serfs.
Ma Shao: "Yes, twenty dollars, and it is a real twenty dollars, gold and silver coins, not banknotes."
"In addition, based on your training results, you can also get at least one year's sentence reduction and be freed early."
"You can also refuse, as long as you are willing to do heavy physical labor like most prisoners, receive a meager salary, and have fewer opportunities for sentence reduction."
The prisoner asked in doubt, "Do other prisoners also get paid?"
"Yes, but most people only earn three dollars a month and need to work about fourteen hours a day," said Ma Shao.
"And the artillery instructor not only gets a salary of twenty dollars, but also works no more than ten hours a day."
"Twenty dollars and three dollars, fourteen hours and ten hours, you who are proficient in mathematics should be able to understand the difference between the two."
Finally, Ma Shao said, "Okay, I'll give you some time to think about it."
"In the meantime, you can also discuss some math and physics problems with my subordinates to see if they are really as illiterate as you think."
Afterwards, the Apache soldiers did discuss mathematics and physics with the captured white artillerymen.
Of course, they sent the best person in this area - they were not so confident that anyone's level of mathematics and physics could defeat the white man's artillery.
"Forehead wrinkles, it's up to you." The Apache soldiers patted a young man on the shoulder, "You are a man who has won the top three in the math and science training class. Don't let the chief down."
"It's not the top three, it's the third place," Forehead Wrinkle corrected him. He frowned, making his forehead full of wrinkles.
He looked at the white artillerymen in front of him and said, "Let's make a bet."
"What's the bet?" the white artillerymen looked at each other and asked.
Forehead wrinkles: "You guys send a representative out, and then he and I will ask each other questions. Whoever can't answer the question must admit defeat and pay one dollar."
"Ten dollars!" the Apache soldier behind him shouted, "One dollar is too stingy. If you don't have money, I'll give it to you!"
"Yes, ten dollars!"
The white artillerymen were teased by their companions. Seeing their confident look, they were not convinced and pushed a young man forward: "Gauss, let them see how powerful you are!"
The forehead wrinkles were startled by the name: "You...you are Gauss?"
Gauss seemed a little reluctant, but decided to take up the challenge: "It seems that you are indeed not ignorant of mathematics, but I am not the great Johann Carl Friedrich Gauss, but Hans Gauss, just a happy coincidence."
Gauss was still alive and had already completed most of his contributions. He was a living god in the academic world at that time. Anyone who had a little knowledge of mathematics must have heard of his name.
His forehead wrinkles showed embarrassment, and he felt that his reaction just now was somewhat embarrassing. It should have occurred to him with his toes that how could Gauss appear among the prisoners at Sutter's Castle?
His reaction was indeed embarrassing.
The artilleryman Gauss in front of him had undoubtedly secretly despised him, so he casually said: "Well, let me ask a question. At the same time and in the same place, throw two iron balls, one weighing ten pounds and the other weighing five pounds. Which one will land first?"
This seems like a humiliating topic.
After all, in 19th century America, anyone with a little education, or even anyone who had lived in a civilized society, would know about Galileo's experiment and know that light and heavy objects would fall to the ground at the same time.
Forehead wrinkles also understood, but his performance just now was indeed a bit stupid, so he didn't complain: "Land at the same time."
He then added: "Galileo's law of free fall. Any object moving from rest, subject only to the force of the Earth's gravity, will have the same speed."
"Yes, you are right." Gauss nodded, "Now ask me."
Forehead wrinkles thought about it and came up with a simple question: "For a right triangle, if its two right-angled sides are three centimeters and four centimeters long respectively, what will be its hypotenuse?"
Gauss: "Of course it is five centimeters. Pythagorean theorem. This is common sense."
The Pythagorean theorem is also known as the Pythagorean theorem. However, you don't need to know any theorem to answer this question. Three, four, and five are the most common Pythagorean numbers, and the ancients thousands of years ago also knew them well.
Gauss added: "Before I start the next question, I'm a little curious, what does 'centimeter' mean?"
Americans were more accustomed to using imperial units, and this continued to be the case.
What's more, this was the 19th century, and the imperial system was popular all over the world, so relatively few people knew about the metric system.
"It's one hundredth of a meter."
"What does 'rice' mean?"
Forehead wrinkles: "A system of measurements originating from France, where one meter is roughly equivalent to thirty-nine inches. This system of measurements has actually been around for decades."
Gauss nodded. "Oh, it seems so. But why do you want to use French units? As far as I know, the Apaches don't seem to have any special relationship with the French."
"The chief said that the metric system is more scientific and reasonable than the imperial system, and more and more countries will adopt it in the future," said Forehead Wrinkles.
"Why?" Gauss frowned slightly.
Wöchentlicher Energiestatus
-- Power-
Rangliste 
-- Power-
Stein