1850 American Gold Tycoon

Chapter 581 Male soldiers use it for their own use

Liang Yao smoked a cigarette, sipped wine, and crossed his legs with interest as if watching a play, watching these southern gentlemen being drunk and sophistry.

In the decades-long debate and quarrel surrounding the issue of the survival and abolition of slavery, the theoretical level and thinking ability of both the North and the South have been tempered and improved, reaching a new height.

Liang Yao had no doubt that if there were northern industrial and commercial owners present, they would not hesitate to fight with the canes in their hands.

A few years ago, a representative from Massachusetts was crippled by a representative from South Carolina with a gold-encrusted civilized staff and was bedridden for two years.

Liang Yao noticed that even slave owners in the South had tough and moderate attitudes towards the abolitionists in the North.

Among them, the slaveholders with the toughest attitudes came from South Carolina, the stronghold of southern slaveholders, followed by Georgia and Virginia.

This is related to the slave-holding tradition of these states and the strong ideology of state rights. Although in the United States, people identify with the states much more than they identify with the federal government. But this problem was particularly obvious in the slave states of the South.

"Boss, why do I feel like these guys are scolding us?" Listening to these red-faced Southern guys shouting and scolding the Yankees in vulgar words, Zeiss next to Liang Yao felt that something was wrong. He always felt that something was wrong. The Southerners were cursing them too.

After all, the three West Coast states, especially California, which is the leader among the three West Coast states, are all industrial states like other northern states.

And his boss Liang Yao is the largest factory owner and capitalist on the West Coast.

"They are criticizing northerners, so what does it have to do with us westerners." Liang Yao didn't take it seriously. Due to its geographical closure and relative economic independence, the western region currently has no direct conflict of interest with the south. .

What's more, the west doesn't need black people from the south as a labor force. If there is a shortage of labor, it will be more cost-effective to sail directly to the Qing Dynasty to transport people. There is no need to compete with these slave owners in the South for slaves.

The southern states are positioned in the west as more of a provider of cheap raw materials and a dumping ground for industrial products and luxury goods.

"Your Excellency." The drunken South Carolina Governor Kinster came to Liang Yao with the support of his servants.

"Governor Kinster, please take a seat." Liang Yao motioned for Kinster to take a seat.

"I wanted to make a special trip to visit you and discuss a business deal with you, but I didn't want you to come to Houston in person. I wanted to take this opportunity to discuss the business deal first." Kingst sat down on the sofa.

Seeing that Jinst began to discuss business with Liang Yao, other large slave owners in South Carolina also gathered around.

These slave owners came to them simply because they wanted to sell cotton to themselves.

After Buchanan took office, although he still adopted a conciliatory attitude, he hoped that neither the north nor the south would offend.

However, due to the growing power of the North in Congress, several bills to increase tariffs have been passed. In the past three years, U.S. tariffs have shown a trend of increasing year by year.

The profits of the cotton exported to Europe by these slave owners in the South were becoming increasingly meager. Coupled with the impact of the economic crisis triggered by the railroad crisis in 1857, the lives of the slave owners in the South were also worse than before.

The planters in South Carolina heard that western merchants in Texas were buying and hoarding cotton at higher prices than northern merchants, and that California did not set up trade barriers to the inflow of goods from both the north and the south, so Kingston wanted to Liang Yao promotes South Carolina cotton.

"I think you want to talk to me about the cotton business?" Liang Yao showed a very kind smile, "If it's a cotton business, you can talk to the local Chinese businessmen."

Since getting involved in the chemical industry, Liang Yao has gradually lost interest in the cotton textile industry, which has relatively low profits, and has slowly withdrawn from the field.

The cotton textile industry on the west coast is currently mainly carried out by Strauss, the governor of Liangzhou, and a large number of Chinese businessmen.

Liang Yao's business focus is mainly in the chemical industry, followed by gold mining, silver mining, industrial mining, machinery, military industry, shipbuilding and railways, which are more profitable and technologically advanced industries.

"It's useless to talk to them about this matter. I still need to talk to you." Although he was a little drunk, Jinster's mind was still sober. "To be honest, I want to barter for this batch of cotton." We can even deliver the goods in advance without accepting cash.”

"Oh? Governor Kinster, what do you want to exchange your cotton for?" Liang Yao asked.

How could Jinster talk about business like this? He directly showed his trump card. There is only one reason for Kingst to do this, and that is that he really needs this batch of goods urgently.

Kingster looked up at the old guys surrounding him and said: "It's not mine alone, it's ours. We want to exchange this batch of cotton from you for a batch of arms. The price is negotiable. The only thing is The requirement is that it must be in stock and be delivered within 3 months!”

Faced with the growing threat from the north, Kinster was eager to formalize the South Carolina militia. Regularizing the militia requires a lot of financial resources and arms.

As for money, these wealthy slave owners in the South will naturally not be short of money. As for arms, the North has now strictly restricted the flow of arms into the South. It has been difficult for Jinst and others to purchase large amounts of arms from the North.

As for the Virginia arsenal and the Texas arsenal, orders have been scheduled for a year. Ordering arms from these two arsenals will take at least a year, which is unacceptable to Kingster and others.

Chinese businessmen active in the southern states, although these Chinese businessmen could get them slaves from Southeast Asia and Japan, as well as some scattered arms.

However, the arms that these Chinese businessmen could obtain were mostly old guns such as Brown Bass and Springfield M1842, and the quantity was not very large, which could not satisfy the appetite of Jinster and others.

What Kinster and others needed was a batch of weapons with sufficient quantity and advanced performance to arm the South Carolina militia.

arms? Spot goods?

It's not that California doesn't have ready-made arms, it's just that these ready-made rifle stocks are General Liang's M1857 rifles, which Liang Yao kept for his future military expansion.

Furthermore, General Liang's M1857 rifle, as a single-shot, breech-loading, metal-cased center-fire rifle, is too advanced in performance at this time and is inconvenient to sell. At present, only the three main regiments of the Western Brigade and the three veteran militia regiments have completely completed the replacement of General Liang's M1857 rifles.

However, when it comes to spot goods, it is not impossible. There are still 3,500 second-hand Walter M1851 rifles that have just been retired from the militia in the armory of Jinshan, that is, San Francisco.

Liang Yao originally planned to use these retired rifles to support the Indians' anti-genocide cause, and exchange them for some local goods to support his family.

Since Jinster and others need arms, it doesn't matter if they sell them to them. Liang Yao's moral bottom line has always been very flexible. Anyway, there is a huge demand for cotton on the West Coast, and he is not worried about losing the cotton in South Carolina.

Even Liang Yao didn't know if the slave owners in the South such as Kingston would dislike these second-hand rifles that were used by male soldiers for their own use.

Although the militia regiments in the West Coast region are more intensively trained than militia regiments in other states, the militia regiments have not participated in high-intensity wars, so the condition of these second-hand Walter M1851 rifles is not bad, even better than the three regular standing regiments of the Western Brigade. The retired firearms in hand are in better condition.

"I still have 3,500 Walter M1851 rifles in my arsenal. Although these rifles are not brand new, they are not used frequently and have been well maintained, so these guns are in good condition." Liang Yao said, "If your Excellency If you don’t mind, these rifles will be delivered to you this month.”

The South is still better prepared for war than the North. These slave-owning leaders in South Carolina are now thinking about regularizing the militia under their opponents.

It's no wonder that they were able to beat the Northern Army into panic in the early stages of the war.

"Walter M1851 rifle? Can it be delivered this month? That's great." Hearing that Liang Yao had a ready-made Walter M1851 rifle for delivery, Jinst and others couldn't help but their eyes lit up, "Old guns are also available. It doesn’t matter, as long as you can provide more ammunition with each gun, it’s just that the quantity is too small.”

"How many rifles do you need?" Liang Yao asked.

3,500 rifles are enough to equip three infantry regiments. This is too few. Liang Yao is curious about how many rifles the slave owners like Kingster want.

"12,000 rifles, 12,000,000 rounds of ammunition, 30 large Napoleon cannons (12-pound field guns), 60 small Napoleon cannons (6-pound field guns), 90,000 rounds of artillery shells." Kingster reported the number of arms he wanted. .

Hearing this huge number, Liang Yao almost spit out the tea in his mouth. These slave owners in South Carolina had an unusually big appetite.

"With such a large amount of arms, I'm afraid I can't get so much ready stock." Liang Yao thought for a moment and said, "I can contact my uncle for you and ask his arsenal to produce the arms you need. Let him produce it. Can the remaining 8,500 rifles, as well as ammunition, artillery shells and field guns be delivered within one year?”

The Sacramento Arsenal is currently fully producing General Liang M1857 rifles and Sacramento cannons. The original production lines of Walter rifles and Napoleon cannons were either transferred to the Austin Arsenal in Texas or to the Xiangshan Manufacturing Bureau in Guangdong.

The order from the Austin Arsenal in Texas has been scheduled for a year. Now if you want to take this order, you can only give it to the Xiangshan Manufacturing Bureau in Guangdong.

"Okay." After a period of discussion, the slave owners in South Carolina agreed to this plan.

After finalizing the order, Liang Yao asked Zeiss to discuss the next details with the slave owners in South Carolina.

The demand for arms was so great, and they only wanted to buy it, not make it themselves. It can only be said that these slave owners in South Carolina had a little foresight about the future situation, but only a little.

They still believed that the upcoming war would end within two or three months, and that just hoarding a batch of ammunition would be enough to cope with the upcoming war.