Chapter 348 Recruitment

After setting up a plan to expand the army by 10,000, Marin not only selected 200 young people in China to train as reserve officers, but also sent Schwartz, 50 experienced squad leaders and 10 company leaders of the reserve force ( They are all wandering knights), specializing in the training of the new army.

However, Schwartz and others did not rush to the Teutonic State directly, but first went south to recruit troops in southern Germany...

Because it is necessary to raise an army of 10,000, it is very difficult to do in the Teutonic state with only 300,000 people. Moreover, the Teutonic state was a relatively wealthy Hanseatic commercial state. In such a country, it is very difficult to recruit 10,000 mercenaries who dare to risk their lives.

Of course, the Teutonic Kingdom also has its advantages, that is, there are many wandering knights there. Because the Teutonic Knights are one of the three famous Knights in Christendom, there are many young German wandering knights who come here every year, with an average of several hundred people every year.

Therefore, the Teutonic state has never lacked knights. There are more than 800 Teutonic knights with identities and the title of "Teutonic Knights" alone. And there are thousands of knights without the title of "Teutonic Knight". In the "Battle of Grunwald" (also known as the Battle of Tannenberg) that led to the decline of the Teutonic Kingdom, among the 27,000 troops of the Teutonic Kingdom, there were 10,000 plate knights alone. people. Of course, their enemies, the Polish and Lithuanian forces, were more numerous.

After the failure of the Battle of Grunwald, the Teutonic state began to decline and could no longer maintain the size of the plate armoured cavalry of more than 10,000 people. But no matter what, it can still maintain the scale of 5,000 plate armor heavy cavalry. Among them, there are more than 800 Teutonic knights with titles alone.

Because of the decline of national power, the Teutonic state could not employ enough wandering knights. Therefore, now the Teutonic Kingdom can only select outstanding knights from the hundreds of wandering knights who come every year and add them to the Teutonic Army. Most of the wandering knights, in fact, can't find the opportunity.

Many young wandering knights came to the Teutonic Kingdom with dreams, but after a few years, many people would be disappointed to find that they could not join the Teutonic Knights. Therefore, many old wandering knights will give up their dreams and return to Germany to find a noble to serve. Even some wandering knights went directly to Poland or Lithuania. Some of them will go to the nominally affiliated country of the Teutonic Kingdom - the Kingdom of the Knights of Livonia to look for opportunities.

Therefore, Marin's recruitment this time only intends to recruit 9,000 infantry and artillery in the German area. Then, leave 1,000 positions left for recruiting cavalry on-site in the Teutonic state.

You must know that there are thousands of wandering knights who cannot wait for the opportunity in the Teutonic Kingdom. Previously, Chief Philip paid to recruit 1,000 people because he had a stake in Marin's salt trade. But Chief Philip estimated that there were still two or three thousand wandering knights who had not waited for the opportunity. Marin was in the Teutonic Country and had no problem selecting 1,000 wandering knights.

Although these wandering knights may not be smart, their knightly martial arts are not as good as those who were picked up by the Teutonic state. However, they were born in a knight family after all, and their horse-fighting ability was at least much stronger than those of the untrained commoners. You must know that these wandering knights have been trained for at least ten years, and their martial arts skills are definitely not bad. By organizing these eliminated wandering knights and eliminating the scum with bad character, it is completely possible to form an elite cavalry.

Moreover, Marin made a plan, not to form pure plate armor knights, but decided to transform them into half-armored heavy cavalry similar to the Polish winged cavalry.

This kind of cavalry, the cavalry wears only half armor, and the horse does not wear armor. Its impact force is stronger than that of light cavalry, but weaker than that of heavy cavalry. However, their speed and stamina are better than plate knights. It can be said that the winged cavalry is a compromise between plate knights and light cavalry. At the time of the war, their name was Lancers...

Marin intends to choose to form a 1,000-strong Lancer,

Test the power. Moreover, Marin also chose a tactic for these Lancers - "wall charge".

This tactic is extremely powerful against the cavalry of the skirmish line. Because, the dense cavalry formation can allow more spears to stab the enemy. No matter how good the enemy is in martial arts, when faced with multiple spears poking over, even if he is not stabbed to death, he will be stabbed and dismounted, and then trampled by local war horses in turn...

If the opposite is light cavalry, let alone stab them to death, and if they die, they will fall to the ground and be trampled by war horses...

Of course, this tactic is also suitable for fighting European cavalry and Arab cavalry. Because, whether it is European cavalry or Arab cavalry, they are used to solving problems with melee combat.

But if the "wall charge" goes to East Asia and Central Asia, it will definitely be abused by the Mongolian and Tatar archers and call mother. Because, the overall speed of "wall charge" is not fast. If the lightly armed cavalry archers turned back and shot arrows while escaping, they would definitely kill these heavy cavalry who launched the "wall charge". After all, their war horses and lower bodies have no armor and cannot withstand bows and arrows...

However, Marin never thought of using Lancers and Wall Charge in Asia either. After all, Marin's current opponents are basically Europeans. European cavalry was accustomed to close combat, either with lances or sabres, but not with bows or muskets. At present, the only cavalry unit in Europe using muskets is the "Black Knights" of Marin...

As for the 9,000 infantry, Schwartz will take his men and recruit them in the poor countries of southern Germany. However, when Schwartz took his men to Württemberg and Alsace, he found that there were not many young people who met the recruitment requirements...

It's no wonder that Marin had recruited 10,000 troops in these two places before, so these two areas already lacked the poor young people who could be recruited to fight for their lives.

In desperation, Schwartz sent someone to send an urgent letter to Marin, explaining the situation...

Marin thought about it for a while, and also felt that the source of troops in the two places was indeed insufficient. So he wrote back to Schwartz, asking him to move to the two vassal states of Baden and Hesse around Württemberg to recruit new recruits.

Baden and Hesse are both mountainous areas with many mountain people and their economy is not good. Therefore, it is still very easy to recruit poor mountain people in these two countries. What's more, Marin knew that Hesse was a famous country of mercenaries. During the North American Revolutionary War, the United Kingdom hired a large number of Hessian mercenaries to suppress the North American militias because of the inability of the army. If it weren't for the French military intervention and Washington's use of land to lure poor Hessian mercenaries (Washington promised that each deserted Hessian mercenary would get 50 acres of land), the British could completely suppress the Hessian mercenaries. Independence movement in North America.

In this way, under the instructions of Marin, Schwartz transferred the recruiting agency to the Hesse and Baden regions and began to recruit the poor and aggressive mountain people in the area to serve as fighters for the new mercenary army.

Coincidentally, the men who Marin sent to Lübeck and other places to buy merchant ships also returned and brought back 10 200-ton Kirk sailboats. Just wait for the 9,000 infantrymen to arrive in East Friesland in batches by land, and then ship directly to the Teutonic State, where they will undergo rigorous training...