River Transport and the Effectiveness of the Qing Artillery Corps during the Ming-Qing Transition

Abstract

This study examines how the availability of river transportation routes affected the effectiveness of the Qing artillery corps. The Yangzi River system and the Pearl River system guaranteed timely and stable artillery support for the Qing siege force in Jiangnan and Liangguang respectively. This was made possible by the Qing’s large reserves of cannons and the sizeable water forces at several strategically important cities along the two rivers, which constituted a river-based artillery logistic system. In the mountainous and unpopulated areas of China, however, the Qing artillery corps faced considerable logistic difficulties. This put the besieging army in a strategic dilemma, i.e., whether to wait for the siege train indefinitely or to assault the city with cold weapons. To push further, this strategic dilemma posed by the terrain may explain why the Qing army, despite possessing the latest artillery technology, continued using cold weapons extensively until the nineteenth century.