Letter to the Gyeonggi Inspector移京畿巡察使文

These rules for drilling troops are meant to put the people at ease. Therefore all those evils of vexation and clamor in going to and fro to distant places, which have of late attended the drilling of troops in other provinces, are done away; and since they are only to go to the land where the village people live and drill as suits them without leaving their own place, it is easy to bring about. Even granting that the robbers from outside do not come, if every man has already practiced arms the robbers at home will not dare come and offend either, and the village may lay its head high and sleep at ease.

Let the company officers first understand this intent, and let them teach this intent closely to the people of each village besides, that none be startled into doubt and hit upon a scheme to escape it. Nor may the company officers and the banner chiefs and squad chiefs and those below them encroach by so much as a hair's tip and become a hardship to the people. What must be striven for lies in high and low trusting one another and doing a true business with a true heart; do not foster the careless habit of dressing things up on paper only and so getting clear of responsibility.

In the farming season put your strength into ploughing and planting, and when there is business hold and guard with one heart. From this time forth you may keep parents and wife and children whole below and hold and guard the state above, and there will be good without end. Otherwise you will be scattered and wandering and unable to look to one another, some falling into the ditch and some losing their whole livelihood so that they cannot keep even their own bodies whole; how much less is there anything to say of other matters. In this the gain and the loss, the getting and the missing, are plain to see: let each give his whole heart and put it in practice.

The matters to be disposed of in Ganghwa and Gyodong are put wholly in the charge of the prefect of Ganghwa; and the general outline of drilling the troops and dividing the units is likewise to be put in practice after this pattern.

Item. Let camps be set in all of the left, right, van and rear of Gyeonggi; one camp leads five battalions, one battalion leads five companies, one company leads three banners, and one banner leads three squads. The number of soldiers in one camp takes two thousand five hundred men as its general standard. For the left camp of Gyeonggi the great camp is set at Yongjin, and of the five battalions it leads, each battalion is to have one training field at a place where the distance the soldiery must go to drill is uneven, far for some and near for others; and the several companies that the battalion leads are likewise to have, within the village where they live, a field for practicing archery.

In ordinary times the company officer leads his own soldiers and has them practice archery or fire the gun or use the spear or run swiftly and the like at the training field within the village; once a month they gather at the battalion's own training field and practice the art of formations; and once in three months the soldiers of all five battalions gather together at the camp itself, practice the art of formations one day, and on the next compare what they have learned and then disperse. The company officers and the banner chiefs and squad chiefs and those below them are rewarded and punished by grades.

Within one battalion, of the three soldiers who stand out, the one who takes first place is remitted household service and the furnishing of horses and the like altogether for a year; the next is remitted the furnishing of horses and sundry labor within six months; and the next after him is remitted sundry labor within three months. The one who takes first place among all five battalions, besides being remitted household service and sundry duties for a year, is rewarded with goods, or is freed from base standing and from his labor service, or is made one of the palace guard (禁軍). A company officer who has done his duty well is reported apart and heavily rewarded; and any among them who is slack in the charge laid on him, or who, trading on his office, schemes for himself and encroaches upon the soldiers he leads, is to be sought out and questioned and the facts made clear, and the grave cases dealt with heavily according to military law; this is to be done.

Item. The able-bodied men of the villages and townships ought to come within the ordering into ranks. Besides these, those who hold military degrees (出身), military men, members of the palace guard and the like who are at home and hold no office are also, according to the number of them there may be at the time, to be roughly formed into ranks and named roving troops, without limit of many or few, in readiness to be called up and used; this is to be done.

Item. For the men who watch and look out in the army, pick those who are clever in nature and knowledge, who know the roads closely, who can go in and out of the mountain valleys, and who walk well; choose ten men for each battalion and name them scouting troops, and set a squad leader over them to lead them, and give each a signal flag (搪報旗), in readiness to be called up and used; this is to be done.

Item. Let each company furnish, as is convenient, horn trumpets great and small and trumpets, and have the soldiers practice the constant blowing of them in time of no business; and let those with skill be set down apart and reported, and let the camp commander have them blow on the day the art of formations is practiced, and let the three who take first place likewise be awarded a reward after the pattern of those who shoot well, as encouragement; this is to be done.

Item. The right camp of Gyeonggi is set at Dokseong, the van camp of Gyeonggi at the mountain fortress of Juksan, and the rear camp of Gyeonggi below the mountain fortress of Paju. The drilling and the gathering of troops at each camp is to be put in practice after the pattern above; this is to be done.

Item. For the arms of the left camp of Gyeonggi an armory office should be set up apart at Yongjin, where bows and arrows and matchlocks and the like are to be made in quantity and given out to the soldiers for use in their drilling; and for the arms of the right camp of Gyeonggi an office is likewise to be set at Dokseong to make and give them out; and the making of arms for the van camp and the rear camp of Gyeonggi is likewise to be reckoned and put in practice after this; this is to be done.