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Chapter 1277 "Ghost Fleet" in the English Channel

An unflagged privateer wanders the waters of Dunkirk.It has more than 30 artillery pieces, which are more than ordinary armed merchant ships, and it is more like a warship used for combat.

The Spanish admiral de Hawkes was on board this privateer, and there were many Spanish sailors on deck and in the cabin.

They were soldiers of the Spanish Navy and were ordered to plunder Dutch ships passing through the English Channel in the waters of Dunkirk in order to combat the maritime trade of the Dutch.

The large fleets of the Netherlands are generally escorted by warships of the Netherlands, and small-scale naval battles will occasionally break out in the English Channel between the two sides.

There was a heavy fog on the sea in the morning, and the privateers came and went silently in the sea fog.Once a merchant ship is targeted by privateers, it is likely to be bombarded by Spanish privateers, and then naval soldiers board the ship for laundering.

"There is a fleet spotted ahead!"

A Spanish sailor in charge of the observation suddenly yelled, which put the other sailors on the deck on high alert.

De Hawkes looked into the sea mist in the distance, and there was a faint appearance of a ship.

"Captain, are we approaching?" asked the Spanish sailor.

"Patience! It might be our own privateer, and we need to find out the number and firepower of the opponent first." De Hawkes did not rush forward to attack the opponent's ship, but chose to continue to observe.

Surrounded by the sound of the waves, the sea fog provides the best cover for sailboat concealment.

"The number of ships is more than one, it seems to be a fleet..."

The sailors on the deck found the looming shadows of ships in the sea fog, one after another, and there may be more ships hidden in the sea fog.

"Is this the large fleet of the Dutch returning from the West Indies?" Some Spanish sailors couldn't help wondering.

In order to deal with privateers from other countries, Dutch merchants usually gather merchant ships together and increase the number of armed merchant ships to improve the overall deterrent force against ubiquitous pirates.Sometimes there are warship escorts in the fleet.

Privateers can only retreat when encountering such a fleet.

"Give up the idea of ​​fighting this fleet. But if there is a single ship in their fleet, it may be our chance." De Hawkes said.

"Captain, look what kind of monster that is!" There was a sudden commotion among the sailors.

De Hawkes looked in the direction the sailor was pointing at, and in the sea fog, there was a ship that looked particularly long and narrow, compared with the outlines of other ships, it was twice their size.

The tall three masts convinced De Hawkes and his men that this should be a ship, but...

"It is impossible to build such a large ship on an ordinary wooden ship, not to mention that the keel is not long enough. Even if it has such a long keel, such a ship will have structural strength problems and cannot withstand the wind and waves on the ocean. It broke in the middle." De Hawkes still couldn't believe that he would see a ship nearly 70 meters long, because with the technology of this era, a wooden ship that dared to sail on the Atlantic Ocean could reach [-] meters is the limit.

In the sea fog, the nearly [-]-meter-high ship occasionally reveals its black hull and the artillery deck protected by the armor layer.

"Hiss, this can't be a ghost fleet..." The Spanish sailor couldn't believe his eyes when he saw the strange ships in the sea fog.

In any case, the appearance of such a strange ship in the English Channel, and this foggy weather, is really chilling.

De Hawkes silently calculated the size of the fleet in his heart. There were more than a dozen sailboats that were seen, and there might be a similar number of undiscovered ships in the sea fog.

In any case, the privateers he led could not pose even the slightest threat to a fleet of this size.

"I've traveled across the West Indies and the English Channel for so many years, and I haven't encountered any ghost fleet. It's very likely that it's just a Dutch fleet. Let's get out of here soon." De Hawkes not only felt that his own The privateers couldn't pose a threat to them, and they were worried that there were other warships in the sea fog.

The "ghost fleet" that appeared in the sea fog was actually the fleet led by Zheng Zhibao and Sun Chuanting.

Zheng Zhibao and others also discovered privateers haunting the sea fog.

"Captain, there is a large sailing ship in the distance!" When the sailor with the telescope saw himself in the Spanish sailor of De Hawkes, it meant that the sailor on the General Fubo could see them more clearly.

"Did you see the flag hoisted by the other party clearly?" Zheng Zhibao took out the binoculars and observed the galleon reported by his subordinates to appear near the convoy.

"The sea fog is so thick that I can't see clearly at all!"

"The Soochow sent us a signal, do you want to organize warships to attack the discovered ships?" The adjutant asked Zheng Zhibao for instructions.

"We are not familiar with the place here, and we can't be sure which side's ship the other party is. There is no need to attack it. It is of no benefit to us." Zheng Zhibao saw that the other party was just a ship, even a warship would There is no threat to one's own fleet, so they ignore each other.

If the other party is rational, they will not use a single ship to challenge their huge fleet.

The Spanish privateers left quietly under the leadership of De Hawkes, without confronting the "ghost fleet".Zheng Zhibao and others ignored the privateers and sailed safely to the mouth of the Thames River.

The sea fog on the English Channel gradually dissipated, and more than 30 large and small sailing ships appeared on the sea, among which the iron-clad ship General Fubo was on the right side of the fleet, and black smoke from coal burning wafted over the iron-clad ship.

This fleet crossed three oceans and came all the way from the far east to the English Channel. During the period, two ships were lost due to waves and hitting rocks, but for the entire fleet, the loss was not too heavy.

They were finally relieved when they discovered the Thames estuary and the English farmsteads that sprung up on both sides of the river.

Arriving in Britain means that they can go ashore to rest.Staying in the shaking and damp cabin all day made many of them show signs of mental breakdown.

"Be careful, don't break the camera, this is a real Western country, record the scenery here."

Several photographers rushed to the deck of the Admiral Fubo carrying heavy cameras and tripods, and began to take pictures of the Thames River and the scenery on both sides.For future generations, these black and white photos are precious historical materials, and no written description is more intuitive than photos.

The arrival of this fleet will cause an uproar in Europe at this time, even if the order they received is only to intervene in the bourgeois revolution in Britain in a low-key manner.

(End of this chapter)