Chongzhen revived the Ming Dynasty

Chapter 556 Battle of Daling River

Dalingh Fort was built in imitation of Fort Zeelandia.

The Dutch took several years to build Fort Zeelandia, but with the huge manpower and material resources of the Ming Dynasty, it was completed in just a few months on the banks of the Daling River.

And it is more perfect and has many unique features.

The most eye-catching thing is the gun positions on the city walls, which are far more numerous than those on Fort Zeelandia.

This is because tracks were reserved when Dalingh Fort was built, and now they are paved with wooden tracks.

This allows the artillery on the city walls to be moved more conveniently and fire from various gun positions.

Tracks were also laid inside the city to facilitate the transportation of materials and personnel between the city walls.

The garrisons and equipment on the city walls were also divided into fixed forces and mobile forces. When a crisis occurred in one direction, the mobile forces on other city walls would be transferred there.

Moreover, because the north side is less than a hundred meters away from the Daling River, there is basically no need to increase the guards on this side.

If the Jianlu dare to attack the city from the river bank here, the cannons and muskets on the city walls will let them know what a torrent of firepower means.

(There is a river to the north, and the artillery on a half-moon fort can cover the riverside position)

Huang Taiji led an army of 50,000 to attack the Ming Dynasty, preparing to bypass the grassland from the Daling River Valley. After learning that the Ming army had built two small castles along the Daling River, he ordered the Dergelei, who was the vanguard, to take them down.

He really didn't care about these two small castles, because the Jin Kingdom had captured countless large cities in Liaodong before.

But after Degelei attacked for three days and failed to capture Dalinghe Fort, he began to attach importance to the two small castles and personally led his army here.

"It seems that the Emperor of the Ming Dynasty wants to teach us a lesson!"

Looking at the castle on the north bank of the Daling River, Huang Taiji said to his left and right.

With the Jin Kingdom's spy force in Liaodong, he knew that the construction of Dalinghhe Fort was not completed by the Guanning Army.

Instead, the newly enthroned young emperor of the Ming Dynasty dispatched troops from some Dongning Island and supervised the construction of this castle.

He had sent people to obstruct the construction of the castle before, but because Khorchin was invaded by Ligdan Khan and Mao Wenlong caused chaos in the east, the main forces of the Jin Dynasty were concentrated in these two directions, and the people sent over had difficulty even crossing the river, let alone destroying the castle.

Now that he saw that Dalinghhe Fort had been completely built, with low walls and sharp corners, it was quite different from the previous Ming Dynasty cities. He knew that there must be something special about this castle.

This made him look around and ordered Ajige:

"Ajige, my brother."

"You lead your troops to capture this castle."

Ajige was the twelfth son of Nurhaci and the first son of the fourth concubine Abahai, and was extremely loved by Nurhaci.

When Nurhaci was alive, he appointed Ajige as the leader of the Plain Yellow Banner, which shows his status.

After Huang Taiji came to power, he suppressed Ajige. First, he exchanged the two white flags with the two yellow flags, making Ajige the leader of the white-bordered flag. Then, he used an excuse to deprive Ajige of his position as the leader of the flag and replaced him with his younger brother Dorgon.

However, Ajige was still very powerful, because when Nurhaci died, he divided the sixty Niulu he controlled among the three brothers Ajige, Dorgon and Dodo. Dodo was given thirty Niulu, while Ajige and Dorgon each had fifteen.

Seeing that he was unsure about the defense of Dalinghhe Fort, Huang Taiji ordered Ajige to lead his troops to test it out.

Ajige was a man of great military prowess but with a rough temper, or it could be said that he had a simple mind and lacked political wisdom.

After hearing Huang Taiji's order, he did not think of arguing at all, nor did he even ask Degelei what he should pay attention to when attacking the castle. He led his troops directly across the river and rushed forward.

In the past, he relied on his bravery to capture many cities. During the Battle of Ningjin, he even dared to rush to the city of Jinzhou, which had red cannons.

Now seeing that there was a large open space on the river bank in front of Dalingh Fort and not many people on the city wall, he directly ordered his soldiers to charge forward, wanting to climb the low city wall in one go.

He Kegang, who was in charge of the battle at Dalingh Fort, sneered when he saw this, and only ordered the artillery to fire when Ajige's troops crossed the river and were about to land.

Suddenly, the Lü Gong cannon, mortars and other large and small artillery fired, some hitting the river bank positions, some hitting the river, and occasionally a few hit the boats, causing the people and horses on the boats to fall into the river.

When Ajige saw the fierce firepower, he was not afraid at all. In fact, the ferocity in his heart was aroused, and he ordered his subordinates to move forward.

The Jurchen soldiers were also very fierce. They rushed to the shore despite the heavy artillery fire. Some of them rode on horses and rushed towards Dalinghe Fort.

When the soldiers on the city wall saw the head being presented to them, they naturally accepted it with joy.

After the reward for beheading merit was increased and collective merit and eyewitness merit were implemented, they no longer needed to risk going out of the city to cut off heads to get the merit they wanted.

This was a great advantage for the musketeers and artillerymen. After the Jianlu came ashore and stepped into the area they had marked, they began to shoot.

The artillery is the most conspicuous in the battle. The new Lu Gong cannon and mortars are both complete ammunition shells that can be fired after being ignited with a fuse.

It can be said that the firing rate of the Ming Dynasty's artillery is now faster than that of the fire gun. Even the wall fire guns used in the past have been replaced by small-caliber Lü Gong cannons.

Ajige encountered fierce firepower that he had never seen before under the city wall. If his portrait had not appeared on the reward card and his personal soldiers had not risked their lives to rescue him, he might have been killed.

If there had been such fierce firepower in Jinzhou City during the Battle of Ningjin, he would have been unable to rush down the city.

After his warhorse was killed and several of his personal soldiers were beaten to pieces, the reckless Ajige felt frightened and allowed his personal soldiers to drag him back to the boat.

But he still hoped that his men could cross the moat and climb up the low city wall.

However, what made him despair was that the closer he was to the city wall, the more accurate the Ming army's artillery and muskets became. Almost no soldier could get within twenty feet.

He saw with his own eyes that one of his generals was shot and killed, and he was hit by more than one bullet. This made him terrified and confused at the same time:
When did the Ming army's muskets become so accurate?

This is naturally due to the rear sight and front sight that Zhu Youjian asked the craftsmen to add to the musket, as well as the one large and three small spherical bullets made by Lu Xiang.

This type of projectile greatly increases the accuracy of spherical bullets within the effective range, which is also the reason why spherical bullets are still equipped.

According to statistics at the shooting range, when one hundred large and three small spherical bullets are fired at a distance of 80 meters, 142 large bullets and 222 small bullets will hit the target, with a total of hits.

On average, out of the 4 pellets in each round of ammunition, 2.22 pellets hit the opponent, which can be said to be a guaranteed hit, causing damage to the enemy.

It goes without saying that large projectiles are very powerful, and although the damage of small projectiles is not high at long distances, if they hit the face or the gap in the armor, they will still make them lose their combat effectiveness.

Especially as the distance gets closer, the power of the small projectiles becomes able to penetrate armor, which makes it difficult for the Jianlu soldiers to rush within 70 meters of the city wall.

Occasionally, someone would rush in, but would be targeted by the musketeers on the city wall and die under the musketeers, which had a shorter range but a faster firing rate.

The speed at which they die depends only on the firing speed of the muskets and has nothing to do with themselves.

The soldiers of Dalinghe Fort now liked to use the new fire gun with this kind of ammunition. They referred to the one large and three small spherical bullets as "Yisan Bullets", which means they were powerful enough to scare the barbarians to death.

Ajige and his soldiers were a little scared at this time, which made the soldiers on the city wall more confident when fighting, and they had no fear of the Jianlu at all.

For them, the only threat they had was the Jianlu's archers. As long as they shot and killed the archers, the Jianlu would not be able to threaten them.

Moreover, the task of shooting archers was assisted by artillery. Who asked Ajige to send troops without using artillery? This allowed the artillery on the city wall to shoot archers first, and with shotgun shells.

As long as someone raised a bow, shotgun shells would be fired, killing a large number of the surrounding Jianlu.

Huang Taiji and others on the other side of the river watched the Ming army on the city wall slaughtering their own soldiers like a massacre, and gradually fell silent.

They really didn't expect that this small castle with a capacity of a thousand people actually had so many firearms.

Did the Ming Dynasty transfer all the artillery and muskets from other cities here?

Why could the Ming army fire so many projectiles in such a short time?

What they don’t know is that the newly manufactured Lu Gong cannon and mortars of the Ming Dynasty focus most on the rate of fire.

After using silk bags to pack ammunition, the artillery's firing rate increased from one round per one or two minutes to four or five rounds per minute, which was faster than the previous Portuguese cannon. Now the limitation on the artillery's firing rate is the heat dissipation problem of the artillery.

Most of these artillery pieces, except those sent to the capital, were transported here.

The artillery in other cities remained unchanged, and in some places some more were even added, with old artillery that had been eliminated in the capital installed.

It can be said that the power of these firearms was unprecedented for the Jianlu, but for the Ming Dynasty, it was just a slight display of strength.

A battalion of 3,000 men in the Ming Dynasty was equipped with ten Weiyuan cannons. After the Lü Gong cannons with breech blocks replaced the Weiyuan cannons and the Portuguese cannons, the number of them in each battalion would exceed this number.

After all, this type of wrought iron cannon is too cheap. For the Ming Dynasty, they can produce as many as they want.

The mortar is even classified as a team-owned artillery and may be distributed to squadrons and squads in the future.
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The Jianlu leaders watched Ajige and the soldiers of the Bordered White Banner retreat in silence, without blaming them.

Because these people thought that even if they led their subordinates up, the result would not change much.

No wonder Dergelei failed to capture the castle after three days of attack.

Huang Taiji himself was even more silent, because he didn't know whether there was only one castle like this in the Ming Dynasty, or whether all the cities had such perfect defenses.

If there were castles like this everywhere in northern Zhili, what could he plunder even if he broke through the Great Wall and entered the pass?
Without taking down the city, it would be impossible to collect much food and property in the wild.

He must capture Dalinghhe Fort and find a way to break into the city.

This made him put aside his contempt for Dalinghe Fort and truly treat the castle as a city. He decided to lead the army into the pass after conquering the castle:

"Dergelei, tell me how you attacked the city and what you learned in the past three days?"

Degelei finally had a place to vent his grievances. He cried to Huang Taiji and others:

"The other walls are just like this one, with countless cannons and muskets."

"Our warriors were shot and killed by them with firearms before they even got close to the city walls."

"Even if you shoot arrows from a distance, it's hard to hurt them."

There are sheds built on the walls of Dalingh Fort to protect against arrows.

There are also many shooting holes and observation holes, so the soldiers can't even stick their heads out.

Until now, Degelei still doesn’t know how many defenders there are in Dalingh Fort and how many firearms they have.

He only felt that with every attack on the city wall, countless firearms were fired.

Huang Taiji comforted him and concluded:

"It seems that if we want to break through Dalinghe Fort, we must use artillery."

"Li Yongfang, lead the artillery across the river and engage in artillery battle with the Ming army on the city wall."

He ordered Lee Bang-won to build a pontoon bridge upstream and transport his artillery over.

Since the rise of the Jin Dynasty, many artillery pieces have been seized in Liaodong, among which the most powerful is the Tianwei General Cannon, as well as the Shenwei Second General Cannon and the Honglei Third General Cannon.

These guns were manned by surrendered Han Chinese soldiers under the command of Li Yongfang and Tong Yangxing.

After receiving the order, Li Yongfang immediately led his soldiers to build a pontoon bridge and transported the still usable artillery pieces such as the General Cannon and the Second General Cannon.

Manggurtai and his brother Degelei led the soldiers of the Zhenglan Banner to support the battle. After suppressing the firearms on the city wall, they were ready to lead the soldiers to attack the city.

The lookout on the city wall saw it and hurriedly sent a signalman to report.

When He Kegang received this news, he knew that the test of Dalinghe Fort was coming. The previous battles were just tests by the Jianlu who underestimated the enemy.

Huo Weihua also seemed a little nervous. He knew that whether he could gain a foothold in Liaodong depended on this battle.

Only by truly winning this battle can he and the Dongning soldiers gain the emperor's trust and gain a firm foothold in Liaodong.

The good news is that the Jianlu's offensive in the past few days has allowed the Dongning soldiers, who have never fought against the Jianlu, to accumulate experience and confidence.

The words from the Liaodong army about how powerful the Jianlu were all just a joke to them:

If you really want to be powerful, can you be shot by them like shooting a deer?
These Jianlu are just a little more ferocious and have better armor.

But in front of the powerful heavy muskets, the armor and leather armor of the Jianlu were no different.

They could shoot them as easily as they hunted deer in Dongning.

It can be said that these Dongning soldiers had no fear of the Jianlu at all.

Even when he heard some Guanning soldiers talking about how powerful the Jianlu were, he still felt a hint of sneer in his eyes.

This made the Guanning soldiers feel a little embarrassed, and they competed with the Dongning soldiers in killing the enemies.

At the same time, they also had some doubts in their hearts:
Why is it that the Jianlu, who were so powerful before, are now killed like hunting wild beasts?
Huo Weihua understood why, because Dalingh Fort was not simply an imitation of Fort Zeelandia, it was built entirely in accordance with the new military ideas proposed by the emperor.

The first is that city defense weapons are completely transformed into firearms, and the second is the so-called space and team.

Nowadays, there are almost no blind spots for shooting around Dalingh Fort.

A firing table was also compiled for the artillery on the city wall, recording all the artillery, shells, and propellant needed to fire at which location.

Now these firing tables came into play. When the Han soldiers led by Li Yongfang had just selected the artillery positions and had not yet completely fixed the artillery, the red cannon and long-range Lu Gong cannon on the wall of Dalingh Fort began to fire, destroying most of those artillery.

It can be said that the Jianlu’s artillery had lost its effectiveness in this war before it could even display its power.

Huang Taiji was so angry that he demoted Li Yongfang and handed over the firearms and Han soldiers to Tong Yangxing.

(End of this chapter)