Rise of the 1630s South America

Chapter 1473 St. Pierre and Rest

On May 1667, 5, the first tentative attack on the French fortress failed. The officers and soldiers of the Fengguo Army conducted fire reconnaissance and trials from various angles, but all of them failed, and more than 31 people were killed. casualties.

The main reason for their impatience is that their attempt to persuade them to surrender failed!Yes, even though the people on the east coast captured many scattered French colonists and indentured slaves, they could not persuade the French who were holding on to the fortress to surrender.They even took the initiative to ask the people on the east bank to let them go, for which they will pay a certain amount of ransom.In their view, the people on the east bank are actually the same as those European armies and even the pirates. They fight for money. Now that they have offered to pay the money, the people on the east bank should just go downhill and retreat. Although they are all pagans.

I have to say that the idea of ​​the French is quite desirable, because Captain Lan Fei has really been shaken: Since the turtle shell on St. Christopher Island is so difficult to break, why not let it go gently? But what about moving on to more valuable targets?Like Guadeloupe or Martinique or something.For the sake of a broken island, is it really necessary to take the risk of attacking in the wild for three to five months, and at the same time exchange for huge injuries and downsizing?I'm afraid it's not worth it!

Therefore, after seriously considering the feasibility and consequences of besieging the French fortress, and testing their "quality" a little, Captain Lan Fei has already moved his mind to retreat.After all, this time the army came to St. Christopher Island, they robbed the French villages and manors, and they have already harvested tens of thousands of yuan worth of tobacco, sugar, dyes and other materials (although they have to pay for cash when they are realized) discount), it is unwise to attack such a tortoise-like fortress, since there is no profit, and on the contrary, it may cause heavy casualties to oneself, so why not just give up and move to other places?

Lieutenant Cai Anguo, who was in charge of commanding the entire fleet, soon received an inquiry from the army. After discussing with his subordinates, they also agreed to leave St. Christopher Island and go to Guadeloupe or Martinique for comparison. cost-effective.There are still a bunch of British people on this small island. It will be ugly if they use any bad means. It is better to leave directly. Anyway, after such a toss here by the east coast, the French should not be able to resume production in a short time. Spaniards made a military covenant.You know, we are only fulfilling the obligation to send troops to reap our own rewards (the river area + the lease right south of the Bueno River in Chile), but we have no obligation to hold our heads and work hard for you.If you want to avenge the French, you still have to rely on yourself, we can only help here!

After the navy and the army have unified thinking, things will be easy to handle!After plundering the French colonial area for the last time, and announcing the "liberation" of more than [-] European indentured slaves and more than a thousand black slaves (of course they were "liberated" to work on Huaiyuan Island under the rule of the people on the east coast, you Understood), the thousands of East Coast Army troops who landed evacuated St. Christopher Island in batches, leaving a mess of land and villages for the French. I believe it will be extremely troublesome for them to clean up in the future.

Undoubtedly, investors' pockets will be spent again for this, and the profits (if any) of the previous years will have to be spit out for additional investment.Moreover, King Louis XIV of France may have to allocate some financial subsidies. After all, everyone suffered this unreasonable disaster this time, but it was all because of your great success, His Majesty the King, not to mention that it was the government that encouraged everyone to colonize the Caribbean!

The entire evacuation work was not completed until late on June 6, because the wind direction in the Caribbean Sea was quite unfavorable before, and everyone had to stay on the original beachhead by the sea for several days, and only then did they catch a wave coming from the northwest. The wind blowing, and then the whole fleet was as happy as it was New Year's Eve. All the ships pulled anchor and set sail, leaving this humid and hot tropical island that made people sickly, and then rushed to the next target—well, the same Guadeloupe is humid, hot and sickly.

On June 6, due to an unexpected storm, the waves off the coast of Guadeloupe suddenly increased, and ships on the east coast wobbled as soon as they approached the coast, making it difficult to land.Captain Cai Anguo could do nothing about this, so he could only order to abandon the landing here. The whole fleet continued southward, crossed Dominica Island, and went straight to Martinique Island, another important French stronghold in the Caribbean Sea. Anchored off the coast of Saint-Pierre on the west coast of the island, they are preparing for landing operations.

……

"The wind direction has changed, and it's southeast wind now. The weather is really unpredictable." Cai Anguo looked at the naval flag on the topmast of the light cruiser "Southern Cross", and said slowly: "Actually, it's time to turn around a long time ago. Before there was a northwest wind to send us to Martinique, it was already the blessing of Tianzun, we should not be too demanding."

Hearing this, Lan Fei also looked at the military flag flying above his head. Several seagulls and albatrosses were circling around the ship. These birds flew over from the open sea, which strengthened the determination of the people on the east coast who were a little uncertain about the course at that time. , so it is considered a symbol of good luck.

The wind at sea was still a bit strong, and there was a drizzle of light rain on the land, which added a lot of difficulty to the landing operation.Moreover, with the passage of time, the waves tend to increase gradually. Cai Anguo's captain's cabin was flooded by a large number of waves just now, and the orderlies rescued a large number of important things such as documents, drawings, and logs. As for those Tobacco, sugar, clothes, etc., can only be soaked by the sea.

However, these winds and waves did not shake the will of the people on the east coast to land. On the contrary, they urged them to unload the supplies onto the boats and row to the coast of an emerald island like Martinique.

Maybe it was because no ships came to inform the French that Cape-France and its surrounding areas had fallen, maybe the French were negligent, or maybe the bad weather gave the people on the east coast cover. In short, many ships arrived this time. When St. Pierre was off the coast, the French did not respond in time; and when the first batch of Feng Guo * soldiers had overcome the wind and waves and rushed to a beach on the side of St. Pierre Port, the French still did not respond. respond.

However, after all, the French are not the gentle and vigorous Spain. After they crossed about two or three hundred soldiers on the east coast and dragged two cannons, they finally woke up and started shelling towards the sea. It's a pity The accuracy of the shells was very poor, and most of them fell into the sea, and they were far away from a distance of [-] miles. One had to wonder if the French on the coastal defense fort were drunk, otherwise how could they have such poor shooting skills? And what about the people on the east coast who were landing in a large scale so late?

Ignoring the harassment of the French, the army is still landing step by step.The wind and waves on the sea are getting bigger and bigger, which adds a lot of difficulties to loading and unloading supplies and rowing forward. Many soldiers also temporarily lost their combat effectiveness due to seasickness.Faced with such a predicament, officers of all levels of the Fengguo Army who had already landed frantically urged their soldiers to rush to dig trenches, build fortifications (both very skilled work), and make all preparations.

Although the accuracy of the French coastal defense artillery is not flattering, several east coast ships were slightly moved to avoid damage (only a few sails were adjusted), which delayed some time.The soldiers who had landed were quite disappointed and worried when they saw that the large force might not be able to complete the landing today.Seeing this, the officers distributed the water in the packages one after another, and asked the soldiers to eat and rest in batches. They were worried that the French would come to attack at night.

Because it is a field battle, the food is rough field dry food, especially for these miscellaneous troops who are regarded as cannon fodder, it would be a ghost if the logistics staff of the Joint Staff Headquarters would bother to prepare food for them.It will be seen that the staple food in the hands of the soldiers is dry hard bread or flatbread, some of which are quite "living" with some bugs, and some may have even lived for several months, but the soldiers will eat them in cold water. It tastes like nothing, but it's obvious that I'm used to it.

In fact, the worries of the commanders who have already landed are very necessary.At four or five o'clock in the afternoon, some troops with messy uniforms, obviously mixed with soldiers, militiamen and others, rushed out of the city, apparently trying to drive the officers and soldiers on the east coast who had already landed into the sea.

The two cannons that had already landed had just set up a canopy. When they saw the enemy rushing towards them, the artillery brothers immediately loaded the ammunition in a hurry. This time it was grape shells. I believe it would surprise the Frenchmen.As for the more than [-] Bong Kung Fu Army infantry brothers, they mounted bayonets on their rifles under the order of the officer.Now that it was raining, muskets were no different from firesticks, and even the power of the cannons was greatly reduced. At this time, the willpower and ruthlessness of both sides were the fight.

Because the people on the east coast had pulled up a row of barbed wire in front of the landing site and dug a shallow trench at the same time, this caused a lot of trouble to the French rushing over.Especially those indentured slaves or black slaves rushing to the front. These people are of poor quality and low in morale. The two cannons loaded with grape bullets had already fired two rounds before, but this time they were filled with shotgun bullets. With a bang, all kinds of fragments flew out and packed into the bodies of the slaves. , There was a wail in front of the position.

"Boom! Boom!" There was another round of bombardment, and more than ten corpses fell down among the charging slave group, and the morale of the rest also collapsed, turning around and fleeing.Just kidding, they have been subjected to endless exploitation by the manor owners on weekdays, and their lives are as humble and lowly as dogs. This time, if the slave owners hadn’t promised them freedom and forced them with knives and guns, the ghosts would have come out to boo!Now, the real knives and guns on the battlefield are like a shot of sobriety, especially those two 120mm cannons that seem to be able to devour human flesh and blood, which made these flustered slaves completely Crash - what kind of shit freedom is not as valuable as life, now I just want to live!

The retreat of the slaves naturally caused a lot of confusion to the French "gentlemen" (referring to white people with free status) who followed closely. Their formation was broken up, and people stumbled and couldn't maintain their balance.Seeing this, the east bank commander who was waiting in full battle in the landing field knew that there was something to be gained, and immediately ordered the soldiers to pursue it.

The orders of the officers were well carried out.Soon, a large group of officers and soldiers of the Fengguo Army armed with 32-C rifles rushed forward with shouts, driving away the demoralized slaves with shining bayonets, and stabbing the slow-moving slaves to the ground with bayonets from time to time. It exacerbated the enemy's confusion, and at the same time made the gentlemen behind them unable to make effective resistance. They could only turn around and swarm towards St. Pierre like the slaves, hoping to get rid of this heartbreaking crisis as soon as possible. Blitz.

This dramatic battle came to an end at nightfall. The officers and soldiers of the Fengguo Army with great morale charged with a perfect hand-to-hand combat, killing and injuring more than a hundred enemies, but their own casualties were only a dozen or so. It was a beautiful battle.

And after this battle, the courage of the French seemed to have been knocked down a lot. Until the next day when all the people on the east bank landed, no one came to harass them, except that they sent a few envoys to ask if they After paying the ransom, you can let the city of Pierre go.To be honest, if the French proposed this proposal two days ago, Captain Lan Fei, who was afraid of casualties and had no confidence in whether he could break through St. Pierre, would have agreed, and then collected the money and happily went to the next place.But after yesterday's clumsy beachhead battle by the French, Lan Fei has already turned up his appetite, and plans to capture the city of Pierre to "take" those belongings for himself, without asking the French to offer them.

And the next battle seems to be as Captain Lan Fei expected. Although the city of St. Pierre, which is centered on merchants and plantation owners, has a population of more than 2000, there are hundreds of gentlemen who can be drawn out to fight, but the broken They were so brave that they couldn't resist the fierce offensive of the army on the east bank - in just two days, after paying the price of more than 100 casualties, they completely defeated all the resistance forces, and let the French all over the city prostrate on the east bank to conquer under the soldier's boots.

So far, Saint-Pierre, the largest city on Martinique, has fallen into the hands of the people on the east coast. The east coast army (so far has been reduced due to fighting and disease) has suffered a lot of casualties and diseases. More than 600 people), and finally have a safe foothold.As for the next step, whether to attack Fort Saint-Louis, which has strong fortifications on Martinique, and Guadeloupe, which was previously missed due to strong winds and waves, depends on the situation.

Now, let's rest first!After several months of fighting abroad, the consumption of materials and ammunition has been very large, and the number of personnel has also been reduced a lot. Fortunately, it is not far from Huaiyuan Island, so let's send a ship back to replenish it first.

(End of this chapter)