Begging in late Ming Dynasty

Chapter 712 Red Waterloo

Before Song Qingshu, artillery battles were not uncommon, but they never appeared on such a scale again. I heard that a certain ship in Lianghuai and Song Dynasty had strong artillery, and this time Wu Sangui's eastern expedition almost pulled out all the firearms he could use in Huguang. Naval guns plus land guns, there are two thousand if not three thousand. Even if you want to raid the Ming army camp on the east bank of Poyang Lake, under such a difficult situation, people still pull over 130 and six Hongyi heavy artillery.

These cannons are indeed sharp. Under Wu Sangui's cheerful order, the Liaodong gunner, who was still wearing Qing Dynasty uniforms, yelled and tamped the cannon powder with a wooden pestle, and iron balls weighing several kilograms rolled along the barrel. , Immediately insert the cannon twister, and the next moment, the roaring cannon and the dense gunpowder smoke evaporated.

In the distance, the building complex of blue bricks and ancient tiles in Poyang Town also exploded with a roaring sound of collapse.

Although Wu Sangui's heavy artillery was good, he didn't have a corresponding artillery cart. Some of the artillery were directly mounted on the cart, while others were lifted off, covered with sandbags, and nailed to the ground with ropes everywhere. It was difficult to change the angle of the artillery, but Even so, the dense shells hit Poyang Town, and it still bloomed. Standing on the point general platform and looking at the opposite side with a long telescope, Wu Sangui could clearly see the collapse of houses, and he could vaguely hear the shelling. Ming Jun screamed in fear, and he couldn't help but nodded in satisfaction.

But the cannon is a machine that eats gunpowder. The gunpowder consumption of each cannon is six to ten catties. It was the same as yesterday, there was rubble everywhere, and more than half of the two-story building that used to house Tibetans collapsed.

The cavalry did not perform well yesterday, and this time they were simply thrown aside. The Xinyi Battalion under the command of Ma Bao and Xie Yongjun, with more than 7000 infantry soldiers, was transferred to the front of the formation.

"Whoever enters the town first will be promoted to a higher rank, and whoever cuts off a thief's head will be rewarded with ten taels of silver. Attack!"

In front of the army formation, the cries of Ma Bao, the mighty general of the Wu army, spread far away like a broken gong. Ten taels of silver are several months' salary for the civilians on Song Qingshu's side today, and it is even more expensive for these poor soldiers in Huguang, Liaodong. A large amount of property, especially the envy of the cavalrymen who found a lot of good things in the camp of the Yu Qianming army yesterday, and the nearly [-] Wu army infantry strode towards Panyang town with greedy shouts.

Xinyi Battalion, Loyalty Battalion and other battalions were all selected from the Zuo Liangyu Army and the subdued Peasant Army. They were the strongest part of the 30 army. Watching the infantry form several square formations, Carrying a spear, drinking the firecracker step by step, and pushing towards Poyang, Wu Sangui's mind was no longer on the battle in front of him.

Similar to Yu Gan, Poyang also belongs to the periphery of the Ming army. The real core is Raozhou City and its nearby water villages. Song Qingshu is powerful because of a firearm. Poyang Town, which has become ruins at this time, has no way to resist his subordinates. With [-] fierce soldiers who have been through the battlefield for a long time, Wu Sangui has already anticipated how to march after crossing Poyang today, and how to have an extremely tragic duel with Song Qingshu under the city of Raozhou.

This is a war where whoever wins is the king of Jiangnan!

But he was doomed to be disappointed today. Song Qingshu never thought of passive defense. Just as the Xinyi Camp moved forward with shouts and noises, there was the same shocking sound like the earth crashing, resounding from the opposite side.

The smoke from the cannons is about to catch up with the smoke bombs, and there is no way to hide. Poyang is high in the northeast, and the lakeside plain is in the southwest. It is diagonally opposite to Wu Sangui's army, and in another low hillside forest called Lianhua Mountain. The gunpowder smoke from the fire enveloped the mountain like a white cloud.

The cannon array stretched for more than 2000 meters. Judging by the intensity of the cannon sounds, there were no fewer than three hundred guns!

Wu Sangui's heart suddenly jumped.

The commander just became nervous, but the advancing troops were facing hell. On the one hand, they were condescending. On the other hand, the defenders in Poyang Town did not use their cannons yesterday. The dense formation immediately suffered a devastating blow. Amid the whistling wind, the solid iron shell hit the ground hard, and immediately bounced into the team like a bouncy ball, knocking down a row of soldiers, and the heavy bullet hit the thigh, and the cracking sound was like breaking bones and tendons, The soldiers who fell on the ground let out a miserable cry.

At this time, the level of cannons of the Ming army can almost catch up with that of Napoleon. In addition to the terrifying bouncing solid bullets, there are also explosive bullets with amazing lethality. The black powder exploded, and the heavy shot put, which was a little bigger than the pill, splashed out like scattered flowers.

Several phalanxes immediately became sparse, and these soldiers of the Wu army were heartbroken. As they walked, the comrades around them fell into a pool of blood. Some even had their helmets and heads bloomed together, and some were interrupted. Arms, thighs, groaning in pain, even a guy looked at the transparent blood hole on his stomach in disbelief, then slowly knelt down and fell to the ground.

This march to Poyang Town was about 500 meters long. Between 900 and 400 meters, Wu Sangui's most powerful Xinyi camp fell down by a third, and the wounded, corpses, and fallen flags were spread out in a mess. one place.

Yesterday there was a lesson learned by Wang Fuchen, but Ma Bao dared not retreat. He gritted his teeth and ordered his own soldiers to supervise the battle at the back of the army formation, and those who retreated would be killed. At this time, under the control of fear, Wu Jun in the Xinyi Battalion did not care about saving energy and gave up walking. , quickly ran towards Poyang Town, howling like a beast while running, on the vast plain, it was like a group of hungry wolves running.

The terrain is narrow and mainly engaged in street fighting. Zhao Sheng's Sixth Front Army was indeed not equipped with heavy artillery, but it had a lot of light artillery. Now Song Qingshu has improved Qi Jiguang's tiger squatting artillery, which is a lot heavier and thicker, and is also equipped with small guns. The cannon cart, somewhat similar to the western eagle cannon, the infantry of the Ninth Division of Qihuo, who had just experienced the baptism of artillery fire, appeared from the hiding place at the root of the house, pushed the small artillery cart to the street corner of the town, and immediately sent a kind of Long cannonballs were stuffed into the muzzle.

This kind of thing is the weapon that the Ming army is most willing to use when fighting against each other, shotgun!
The back is a solid fader, and the front is wrapped in gunpowder with 28 small projectiles. With the roar of light cannons, 100 whistling projectiles were blasted out by more than 200 small cannons. Wu Jun, who was charging, ushered in In a death climax, the forward line was almost emptied, and a large piece of bloody corpses were scattered on the battlefield, about [-] meters away, shrouded in death.

"retreat!"

This time, Wu Sangui almost shouted out.

With the fluttering banners and the beating of clappers and gongs, the panic-stricken Xinyi Battalion finally fled back crying like a group of ants in a flood.

The turning point of the Civil War in later generations, the last famous Pickett charge in the Battle of Gettysburg, George Pickett's 1 men were bombarded by 500 cannons and tens of thousands of flintlock guns of the Northern Army The casualties were more than one-third on the spot, but because they were Yankees, the Northern Army did not bombard them when they retreated, which slowed down the casualties of the Pickett Army.

However, when dealing with Wu Sangui's slave-building traitor army and Zuo Liangyu's civil war expert, the Ming army was not so merciful. With sufficient ammunition, the Xinyi Battalion was once again baptized by artillery fire during the retreat. When the Xinyi Battalion withdrew at around 09:30 in the morning, at least 1 people fell down at an attack distance of 500 meters.

Not all of them died, less than half of them were wounded to the end and disabled. The Wu Jun who was shot screamed like he was dying, but none of the 30 Wu Jun with ashen faces dared to come forward to rescue them.

After losing a large sum of bets again, Wu Sangui's eyes turned blood red, and he turned his head, screaming crazily at the exposed Ming army position on Lianhua Mountain.

"Fire, fight back, and destroy the cannons of those Song thieves!"

At his order, 130 Hongyi cannons also turned their muzzles and roared towards the hillside.

The first front army led by Song Qingshu is stationed in the Lianhua Mountain area. There are Qihuo, Gezuo, and Fengyang. The fishhook occupied all the ridges around Lianhua Mountain, blocking Wu Jun head-on.

Today's terrain and situation are very similar to the Battle of Waterloo 140 years later. Poyang Town is located at the front and blocked the left wing of the Wu army's attack, making it afraid to do its best. The Lianhua Mountain in the northeast blocked the Wu army's right wing. Whichever direction Wu Sangui wants to attack, he will be restrained and sniped by the crossfire from the other side.

In the face of Wu Sangui's crazy artillery revenge, Song Qingshu also learned a trick from the Duke of Wellington. The forward infantry lay directly under the dug low wall and trench, and the three hundred cannons were dragged back to the ridge On the other side, the surging artillery shells either flew over the top of the mountain or were blocked by the ridge. More than 35 divisions leisurely listened to the explosion of huge fireworks on the opposite side.

The shelling lasted for half an hour, until the quartermaster reported to Wu Sangui tremblingly that the ammunition was about to run out, and then the shelling stopped. Holding the binoculars, Wu Sangui looked forward gloomyly. The shells had been ravaged twice, and the trees had fallen from side to side and collapsed a lot, but the flag of the Ming army that was exposed was still firmly planted in the position and remained motionless.

A hideous wound was cut on the face by the shrapnel, and before it was bandaged, Ma Bao came over fiercely holding the knife, and punched Wu Sangui heavily.

"My lord, are you launching an attack?"

But before Wu Sangui could make up his mind, at the other end, dozens of horses suddenly galloped from the east, and Wang Fuchen, who was punished to "clean the toilet", ran to the stage in a panic, sweating profusely. His head hit the ground heavily.

"My lord, it's not good. The scouts from the Northeast are here to report. A large group of Song Qingshu bandits set off from Raozhou, detoured our army's right wing, and headed straight for Yugan. My lord, the Song thieves' plan is to encircle us!"

These words made Wu Sangui's gloomy face a lot darker again...

(End of this chapter)