Chapter Seventy-Three: Xiangyang and Nanjing XIV

More than 100 boats, large and small, stayed in the Yangtze River, but most of them were empty. There weren't many of them.

Zheng Chenggong was dressed a little embarrassed.

On top of the gold armor, I don't know where it was stained with some mud, and on top of his boots and pants, there were already large wet stains.

Zheng Chenggong is not a person who is so pretentious that he is spotless all over his body, but after all, he is from a rich background, and he naturally has someone to take care of him, and he will never be so embarrassed on important occasions, and he will change his clothes immediately, and at this time he has long forgotten all this.

I'm afraid that Zheng Chenggong is naked at this moment, and he doesn't realize it.

He only felt that since his debut, several years of hard work and ambitions, have been ruined today, and all the efforts of the Zheng family since Zheng Zhilong began to actively move from sea and land to land have been ruined. Although there are still many soldiers along the river and coast, especially Shi Lang's department.

Originally, he wanted to idle Shi Lang's move, but he didn't want to save Shi Lang.

Who can say clearly about this blessing and misfortune.

Overnight, the Yangtze River is full of floating corpses, just like a few months ago, for the fish in the Yangtze River, this year is an authentic harvest year. Within a year, hundreds of thousands of corpses fell into the Yangtze River, and I am afraid that the fish in the Yangtze River can grow to the size of a boat.

Zheng Chenggong couldn't bear to watch it at all, but he forced himself to watch it.

"Today's defeat, all the mistakes, are all on me." Zheng Chenggong's face turned pale: "I must remember everything today." Be sure to remember revenge. ”

Zheng Chenggong only gathered 10,000 or 20,000 soldiers, retreated to Zhenjiang with the sailors, and joined the Zhenjiang defenders, and Zhou Quanbin and others who fled by land. The whole army is only about 40,000. More than half of them are sailors.

The Qing army waited for this opportunity, and they don't know how long they had been waiting. Naturally, Zheng Chenggong can't be let go.

Brigade of cavalry, attacking from all directions. Biting Zheng Chenggong to the death.

The battle here has just ended, and the battle of Xiangyang is long overdue.

As the center of the Great War, Fancheng was already in dilapidation.

Within a few days, Zhang Xuan was very calm, and did not carry out a general attack on Fancheng, but bombarded it with artillery.

At the beginning, the number of artillery pieces of the Qing army was still higher than that of the Xia army, and the Xia army could only use the cannons of a few warships that had become batteries, all of which added up to only a few dozen. But in Fancheng, there are cannons that have been left in the first place. Coupled with the cannons brought by the Qing army from the rear, the number exceeded 100.

Although almost all of these cannons came from Nanjing.

The reason why Zhang Xuan postponed the attack was also to find a problem, the increase in the density of firepower made it more difficult to attack the city. What large-scale siege equipment, such as Zhang Xuan's Lu bus used when he attacked Kaifeng City, was a head higher than the Kaifeng city wall. Hundreds of people pushed at the same time, and even now, it is a behemoth three or four stories high.

When the density of firepower is low, this thing is still a siege weapon. But now the number of artillery pieces has increased dramatically, so to speak, explosive. In the battle between the two sides, the importance of artillery is becoming more and more important. Therefore, the means of siege have also changed.

Without enough artillery superiority, Zhang Xuan would never attack the city easily.

So during this period of time, he did three things, the first thing was that the army surrounded Fancheng on three sides.

Although the camp is some distance away from Fancheng due to the Hongyi cannon, it has also blocked Fancheng from afar. However, this blockade net is quite tight, and it has become a trend of encircling three without one.

The second thing is to mobilize artillery.

Whether it is the newly released artillery of the Guangzhou Manufacturing Bureau, or the original artillery of Wuchang City, Xiangyang City, and even other passes. Even the artillery of the naval division, as many artillery as there are, mobilize as many cannons. Strive to suppress the artillery at the head of Fancheng with an absolute overwhelming advantage.

I am afraid that this kind of thing will become inevitable in the future.

The third thing is to infiltrate north.

Nanyang Prefecture, although it is also in Henan, is different from other places under the rule of Henan.

Because of the frequent wars in Henan, especially the massacre of the Qing army in Henan, the Qianli Plain of Henan presented a desolate situation. Great Xia occupies a lot of territory in Henan, but there is no Henan Province, but it is divided into Huaixi Town, and Xiangyang Town is under the jurisdiction of the two towns, although there is a threat from the Qing army, but there is also the reason for the withering of the people's livelihood in Henan.

But Nanyang is different from Xinyang.

Xinyang is surrounded by mountains, easy to defend and difficult to attack. The massacre of the Qing army did not affect Xinyang, and the refugees from the north were settled near Xinyang, so Xinyang's household registration was not solid, but it was definitely much better than other places, almost becoming a geographical term.

The same is true of Nanyang.

In the era of Li Zicheng, Nanyang was an important place for the army to operate, although it was ravaged by the Qing army for a while, but it did not last long. It was immediately recovered by the Xia army, and the massacre of the Qing army in Nanyang was not heavy, so after Gao Shiheng occupied Nanyang Mansion, he was committed to restoring production and stabilizing people's livelihood. Although Nanyang can't be said to be a big rule. But it has been recovering.

Even when Gao Shiheng and Yuan Shizhong joined forces to go north to Luoyang, Nanyang bore a lot of manpower and material expenses.

Although Gao Shiheng finally had to give up and come to Nanyang and retreat to Xiangyang. But the Xia army still has considerable influence in Nanyang. After all, the Qing army can be said to have an unstable foothold in Nanyang, and many corners and corners cannot be fully controlled.

Zhang Xuan sent a large team of men and horses to infiltrate the north. Therefore, many were blocked by the cavalry of the Qing army. But there are still some in Nanyang, who have gained a firm foothold, and in Nanyang, there are a lot of beacons everywhere, but it cannot be said to be stable.

The three-pronged approach has also paid off today. Zhang Xuan finally felt that the time had come. It's time for a general offensive.

Therefore, under Zhang Xuan's order, Deng He presided over the general attack of the whole army on Fancheng.

When he was here, Zhang Xuan thought about it and kept thinking about how to conquer Fancheng. In the end, it had to be summarized as the original plan under Kaifeng City. It's the way to dig the city.

Large siege equipment cannot be used at all, it is a live target. Zhang Xuan also wanted to collapse from the ground, but unfortunately, Fancheng is too close to the Han River, although there seems to be some drought this year, and the water level of the Han River has dropped, but the underground of Fancheng, which is so close to the Han River, is absolutely impossible to dig more than a zhang without water.

First of all, I am afraid that a well will be dug first.

Come to think of it, there is only the digging of the city.

However, even if he was digging the city, Zhang Xuan didn't want his soldiers to really dig the city wall and dig through the city wall, but prepared a large number of gunpowder bags, but unfortunately, black-gunpowder is black-gunpowder. There is a limit to the amount of black powder that can be carried by one. Carrying too much will affect the action.

It is impossible to blow a hole in the city wall in one go, like explosives.

But Zhang Xuan believes that there is no problem that cannot be solved by a powder bag, if there is, there will be another one, and if there is, there will be two more. One day, the world will understand that exploding is an art.

It's just that in this way, Zhang Xuan almost swept away all the gunpowder in Huguang and other places, and even Zhang Xuan gave an order to the Macao City Shipping Division, ordering all the tariffs of the Macao Municipal Shipping Division to be levied in another way, that is, to collect sulfur and saltpeter.

As a result, a large number of Cantonese merchants had to run the Japanese route, and a large number of gunpowder raw materials were transferred from Japan and the Ryukyus.

There are also people who transfer directly from Zheng's hands.

With this supplement, Zhang Xuan's gunpowder hunger and thirst were temporarily alleviated. But with the number of cannons climbing almost indefinitely, there are already too many firearms in use, and the future consumption of gunpowder will definitely hit to an alarming level.

However, most of the saltpeter production areas in China are in the north, and the south cannot be said to be absent, but the quantity is not much, so a considerable part of the raw materials consumed by China's gunpowder depend on imports. This problem is only a temporary solution here for Zhang Xuan, and in the future, as firearms gradually become the mainstream, it will definitely develop to a situation that has to be faced.

But that's another story.

At this moment, Zhang Xuan's subordinates, under Zhang Xuan's order, rushed up violently and headed towards Fancheng.