Compared with the Dutch, the Ming army's attack on Guangdong was not only immense, but also overwhelming. Pen ~ fun ~ pavilion www.biquge.info

The Ming army killed the water pass, the Qing army stationed at the water pass retreated without a fight, the Ming army entered the territory of Guangdong, and the sword pointed directly at the direction of Chaozhou.

The Hanjiang River, where Chaozhou is located, has become a natural danger to block the attack of the Ming army. The Hanjiang River is also a natural danger from Fujian to Guangdong, and the defenders of Guangdong can be stationed on the Hanjiang River to prevent the opponent from entering the hinterland of Guangdong. However, for the Ming army with a strong naval division, the Hanjiang natural hazard is really not a natural hazard.

According to the original plan, the Ming army sailed along the coastline and arrived at the mouth of the Hanjiang River.

On the other hand, the Ming army, which took a detour all the way, went upstream along the Han River, entered the mountainous area, and reached the narrow upper reaches of the river, cut down wood to build a raft, and crossed the Han River, so that they could detour back to the back of the Qing army.

After the departure of the Dutch fleet, the Ming navy divisions trapped in various inner harbors were able to go to sea again, and with the cooperation of the sailors, they could detour back to the back of the Qing army.

Wu Haodong, the general of the naval division, led 220 Dafu ships, 360 Haicang ships, and more than 1,000 other small and medium-sized ships, and more than 20,000 officers and men of the naval division, arrived at the mouth of the Hanjiang River. In addition, there were 5,000 people of Zhao Zhipeng's mountain army and 5,000 elite infantry of Li Rui arrived at the mouth of the Hanjiang River by boat.

The location of the Hanjiang River is very important, it is a natural danger between Guangdong and Fujian, so the Qing army also arranged a barrage rope at the mouth of the Hanjiang River, arranged a large number of underwater hidden piles, arranged artificial reefs and other defense facilities, and established the Shashan Fort at the mouth of the river, which was used to prevent the Ming army's naval division from entering the river for sneak attack. These defensive facilities, in fact, did not have much use for the Ming army.

Later, Shantou, a city located at the mouth of the Hanjiang River, was only a small village at the mouth of the Hanjiang River in this era.

The artillery arranged by the Qing army on the Shashan Fort is not too old, they are all newly cast artillery in the second year of Kangxi, many of these cannons are imitation Hongyi cannons, which are named Shenwei General Cannons, among which there are six Chongde cannons that weigh 6,000 catties and can fire 28 catties of cannonballs.

After a night of reconnaissance, I received information from the agents of the Heaven and Earth Society, and learned that the range of these cannons could reach three miles, but in fact, after more than a mile away, these front-loading smoothbore guns were not very accurate. But these cannons can still block the Han River, which is not very wide.

On March 6, 1665, the Ming army arrived at Jiangkou.

As soon as the sky was dark, the Qing army garrison stationed at the Shashan Fort was woken up: "Minggou Shui Shi is here!" ”

The Qing garrison was awakened, walked up to the fort, and looked at the dense mast forest at the mouth of the Han River in the distance, although he was very worried, he still cheered up the Qing soldiers: "The ship of the puppet Ming Haikou can't enter at all!" We have a lot of heavy artillery here, and our battery guns can tear them to shreds as soon as they come in! ”

On the river, flags are unfurled, masts are like forests, and dense ships are all over the mouth of the Hanjiang River.

"There are six super heavy guns, eighteen three-thousand-pound cannons, and more than fifty other cannons of various calibers on the Shashan Fort in Tartar, I'm afraid it's not so easy to enter from the Hanjiang Estuary, right?" Zhao Zhipeng asked with some concern.

Li Rui and Wu Haodong were confident, and in their eyes, the Qing army's forts were simply decorations.

"We have new artillery that can destroy their cannons outside the range of the Tartar cannons!" Wu Haodong said with a smile.

The new gun was a three-pounder hexagonal front-loading rifled gun that had recently been brought back from Coconut City, the original Batavia, on a catamaran clipper. Half a year ago, in order to deal with the threat of the Dutch, Wang Xinyu transported four front-loading rifled guns to Batavia, which was specially used to deal with the small boats used by the Dutch army to clear mines. After the Dutch army left Coconut City, the cannons were brought back.

Within half a year, the Dongfan Gun Factory produced four new front-loading rifled guns, and now the Ming army has a total of eight three-pounder hexagonal front-loading rifled guns.

This kind of gun is very light, although it is a three-pound gun, but because of the use of long shells, the caliber is smaller than the original three-pound smoothbore gun of 74 mm, the caliber of the gun is 45 mm, the weight of the shell is 3 pounds, the weight of the gun body is 500 catties, plus the gun carriage and gun carriage, the weight of the whole gun is 700 catties.

"Clean up the barrage and underwater piles, or use the old way, blast with mines! When our boat enters the river, the Tartar batteries will open fire, and we will destroy their artillery with new artillery! Wu Haodong gave an order to the officers and soldiers of the water division.

Eight Daifuku ships were converted into specialized three-pounder forward-mounted hexagonal rifled guns, and the forehead guns of these eight Daifuku ships were removed, leaving only the small guns of the Franc machine on the side of the ship, and one of these rifled guns was placed on the deck of the ship. Of course, the gun wheels were removed and replaced with an iron gun carriage that could rotate on the deck.

This kind of special gun carriage is to set up an iron circle track on the deck, a turntable type wooden gun carriage with four transversely arranged iron wheels is placed on the iron circle track, there are two guide rails on the wooden gun carriage, and four small iron wheels are installed on the gun carriage itself, which are embedded in the guide rail, and the gun is fired as soon as it is fired, under the action of recoil, the gun body retreats along the guide rail, which reduces the pressure on the hull deck. After firing, the gunner pushed the gun forward to reset.

The Daifuku ship, which is more than 200 tons, can still withstand this kind of cannon.

On the river, the eight artillery ships were lined up, and outside the range of the Qing army's battery, all the gun jackets had been lifted, and the muzzle of the black hole was aimed at the Qing army's battery three miles away.

"Let's go, go blast the Tartar barrage and underwater piles!" Wu Haodong gave an order to the boat.

The soldiers rowed more than a dozen small boats loaded with mines, sailed out of the fleet, and slowly rowed past the waters with barrages and underwater piles in front of them. Although the location of the underwater hidden pile is not clear, as long as the boat approaches, the sailors on board can find it with bamboo poles. When the time comes, as long as they drop delayed mines into the river, they can blow up all the underwater facilities that the Qing army has painstakingly managed into pieces.

The boat took advantage of the high tide and rowed upstream. Approaching the barrage, a small boat stopped, and a soldier familiar with water jumped from the boat, and dropped a mine from the boat. The soldiers who launched the water tied the mines to the barrage ropes, and after fixing the mines, the soldiers climbed into the boat as soon as they pulled the fire ropes on the mines.

The boat quickly departed and retreated to safety.

A column of water rose on the surface of the "boom" river, and the exploding mine blew the barrage in two, and the middle of the heavy iron chain immediately sank to the bottom of the river.

"Not good! Ming Dog is blowing up the barrage! Hearing the sound of explosions coming from the river, and the sound of iron chains sliding from the stone piles on the shore that blocked the river, the Qing garrison shouted.

The small boats used by the Ming army to clear obstacles were within the range of the Qing army's batteries, but the accuracy of the shelling of small boats by smoothbore guns was difficult to guarantee, and it was not easy to hit small targets moving on the river.

Then, several small boats passed the position of the barrage, and the Ming soldiers on the boat stretched out their bamboo poles and stretched out into the river water to test them.

"They're looking for our underwater piles! Maybe it's going to blow up with gunpowder again! Can't let Ming Gou succeed! Hurry up and shoot! The Qing garrison shouted anxiously.

On the fort, the large and small artillery of the Qing army spewed fire, the cannon roared, the shells whistled, and the white smoke rose on the fort. In the firelight, the cannonballs sprayed out swept across the river, constantly smashing into the river, and raising columns of water that soared into the sky.

"Quick, watch out for the Tartar shells! Don't get hit! The small officer of the Ming army in the small boat shouted.

The Ming soldiers on the small boats rowed their oars hard, and all the small boats were advancing and retreating at full speed. These small boats were originally very small, and they were in rapid motion, and it was difficult for the Qing army's battery guns to hit the target, and the shells fired fell in the river in vain, giving the Ming army a performance of splashing.

"The Tartar batteries have already fired, count their gun emplacements!" Li Rui asked people to send a flag signal.

The Qing army battery was hidden in the shadows, and all the gun emplacements were also hidden in the woods, and it was not easy for the Ming army fleet on the river to discover the gun positions on the Qing army batteries. But as soon as the Qing battery artillery fired, the position was exposed.

"Fire!" An artillery officer let out a roar.

On a Daifuku ship, a burst of fire suddenly erupted, the white smoke rose up, and the muzzle of the cannon spat out a tongue of fire more than a foot long, and the cannonball smashed down hard above the Qing army fort with a piercing scream.

The cannonball landed on the fort, very close to a gun emplacement, splashing a burst of dirt and sand, and after the cannonball hit the ground, it jumped up again, and hit a large stone fiercely, and suddenly the stone was torn apart, countless debris was sprayed, and several Qing soldiers were hit by the splashing gravel and fell down screaming.

"Good fellow, how can you hit so accurately?" Although this shell did not hit the artillery position and failed to destroy the artillery of the Qing army, the landing point of the shell was only two zhang away from a 3,000-pound cannon of the Qing army, which made the Qing garrison break out in a cold sweat.

The first shell was fired, and it was able to hit less than two feet away from the gun position, and such an artillery fire was already very accurate! You must know that the opponent is shelling three miles away! At such a distance, it can still be hit so accurately, the artillery of the Qing army can't do it at all. And when this cannonball hits the ground, it emits a piercing scream, which is terrifying.

"Boom" another shell whistled with a piercing screech and landed on the battery. This time, the landing point of the shells was a few steps closer to the gun position of the Qing army!

The face of the Qing army battery garrison turned pale: "What kind of cannon is equipped on the Ming dog ship?" Why is it so powerful? Can you still hit it so accurately? Can their ships be fitted with such heavy cannons? ”

Next, the accuracy of the shelling stunned the Qing garrison.

A cannonball directly hit a 6,000-pound cannon, this cannonball hit the cannon body fiercely, the high-speed flying cannonball hit the cannon body, actually knocked such a heavy cannon to the side, the high-speed rotating cannonball like a drill, drilled into the cannon body, and the splattered crushed iron ore smashed over several Qing soldiers around.

"Boom" another shell roared, although this shell did not hit the gun position, but fell in the crowd of Qing gunners. The rifled gun's high-speed rotating shells hit hard ground, creating a more lethal force than spherical shells. The high-speed rotating cannonball hit the stone slab, and the stone shattered quickly, and the stone flew up, smashing the heads of the surrounding Qing soldiers with blood. After the shell hit the ground, it began to bounce irregularly, and the bouncing carried a spin, and the rolled stones flew in all directions.

One shell after another fell on the battery, eight hexagonal rifled guns, each of which fired one shell a minute, and eight guns fired eight shells in one minute. After half an hour of shelling, minus five minutes of heat dissipation time, a total of 200 shells fell on the battery.

One of the shells hit the powder keg behind the Qing army's gun emplacement, causing the powder keg to explode violently, and more than a dozen Qing gunners were flying with blood and flesh, screaming miserably, and the cannons were blown up.

Before the invention of rifled guns, the main task of artillery was to bombard the opponent's infantry, bombard large targets such as city walls, or bombard larger targets such as ships on the sea, while bombardment of the opponent's gun positions with smoothbore guns, because the artillery targets are small and not easy to hit, so it is necessary to concentrate a large number of artillery shells at the same time to destroy an artillery, and the effect is very poor. With rifled artillery, it becomes very easy to destroy the opponent's artillery with artillery.

The Ming gunners carried water in buckets to cool down the hot guns. Other soldiers poured water through the muzzle, then lifted the tail of the cannon, poured out the water from the bore, and dried the bore with a mop.

After the temperature was dropped, a three-pounder hexagonal front-loading rifled gun once again fired shells at the Qing army battery.

"Minggou's cannon is too accurate!" The Qing soldiers on the fort fled in all directions.

Being beaten for nothing and not having the power to fight back is the most frustrating thing. It is simply impossible for the Qing soldiers to stand on the fort and die.

After several rounds of shelling, there were no more Qing soldiers standing on the fort, and they all fled from the fort to avoid the shells.

Without the threat of the Qing army's forts, the boat shuttled back and forth on the river without any scruples, probing out the location of underwater piles everywhere, and then blasting them with mines, blasting the underwater piles into broken wood.

Broken logs surfaced and floated away with the current, no longer underwater piles capable of threatening the Ming ships.

"Let the flotilla go up and bombard the Tartar batteries with the ship's cannons!" Wu Haodong gave another order.

The Qing army battery was already empty, and at this time, the small boats of the Ming army could reach the battery and bombard the battery with a huge number of smoothbore guns, destroying the Qing army's artillery.

One after another, the Dafu ship and the Haicang ship approached the shore, and the Hongyi cannon and the Franc machine cannon on the ship were aimed at the shore battery, and the muzzle of the gun spewed out dazzling fire one after another, and the overwhelming shells smashed on the Qing army battery.

At the same time as the shelling of the Qing army's forts, the Ming army's small boats rowed towards the shore, and the officers and men of the army division on the ships were preparing to land. Behind the small fleet, more than a dozen centipede clippers equipped with swarm rockets also approached the shore, and if the Qing army found that the infantry was organized to block the landing, a swarm of bee rockets on the fast ships could attack. (To be continued.) )