Chapter Twenty-Four: Helpless
Although the Ming army was once equipped with a large number of firearms, it was absolutely not like today's Yu Jiajun, which had such sharp firearms, and although the Ming army had many firearms, it was not good at using firearms.
In addition, the Ming army was afraid of short-handed combat, once the Houjin army was not defeated by the Ming army's firearms at the time of the battle, then as long as the Houjin army was close to the Ming army, the Ming army would often roll up the flag and scatter, and finally be defeated by the Houjin army.
Therefore, few people in the Ming army dared to fight field battles with the Houjin army in the field, and the few so-called victories fought were mostly defensive battles, defending some fortified cities, and relying on some heavy artillery to achieve victory.
But what he saw today was very different from other Ming troops, they had strict military discipline, more than 10,000 soldiers and horses were commanded flexibly, like an arm and a finger, and the sharpness of firearms was only seen in their Qing army's life, especially such a non-stop shooting, almost hitting those fierce generals under him who were powerless, let alone fighting back.
He saw with his own eyes today that the Yu family army successfully rescued thousands of people on the battlefield with an extremely flexible cooperation, and then in the blink of an eye, he sealed the gap, and even saw with his own eyes that countless battle-hardened soldiers under his command were killed in front of the two armies in front of the family army, facing those sharp cannonballs, as if they were slaughtered chickens and dogs.
And the soldiers under his command, it can't be said that they are not brave enough, these warriors under his supervision, one after another charged towards the front of the Yu family's army, but without exception were slaughtered by the opponent's firearms, leaving them no chance to get close to the enemy formation.
When the battle reached noon, the first batch of soldiers and horses sent to attack had been completely defeated by Yu's army at this time, and many Niulu were even wiped out, and not even a single person could escape back.
Dolgon's heart is bleeding, this time into the customs he led the soldiers and horses, but are the essence of their Qing Dynasty Eight Banners, except for the Zheng Huang and the Yellow and Zheng Huang Banners have not been out of the customs, the rest of the five banners are elite, but today sent the blue flag and the Red Banner soldiers, but suffered heavy losses, there are many warriors of the two banners, all fell in front of the two armies, worthless by the enemy's artillery killed in front of the army.
It was only at this time that Dolgon really realized what kind of army he encountered today, this army of the Yu family far surpassed all the Ming armies of this era in terms of training, equipment, and even tactics, and the tactics used were not at all a tactic they knew.
The large array of the Yu family army can output an excessive amount of firepower, these cannons hit far and accurately, and the power is huge, the cannon can reach a mile or two away, the musket can reach three hundred steps, the first three hundred steps of the enemy formation is almost a dead land, as long as you enter this area, no matter what kind of heavy armor you are wearing, how strong and skilled your martial arts are, as long as you are hit, there is almost no reason to be spared.
Yu Jiajun constantly used the salvo of firearms to strike, and every time the salvo was fired, a large number of Qing troops would fall in a pool of blood on the battlefield, either killed on the spot, or seriously wounded, and fell to the ground whining and wailing, life was worse than death.
Dolgon only knew what fear was at this time, so he had to quickly order Mingjin to withdraw his troops, and the Qing army, which had been defeated on the battlefield, was like being amnestied at this time, and when he heard the sound of Mingjin, he quickly turned around and ran back, but at this time, Yu's army still did not cease fire, and continued to shoot at the Qing army that gave them their backs in rows.
The artillery did not stop from the beginning of the battle to this moment, and in order to maintain the continuity of fire, those artillery batteries began to switch to alternate fire after the initial period of fierce salvo fire, so as to prevent all the artillery from having to interrupt the shelling due to the continuous high temperature.
These artillerymen are very ferocious and shrewd, when the enemy army approaches, they will change grapeshotfire or shotgun for direct bombardment, where there are many enemy troops, they will shoot wherever they want, a large area, the Jiannu people who hit on their backs, and some of the cavalry that accompanied the impact of the army are the objects of their key care, often concentrating firepower, hitting the cavalry first, and grapeball is smashing towards the enemy's dense place without money.
Those Jiannu generals wearing heavy armor, the armor on their bodies at this time has become a burden, in front of the artillery of the family army, like paper paste, if they are touched, they will die, and if they touch, they will be injured, and they will not play the due protective role at all.
Seeing that Jiannu had retreated and had run out of a distance of 300 paces, the musketeers were ordered to stop firing, but the artillerymen still did not give up, constantly adjusting the elevation angle of the muzzle, and kept firing at the Jiannu rout.
The red-hot solid bullets whizzed out of the barrel and smashed into the battlefield, bouncing forward after hitting the ground, and everywhere they passed, every life became the object of their harvest.
This kind of shelling has been driving the Jiannu rout out a mile away, each artillery group received an order to stop shooting, one by one sweating, crying out for joy, although it is now the end of February, but under the influence of the Xiaoice River period, the weather in Tianjin Wei is still very cold, the night temperature is still below freezing, the maximum temperature during the day is only above freezing, but even so, many artillerymen still hot to throw off the cotton clothes on their bodies, almost bare-chested, constantly pushing the artillery to reset, constantly loading shells.
When he saw those arrogant Jiannu generals, who were unable to form an army, crawled back with a rolling belt, a deafening cheer sounded in the large array of the Yu family's army.
After today's battle, the Jiannu army suffered heavy losses, even Yu Xiaotian did not expect, although at the beginning, Jiannu used the cover of those people to get close to the defense line of the Yu family's army, which caused a lot of pressure on the Yu family's army, but when they successfully rescued thousands of people behind the big array, the next battle began to tilt one-sidedly to the side of the Yu family's army.
The infantry of the Yujia army gave full play to the power of the musket three-stage shot, and constantly carried out volleys of guns, and the open terrain in this area is also the best terrain to effectively exert firepower, so from the beginning to the end of the battle, each musketeer fired at least thirty to forty bullets, dozens of rounds of salvo fire, and there were almost no living creatures in front of the battle.
Those Jiannu generals who looked fierce and incomparable, under the salvo of such muskets, suffered heavy casualties, which made Yu Xiaotian feel frightened, this is no longer like a war, it is completely like a massacre, Dolgon does not understand the tactics of the Yu family army, and he went to war for the first time, and sent a large number of soldiers to make contributions to the first war, and as a result, the Jiannu soldiers on the battlefield were densely crowded, and they happened to become the object of the Yu family army's firepower.
Under the pouring of intensive firepower of the family army, these Jiannu soldiers on the front of the battlefield became the best live targets.
When Jiannu retreated, and then looked at the battlefield at this time almost covered with Jiannu's wounded and corpses, human blood and horse blood in the cold air emitted a bloody smell at the same time, but also rose a lot of heat, so that the battlefield was shrouded in the heat created by human blood, all kinds of broken weapons, crookedly inserted in the corpse group, all kinds of broken flags, also twisted everywhere on the battlefield.
Yu Xiaotian stood on the watchtower, spat at the foam, and laughed cruelly: "Who said that Jiannu is invincible?" In Yu's eyes, these Jiannu are just some local chickens and dogs! ”
The generals and guards who followed him suddenly burst into laughter......
Dolgon and Dudu looked at each other and sat in the big tent, trapped in the city of sorrow, facing the Yu army that was dead in their way, they had nothing to do.
This was the fifth day that Dolgon's troops had been held back here after they arrived at Tientsin, and during these five days, Dolgon and Dudu had exhausted almost every conceivable strategy against the enemy, charging with large armies, attacking small groups, attacking at night, and attacking their flanks with cavalry and infantry......
But all the methods they had used before, the effective tactics of the enemy, Dolgon and Dudu used them all over again, but in front of the home army, their tactics seemed to have lost their effect, and in the face of the fierce artillery fire of the home army, almost without exception, the soldiers and generals they sent out, almost without exception, suffered heavy losses, and in the end could only end miserably.
In the past five days, they have launched at least a dozen fierce attacks on the home army, but they still have not been able to break through the Tianjin Guard, and the seemingly thin defense line of the Yu family army is now like Mount Tai, indestructible, and immovable.
No matter how much they attacked, they couldn't reopen this line of defense and lead their troops away, and the Yu family army was stuck on their way out of the customs.
After a fierce battle in the past few days, they did not cause much casualties to the Yu family army, even if they dragged the artillery of the accompanying army, trying to resist the artillery of the Yu family army, but the result was also very depressed, these Ming army cannons they captured at hand were not the opponents of the Yu family army at all.
And the gunners they put together improvised were not very skilled at all, and when they were firing guns, there were often accidents with the explosion of the chamber, and the chance of killing the enemy was not as good as the chance of killing their own people.
Therefore, the great losses of Jiannu in the past few days are no longer as simple as breaking their muscles and bones, and in five days, they have paid more than 10,000 people in battle damage, which is simply unacceptable.
How many soldiers and horses did they have in total, and Dolgon knew better than anyone else, and he naturally knew better than anyone what 10,000 elite soldiers meant to them, but in just five days, they paid such a big price.
Although among the soldiers who died, at present, the army went to fight with the Mongolian Eight Banners and the Han Army, but in order to break through the resistance of the Yu army, Dolgon also really invested in the army, and sent the elite of the red, red, and blue flags with the army to the battlefield, and it was still a heavy loss, and many Baturu who went out with the army were killed in front of the two armies, which was simply unacceptable to Dolgon.
And the biggest blow to them is not only the loss of men and horses, but also their morale, after the battle in the past few days, it has completely fallen to the bottom, such a situation makes Dolgon and other Tartar generals at a loss.