When the Liu family's fleet got closer, the hull of the fleet was revealed from below the sea level, and there were hundreds of warships.
Yang Peng looked through the telescope and saw that more than a hundred of the warships were three-masted ships with low heads and high tails, and were equipped with large and small artillery. These lucky ships are at least thirty meters long and are considered large ships of this era. Some of the large ships were larger, and looked larger than Yang Peng's battleships. They were probably nearly forty meters long, and there were many artillery pieces placed on both sides of the ship.
Most of these lucky ships have Chinese-style hard sails hung on their masts. But Yang Peng also saw more than a dozen lucky boats with yellow soft sails in the telescope - those white canvases would age and turn yellow after being hung for a long time - obviously the Liu family was also influenced by the West in the process of dealing with Westerners in Nanyang. Due to human influence, Western-style sails were adopted on some lucky ships.
Yang Peng saw in the telescope a huge fortune ship sailing in the center of the Liu family's fleet, with high hard sails hung and cannons placed on both sides of the cabin. The big flag with Liu characters on the mast of the big ship fluttered in the wind, making Yang Peng suspect that the ship was Liu Xianglong's flagship.
But more of the Liu family's fleet are two-masted boats equipped with canopies. These boats are often in the "sand boat" style, but there are also some small lucky boats. There are more than a dozen sailors on board. Not only does it have sails, but it also has oars when it sprints. The speed is very impressive. Yang Peng observed these boats with a telescope for a while and found that, as Gao Ligong said, these boats were filled with dry firewood, straw and other flammable materials.
These small boats are actually fire boats, and the only tactic is to rush under Yang Peng's big boat and light it on fire. The two fleets got closer and closer, and the distance gradually shortened to seven or eight miles. Yang Peng put down the telescope and looked forward, only to feel that half of his field of vision was occupied by the Liu family's fleet. There were too many ships on the opposite side to count, but Yang Peng made a rough estimate and felt that there were at least 600 warships, or more.
There are more than 600 ships, and more than 100 of them are warships with cannons. This number far exceeds Yang Peng's 53 ships. Liu Xianglong is so domineering that he regards the southeast sea as his backyard, which is indeed something he can rely on.
The soldiers around Yang Peng were very nervous when they saw the momentum of the Liu family fleet. Yang Peng shouted: "All ships line up in a long formation and aim their broadsides at the enemy fleet! The ironclad ships line up in the center."
The flag soldiers took action and turned Yang Peng's orders into colorful flags and hung them on the flagpole of the Yangwei Hao. The fifty-two ships in the fleet all have specialized personnel who use binoculars to keep an eye on the flagpole of the Yangwei at all times. As soon as these personnel saw the new flag command hung on the flagpole, they conveyed the command to the captains of each ship.
The fifty-two steamships turned their stern rudders and took their positions, entering the line array position. Looking at it from Yang Peng's point of view, he only felt that more than fifty ships on the left and right sides formed a wall on the sea.
More than five hundred 18-pound cannons were eyeing the approaching Liu family's fleet. At a distance of five miles, four miles, and three miles, the two fleets gradually approached. Yang Peng's 18-pounder cannon had a direct range of more than three miles, but Yang Peng did not let the cannon fire at a distance of three miles. The waves on the sea were bumpy, and the muzzle of the cannon also undulated with the waves. There was no point in firing from a distance. Moreover, the artillery of this era will overheat the barrel after firing more than ten shots. Every opportunity to fire is very precious, so in naval battles, Yang Peng always let the fleet get closer to the enemy ship for a mile before firing.
The gunners in the steamer adjusted the gun carriage to aim at the Liu family sailboat in the distance, waiting with bated breath for the opportunity to fire. Three miles away, two miles away, the sailors of the Liu family howled and drove six hundred warships to Yang Peng's fleet one mile away.
"Boom!" "Boom! Boom! Boom! Boom!" "Boom! Boom! Boom!"
More than five hundred cannons on the sides of fifty-three ships opened fire. On the "wall" composed of fifty-three ships, the flames of more than five hundred cannons formed a fire dragon. More than 500 bombs flew towards the Liu family's ship.
Most of the shells fell into the sea, kicking up huge columns of water. But dozens of rounds smashed into Liu Xianglong's three-masted ship, punching a big hole in the hull. After a few seconds, the bomb exploded. Sparks caused by the explosion spurted out from the holes in the hull, like flowers blossoming inside the warship. The hole in the hull was blown even bigger, and all kinds of planks and barrel fragments were blown out of the ship by the air waves caused by the explosion, leaving a mess.
Another two dozen two-masted fireships were hit by bombs, and the flammable materials loaded on the fireships were instantly ignited, setting off a raging fire that was very conspicuous on the blue sea. The sailors on the ship jumped into the sea in panic and swam to other nearby ships.
After the steamships fired a round of cannons, they all turned around and headed east, widening the distance between the two fleets to prevent the fireships from coming up and burning the ships. Seeing the shooting effect of the bomb, the sailors and soldiers of Yang Peng's fleet cheered in unison. Cannons still work! The combined cannons on the port and starboard sides of the fifty-three steamships can fire twenty rounds. After these twenty rounds, Liu Xianglong's fireships will basically be sunk.
However, Yang Peng was not excited, and just looked at Liu Xianglong's more than one hundred three-masted ships quietly. Sure enough, the Liu family's gunboats were not to be outdone. Ten seconds after being shelled, Liu Xianglong's gunboats all turned around. Six or seven hundred cannons from more than a hundred Fu ships aimed at Yang Peng's fleet and opened fire.
Yang Peng could see clearly through the telescope: Liu Xianglong's ship-borne artillery was of different sizes. The small one was only a little thicker on the wrist, probably a six-pounder or a seven-pounder, while the larger one had a barrel as thick as his head, maybe sixteen or six pounds. Eighteen pounder gun. The largest Fu Ship even had thicker guns, twice as thick as Yang Peng's 18-pounder.
The Liu family has been operating in Fujian for hundreds of years and has extensive exchanges with Western powers, and has accumulated a lot of artillery. Amidst the rumbling sound of the artillery, the Liu family's artillery spit out tongues of flame, and the shells came like raindrops. Dozens of shells hit Yang Peng's ship. Of course the armored ship was fine. The cannonballs hitting the iron armor only left a mark before being bounced off. But other steamships were beaten, and some heavy artillery shells penetrated the hull and crashed into the interior of the ship, causing considerable damage.
Some shells even hit sailors and soldiers in the cabin, causing casualties. Seeing the effect of the Liu family's artillery, Han Jinxin took a breath and said: "My lord, if we fight like this, even if we win, our casualties will be high."
Han Jinxin was right. Although the Liu family's artillery was not bombs, they were indeed huge in number. If the shooting continues like this, many ships may be sunk by the Liu family. What is even more dangerous is the paddle wheel of the ship. Only a few of the forty-three merchant ships have been transformed into propellers, and the others still use paddle wheels. If the paddle wheel was hit, the ship would undoubtedly be burned clean by the incoming fire ships.
Yang Peng nodded and said loudly: "The armored ships attack, rush in and defeat them!" The ten armored ships turned their bows and rushed towards Liu Xianglong's fleet at full speed. Each ironclad ship uses two large steam engines, and the propellers have been installed after five months of debugging. The efficiency is comparable to that of a paddle wheel. When the ironclad ship is running at full speed, it can reach a speed of ten knots, which is equivalent to a speed of 18 kilometers per hour. In this The age of sailing ships was absolutely high-speed ships.
The steel ramming angle at the front of the ironclad ship broke through the sea surface, forming two waves on both sides of the ship, and crashed into the Liu family's fleet menacingly. The gunboats of the Liu family's fleet were lined up at the back, and a large group of fireships were crowded together in front. The fireship, which had been chasing Yang Peng's fleet, was overjoyed to see the armored ship approaching. What they were worried about was that Yang Peng's fleet was sinking all the fire ships here in the distance. Unexpectedly, ten ships suddenly came to their door.
Although they also saw that the armored ships were all covered with iron armor. But they have no experience fighting ironclad ships. In their concept, as long as they are ships, they can be burned. In front of the Yangwei, the pirates on a two-masted sand barge cheered loudly, picked up the oars and rowed hard, rushing towards the Yangwei as quickly as possible.
But when the Yangwei got closer, they realized something was wrong. The Yangwei was too heavy and drove too fast. The sharp collision caused waves a foot high. If a fire ship more than ten meters long collides with it, it will only be sunk.
"Turn the rudder! Shacai! Turn the rudder!" "Avoid that iron ship!" The pirates panicked, shouting loudly in Minnan dialect, asking the helmsman to get out of the way.
However, it was too late for them to react at this time. Although the fire ship turned hard to the left to avoid the sharp collision angle of the ironclad, it was still hit hard by the starboard side of the Yangwei. The fireship, which was panicking to avoid the ironclad, failed to aim its bow at the ironclad. The impact occurred on the starboard side of the fireship, and the sharp steel thorns on the bow did not penetrate the hull of the ironclad.
The fireboat was loaded with high piles of dry firewood, and its center of gravity was very unstable. It tilted completely when it hit. The five-hundred-ton Yangwei didn't move at all, but the dozens-ton fireship overturned and overturned in the waves. More than a dozen pirates fell into the seawater, and several pirates were even pressed into the seawater by the overturned hull and never floated again.
Not only this fire ship, but also the other fire ships in front could not adapt to the high-speed collision of the ironclad ship. The Fuchuan of this era did not sail more than seven or eight knots even with the wind, and the speed was even slower in crosswinds and headwinds. How could there ever be a high-speed collision with a speed of ten knots? The fire ships in front all rushed towards the Yangwei at first, but when they rushed closer and saw the sharp collision angle of the Yangwei, one after another they panicked and avoided.
But is it so easy to turn around when sailing on the sea? The Yangwei ran rampant among the fire ships, sinking three fire ships in just a short time, completely crushing them naked. Not only was the Yangwei doing violence, the other nine armored ships were also sweeping away. Ten armored ships are like ten giant elephants rushing into the middle of a group of jackals. No matter if you have sharp teeth or not, I will just trample them at will.
The pirates of the Liu family became a little frightened when they saw these ten menacing armored ships. The pirates' hands and feet became weak and they no longer paddled hard to rush up. Just when the pirates were discouraged, the cannon on the ironclad ship opened fire again. Except for the artillery on the poop which had no target, all the other thirty-one gun positions on the ironclad were firing. At this time, the muzzle of the cannon was a hundred meters or even dozens of meters away from the fireships on both sides. It was almost a shot that was accurate.
The cannons on the left side of the Yangwei fired one after another, and the recoil force acted on the hull. The hull pressed to the left little by little amid the roar of the gunfire, creating a wave of waves on the sea. Then the cannon on the right fired one after another, and the ship's hull straightened to the right amid violent vibrations, and finally fell slightly to the right.
Bombs exploded one after another on the two-masted steamboat. The nearby Liu's fireboats seemed to be controlled by Yang Peng's matches, and they were lit one after another. The Yangwei only fired one round, and twelve fire ships around it ignited huge fires. Some of the Liu family pirates' clothes were also burned, and they screamed and jumped into the sea.
The huge flames were so bright that they dazzled people's eyes and outshone the bright sunlight. The scene was like a whole forest burning around the ironclad. Ten armored ships sank or ignited at least a hundred fireships before Liu Xianglong's flagship responded. The long horn sounded in the Liu family's fleet, three long and three short, and Yang Peng didn't know what it meant.
Hundreds of shells were fired from Liu's Dafu ship behind, and probably dozens of them hit the target, clanging against the armor of the ironclad ship. However, except for one heavy artillery shell, none of the other shells could penetrate an inch of thick iron armor. The only heavy artillery shell lost its kinetic energy after hitting the armor, causing no major damage.
But the sound of the horn inspired the pirates on the fire ship. The pirates howled and regained their fighting spirit. They aimed at the side of the ironclad and rowed with all their might, hoping to pierce the steel spikes on the fireship's bow into the armor.
In front of the Yangwei, more than twenty fireships rushed over from the front left and right, as if they had surrounded the Yangwei. Yang Peng sneered and shouted: "Turn the rudder!" The Yangwei turned its bow slightly, abandoned the fire ship on the right, and ran over several fire ships on the left. The sharp collision angle broke through the hull of the first fire ship almost without any hindrance, and pressed down, cutting the small boat of several dozen tons into two pieces. Then the hull behind the collision angle pressed up again, pushing the two-part wreckage of the fireship into the sea water.
More than a dozen pirates were instantly killed. As soon as the Yangwei turned to the left, the dozen or so fireships on the right could no longer keep up with the speed of the Yangwei, and were getting further and further away. Most of the dozen or so fireships on the left were facing the Yangwei directly, unable to hit the belly of the Yangwei. The Yangwei continued to turn to the left, and two more fireships were knocked over by the heavy ironclad ship on the sea.
Only the two fireships on the far left still had an angle, and they rushed up at high speed, ramming the steel spikes on their bows into the Yangwei's armor. If the pirates on the steam ship could sink a steam ship, Liu Xianglong would give the pirates on the ship a reward of 800 taels of silver. When the pirates on the fireboat saw that the steel spikes had been fixed on the iron armor, they were so excited that they seemed to have seen the white silver. They immediately lit the thatch and dry firewood on the fireboat.
Those thatched firewood had been poured with oil, and there was some black gunpowder inside, so they burned violently when exposed to an open fire. The fire quickly engulfed the two small fireboats. The Yangwei's port side burst into flames, and the two fire ships turned into two huge fireballs. The breath of fire burned the armor of the ironclad ship.
Liu Xianglong stood on the fleet's flagship Changde. This is a giant fortune ship with a length of 14 feet. Liu Xianglong secretly hired Chinese craftsmen from the Western City of Manila, and then combined Western technology with the fortune ship craftsmanship to build the giant ship. The ship has a thick hull and a solid structure, with five decks above and below.
This ship is not only huge, but also armed to the teeth. It is equipped with ten twelve-pound cannons, as well as eighteen eighteen-pound cannons and eight twenty-four-pound cannons that Liu ordered from the Western Bugalao Cannon Foundry. , the firepower is very powerful.
The shell that penetrated the ironclad ship just now was fired by the 24-pounder gun on the Chandok. In the entire Liu family fleet, these eight heavy guns are the only ones that can threaten the armored ships.
Of course, Yang Peng cannot be defeated with only eight heavy artillery. Liu Xianglong held up the telescope he bought from a Westerner and frowned as he looked at the ten armored ships ramming among the fire ships.
Asia's largest pirate has dominated the oceans for more than 80 years, but this is the first time he has seen such a warship. Not only can Yang Peng's warship advance and retreat at high speeds without sails, it is also covered in iron armor, making it extremely sharp.
Liu Xianglong's palms became sweaty as he watched one after another fireships being hit or sunk by armored ships. This armored ship is so powerful. How many of the Liu family's navy must die to win this battle? It wasn't until he saw the two fire ships lit on the side of the Yangwei that Liu Xianglong relaxed his brows. With the blessing of the Heavenly Concubine, the fire ship finally stuck to it. Once such a raging fire breaks out, can these ten ships not burn down?
If the armored ship is driving so fast, the iron sheet on the outside should be very light and thin, right? Liu Xianglong stared at the Yangwei with his telescope, praying in his heart that the fire would burn brighter and burn the incredible iron-clad ship to pieces. However, to Liu Xianglong's great disappointment, the two fireboats stuck on the armored ship burned for a long time and failed to ignite the hull of the armored ship.
If the ironclad ship was just covered with a layer of iron, it would probably have been burned by these fireships. However, the Yangwei was covered in 3.3cm thick armor. How could it be so easily burned through? The fire burned for more than ten seconds, but it had not yet heated up the armor, let alone ignited the hull behind the armor.
Liu Xianglong was very disappointed to see that the Cangzhou people on the armored ship carried long tree trunks and used the tree trunks to hit the burning fire ships on the side of the ship. In the end, they knocked the two burning fire ships away.
Liu Xianglong suddenly turned pale and couldn't help but cursed: "Lin Mu Ka Hou". On the Yangwei, Yang Peng looked at the fire ship that was knocked away with joy. When the Liu family's fire ship was built, the default enemy was a large wooden sailing ship. Probably the Liu family never thought that their enemies drove ironclad ships. Therefore, the steel spurs on the bow of the fire ship are designed to be very sharp and slender. This kind of slender barb hook will pierce deeply when it hits the wooden hull, but when it encounters hard iron armor, this kind of slender steel barb will not be effective.
The slender steel spines will be blunted after piercing the armor, and the armor-piercing ability will be greatly reduced. So the sailors on the Yangwei carried the processed cedar trunks and rammed them against the fireship, and the fireship was knocked open. The Yangwei threw away the two fireships and continued to run over them at a high speed of ten knots.
The two-masted sand ship in front, which was used as a fireship, was still watching whether the two fires could burn the Yangwei, but suddenly found that it was already in front of the collision angle of the Yangwei. The sailors on the sand boat suddenly panicked and rowed away as hard as they could. However, the helmsman of the Yangwei was not prepared to let go of the sand ship. He turned his stern rudder to chase the sand ship, and finally hit the stern of the sand ship.
The angle of impact smashed the stern of the sand ship into a mess. The angle of collision was tilted downward along the bow of the ship, so the small ship was immediately pushed butt-down into the water. The heavy ironclad ship then ran over the sand ship. The sand ship and the dozen sailors on it were completely pressed into the water by the 500-ton ironclad ship and never floated again.
After a minute of collision among the fireships, the cannon on the ironclad ship was loaded with shells again. The loud rumbling sound sounded again, and in the huge smoke, the fire ships near the ironclad ship seemed to be named, and one after another exploded with huge sparks. Some fireships were set on fire by bombs, while others were directly penetrated by bombs and sank into the sea little by little.
The pirates on the fire ship were desperate. This is not a war, this is simply one era crushing another era. The fireship tactic failed miserably. This tactic that once defeated the Westerners and Spaniards, helped Liu Xianglong defeat Li Kuiqi, Zhong Bin and Liu Laoba, and allowed Liu Xianglong to dominate the East Asian seas, has no effect in the face of ironclad ships.
These ten armored ships are like ten steel behemoths on the sea, not afraid of flames at all. This kind of war machine that should not appear in this era is too terrifying. Continuing to fight will only lead to death. Although the reward of eight hundred taels of silver was tempting, it was obviously more important to save his life. After losing more than 200 fireships, Liu Xianglong's fireship army collapsed.
The fire boats no longer rushed towards the ironclads, but turned their bows one by one to escape to the north and south. The pirates felt that the hard sail was not strong enough, so they rowed the oars desperately, hoping to escape faster.
The fire ship gradually dispersed and left. Opposite the ten ironclad ships, there were only more than a hundred blessing ships left. But Liu Xianglong has not given up yet. As soon as the fireships withdrew, more than a hundred Fu ships once again rained cannonballs on the ten ironclads. More than 600 shells screamed towards the armored ship, hitting the armor with a clanging sound.
The distance between the gunboats on both sides was only three hundred meters, and the accuracy of the cannonballs was much better. The cannons of the Liu family fleet made large and small dents in the armor. However, except for the eight twenty-four-pounder cannons, the other small guns were still unable to penetrate the armor. Only two shells were fired into the ironclad.
Yang Peng's artillerymen had just finished firing and were still reloading and unable to return fire. Li Zhi waved his hand and shouted loudly: "Rush up and sink them!"
"Here!" the sailors sang loudly, turning the ship's bow as ordered by their commander. The sailor operating the boiler suddenly pulled the switch next to the whistle. The air in the boiler rushed out from the whistle, and a huge whistle sounded from the Yangwei.
"Woo~~" This whistle sounded like the horn of an armored ship charging. After hearing the whistle, the other nine ironclad ships all turned their bows and rushed towards Liu's line of Fuchuan.
The Liu family's lucky ships realized that the ironclad ship was about to rush up and ram the ship, so they turned around and ran away in fright. The pirates had all seen the scene where the ironclad ship collided with the fire ship just now. No one believed that the larger Fu ship could not be sunk. These lucky ships were so panicked when they escaped that they even gave up the movement of turning the rudder and returning to shoot.
But Fuzhou was far from a match for steam steamers in terms of speed. There was a distance of 300 meters between the two fleets, and it only took the armored ship three minutes to catch up. The Yangwei aimed at a four-deck Fuzhou ship and rushed over, slamming the corner into the poop of the Fuzhou ship. The wooden Fuchuan was built with economy and practicality in mind. How could it withstand such a fierce collision from an ironclad ship? Only a loud bang was heard, and the tall poop of the Fortune Ship was cut from the middle by the Yangwei, split into two pieces on the left and right.
Seawater poured in crazily from the cracked hole in the bottom of the Fuchuan, instantly causing the Fuchuan to lose its ability to move forward. The Yangwei's ramming angle was still in the poop of the Fu ship, and the artillery on both sides opened fire. Thirty 18-pound bombs were like thirty shooting stars, shooting at the other two lucky ships on both sides that were escaping in panic.
What happened after all, let’s see what happens next.
