On the front, Li Gangsheng withstood a wave of "pig attacks" from the regiment's heroes, and on the side, the "surprise attack" of a small group of gunners led by Sloppy Huliang was also repelled by a single salvo from the ninth squadron. Ma Huliang is not as "brave and fearless" as Yang Xiaodong. He will run away immediately when the blood of the people around him splashes on his face.
When the soldiers of the 1st platoon began to pursue with their bayonets drawn, the regiment heroes in Yangjiazhuang suddenly collapsed, and hundreds of them dispersed in a rush. Yang Juren was almost pushed to the ground and died by the fleeing regiment members. Fortunately, Yang Erhu still remembered his uncle and led a few soldiers to rescue him from the crumbling crowd.
Seeing the complete defeat, Yang Jinghui was disheartened, and felt that he would not be able to see his "father" when he went back. He drew his sword and was about to kill himself. Yang Erdong quickly snatched the sword away and said: "Master, don't be discouraged! It won't matter if you lose for a while here. The Kun bandits are strong but few in number, so let's just stay out of their way!" After saying that, he quickly ordered a few servants to carry Mr. Yang and escape in a hurry.
By the time the follow-up troops of the 2nd Company arrived, the ambushed Xiang Yong had been driven off the battlefield, leaving only corpses and wounded scattered on the ground.
However, Li Gangsheng was not happy at all. It seemed that he had won a complete victory, but in fact, three people in his platoon were killed on the spot, and ten others were injured to varying degrees, two of them seriously - this is almost synonymous with death.
Several of those with minor injuries were "not suitable for combat service," which meant that although they did not need to be evacuated to a field hospital, they still had to leave the company and go to the "recuperation team" accompanying the army to perform some simple field service work.
After this calculation, there were a total of thirty-four people, and the net reduction reached eight, almost a quarter. Although the enemy had more than a hundred corpses abandoned on the battlefield and there would be no shortage of prisoners, no matter how many people were killed and captured, they would not be able to offset their own pure attrition.
Li Dong led people to search and capture prisoners in the grass. There were Tuanding Xiangyong who could not escape everywhere in the bushes, and many of them were injured. Some people were not seriously injured, but it was difficult to accommodate prisoners at the moment, so prisoners who could not move around on their own were not taken, and were left where they were to fend for themselves.
In total, more than fifty prisoners were captured. They urgently interrogated the prisoners and learned that the enemy was a Xiangyong from Yangjiazhuang. This broke out a debate among the commanders.
Because he encountered an ambush, Wu Baliu, the commander of the 2nd company, was worried that the communication line would be threatened, and advocated a raid on Yangjiazhuang first. Wu Baliu was unexpectedly promoted to the 10th Battalion as company commander shortly after entering Guangzhou. His company rank was one level lower than the senior captain, so he was unwilling to accept this "victory" that was not straightforward enough.
However, Yang Zeng, the detachment leader of the Suijiang detachment and the commander of the 8th Battalion, believes that their primary purpose is to break the siege of Shijian and ensure the security of the gateway to Guangning County.
"Our army is now divided into two routes, water and land. The purpose is to reach Shijian as soon as possible. If we divide our troops to suppress the bandits now and rashly enter the mountainous area without knowing the situation, we are likely to suffer losses. Besides, Xiangyong cannot threaten Suijiang's water transportation. .”
Although Huang Chao was present, he felt that it was better for him to speak less on military issues and let the commander take charge.
At that time, it was decided that the plan would not change, and the 2nd Company and the Wuzhou Squadron would continue to move forward by land to break the siege of Shijian.
Suijiang is different from Xijiang, which is busy with shipping. There are vast mountains on both sides of the river. The narrow roads make the troops take a long time. In addition, this is a "non-security area", and enemy troops may appear from all directions. The ambush just now caused heavy losses. Although the two seriously injured people were evacuated immediately after getting on the boat, in fact everyone knew that the disaster was more serious than bad. If he did it again, one of his platoons would be reimbursed. The heavy responsibility made Wu Baliu and Li Dong, the commanders of the 2nd company, tense up, as well as their officers and non-commissioned officers.
However, the rest of the journey was uneventful. Villagers in the villages we passed fled far away. Occasionally, we encountered a village that strictly guarded its walls and only sent people to bring tea to "welcome the army's crossing". There was no hostility.
Wu Baliu would ask questions every time he encountered such a village. From the mouths of the local people, we learned that those who surrounded Shijian were the Yangjiazhuang warriors who ambushed them - many villages dared not speak out against Yangjiazhuang. As for the battalion commander and chief, they wanted to know very little about the movements of the Yao people. They only knew that some local Yao people followed the bandits to cause trouble, and several villages joined forces to plunder, but there were no large groups of people. It seems that Chief Huang's judgment that the Yao people were just "taking advantage of the fire" was correct - they had no intention of large-scale rebellion.
Wu Baliu led the team hurriedly and slowly, and finally arrived at a place less than 2 kilometers away from Shijian. This place is known as the South Gate of Guangning. The so-called small town is just a larger village, located in the mountains beside the river. On the alluvial plain, there is a wooden wall to protect it. Yangjiazhuang Xiangyong who surrounded Shijian set up a wooden fence at the traffic pass and controlled the road and several villages on the nearby hillside.
Jie Wendong, the leader of the rural brave who surrounded Shijian, was originally the second in command of the rural bandits. Yangjiazhuang Township bravely rose up to suppress bandits in the surrounding areas. Seeing that the situation was not good, he, under the coercion and inducement of Master Yang, defeated the big boss and surrendered the village.
His old gang, which originally numbered fifty or sixty people, was also a force in Yangjiazhai. Yang Juren both guarded against and exploited him. This time, in order to win over people's hearts, he was sent to lead a team to attack this stone gorge, so that he could make a small fortune.
Jie Wendong originally thought that the stone stream would be the same as last time, so he opened the door to surrender and obediently offered his belongings. Therefore, they only brought more than a hundred members of the regiment, and the others were strong men from various villages who had joined Yangjiazhuang to "make a fortune" and build up their momentum. They don't have much wealth, so they can get some rags, furniture, and pots.
Unexpectedly, a small group of the National Army was stationed in the town and additional fortifications were built. He led the group to charge for a while, but was beaten to death by firearms before he could climb the wall. In addition to Nanyang rifles, the National Army also had many captured weapons. Weapons and weapons were fired by the militia temporarily recruited from the town, and they were beaten randomly. Jie Wendong's men could not withstand the firepower and immediately withered.
Jiewendong was furious. He had some desperadoes under his command, but there were too few of them. The whole army was made up of ordinary people. Seeing that Shi Jian was a tough guy, no one was willing to risk their lives to do it. There was a stalemate at the moment.
When there was nothing he could do, his "strategist" Jiang Wenming came up with a plan and said that since he couldn't take it down at once, it would be better to block the road first to prevent reinforcements from the county from coming to rescue him. At worst, they could surround them for several months and force them to surrender without food.
Jiang Wenming was originally a poor scholar who owed gambling debts, so he had to go to the mountains to become a bandit. Because he knows a few words and has a vicious heart. He also knew how to use a gun and a stick a few times, so he was considered a "all-rounder in both civil and military affairs", and soon he became the "strategist" of the village.
He knew that the "career" of this bandit was not one of being famous, so he established a relationship with Yang Juren very early, and often did dirty work that was inconvenient for Mr. Yang to show up. This time, Jiang Wenming also contributed to the question of Donghuo and the leader's return to Yangjiazhuang.
Jie Wendong already knew that Mr. Yang suffered a big loss from the ambush. Not only did Yang Erhu send an envoy long ago, asking him to withdraw his troops quickly to avoid being bitten by the Kun bandits and suffering another big loss. Yu Heiqi, a former subordinate who had fled from the battlefield, also ran to him and told him everything that happened.
"How many people are here, Kunthief?"
"I only saw about forty people, and they were defeated by them." Yu Heiqi was shocked, "That firearm is powerful!"
"Stop talking nonsense! Do you think the Kun thief's firearms are very powerful?" Jie Wendong said impatiently, "I'm asking how many people there are in their team?"
"This, I didn't see it... I dare not say it." Yu Heiqi said, "I only know that the Kun Thief Brigade was on a boat..."
"roll!"
Jie Wendong lost his attention for a moment. Running away was naturally the safest option. But Shi Jian's mouth was full of fat, but he couldn't eat it, which was a bit regretful. Especially last night, he had just transported several hundred kilograms of gunpowder from the village, and was preparing to float it over by boat, blow up the walls of the village along the river, and then break in during the chaos. If I run away, all these things will be in vain.
After thinking about it, he decided not to run away for the time being, but to seize the time to do this job first - anyway, the bandit's group was by boat, and it would have to be the day after tomorrow at the earliest to get here upstream. As for the people who came overland, there were only a few dozen people. Just send some people to block them with wooden fences. Presumably even these dozens of people can't attack.
After discussing with Jiang Wenming, the two sides divided their troops into two. Jiang Wenming took half of the people to block the intersection, and he took the other half to attack Shijian.
"...You hurry up and take action. If you don't succeed, you have to leave." Jiang Wenming told him.
"I don't have to worry about that." Jie Wendong said carelessly, "All you have to do is let the Kun thieves' overland spies charge over - I heard they are all very capable troops."
"No matter how hard we can fight, we can only defeat a few dozen people. I can't hold on here. They don't have artillery, so they won't be able to attack them easily."
Jiang Wenming said this with some confidence. In order to attack the fortress, in addition to gunpowder, a lot of firearms such as lychee cannons were also transported from the village, as well as an iron cannon from the Ming army - this was an old thing in the village. In order to clear the stone stream, Jie Wendong finally moved all the old men out.
With these firearms, as well as wooden fences and quickly repaired forts, it will not be a problem to resist dozens of people.
Wu Baliu's advance team arrived before dark. He heard the leading soldiers reported that the enemy had actually built fortifications on the road and set up cannons. He thought there was a heavy concentration of troops and did not dare to take it lightly. Because it was getting late and the surrounding environment was complicated, we decided not to attack that night and wait until dawn the next day to deal with it.
"Tomorrow our 2nd company will be the main attack, and you will follow us." Wu Baliu gestured on the hastily drawn terrain map, "The terrain here is narrow and it is not easy for the troops to deploy..."
"I request that tomorrow's main attack mission be carried out by our squadron." Li Dong said, "Please ask the Fubo Army to support us with firepower."
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Next update: Volume 7 - Guangzhou Governance Chapter 385
