875 Gunfire on the Atlantic Ocean

"What is the concept of a 210 mm caliber main gun? Many people don't know very well. But if you tell them that the muzzle of an artillery gun of this caliber can penetrate into the head of a young man. I think many people will immediately imagine that. The picture. A thick barrel. A cannonball that requires two people to hug..."

Many years later. Young Sun Chujian often accepts interviews from reporters. I still feel extremely excited when I recall my experience of serving on the Zhiyuan ship.

"When Prime Minister Xiao was planning to establish the Ryukyu Navy, it was catching up with the era of great changes in naval technology. When the Zhiyuan ship turned into a lone wolf ghost in the Atlantic Ocean, the British Navy was also filled with a large number of sailing battleships. There were even rows on the left and right. Smoothbore cannon..."

"Haha. At that time, Europe used to classify artillery by pounds, that is, the weight of the shells. Take the twenty-four-pound artillery with the most equipment in the United Kingdom as an example. The caliber is 583 inches, which is converted into metric system, which is 148 mm. It is the same as the Zhiyuan 210 mm main gun comparison. You can see the difference..."

"Even the British Royal Navy has the most firepower. The thirty-two-pound gun. The caliber is only 162 mm... not to mention the accuracy and range of the rifled gun. The Zhiyuan was undoubtedly the first in firepower among the world's navies at that time. The perverted killer..."

"No, no, no... don't listen to that old guy Kevin nagging all day long. He will only tell you about the shortcomings of various data. That person is an obsessive-compulsive disorder patient... I know that the Zhiyuan has many shortcomings. For example The barrel steel is not hard enough. After firing two hundred times, the left breech line will be smoothed..."

"Yes. I also know that there is something wrong with the aiming equipment. The accuracy of the optical instruments is very poor... but so what. Scientists are somewhat perfectionistic. Obsessive-compulsive disorder is just for them..."

"This is like the story that the Prime Minister often tells. A group of people encountered a tiger in the forest. Everyone ran away, but one person didn't tie his shoelaces first... Haha. Someone asked him why you were so stupid and didn't run away quickly. . The man said with a smile. No matter how fast I run, I can't outrun the tiger. I just need to run faster than you..."

Sun Chu smiled so hard that he couldn't even see his eyes. "Yes, yes. The pattern of that era was like that. A big tiger called national annihilation jumped out of the darkness. All nations fled forward like crazy..."

"Of course we all know. No one, no organization, no country can escape the end of destruction. But no one is willing to perish without resistance. So we have to race and run. If we don't seek first place, at least we can't run in the first place. At the very end.”

"When I first saw the Zhiyuan. When I heard the sound of the cannon west of the Marshall Islands. I knew... we have got rid of the youngest position. China's national destiny has begun a desperate counterattack."

No matter how these veterans recall the scene of that shot, they cannot fully describe the shock of that year. Because that was the first shot fired by the Chinese towards Europe.

The storm was pouring. Lightning flashes like a swimming dragon. The thunder roared like a rising tide. Morale is strong.

The Reach shredded its disguise. The twin heavy artillery was ready for battle. Naked sailors in the boiler room shoveled chunks of white coal into the furnace. The blazing flames release huge kinetic energy.

The pressure in the boiler is about to reach dangerous levels. The underwater propellers rotated rapidly, pushing the Zhiyuan through the waves at a speed of 13 knots.

Four thousand meters...three thousand meters...three thousand five hundred meters...the target is getting closer and closer. Artilleryman Lin Zhen has locked the target. The launching traction rope was in Xiang Ying's hand. Both of them had rubber ear plugs inserted into their ears. Communication is all through sign language.

Xiang Ying stared at the little lamb in the distance. I prayed silently in my heart, "Your Majesty, Prime Minister, please bless me to hit the target... This is the first shot of the Zhiyuan in actual combat. Please bless me to hit the target..."

"Captain...has entered the two-thousand-meter range...and is ready to launch." Lin Zhen roared and made a sign language for launch in his hand. Xiang Ying suddenly pulled the launch rope without saying anything.

Boom...a loud noise suppressed the thunder in the sky. The 210-caliber high-explosive shell spun out of the muzzle and lit up an orange red on the dark sea.

The explosive blast from the propellant swept across the bow of the ship. The rainproof tarpaulin was blown away by the blast wind and flew into the Atlantic Ocean. Xiang Ying and Lin Zhen felt the blast rushing towards them with their big mouths. Even the internal organs felt the pressure.

The muzzle velocity of the 210-caliber artillery has reached 600 meters per second. It only took four seconds for the shell to explode in the airspace on the deck of the French Swift. The Prussian-designed time-delay fuze was extremely reliable.

The French are crazy. The fireball on the deck directly broke the main mast. The fragments cut into the sailors' bodies. The first mate, who was standing next to the captain, had his head cut off without saying a word. The captain was knocked to the deck by the shock wave. When he raised his head, he found that the sky and the earth were bright red.

Blood seeped from his features. He opened his mouth and screamed "Fight back...all fight back." But the sailors on the deck of the Swift were deafened. One by one they lay on the deck and howled.

The Parisian looked at the seriously injured Swift and they were all dumbfounded in shock. The captain looked at the battleship more than two thousand meters ahead and screamed in horror. Just like a little girl who meets a gangster.

"God. It's impossible... What kind of warship is this? How could it fire at such a long distance? How could it have such accuracy... Why are the cannonballs so powerful?"

"Is this sent by God to punish us... Look, his cannon can rotate. He can fire without adjusting the attitude of the hull... It's broken. He is coming towards us. Run away."

Compared to the captain's timidity. The first mate was obviously braver. The first mate with a naval background yelled on the deck, "God bless France. Where can we escape in the storm. We don't even dare to raise the main sail. The enemy has decided to kill us completely without declaring war." Are we lambs to be slaughtered?"

"French boys. Counterattack. Turn and attack. We also have artillery..."

It was not unusual for merchant ships to be equipped with two or three cannons in that era. The sea in the 19th century was far less peaceful than in later generations. Not to mention pirates, even the warships of many countries will occasionally appear as gangsters.

In this day and age, all those who can make a living as sailors are desperadoes. The first mate aroused the general spirit of the Parisian to fight. People looked at the timid captain with contempt. The best gunners rushed to the bow. The bow gun opened the black hole.

This is a naval standard twenty-four pounder smoothbore gun. Caliber 148 mm. Effective range is one thousand meters. But in fact, the range of more than 800 meters is no longer accurate. If you want to improve accuracy, you have to shoot at close range. Within four hundred meters is the world of smoothbore artillery.

"Charge forward...the artillerymen are ready to fire...even if we die, we have to bite off a piece of their flesh."

Note: Reach's tactics. It was the famous sea-breaking battle of later generations. German tactics. During World War II, there was a battleship called Admiral Spee. The series of battles in the Atlantic Ocean are classic. The final death was also very tragic. Even Churchill expressed his admiration for the battleship.

Of course, our Zhiyuan journey will not end in tragedy. In the Atlantic group, we are also a lone wolf.