Dashun Yongchang first year, April 22nd.
Inside Shanhaiguan.
"The Tartars are coming! The Tartars are coming!"
From the stone river beach in the south to the stone mountain pass in the north, the entire battlefield suddenly erupted with huge shouts like a mountain roar and a tsunami, full of panic.
Accompanying this shout was a chorus of "Wow! Wow! Wow!" and a sudden strong wind blowing from the sea in the south. I don’t know if it’s God’s troubles, or the Shanhaiguan area near the sea has many hurricanes in summer.
Anyway, the strong wind that was blowing sand and rocks, and the sky was dark, suddenly rose up just when the Dashun Army and Guan Ning Army were fighting on the Shihetan battlefield until it was difficult to break up, and the attack of 3,000 cavalry launched by Li Zicheng, which had been organized with great difficulty, was completely beaten. break.
Just when Li Zicheng, who was commanding the troops to fight hard and bloody for most of the day and felt the prick of Wu Sangui's Guan Ning Army, was wondering whether to withdraw his troops and return to the camp to rest. The cavalrymen whose flags, uniform colors, and hats were different from those of Guan Ning's army suddenly appeared on the east side of the Shihetan battlefield!
Then they took advantage of the wind and launched a charge together with Guan Ningjun, who was accustomed to the windy weather at the seaside!
Before the Manchurian soldiers appeared, the Dashun Army and Guan Ning Army had been fighting on the battlefield west of Shanhaiguan for two days and were exhausted. Especially since the decisive battle between the two sides started early this morning, the fight was even more difficult. Under the personal supervision of Li Zicheng, the 60,000 Dashun Army launched round after round of fierce attacks on the Guan Ning Army, which had less than 30,000 troops. The two sides fought repeatedly on the river beaches on both sides of the fordable stone river. The corpses were laid out layer after layer, and the blood flowed into the shallow stone river, almost dyeing the river red.
On the side of the Dashun Army, those who died were not just some random gangsters, but the elite of Yishui's old battalion!
Because this time Li Zicheng was on an expedition of 700 miles and was in a hurry. He wanted to capture Guan Ning's army before the Manchus invaded. Therefore, we did not bring along any rabble who were procrastinating and wasting food, but all the old soldiers were brought along.
He just wanted to use the strong fighting power of the old camp soldiers to take down Guan Ning's army in one fell swoop!
Before sending troops, he had studied the terrain of Shanhaiguan with his generals and found that the strength of Shanhaiguan was from the outside (east). The walls facing the inner (west) side of Guancheng are very thin, the trenches are dug very shallow, and there are no defensive facilities such as city towers and tiger falls.
Even with easy-to-carry light artillery bombardment, several gaps can be opened, and it is not difficult to attack the city again.
But on April 21, when the two sides had a tentative battle on both sides of the Shihetan, Li Zicheng already discovered that something was wrong.
Guan Ningjun's combat effectiveness is much stronger than he imagined! He originally thought that Guan Ning's army, like most of the Ming army, was just a small number of servants capable of fighting. But once they fought, he discovered that Guan Ning's army had a certain level of combat power, and even ordinary soldiers were quite brave. This shows that Wu Sangui and his servants did not go south, but are here in Shanhaiguan!
What shocked Li Zicheng even more was that his old soldiers had become weaker! In the first battle on the 21st, he showed weakness. There is no longer the momentum of the past where everyone is vying to be first and everyone is brave.
On the night of the 21st, Li himself had to summon his generals to cheer them up and reward the soldiers who participated in the battle. This boosted the morale of the troops, but that was all. Before entering Beijing, Li Zicheng's old soldiers thought that they had a share in Dashun, and that they were the founding heroes of the country, so they were full of energy and high morale. Be proactive when it comes to fighting.
But now everyone works for money and lives, and they can do whatever they can, which is almost the same as the elite of the Ming army.
Without that sense of ownership, the foundation of Dashun's old battalion soldiers was not very strong, and their numbers did not have much advantage. Therefore, when Guan Ning's army left the city and fought in the field with Dashun's army, they actually fell into a bitter battle.
Of course, although the Dashun Army could not cheer up, the Guan Ning Army also did not have high morale. After all, Beijing fell, and the officers and soldiers of Guanning Army had just abandoned their hometown and became rootless soldiers. If it weren't for the news that Li Zicheng was torturing and paying in Beijing, all the officers of Guan Ning Army felt the danger. They all helped Wu Sangui to publicize in the army how cruel the bandits were, and they would slaughter Guan Ning Army's family and so on. The soldiers may have collapsed due to low morale.
In this way, the two most powerful and elite Han armed forces started a brutal fight in Shanhaiguan even though their morale was not very high. As time went by, the casualties on both sides became more and more serious, and their strength became more and more exhausted, and both sides became a tired army.
If the Manchu soldiers led by Dorgon had not suddenly joined, the Dashun army, which had an advantage in numbers and had the right time, should have won the victory in the end.
But just around the end of April 22nd, 20,000 elite troops selected by Dorgon from the 100,000 Eight Banners army passed through the Xilao City in Shanhaiguan and appeared in the center of the Shihetan battlefield. .
Dorgon had been watching the battle on Xilao City since the morning of this day. He had seen it very clearly and found that Li Zicheng's troops were not as large as the legend said. Moreover, the formation he deployed was too wide, from Beishan all the way to the seaside. There was no way he could withstand the onslaught of the Eight Banners cavalry!
As long as enough cavalry is invested to break through the middle of the Dashun Army in one fell swoop, they can be divided into two halves.
When the sudden strong wind stopped, Li Zicheng, who was supervising the formation at the height of the red tile shop, happened to see the four-color Eight Banners cavalry rushing towards the stone river beach like a flood, rushing from the east bank to the west bank, crushing them like a torrent. The Dashun Army in the center of the formation. Then a Dashun Army camp located on the west bank of Shihetan started a fierce battle with the Dashun Army guarding the camp. The other one rushed straight towards the red tile shop.
Li Zicheng was stunned when he saw it. Suddenly a horse came galloping towards him and reported to him: "The Tatar soldiers are coming. Ruhou (referring to Liu Zongmin) please the emperor to get out of here!"
Song Xiance on the side also said in panic: "I didn't expect the Tatars to really come. Shanhaiguan is no longer accessible. Please leave as soon as possible!"
Li Zicheng was not willing to leave his brothers on the battlefield and run away. He gritted his teeth and said to an imperial camp general: "Immediately send an order to Ruhou and Liu Fangliang, and the army will fight and retreat!"
But as soon as the general who delivered the order left, the vanguard of the Eight Banners soldiers rushed to the front of Li Zicheng's imperial camp and was blocked by the imperial camp soldiers led by Li Shuangxi.
At this time, on the west bank of the Shihe River, Dashun's army had been divided into many places by the Eight Banners soldiers and Guan Ning's army. Melees broke out everywhere and the fortresses were breached. However, when the Dashun Army was forced into a desperate situation by the Eight Banners soldiers, they also showed combat effectiveness that surprised Dorgon.
They were clearly a tired force. They had not shown much strength when fighting Guan Ning's army before, but now they actually withstood the charge of the Eight Banners cavalry. They resisted desperately everywhere, and actually fought hard with the Eight Banners soldiers, which also caused a lot of casualties to the Eight Banners soldiers.
If it were the Ming army that Dorgon knew well, even the Guan Ning army would have collapsed long ago after fighting like this!
"These rogue bandits are not weak!" Dorgon, who was standing on the Xilao City supervising the formation, said to himself, "Did he hold back his hand when fighting Guan Ning's army before?"
Hong Chengchou, who was standing next to Dorgon, was also a little dazed. In his impression, the bandits should be very weak. Even if they are much stronger now, they should be defeated at the first touch when they encounter the Eight Banners Heavenly Soldiers!
But now it doesn’t collapse! Hong Chengchou said in his heart: Fortunately, Li Zicheng only brought about 60,000 to 70,000 people. If he really brought 200,000 rogue bandits, the battle at Shanhaiguan would have really hurt both the rogue bandits and the Tatars.
In addition, Zhu Cixiang, the prince of Fujun in the Ming Dynasty, seemed to have defeated 20,000 rogue bandits in Tianjin Guards... How did this rebellious son who imprisoned his father and killed his younger brother do it?
While Hong Chengchou was thinking wildly, Dorgon was already issuing an order: "Send the order to Duoduo, Tan Tai and Obai, and let them lead a brigade with two white flags and two yellow flags to attack! There are many of us today, even if we use a large number of people, We want to kill Li Zicheng!"
"twitter!"
As the large groups of troops with two white flags and two yellow flags passed through Shanhaiguan Xilao City and entered the battlefield, the situation on the battlefield became even more unfavorable to the numerically disadvantaged Dashun Army. However, under the command of Liu Zongmin and Liu Fangliang, the Dashun Army's resistance remained tenacious and dragged the battle until nightfall, before retreating westward under the cover of night.
Because they were retreating under the cover of darkness, and Dorgon was unwilling to pursue the bandits fiercely and cause too much damage to the Eight Banners soldiers, he only sent Wu Sangui and more than 10,000 Guanning Army cavalry to follow them.
Therefore, Li Zicheng did not lose all his capital under Shanhaiguan! In fact, he still has a chance to turn the situation around!
