The bloody close combat soon started on the right wing of the Dashun Army. First, the spears rushed into the wall and inserted into the array of sword and shield soldiers. The sharp spear tips carried huge momentum and penetrated the sword and shield soldiers in an instant. The cloth armor he wears. Then came the counterattack of the waist knife! The shield protected the waist knife and rushed in front of the spearman. He raised and lowered the knife, slashing and stabbing at the gaps in the spearman's armor. The casualties on both sides began to increase sharply. The archers behind the Ming army array and the Dashun army knights on horseback supervising the battle began to shoot arrows at the opponent's crowd.
The archers on both sides (including the Dashun knights) are very good. They are all veterans who have been in the army for many years. They are good at shooting arrows. They may not be enough to meet the Tatars, but now they have also met their opponents. After a burst of shooting, the two sides fought hand-to-hand. The soldiers were all hit by arrows.
However, arrowheads are not bullets after all, and they do not have much "stopping ability" against armored targets, so there are not many people who are knocked over by arrowheads.
Shortly after the fierce battle on the right wing of the Dashun Army began, the cavalry of both sides also fought on the open plain east of Tangjiashan. However, it was not Zhang Yong's thousand light cavalry and the Dashun Army cavalry that were fighting, but the sixteen hundred heavy cavalry that came out from the Gong'an City, with one battalion as a wave, a total of four waves, from four different direction, launched an intensive charge towards the Dashun cavalry patrolling the plains east of Tangjiashan. Amidst the rumble of hooves, more than 6,000 horse hooves kicked up dust all over the sky, and it was like shaking the ground.
This attack was made on the spur of the moment by Zhu Cihong after he learned that the Ming army at the front of Tangjiashan was being bombarded.
He knew that relying on 20 or 30 general cannons would not cause too many casualties to the Ming army of up to 50,000 people, but being bombarded was a very "morale-destroying" thing, especially when they were only hit without fighting back. Down.
So he had to find a way to counterattack... The twenty-four three-pound cannons in Wu Guoyong's hands could not fly over, and the only thing he could use was Sun Fugui's cavalry regiment.
These are armored cavalry who have practiced group charges!
Moreover, their melee combat capabilities are not weak. Everyone has a slatted iron armor, and at least one third is equipped with a weapon for close combat - a musket! The rest are also equipped with armor-breaking weapons such as throwing axes and iron whips.
By the way, the reason why they are equipped with so many melee weapons is because they will engage in melee combat with the enemy after the group charge is over, instead of quickly breaking away from contact and launching the next round of charge. The reason for this is mainly because they don't have enough horsepower.
Zhu Cixiang could match each of them with two horses, but he did not have the ability to match them with truly superior war horses.
In other words, the horses they rode were simply not up to the standard of war horses among the Qing and Dashun armies!
Horses can be raised in the south!
However, the cost of raising horses in the south is many times higher than that of raising horses in the grasslands or even the Central Plains, so it is impossible to maintain a large herd of horses.
In the grassland-style horse breeding that emphasizes quantity, tall and strong foals are selected by selecting one out of a hundred and then castrated to serve as war horses.
However, horses bred in the south are both rare and expensive. If you want to pick only one in a hundred, there will be no horses available!
So after charging for a while, these armored cavalry were too exhausted to run away. If they didn't go back and take a good rest, they wouldn't have the energy to charge the second wave.
Therefore, Zhu Cixiang's shock cavalry had to fight hand-to-hand after charging, and it was impossible to use the so-called modern shock cavalry tactics.
Fortunately, their hand-to-hand fighting abilities were strong, their equipment was good, and they had four waves of group charges as the base. Li Zicheng's two or three thousand cavalry on the east bank of the Hudu River were immediately beaten to their knees, suffering heavy casualties and retreating steadily.
Tian Jianxiu, who was responsible for commanding the Dashun Army on the east bank of the Hudu River, was stunned by the storm-like offensive of the New Army cavalry, and had to send out several infantry units (about three to four thousand people) to go out intensively. The top of the queue went to cover the retreat of their own cavalry.
After winning for a while, Sun Fugui did not dare to fight, because although his subordinates had good armor and weapons, they did not have good horses to ride on. The round of charging and fighting just now had almost exhausted the strength of those rogue horses. You have to take it easy now. So Sun Fugui also ordered his subordinates to lead the Dashun knight's horse, which was wandering on the battlefield without its owner, to retreat first.
At the same time, on the west bank of the Hudu River, the battle between the Dashun Army's right-wing infantry group had already decided the winner. Although the Selection Warriors commanded by Kim Sheng-hwan played hard, they still fell behind. It was not that they were defeated by the Dashun Army troops commanded by Li Guoying, but that the Dashun Army Cavalry that had been supervising the battle from behind also joined the battle after firing their arrows. They bypassed the infantry of both sides who were fighting fiercely and moved behind Jin Shenghuan's warriors. Before they could launch an attack, the Ming army's warriors retreated on their own. As a result, they became the targets of the Dashun Army's infantry and cavalry pursuit!
Two to three thousand broken troops ran wildly, and were driven by the infantry and cavalry of the defeated army towards the Hudu River.
Just when a one-sided massacre was about to take place, thousands of Ming army cavalry detoured from the west bank of the Hudu River west of Tangjiashan (the Hudu River turned a corner near Tangjiashan, with a section running east-west, and this section is now the main battlefield) Come over and launch a charge.
This cavalry was Zhang Yong's personal servant. Although there were only a thousand cavalry, they seized the opportunity and caught the Dashun Army commanded by Liu Zongmin by surprise - it turned out that they did not cross the river together with thousands of cavalry, but were divided into twenty teams. They crossed the river in batches pretending to be scouts and cavalry, confusing the Dashun Army cavalry who were monitoring this section of the tiger crossing.
After crossing the river, they moved toward the bend of the Hudu River while completing their assembly. As a result, they caught up with the rout of the selected front commanded by Jin Shenghuan.
Zhang Yong made a prompt decision and led the cavalry to charge. The Dashun army's infantry and cavalry, who were chasing the Ming army, were in chaotic formation and were entangled with the enemy. Facing the sudden impact of more than a thousand Qingqi, he didn't even have the ability to resist at all!
However, the Dashun cavalry on horseback are all bandits with many years of experience, and they are very experienced in dealing with this kind of situation. With the sound of "hoohoo", they saw that these knights on horseback had turned around and headed towards He fled in the direction of Guangdeguan, leaving the Dashun infantry on the battlefield to the enemy - these infantrymen were the old troops of Zuo Liangyu and Zuo Mengeng, and no one would feel bad if they were all killed.
Zhang Yong, however, was not busy massacring Li Guoying's infantry, which had completely fallen into panic. Instead, he led his cavalry to chase the Dashun Army's old battalion cavalry and rushed in the direction of Guangde Temple.
The more than thirty one-pound cannons in front of Guangde Temple are the key to today's battle!
If they can be captured, then the battle of Tangjiashan will be won...
Zhang Yong rode his horse and raised his gun. Under the protection of a group of close servants, he rushed to the front of the team. Without blinking, he stared at the Dashun Army artillery position in the distance where smoke continued to rise. Groups of spearmen, archers, and sword soldiers have already come out of Guangde Temple and began to form formations in the northwest direction of Guangde Palace, which is facing Zhang Yong's headquarters. They obviously want to block Zhang Yong's cavalry. .
However, Zhang Yong is not a gas-efficient lamp. Just when his cavalry was about to approach the Dashun Army's infantry formation, Zhang Yong suddenly turned his horse's head to the left and led his more than a thousand light cavalry along the Dashun Army's formation. The incoming formation ran wildly, and finally turned right again at the end of the Dashun Army's infantry formation, and rushed to the front of the Dashun Army's artillery array!
He wanted to attack the more than thirty general cannons placed in front of Guangde Temple from the front!
If these artillery pieces were three-pounders used to defeat the New Army, he would undoubtedly be killed if he did so. Even if you look at it, the difference between "one pound" and "three pounds" is not that big. However, there is a huge gap between the two sides in terms of artillery technology, the lightness and flexibility of the gun mount, and shotgun technology.
Moreover, the gunners who operated these "one-pound" cannons were all subordinates of Zuo's army. When they saw thousands of cavalry rushing over like a flood breaking a dike, they were all frightened. Where could they fill the gunpowder with lead? They all threw away their cannons and ran for their lives.
Zhang Yong immediately seized the opportunity and led the cavalry to rush forward and captured the artillery array with one charge.
However, Zhang Yong and his cavalry did not carry hammers and nails. They did not know to nail the fire door, but instead went around to prevent fires and ignite gunpowder.
Just when Zhang Yong was leading his men to wreak havoc everywhere, deafening cheers suddenly rang out on the battlefield. It turned out that Li Zicheng had descended from Jinmao Mountain and personally supervised and led more than 10,000 Dashun troops to launch a general attack on foot and cavalry!
