Early morning on February 18th, the 10th year of Hongxing reign in the Ming Dynasty.
In the distance, from the Osumi Peninsula, there was a faint sound of gunfire. It carried for more than twenty miles in the humid air of the sea. It sounded like bursts of thunder, rumble, rumble. This is the small armed Galen ship of the Eight-Power Allied Forces harassing and bombarding the fort on the territory of the Tarumizu Shimazu family on the west side of the Osumi Peninsula to attract the attention of the Satsuma domain defenders.
This Sakurajima is called an island, but it is actually a peninsula surrounded by sea water. Only the eastern corner is surrounded by the Osumi Peninsula. It is not very wide. Even for a little over two miles, it is still mountainous, but it is not impassable. There is a section of beach on the Tarumizu boundary on the west side of Osumi Peninsula where you can land. After the troops landed, they marched along the coastline towards Sakurajima. They would reach the gentle slope on the west side of Sakurajima and Kagoshima Castle.
The main body of Sakurajima is an active volcano, with an altitude of more than 1,000 meters. The mountains on the east, south and north sides are relatively steep. There are mostly cliffs along the coast, making it impossible to land. Only the west (southwest and northwest) is relatively gentle, with some There are many beaches and fishing villages where landing operations can be carried out.
However, the Shimazu family and the Spanish fleet had long noticed this, and built the Sakurajima Fort on the gentle slope due east of Sakurajima. They also built the Sakurajima Fort on the east side of the harbor at the foot of Castle Mountain opposite Sakurajima. The fort was built. The two forts are only seven miles apart, about five miles of which is the sea surface of Sakurajima Strait, which is very narrow and completely covered by the firepower of 24 12-pound cannons from Sakurajima Fort and Kagoshima Castle Fort.
It is this narrow strait that divides Kagoshima Bay into inner and outer parts. As long as the enemy cannot capture Sakurajima Fort, Inner Kagoshima Bay is an absolutely safe anchorage. The outer Kagoshima Bay was too wide for the artillery of this era, and the narrowest area around Ibusukizu was more than 20 miles wide. Even if the Eight-Nation Allied Forces occupied the land on both sides, they would not be able to block the channel with artillery.
As for the use of fleets to blockade, it can be effective in a short period of time, but a long-term blockade is impossible. First, the Eight-Power Allied Forces still lacks the number of warships in the east. Excluding the Wanshi Big Bird Ship, which is too slow and can only be used as an armed transport ship, the coalition fleet only has a total of seventy-one armed galenic ships. Although it was nearly twice as many as the Spanish's more than twenty armed Galenic ships.
However, these warships have to undertake too many escort tasks, so only part of them can be used for the blockade of Kagoshima Bay, and they cannot work all year round. Even if people can bear it, the sailboats still need repair, maintenance, and supplies. Therefore, once a long-term blockade mission is carried out, the ships must take turns to take up the duties. The total number of armed Galen ships currently used in operations in Kagoshima Bay is only thirty, and after another round of duty, there may only be twenty.
With this number of armed Galenic ships, we have to be careful of the Spanish main force of the Eastern Armada coming to sneak attack...
Therefore, capturing Sakurajima is still the first choice of the Eight-Nation Alliance!
On the sea surface of Kagoshima Bay south of Sakurajima, the main force of the Eight-Nation Allied Forces fleet, as well as the transport fleet carrying the main force of the Ming Army's First Division, had formed a landing formation with murderous intent.
Because some ships were previously allocated to control the Goto Islands, Nagasaki Port and Tanegashima. Some light Galen ships were also used to perform harassment and security missions. Therefore, the ships currently concentrated on the ocean south of Sakurajima are 27 armed Galen ships and 45 Manseki Otori ships.
When the sky brightened in the early morning of February 18, 72 galenic ships and bird ships, under the command of Tasman, Zheng Jiangong, David Jones and others, had completed their formation. Among them, 45 Ten Thousand Stone Big Bird Ships entered the front line, all facing the enemy with their bows, and began to rush towards a beach two to three miles wide southeast of Sakurajima.
Although this kind of big bird ship is not suitable as a warship (it is too slow), it is very suitable for landing battles and bombarding targets on the shore.
Because this kind of ship is different from traditional bird ships, it has a relatively wide forecastle. There is a mast with a hard sail on the deck of the forecastle. The lower part of the mast is relatively open, and two 24-pounders can be placed side by side. Short gun.
These two 24-pound short guns are placed on wooden circular rails and can rotate left and right. One of them can be fully turned to the right, and the other can be fully turned to the left.
In addition, there are two 24-pound guns placed one behind the other on the deck amidships of this Wanshi Big Bird, which can rotate 360 degrees. A 24-pound gun that can rotate 360 degrees is placed on the stern of the ship.
In other words, there are a total of five 24-pound guns on a Wanshi Big Bird ship. When firing forward, there are 2 doors that can exert power at the same time. When firing left and right, there are 4 doors that can fire at the same time. When firing backward, there are 1 door that can fire.
Although the whole ship has 5 cannons, considering the power of the explosive shells and the more stable trajectory of the cannonballs equipped with wooden supports, these bird ships are still very powerful when teamed up for bombardment.
Now the 45 bird ships were divided into two teams, forming two diagonal fronts on the southwest sea where they were scheduled to land on the beach. The bows of the 45 ships were all aimed at the beach, and a total of 90 24-pound bombardment guns were aimed ahead. The shells that have not yet been loaded with wooden tube fuses have been hoisted up from below the forecastle deck. No more can be hoisted, only two at a time - this thing is going to explode, which is terrible!
Therefore, warships equipped with bombardment guns moved their bomb bays under the gun positions, and stored the shells and porcelain bottles filled with seawater in fixed thick wooden crates - once the wooden crates were hit, the porcelain bottles would be It will break, and the seawater in the bottle will wet the cannonball to reduce the chance of being killed.
In addition, two wooden barrels filled with seawater were placed next to each bombardment cannon. This is used to prevent bombardment cannons from failing to fire - the wooden tube fuses used for wooden support shells are lit and then inserted into the holes in the shells. In fact, they are a kind of delayed fuze, which will explode when it reaches the point! If the cannonball is not fired, it will explode in the barrel!
So you must prepare a fire-extinguishing bucket next to the cannon. If that doesn't work, pour water into it from the muzzle...
We have basically made these fire and explosion-proof preparations. The bombardment gun is still a very dangerous weapon to our own people, so we dare not install more. Under the current circumstances, a ship can only install five at most. Moreover, the area of the lower gun deck must be reduced to make room for a dedicated bomb bay.
Therefore, any ship equipped with bombardment guns will have a significantly reduced number of guns.
...
Zheng Jiangong stood on the stern of his temporary flagship "Fuqing". Behind him was a 24-pound bombardment gun with its muzzle facing rearward.
At this time, he was holding a monocular and carefully observing the beach ahead.
A dozen sampans released by the Big Bird Boat were carrying the first batch of marines to break through the waves and rush to the beach.
The beach was quiet, not a ghost was seen.
However, Zheng Jiangong's brows gradually knitted together. Because he knew that the only beach in the southeast of Sakurajima where one could land was impossible to be defenseless.
The Samurai Samurai couldn't be that stupid, and Spanish Admiral Garcia was no fool either. The soldiers from Sazhou must be hiding somewhere near the beach!
Zheng Jiangong shouted in his heart: Show up quickly, warriors of Sazhou!
At the same time, Sashu warrior Saigo Takahiro poked his big head out of a trench in the woods near the beach, squinting at the Eight-Power Allied Forces warship on the sea not far away.
Saigo thought to himself: There are so many warships! There are at least seventy or eighty of them, covering the sea! But it doesn't matter. No matter how powerful the warships of the Eight-Nation Alliance are, they can't board Japanese land.
Because on the land of Japan, there are countless passionate warriors like myself!
Thinking of this, he tightened his grip on a Spanish light musket in his hand. Saigo, who was born into a family of Sashu feudal lords, is in his early thirties this year. Although he has the status of a samurai, he has never had the opportunity to serve as an official (his father is a feudal lord, but he has two older brothers). He can only work hard at home while practicing various skills. The techniques of murder and arson are waiting for your own troubled times.
Now is the chance!
