A huge fireball suddenly jumped up on the midship deck of the Wuhanfu, and then turned into a black smoke and shot straight into the sky!
This is the scene of a 40-pound explosive bomb exploding. In addition to the frightening scene, the lethality is also amazing. It directly blew a large hole on the deck of the Wuhanfu, completely destroying the two gun cabins below, and all kinds of The debris was carried by the shock wave of the explosion and swept across the flat deck, cutting down the officers and soldiers on the deck one by one, like ripe wheat.
Liu Guoxuan and Zheng Jing were lucky. They both huddled in the command podium surrounded by sandbags, so they escaped disaster - sandbags are now actually placed on the deck of a battleship. It's a bit incredible to think about it!
However, wooden pallet shells and their improved nail-head wooden pallet shells are incredible things. They appeared completely in the original history - blooming ammunition existed very early. In the 17th century, the navies of the Western powers There are light gunboats that can be equipped with large-caliber mortars. However, due to the lack of the two inventions of wooden tube fuses and wooden ammunition holders, the explosive ammunition was very unsafe and therefore could not be used on battleships. Let's just blow up a small gunboat. Human lives in the 17th century were not valuable anyway, but how expensive is a battleship? If it is blown up because of exploding bombs, the naval commander must not be sent to a military court?
So it was only in the 19th century that explosive bombs were put on battleships. The first ones to get them on and put them into actual combat were the Russians who were desperate for their lives...
Now, thanks to the three key inventions of the wooden tube fuse, the wooden bullet holder, and the pointed cannonball (nailhead bullet), the explosive bomb has become a weapon that completely subverts the rules of the naval game.
At the same time, armor is too expensive and technically difficult. A sail battleship has a displacement of at least more than a thousand tons. How could it be built with steel? Steel, not pig iron, at least wrought iron, right? How much is the output? How could it be possible to spend hundreds or thousands of tons to build a battleship? And we can’t make large enough wrought iron plates these days! If too many small pieces of iron plates are used for splicing, the interface part will be difficult to handle. If the splicing part is not handled firmly enough, it will still be broken if a cannonball hits it!
Therefore, steel armor cannot be manufactured in the foreseeable future.
Without armor, but with reliable explosive shells...the hard life of naval officers and soldiers is really endless!
When Liu Guoxuan and Zheng Jing were holding their heads and huddled behind sandbags to avoid death, the Dutch were also having a hard time. The New Hetok was already finished, all five gun cabins were blown up, and a fire was still burning at the stern of the ship, as if A floating torch floating on the sea.
The ship has been completely abandoned and is now just floating aimlessly along the ocean currents, waiting for its end!
Along with the New Hertok, there were five other Dutch warships and three Ming army Chihusho-class ships. Tropp's division plan was still successful, but the price paid exceeded his imagination.
While performing a division mission, the Seven Provinces Council was heavily bombarded by concentrated artillery fire from a military guard class and a Sentosho class at close range. It was hit by fourteen rounds, nine of which successfully exploded, destroying the ship of the Seven Provinces. The stern and five gun compartments also caused at least three fatal explosions, and a 15-pound shell hit the command podium. The command podium was full of dead bodies. The captain and first mate of the Seven Provinces were also killed on the spot. It was really tragic. !
In the end, the fire spread on the Seven Provincial Council and was completely unable to be extinguished. The surviving crew had to abandon their battleship...
Two medium-sized and light battleships actually destroyed a huge battleship in a close-range artillery battle (not without cost, the Weishuo-class ship that participated in the battle was also turned into a torch and finally completely burned). This is It was something that was unimaginable in the past!
But now, before the terrifying shells, all wooden-hulled warships are equal cannon fodder. No matter how thick the wooden shell is, they cannot stop the nail-head shells... So the difference is only the size of the cannon fodder!
The battleships that are still fighting are not in good condition either. They have either been blown out of holes or are burning somewhere!
The most tragic among them was the Takayamasuo. This two-masted gunboat with a carrying capacity of 300 tons was flanked by two Dutch formations together with its three sister ships. The guard ship was completely destroyed and burned like a torch. The survivors on the ship The sailors are now flopping in the sea. Only the Takayamasuo broke out of the encirclement, but it was hit by one 40-pound explosive bomb, three 36-pound explosive bombs, and four 30-pound explosive bombs. All five gun bays were blown up, and the butt of the ship was also blown up. Half of it, but fortunately both masts and the foremast were intact, so we could still escape at full speed. Most of the officers and soldiers on the ship were killed or wounded. The gun room was full of corpses, and the flat upper deck was also littered with corpses. The captain, first mate, and second mate were all killed, and only one of them had a broken leg and could only sit on the deck. The third officer was roaring like crazy.
"Quickly put out the fire! Hurry and throw the cannonballs into the water! Hurry..."
Fire was spreading everywhere on this 300-ton warship, and the shells in the ammunition magazine were set alight at some point!
If it really explodes, everyone in the boat will have to go to the sea to feed the fish!
After the Seventh Provincial Council was destroyed, the captain of the Dutch Provincial Council, who was responsible for commanding the split formation and the outflanking formation (which was actually in a mess and no more teams), sent three warships to pursue Gaoshansuo, leaving two more ships. Fish for people (both sides need to be fished out. The Ming Dynasty navy officers and soldiers fished out revenue, which can be redeemed by Emperor Zhu at a high price), and then took the remaining warships that can still fight to support the Zeeland Provincial Council formation.
The formation led by Major General Tropp himself has been beaten badly! Eleven ships are smoking, three of them have been abandoned, and the remaining eight have been blown to pieces. If they can still be pulled back to the Netherlands, it will be a big headache for the engineers of the shipyard... ..Now that it’s like this, can it still be repaired?
The queues on both sides were in chaos, with more than a dozen boats mixed together and fighting. Melee combat was originally the strength of the Dutch Navy. They had good skills and dared to engage in boarding battles. In the Anglo-Dutch War, melee warfare caused heavy losses to the British Navy and forced the latter to innovate and invent battle line tactics. .....
But now they find that they suddenly can't fight in melee!
Because during the artillery formation, only half of the artillery on both sides can fire. And after the melee started, because the two sides were mixed together, it was not one side facing the enemy, but both sides were likely to face the enemy ship. Moreover, without the array, the ship will sail irregularly, so every time the naval gun fires a shot, it must be re-aimed. At this time, the 15-pound gun is much more convenient than the 40-pound, 36-pound and 30-pound guns. too much.
In addition, due to the previous fierce battles, the warships on both sides lost part of their gun bays, so the number of cannons that can fire has been reduced. The Ming Navy's warships have more gun bays, while the Dutch Navy's warships have fewer gun bays. After subtraction, the amount of ammunition (regardless of weight) that the Ming Navy's warships can produce in a melee is more than ten times more than their opponents!
With such a firepower disadvantage, how can the Dutch fight in a melee? All that was left was to be beaten... As for docking and so on, there was no need to even think about it. Before you even get close, someone else's 15-pound explosive bullet hits you, and as soon as you get close, it's a surefire hit!
Tropp and David Jones were now sitting across from each other leaning on the sandbags. They were not giving any instructions. They were just looking at an unexploded nail-headed bullet in a daze - there was also a "nail" added to the head of the shell. , this is too immoral, right?
According to this way of playing, as long as it is a wooden hull boat, it will be useless no matter how big or strong it is! Several pounds of black powder were attached to the hull of the ship and exploded. If it couldn't be blown through, it wouldn't be wood anymore!
Do you think that in the future, if you work in the navy, you will have to sit in a small boat of two to three hundred tons and mount a few 18-pound cannons to line up with the enemy and kill them?
The two of them were stunned for an unknown amount of time before David Jones realized that there was no longer the roar of artillery fire in his ears. He stood up holding the sandbag, stretched his neck and looked around, and then murmured to himself: : "They're gone..."
Tropp still didn't quite understand, "Who's gone?"
"Several Chinese warships left...and were driven away by our reinforcements! Rear Admiral, do we still want to pursue them?"
"Chasing?" Tropp said with a wry smile, "David, have you forgotten that the Chinese also have reinforcements? Their reinforcements are coming soon, and it's time for us to escape! Now, victory still belongs to us. When the time comes, retreat quickly!”
"What about Johor City? The Ming army is landing in large numbers!"
"It doesn't matter. Aren't there reinforcements from the Dashun Kingdom? Let's retreat to Penang Island first and join the Dashun Army!"
