In less than half a month, Governor Coquilla of the Philippines heard from the captains of the two battleships that fled to Manila that Portiglio and his men were besieged in San Salvador.
Zheng Yiguan led thousands of warships and hundreds of thousands of troops to raid there, which led to such a result.
After hearing this, Coquilla naturally thought that both captains were telling lies. Even after reading the emergency letter written by Portiglio, he also thought that he was exaggerating and describing the enemy's strength too exaggeratedly. .
Coquilla still has a little understanding of Zheng Yiguan's military strength. He doesn't have that many troops and that many warships at all. He can only dispatch 10,000 to 20,000 people and one to 200 warships, and that's it.
This is entirely based on the knowledge of the Battle of Liaoluo Bay. Coquilla had previously heard that the Dutch garrison at the Castle of Jelandia surrendered to him, and even the pirates could not win. This was definitely the work of an extremely incompetent coward.
Even on the European battlefield, without bastions, the Dutch army would not be able to defeat the powerful Spanish army. More than a hundred Spanish soldiers could destroy the so-called Inca Empire.
Portirio has nearly 500 imperial soldiers in his hands. Even if he cannot fight against tens of thousands of pirates, with the advantage of the castle and firepower, he can hold on for a long time until reinforcements can relieve him.
Although he looked down on Zheng Yiguan, Coquilla decided to organize a fleet, bring a certain number of infantry, and go to Dongfan to relieve Portirio. He could not just sit back and watch him be besieged by a group of pirates.
Specifically, it was fifteen armed merchant ships plus two hundred infantry!
Although none of the ships dispatched this time were warships, each armed merchant ship was equipped with at least twenty cannons. The firepower of fifteen armed merchant ships was enough to deter the pirates.
After the reinforcements landed and joined the defenders in the castle, Portirio commanded nearly 700 brave and fearless imperial soldiers, which was enough to repel or even severely damage Zheng Yiguan's pirate army.
If Zheng Yiguan could be captured, he would be able to obtain a large ransom.
Considering how wealthy Zheng Yiguan is...
Twenty million Spanish silver coins!
can not be less anymore!
Coquilla thought it was very reasonable for him to get half of it, and the remaining half would be awarded to meritorious officials.
Before setting off, Coquilla also announced in public that he would be rewarded with a thousand silver coins for sinking a large pirate ship.
If you kill a pirate, you can get a reward of fifty silver coins.
This was undoubtedly very tempting to the Spanish officers and soldiers who rushed north for reinforcements.
Full of hopes and dreams, everyone, together with the two battleships that had escaped from defeat, pulled anchor and set sail...
When they were about to arrive at the sea outside San Salvador, everyone in the fleet saw an incredible scene.
On the sea in the distance, stretching from the shore to a far distance, there is a horizontal row, all of which are warships.
To be precise, it's an enemy ship!
Viewed from one's own perspective, the gaps between the battleships in the front row are also filled by the battleships in the back row.
The specific number is so large that it is difficult to estimate with the naked eye at a time, and there are at least three to four hundred ships!
At this moment, everyone has only one thought in their minds...
If your dream is out of reach, should you give up? ? ?
The other party listed such a majestic formation, which was obviously not used to welcome him.
With only seventeen warships on our side, can we really defeat the hundreds of pirate ships on the opposite side?
What if the other party is bluffing?
Looking at this posture, it doesn’t look like...
Perhaps the empire's armed merchant ships are powerful enough to fight one against five, or even one against ten, or one against twenty!
The problem is that our team is here to relieve the defenders, not to die with the pirates!
If the other side dispatches a large number of arson ships, how will our own armed merchant ships be able to fight back?
No matter how powerful the armed merchant ship is, it can't withstand the fatal blow of the arson ship. This is something everyone knows!
Fleet Commander Major Luis Garcia looked at the size of the enemy fleet, thought about it, and decided to fight to the death.
If he was frightened back like this, he really wouldn't be able to explain it to Governor Coquilla, and the Governor might even punish him.
The Spanish Imperial Fleet is not even afraid of the Dutch Fleet, so why would it be afraid of the Pirate Fleet?
joke!
Warriors of the Empire!
It's time to show your fearlessness!
Pirates are not scary, the scary thing is the idea of being afraid of pirates!
These pirates in front of me are all Mingren. They are short, humble, cowardly and ignorant!
Even if 10,000 Ming people were killed in Manila, they would not resist. They could only kneel down and beg for mercy and cry.
It can be seen from this that pirates are no more powerful than ordinary Akito!
So what if there were hundreds of warships?
Pirate warships are far from rivals of the empire's armed merchant ships!
The Dutch can occupy the southern part of Dongfan Island with such a small number of troops, so the empire will naturally do better than them!
After the order was given, the Spanish fleet's seventeen armed merchant ships formed a column and rushed towards the enemy's position.
Zheng Zhifeng, the commander of Zheng's fleet, ordered the middle fleet to stabilize its position, and the left and right wings began to outflank, striving to annihilate the Hongyi fleet in this sea area.
After being equipped with a large number of "Harpoon" anti-ship missiles, mastering the tactics of seizing the T-head, and gaining actual combat experience with the Dutch Red Barbarians.
Zheng Zhifeng faced off against the Spanish Red Yi Fleet this time, and the pressure was much less than before. Moreover, the tactics were familiar and his subordinates could understand them.
The middle fleet concentrated its firepower and used its "whaling harpoon" to attack the opponent's larger warship first.
If the first ship is Hongyi's flagship, then consider it unlucky!
The hit rate of a naval gun one mile away is not much different from setting off a firecracker during the New Year.
Just listen to the sound, and you have to rely on God's blessing to hit the target.
If you're not lucky, you can hit it once in a quarter of an hour, and that's it.
The Zheng fleet had an absolute numerical advantage and was not afraid of suffering the loss of dozens of warships.
Let the Spanish Red Barbarians fire, and it would not be too late to just wait for the distance between the two sides to shorten to only one or two hundred steps before taking action.
Our own ships fired all their guns, but the pirate ship did not fight back...
This makes Luis Garcia feel incredible, but this is good, at least he can achieve a lot of results quickly.
The gunners were of course very happy about this. Probably the pirates had been frightened by the powerful Imperial fleet and would not fire.
In this way, everyone's dream of making money can come true again. It's really great. You can get bags of silver coins soon.
As the distance between the two sides gradually shortened to only two to three hundred steps, the front row battleships of the middle fleet led by Zheng Zhifeng suddenly turned sideways.
After a salvo fired by the Spanish Red Barbarians, the artillerymen quickly installed the anti-ship missiles on the launchers.
Take advantage of the opponent's opportunity to reload ammunition and launch the "Harpoon" anti-ship missiles one after another.
The gunners and sailors in the Spanish fleet have never seen such a terrifying weapon, it is like a legendary dragon!
With its tail blazing with flames, it flew straight towards the armed merchant ship where they were.
Although there were many misses and even falling into the sea halfway, two dragons still crashed into Major Garcia's flagship "Moya".
The hit locations were all on the port side, one near the bow and one right amidships.
There were two loud noises, followed by flames and thick smoke.
The explosion immediately detonated the opponent's powder barrel near the gun window, and a series of explosion accidents occurred.
It killed and injured about fifty gunners and sailors on the spot, and almost destroyed the port side of the "Moya".
Major Garcia wanted to continue commanding the battle, but the situation on the ship no longer allowed him to do so.
They had no choice but to evacuate the flagship in a small boat and wait for the armed merchant ships behind to catch up and pick it up.
The fact that the "Moya" was hit by a pirate ship and exploded violently has been informed by the armed merchant ship behind it.
This made the captains of each ship shocked and had to re-evaluate the strength of the group of pirates in front of them.
To destroy the flagship of one's own fleet in such a short period of time was completely beyond everyone's imagination.
Even the Dutch, who can compete with the imperial fleet on the mainland, may not be able to do so.
Whether to continue fighting or turn around and retreat made many captains very difficult to decide.
The distance between the flagship "Moya" and the second "San Diego" is not far, only less than half a mile.
After the flagship exploded and caught fire, the "San Diego" quickly arrived with the purpose of fishing out the fleet commander.
This was not in vain, the cost was that the "San Diego" was also bitten by the "evil dragon" that arrived in a flash...
After Zheng Zhifeng saw that the opponent's first warship had exploded and was almost scrapped, he used a semaphore to order the middle fleet to shift its target and besiege the second enemy ship.
Come over one and destroy one!
Such a stupid Hongyi came to die on his own initiative. This naval battle was really relaxing and comfortable~!
The advantage of a horizontal team facing a column is unparalleled. Once one's own firepower advantage is used, the opponent has no chance to turn defeat into victory.
Within half an hour, the middle fleet destroyed three large Hongyi battleships one after another. The attack process was almost exactly the same.
The remaining Spanish warships realized that going over would lead to death. Even without receiving orders from the fleet commander, they began to take the initiative to turn around and prepare to slip out of the battlefield.
However, the left and right wing squadrons of Zheng's fleet had already carried out outflanking, because they did not want to repeat the mistake of the last time when a fish slipped through the net.
It takes a lot of time for a Spanish armed merchant ship to turn 180 degrees on the spot, and the Zheng's warship took advantage of this opportunity to complete the outflanking mission.
When the remaining fourteen Spanish armed merchant ships completed the U-turn, they discovered that dozens of pirate ships appeared further east, which meant that their own retreat was cut off.
The opponents they faced before rushed forward at full speed. Now the Spanish fleet faced a situation of being surrounded in front and pursued by troops behind.
Even so, in order to escape Ascension, the Spanish fleet also intended to force a breakout.
The pirates possess an unknown weapon that is even more powerful than a large-caliber naval gun.
It's best not to engage in combat with this weapon until you understand it.
The captains didn't say it, but they thought so in their hearts.
He asked the gunners to fire for a long time, but the other party seemed to be fine, but instead released a few evil dragons, and his own warship caught fire and exploded.
How can we fight this battle?
Could it be that the Dutch, who could compete with the imperial fleet, were defeated by this mysterious weapon?
I didn’t understand, but I ran back to Manila thinking, if I don’t run, I won’t be able to run again.
The third armed merchant ship "Pablo" failed to rescue Major Garcia, the fleet commander who got off the "San Diego".
After being hit head-on by a pirate ship, two explosions occurred, and then the entire ship began to sink rapidly.
Luis Garcia looked at the two burning armed merchant ships and one sinking armed merchant ship, feeling extremely uncomfortable.
But he did nothing while soaking in the water. The other warships in the fleet fled, seemingly abandoning him.
It didn't take long for the fleet commander to be successfully captured by the pirates...
The remaining fourteen armed merchant ships did not run away. After the trapped beasts fought for more than two hours, three were sunk, five were destroyed, and the remaining six surrendered with white flags raised.
The Zheng fleet lost thirty-seven warships during the siege, including a plywood ship imitated by Hongyi.
But Zheng Zhifeng was very happy to be able to annihilate this enemy support fleet.
Especially when the prisoners said that there were two hundred infantrymen on board.
Without the battleships and reinforcements, the defenders trapped in the castle became lonely ghosts.
The only pity is that this battle was not enjoyable!
The size of the reinforcements coming from the other side is really too small, seventeen ships and two hundred infantry!
In comparison, Zheng Zhifeng felt that this group of enemies was not as good as the Dutch Red Barbarians...
If the strength of the Spanish Red Barbarians is so unbearable, just let the eldest brother directly lead the troops to siege Manila and regain Luzon!
By then, the Spanish red barbarians on the island can be driven into the sea to feed the fish. When the prince is happy, he can upgrade his eldest brother's title from Zhenhaibo to Zhenhaihou!
After mobilizing troops and mobilizing a large number of people, Zheng Zhifeng did not forget to complain while writing a letter.
After the Spanish red barbarians in the castle saw a captain who was put in to persuade them to surrender, they asked to see the fleet commander, Major Luis Garcia, before they could seriously consider it.
After discussing with Zheng Zhifeng, Zheng Zhi'ao rejected the other party's unreasonable request.
If you don't surrender, just continue to live inside. Anyway, only when the storm comes will you have a chance to breathe.
Zheng Jiajun has enough patience this time. If it doesn't work in half a year, it will be one year. If it doesn't work in one year, it will be two years!
By then, all the red barbarians in the city will get sick due to lack of nutrition, and we can capture this place without a single blow.
Without reinforcements to relieve the siege, this is a lonely city with no hope of victory.
Therefore, it is better to surrender late than to surrender early. If it is surrendered late, whether you can survive or not will be a problem.
Two weeks later, Portirio imposed a series of conditions before surrendering.
After Zheng Zhilong saw the other party's request, he flatly refused.
In the words of the prince, we must surrender unconditionally!
Otherwise, if you are willing to continue to suffer, just stay in it!
There are dung bombs every day, so smell it!
Zheng Jun fired tens of thousands of loaded coconut bombs into the city every day, which smoked the defenders into confusion.
On July 20th of the Western calendar, the defenders who couldn't stand the stench finally walked out of the castle on their own initiative.
Instead of coming out to surrender, they launched a surprise attack and were heavily bombarded by mortars.
After sixty or seventy people were killed or injured, they had to flee back in defeat, and then they no longer had the courage to come out to provoke.
Until the surrender on September 1, during this period, Manila did not send reinforcements to relieve it.
One can imagine how desperate the defenders were. They either died of illness in the castle or had no choice but to surrender.
Many people have suffered mental breakdown, their eyes are dull, or they are seriously ill and dying.
Considering the extremely poor condition of his troops, Portirio had to make concessions.
After conditionally surrendering and being rejected by the opponent, the defenders had no choice but to survive.
