The three battalions of fusiliers quickly formed a three-row shooting formation relying on this "trench"!
The hour-and-a-half-long shelling did not cause them too many casualties... The bullet-avoiding ability of the "trenches" has been tested by history.
And two thousand rounds of "sugar bombs" seem like a lot, but these days' blooming bombs have problems with the fuze quality, and if one-third of them explode after landing or about to land, then it is considered very reliable. Even the sugar-poisoned wooden tube fuse developed by Zhu Heji himself can increase the explosion rate on landing to more than 40% to less than 50%.
The accuracy of the Weiyuan General Cannon is relatively poor, and it can be used to deal with larger targets. However, if the target is a "line" or a "point", the accuracy of the Weiyuan General Cannon will be very tragic. In "land-explosion" artillery shells, usually there is not even a 1% hit rate.
Therefore, among the nearly 600 "land-exploded" artillery shells, only a few artillery shells fell into the trench and exploded. Although dozens of people were killed and injured, but for the three fusilier battalions, For more than 1,500 people, the casualties were still within the tolerable range.
After all, the first batch to be selected into the Fusiliers Battalion are veterans with rich experience and firm beliefs. Every one of them had participated in the battle to pacify Guangfu... had seen the "garlic magic medicine" with their own eyes, and they all regarded Zhu Heji as a half-god and half-saint!
Under the command of the officers, the thousands and hundreds of people who were not killed or injured quickly arranged into three firing formations, and then began to load ammunition quickly.
The fusiliers used paper-cased fixed-load ammunition. These custom-loaded bullets are not processed in factories, but are made by the gunners themselves. Some experienced gunners will also wrap the lead bullets with silk to increase air tightness - high air tightness means higher accuracy and Effective range!
After completing the reloading, everyone took a kneeling position to reduce the probability of being shot. The tactic of standing around and being shot is not advisable for infantry in the sugar pill era.
This is not bravery, but death!
So the infantry must receive more training and, ideally, education...
Seeing the soldiers under his command squatting inside and outside the "trench", Chen Yongxia was also half-kneeling behind the earth wall, holding on to the earth wall, rubbing his eyes and looking towards the opposite side. At the beginning, the smoke was still thick and I couldn't see anything clearly. I could only hear the shouts of Qing Yao on the other side. They seemed to be shouting "Grab Jiang Ning" or something!
After a while, the river wind blowing from the Yangtze River finally blew away most of the smoke, and Chen Yongxia and the others finally saw clearly the enemy they were about to fight.
I saw the Eight Banners New Army wearing rifles and helmets pouring out of the three door openings of the Golden Gate like three torrents, and then passed through the three passages filled in the second trench outside the Golden Gate, and finally passed through. They gathered together outside the "Second Trench" to form a very long, but not very neat, line.
The three rows in front were all composed of shotgun soldiers. Now the Qing army's shotgun soldiers no longer need to use the nine-into-ten chain tactics. Instead, a "three-stage attack" with more intensive firepower was used, which means that the shotgun soldiers were divided into three relatively dense rows. The first row was responsible for firing, and the last two rows were responsible for loading.
Behind these three rows of shotgun soldiers were three rows of archers, all carrying Manchurian longbows. These archers had imitation grenade hammers hanging from their waists and moved forward with their heads covered.
After the three rows of archers, there were three rows of infantrymen carrying spears. Everyone was carrying a three-foot-long spear and a bag of soil used to fill the trench. The tip of the spear glowed with a frightening coldness in the afternoon sun, rising and falling as the soldiers advanced.
And behind these nine rows of Qing troops, there was a steady stream of Qing troops pouring out from the Golden Gate!
This scene not only stunned the fusiliers of the Ming Army at the forefront. Even Zhu Heji, who was far away on the wall of Xiaoling Acropolis, looked a little dazed.
He even admired Sun Sike a little bit, "Damn it, this guy named Sun is really smart. With the situation like this, he can still mobilize so many people... He wants to save money for the lonely family. ah!"
Zuo Chunqiu, who was standing next to him, smiled: "Supervisor, isn't this good? It saves money and establishes prestige... When you march to Beijing in the future, Qingyao won't dare to make a fuss about the imperial mausoleum of Tianshou Mountain. .”
Zhu Heji nodded silently, and did not continue to speak. Instead, he raised his telescope and looked ahead with breathless concentration.
...
"Boom boom boom..."
In the dense queue of the Qing army, clouds of smoke suddenly rose up!
This was a super-caliber shell fired by a small-caliber mortar positioned behind the Ming army's "trench line" that fell on their heads.
Although these super-caliber bullets cannot hit far, their firepower is very fierce. Shrapnel flies in all directions, and every explosion can explode a piece of flesh and blood.
The firepower was undoubtedly fierce, but the Qing army did not retreat because of this. Instead, they accelerated their advance, as if they had determined that there were few living people on the Ming army's position ahead!
In the blink of an eye, the Qing army's queue had already withstood the bombardment of super-caliber bullets and approached the wooden fence on the inside of the first trench in the Golden Gate.
This wooden fence was also hit by the Weiyuan Cannon's explosive shells, causing several holes, but most of them were still intact and could block the Qing army's advance.
At this time, the shotgun soldiers of the Qing army also discovered that behind the earthen wall where the Ming army was entrenched in front, there were many gleaming saucer-shaped helmets shaking!
So they stopped advancing under the command of the officer, raised the shotguns in their hands and fired.
Chen Yongxia held a suona in his hand and lay behind the earth wall to carefully observe the approaching Qing army. He found that the opponent was about thirty steps away from him. However, he did not blow the suona immediately, but waited for Qing Yao to fire first.
Qing Yao's first row of shotgun soldiers didn't let him wait too long. They leveled the shotguns in their hands. As a large flag in front of the Qing army was leveled, a row of large and small guns flashed in front of the Qing army. Little fire!
A row of bullets immediately swept across the "trench" guarded by the Ming army. Seven or eight Ming army fusiliers were shot and fell to the ground, and some even let out shrill screams.
However, Chen Yongxia was safe and sound. He no longer waited and blew the suona immediately, and the other two battalion generals at the front also blew the suona after him - Chen Yongxia is the commander-in-chief of the three fusilier battalions at the front today. !
With the sound of several suonas, the fusiliers of the three battalions immediately formed a three-row salvo formation - the first row "kneeling in the trench", the second row "standing in the trench", and the third row "Standing outside the trench".
Seeing that his subordinates were all in good posture, Chen Yongxia immediately raised his voice and gave the order: "Raise the gun - aim - shoot!"
Before the lingering sound of the password dissipated, more than a thousand flintlock guns fired almost simultaneously, making a "boom, boom, boom" sound, as if they were firing cannons!
As more than a thousand lead bullets swept across the front line of the Qing army, the Qing's shotgunners immediately suffered a disaster, screaming and shaking and falling in large numbers.
However, the remaining shotgun soldiers of the Qing army barely reacted and fired back in disorder.
The Ming army, on the other hand, stared at the Qing army's firepower and lowered its head to reload!
Flintlock guns have two advantages over matchlock guns. One is that they can form dense formations, and the other is that they can be loaded quickly.
Therefore, the confrontation between flintlock and matchlock guns on the battlefield will mostly end with the victory of the flintlock!
The more than a thousand fusiliers of the Ming army still used the "trench volley" method of attack. More than a thousand guns fired almost at the same time, knocking down the Qing army's shotgun soldiers who were more than thirty steps away!
Then, taking advantage of the opportunity of the Qing army's shotgun soldiers being beaten dizzy, they completed another reload and volley at an extremely fast speed.
After three rounds of volleys, the Qing shotgun soldiers finally collapsed. They had hundreds of casualties, and the battlefield was full of corpses. They no longer wanted to fight and had to retreat in disorder.
However, the archers behind the shotgun soldiers stepped forward at this time. They seemed to want to shoot with bows and arrows and flintlock rifles.
What a commendable courage!
While the fierce battle on the Kinmen side was in full swing, on the steeper western slope of Zijin Mountain, hundreds of lightly-armed Ming soldiers, led by Mr. Zu Dazu, were working hard in the dense mountain forests. forward……
