Although Ma Chengxun is young, like his third uncle and even other children of the Ma family, he joined the army with his father at the age of thirteen or fourteen. He has rich battlefield experience, and his breadth of knowledge and sharpness of vision are extraordinary. As soon as the Jianzhou Army and the Ming Army fought, he realized that he might have underestimated these Jurchen Yi people before.
The weapons and equipment of the Jianzhou Army looked a bit shabby. The swordsmen and shieldmen who rushed forward even prepared their own weapons. The shields were wooden shields, and the shapes were not uniform. The big ones were bigger and the smaller ones were smaller. Although they were mostly rectangular, they also had round shields. The swords were not uniform either. The common sword is the mainstream, and there are also Yanling knives commonly used in Beijing and ordinary machetes. The sharp-eyed Ma Chengxun even discovered the hooked hatchet commonly used in the Central Plains.
The armor coverage on their bodies is barely passable, but according to Ma Chengxun's visual inspection, the level of these armors is not high. They are basically cloth armors and cotton armors, and there are no heavy armors such as Mingguang armor and Mountain Wen armor. Moreover, the colors and styles of these armors are also not uniform, and come in all kinds of shapes. If Gao Situ were here, he would definitely have to talk about "standardization".
From a common point of view, the combat effectiveness of such an army is usually not much higher. At least the combat effectiveness of Ming army guards with similar equipment levels is obviously not much higher. However, at this time, Ma Chengxun only saw their "starting moves" in combat and knew that the combat effectiveness of this Jianzhou army was by no means comparable to that of ordinary guardsmen.
They rushed down from the mountains and forests on both sides of the valley. The sword and shield players rushed forward without hesitation. They did not push and give way like the Ming army guards did. Instead, they rushed forward with their shields raised, shouting "Ma". The Manchu dialect that Chengxun still doesn’t understand.
If it is not strange to say that "barbarians are brave", then what really makes Ma Chengxun's heart tremble is the bows and arrows of these Jianzhou Jurchens.
Ma Chengxun has seen a lot of bows and arrows. The Mongols are famous for their mounted archery. Ma Chengxun has seen the power of bows and arrows countless times since he was a child. But this time it was different. The bows and arrows of the Jianzhou soldiers were completely different from those of the Mongols.
The bows used by the Jianzhou soldiers were the same as those of their predecessors, the Jin Dynasty. It is characterized by large size, large bow tip and large pulling force. When lowered, the length of the bow is generally longer than that of an average adult man, and smaller ones can reach the height of an average adult woman.
Obviously, the characteristic of this kind of bow is that it pays attention to "stability" and "accuracy", which is different from the value orientation of Han bows - Han people's bows pay more attention to range. The phrase "a hundred steps can penetrate a poplar" has already explained this orientation.
Ma Chengxun found that these Jianzhou soldiers who used Jianzhou bows generally shot at close range with heavy arrows. They did not seem to pursue range, but their armor-breaking ability was quite good.
Ma Chengxun's cavalry is a light cavalry, and the armor they are equipped with is of excellent quality. However, after all, the light cavalry needs to consider the load of the horse. Mongolian horses are not known for their load-bearing, so their armor is far incomparable to the heavy armor of the infantry. .
At this time, as soon as the two sides fought, Ma Chengxun quickly discovered that the archers of the Jianzhou soldiers could shoot and injure his own cavalry at a distance of fifty steps. Judging from his past experience, once the distance is shortened to thirty steps, it may be possible to directly cause a kill.
In fact, the bows used by the Jianzhou soldiers at this time were what later generations called Qing bows. The structure of this bow was symmetrical from the middle to both sides, including the grip, bow arm, string pad and bow tip. The grip is made of wood and is covered with warm wood and shark skin; the bow arm is made of bamboo or elm or birch wood, with horns or sheep's horns on the front and beef tendon (some use deer tendon) on the back; the string pads are bone Made of wood, some are made of wood; the tip of the bow is made of wood, and the middle corner piece is made of wood. Bow strings are divided into three categories: leather strings, silk strings and tendon strings.
Compared with the early firearms of the Ming army in the original history, the Qing bow was more powerful and more accurate, and indeed had advantages on the battlefield. But things are different now. The firearms level of the Ming army has greatly exceeded that of the same period in history due to its high pragmatism and its relationship with Jinghua.
Although the Jianzhou archers that Ma Chengxun faced at this time remained at the historical level, the advantage of long-range weapons no longer existed. The Wanli II lance in the hands of the Ming army cavalry exceeded the Jianzhou bow in terms of range and accuracy.
The only thing to worry about is the "continuous firing capability". The continuous firing of a musket has a long interval. Even if it uses a paper shell fixed charge, it is definitely not as good as a bow arrow that can be fired again after drawing the arrow.
As for later generations, there are always people who say that firing a strong bow can easily lead to loss of power, and usually the bow can only be fired a few times. This statement is actually a bit of a misunderstanding. If a strong bow is fired in the style of archery competitions in later generations, it may be true that a person can only shoot a few arrows before losing power.
The reason is very simple, that is, during archery competitions, aiming time is generally too long due to the need to ensure competition results. That is to say, the shooter draws the full bow and holds it for too long, which requires a lot of extra effort and at the same time keeps the muscles tense at high intensity, forming a general muscle training mode of "anaerobic exercise".
Anyone who has practiced fitness knows that the requirements for anaerobic exercise are "heavy weight-bearing and low reps." Usually, fatigue will occur after a group of exercises does not exceed twenty times.
But in fact, fighting is not anaerobic exercise. It is impossible to use your maximum strength to draw a bow. At most, you can draw a bow that requires 70 to 80% of your strength. After firing the bow, you will never maintain the aiming posture for a long time. Instead, you will aim quickly, shoot quickly, and prepare the next arrow quickly.
As for accuracy, it is part of the "battlefield experience". When a person is accustomed to this way of archery, although his accuracy may not be as high as that of later archery competitions, it will not be very low and is sufficient to meet the needs of the battlefield.
To put it simply, the battlefield considers overall efficiency, and any approach that may lower the overall efficiency will be abandoned.
Now Ma Chengxun has seen that the reason why the Jianzhou soldiers rushed so fast may be that "the barbarians are not afraid of death", and secondly it was because the Jianzhou sword and shield soldiers had to do this to create shooting opportunities for the archers. But in this way, Ma Chengxun was a little troubled and a little annoyed by the terrain of the river valley.
The long and narrow river valley greatly restricted the deployment of the cavalry, and making roundabout attacks and side attacks were almost a dream. In particular, Ma Chengxun's troops were from Datong. They had fought against the Mongols for a long time, and the battlefield environment had always been open. In an area with narrow river valleys and mountains and forests on both sides, he felt awkward that he had nowhere to use his strength.
The only way to play has become very stupid, which is to attack directly forward. No matter whether your Jianzhou Army wants to outflank, intercept or have other purposes, I will kill them all the way. As long as you kill them, the river valley may be narrow but it is flat ground after all. How can your infantry still catch up?
As long as we can't catch up, this battle will even be considered won - Ma Chengxun visually estimated that there are at least 5,000 Jianzhou soldiers in the valley now, and the Jianzhou left guard's strength is only 10,000, and they still need To deal with the other three armies (Ma Chengxun did not expect Nurhaci to dare to ignore the south and east roads), so Hetuala may be an empty city at this moment.
Although the cavalry is not good at attacking cities, it is not difficult to capture an empty city, right? What's more, when he appears under the city of Hetuala, since the founding army in front of him has no time to turn around, who knows whether Hetuala will think that they have been completely wiped out? Once Hetuala thinks so, it is not possible to surrender directly to the city. After all, the Jurchens have a limited population and the casualties they can bear are always very limited.
These situations are a long story, but they were sorted out quickly in Ma Chengxun's mind. He drew his sword and shouted: "Front Arrow Formation! The troops are forward, the whole army is tight, and follow the general to kill them!"
The Ma family has always been well-known for its troops. In the past ten years, the Ma family has gained the reputation of being pragmatic. They followed Jinghua in Shanxi and participated in border trade. Their financial resources are far greater than at the same time in history. Therefore, the number of troops is much greater than in the original history.
In the original history, although the Ma family had successively produced a number of chief soldiers, deputy chief soldiers, and a lot of generals, the total number of soldiers was less than 20,000 at most, and they still belonged to various generals in the family. . For example, Ma Gui, the actual head of the Ma family in the middle and late Wanli period, never had more than 8,000 soldiers, and usually hovered around 6,000.
However, the Ma family in this life has become really prosperous because of its high pragmatism. General Ma Chengxun alone had 1,500 troops in Kaiyuan, all equipped with two horses. This time, after he left five hundred troops in Kaiyuan as Dinghai Shenzhen, he brought out a thousand more to fight.
The impact of a thousand cavalrymen is naturally astonishing, but due to the river valley, no more than 300 can be deployed in the front. These three hundred people were the arrowheads of the Feng Shi Formation. All of them had their rifles loaded. During the charge, they fired first, causing about a hundred casualties to the Jianzhou soldiers in the front. They also hit the Jianzhou soldiers who rushed down from both sides. A lag.
However, the Jianzhou soldiers of this era were indeed brave, and they really fought forward. More than a hundred people in front had just fallen, and many of them were still rolling on the ground and wailing. The Jianzhou soldiers behind them made up for it with red eyes.
Following the loud shouts of E Yidu and An Feiyanggu, the Jianzhou soldiers bravely faced the Da soldiers who had just inserted bayonets on their lances.
In fact, Ma Chengxun didn't know that the Jianzhou soldiers that the Da soldiers encountered now were not ordinary soldiers. They were not ordinary soldiers in Niulu, but "Baya La".
Before Nurhaci sent troops to Hada last year, he organized the "Baya La" as a garrison. Bagala means "guard army" and constitutes his personal bodyguard.
This organization also existed in the original history. "Manwen Old Documents" records that "Each cow recorded a hundred men in cavalry, divided into three teams: white baga, red baga, and black camp." They were all elite cavalry. Nurhaci himself had more than 5,000 cavalry soldiers, and other flag owners also had bagaras of varying numbers, who played an important role on the battlefield.
However, these Bagalas are not cavalry at the moment (historically, Nurhaci only began to have a large-scale cavalry establishment after conquering Yehe), but infantry with relatively sophisticated weapons and equipment and relatively stronger personal force.
As for the number of people, of course there are not five thousand. In fact, there are only one thousand in total. They are divided into two Baya La Niulu, one red and one white, but the establishment is larger. Each Niulu has 500 people, which is unique in Jianzhou. The generals leading the red and white groups of Bagala were Eyidu and Anfeiyanggu.
The Ma family's elite soldiers numbered one thousand, and the red and white Bagara also numbered one thousand. The elite soldiers of both sides collided with each other.
Now that they have engaged the enemy hand-to-hand, the soldiers have already installed bayonets. However, this weapon is still useful in horse battles, but it is not particularly useful against horses. The only part that can be held is the butt of the gun, which can be used to perform moves. Basically, it can only be based on thorns.
As we all know, the most common melee weapon of the prairie cavalry is the scimitar. Its advantage is that it can easily use the kinetic energy of the horse to kill the enemy effortlessly. Although the Central Plains cavalry uses spears and horses, they are mainly equipped for enemies who are also members of the Central Plains cavalry, because the armor of the Central Plains cavalry is usually stronger.
Although the nomadic cavalry sometimes faced the Central Plains cavalry, due to the popularity of tactics such as Mangujie, they did not often engage in hedging with the Central Plains cavalry. They were more often used to rob ordinary people and did not have the requirement to break armor. high.
Jianzhou Bagala also has armored soldiers. It stands to reason that the bayonets and lances of the Majiada soldiers came in handy. However, Ma Chengxun soon discovered a big problem: although the current shields of the Jianzhou soldiers could not block musket projectiles, they There are huge limitations on the performance of the lance and bayonet!
The shields of these people are not simply held in hand, but held in hand and tied to the arm. It can be seen as the left forearm being put into a ring on the left side of the inner side of the shield, and the left hand grabbing another ring on the right side of the inner side, so that it is almost impossible to let go of the shield.
At the same time, when the bayonet is thrust out, it is usually blocked by the shield. Since these shields are made of hardwood from the old forests of Changbai Mountain, it is difficult to pull out the bayonet after it is inserted. At this time, the Jianzhou soldier casually slashed with his right hand. The soldiers either let go and let go of the bayonet, or their hands were likely to be severed by the knife. As soon as there was a battle at the front, the number of soldiers injured by this move quickly exceeded thirty.
Ma Chengxun reacted quickly, yelling at the soldiers to be careful not to hit the enemy's shield, but on the battlefield, there was a critical moment, and most of the time he acted based on instinct and experience. How could there be too much damage in a moment? Variety?
Although there are many masters with superb military skills and tactics who can find the opponent's flaw in the lightning and flint, and stab Jianzhou Bagara in the back through the shield, but there are also many people who are still stopped by the bayonet and either give up their lances or have their right hands taken. Hit.
In just a short collision, the casualties on both sides exceeded a hundred.
Ma Chengxun, the other party's E Yidu, and An Feiyanggu all suddenly became red-eyed.
"Fuck his grandma!" Ma Chengxun was furious. He pinched the horse's belly and stepped forward. This is the tradition of the Ma family. Going into battle in person can arouse the morale of the army. Moreover, he thinks that the armor on his body is more sophisticated and sturdy, and he is not afraid of the opponent's cold arrows.
Although E Yidu and An Feiyanggu were not as angry as Ma Chengxun, they were more worried about Nurhachi's anger. When they saw this, they all roared and rode out - of course they had horses.
Ma Chengxun leaped forward on horseback, using the long knife he was good at instead of the bayonet and lance in his hand, and slashed three bagaras one after another with his flexible knife skills.
Ma Chengxun was in full swing and was about to shout, "Follow me to defeat the enemy." Two cavalrymen rushed out from the left and right sides in front of Leng Buding. The cavalryman on the left remained silent, only charging forward with his sword, while the cavalryman on the right did not. He shouted: "Ma Chengxun should not be so arrogant, the time has come for you to be crowned!"
Ma Chengxun's eyes flashed with sternness, he put the knife in front of his chest, and snorted coldly: "How dare you talk so boldly!"
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