About three hundred meters away from the Song Family Manor, Zhang Malin listened to Luo Zhixue's orders brought by the messenger, especially when he heard the messenger said that Luo Zhixue would have dinner at the Song Family Manor tonight.
Zhang Malin said with a serious expression: "Please report back to the general, our artillery post will definitely complete its mission to cover the infantry attack!"
After the messenger returned, Zhang Malin headed towards the position of his own 600 long artillery pieces.
Zhang Malin was one of the first people in the artillery post to learn artillery, and he never stopped studying artillery after becoming a sentry officer. He was not only a sentry officer in the artillery post, but also an artilleryman. The most skilled gunner in the post.
After these two 600-pound long guns were put into service, he was also the first batch to take the gunners for training, and he was thinking about how to shoot more accurately and faster all day long.
Zhang Malin stood in front of a 600-pound long cannon, touching the cold barrel in his hand while squinting at a section of the enemy's courtyard wall about three hundred meters away in front of him, where there were two enemy light short-barreled artillery pieces. , visual estimates estimate between 100 and 200 kilograms. If they cannot be suppressed, then when our own archers and musketeers step forward to suppress the infantry fire, our infantry will suffer a large number of casualties.
He will personally direct two artillery pieces to bombard the courtyard wall where the enemy's light artillery is located, and strive to destroy this section of the courtyard wall in the first few rounds of shelling.
When this section of the courtyard wall collapsed, the light artillery deployed by the Song family on the courtyard wall would naturally fall down with it and would no longer be able to exert its due combat effectiveness.
After Zhang Malin withdrew his observation sight, he already had some calculations in his mind, and then said to his gunner: "Start loading!"
Immediately, his artillery crew took action quickly, and a gunner took out a propellant pack from an open wooden box next to it.
According to Luo Zhixue's early instructions, the propellants for all guns were weighed in advance and packed and stored according to the propellant required for each shell. During combat, the packed propellant packages were used directly and the outer sealing packaging was removed. Then you can load it directly.
It saves you the trouble of weighing the propellant before the battle.
Anyway, the artillery in the Baoxiang Camp are basically small artillery. The adjustment of the range mainly depends on the elevation angle rather than the amount of propellant. Therefore, there is no problem in using fixed propellant.
This also further improves loading efficiency.
While the propellant was being prepared, a gunner prepared a solid iron round shell, and a gunner inspected and cleaned the shell.
After checking the gun barrel and confirming that there is no debris and debris inside, the gunner puts the prepared propellant package in and compacts it with a special wooden stick, then puts in the solid shell and compacts it again.
Immediately, a gunner used a needle to pierce the propellant bag through the propellant hole, and then put in the fuse.
The entire loading process is much faster and simpler than that of artillery units that are still using bulk ammunition.
During the early testing, the rate of fire of the 600-pound long gun could reach two rounds per minute. After the gun crew became more proficient in the later period, it could even achieve three rounds per minute. This rate of fire was already the same as that of the front-loaded musket. The rate of fire is comparable.
Of course, even with such a fast rate of fire, it is impossible to maintain this rate of fire for a long time, because the barrel cannot withstand continuous rapid fire in a short period of time, even if it is brushed with water-soaked kapok to cool the barrel.
Unless there is a last resort, such rapid fire is rarely carried out continuously. The initial shelling is usually faster, and the subsequent continuous shelling is often separated by a longer period of time to allow the barrel to cool down.
After Zhang Malin saw that the gunner had finished loading, he stepped forward and started aiming.
From the perspective of others, Zhang Malin's aiming seems to be very simple. He just fiddles with the artillery twice and aims well in a short time.
But these few random fiddles are the real test of whether a gunner is qualified.
Don't think that it's easy to hit an enemy hundreds of meters away with a low-quality front-loading smoothbore cannon. This is a difficult technical task that requires very high experience.
Only an experienced gunner can direct his artillery to hit wherever he wants and achieve accurate hits within the effective range.
As for the lack of experience, the gunner with average skills could only aim at a rough target.
After taking aim, Zhang Malin lit the fuse directly!
After the fuse was burned, the propellant in the barrel was ignited, and then the entire 600-pound cannon shook violently and moved back a considerable distance.
At the same time, everyone also heard a loud noise.
At the same time as the loud noise, a cloud of white smoke also came out of the muzzle.
Before the white smoke could emerge from the muzzle, a solid shell had already flown out of the muzzle and headed straight for the Gaojiazhuang courtyard wall 300 meters away.
The solid cannonball then hit the wall of the Gao family manor directly, causing a cloud of rubble to rise.
A few seconds later, another 600-pound long cannon commanded by a captain under his command also opened fire. This shell also hit near the impact point of the first shell.
After the first round of shelling, Zhang Malin urged his gunners: "Quick, load, check the barrel carefully, don't leave any residue, I must clean up all the residue."
After a while, the second round of bombardment from the artillery sentry's two 600-pound long cannons hit the courtyard wall of Gaojiazhuang.
As the two 600-pound artillery roared one after another, it was also the official start of the Baoxiang Camp's attack on Songjiazhuang.
However, as the battle officially began, unlike the shelling and preparations outside which were carried out step by step, there was panic in Gaojiazhuang.
Song Pinghe was still arranging manpower behind the courtyard wall, but suddenly he heard a loud rumble from outside, and his heart couldn't help but beat violently.
Although he didn't see the rebels firing cannons on the courtyard wall, he still knew that it was the rebels' long cannons that fired. He immediately ran over and saw that a section of his courtyard wall was cracked...
Song Pinghe suppressed the panic in his heart and said in a deep voice: "Don't panic, they are just a few small cannons, they can't do anything to us."
But not long after he finished speaking, suddenly there was another loud noise outside!
The next second, he suddenly saw a small hole torn open in the already cracked courtyard wall in front of him. The rubble was flying wildly, and a black solid shell drilled in, and then hit Song Pinghe and seven others. A house eight meters away sent another wave of sawdust flying!
"ah……"
"Help..."
When Song Pinghe heard that the scream was his eldest son's voice, he thought his eldest son was injured and immediately looked back.
The result is good, this guy is fine.
Song Pinghe's face turned dark on the spot, and he wished he could stuff this embarrassing thing back into his wife's belly. You are still more than two fucking feet away from the bullet's finding point, and it didn't hurt you. Why don't you scream for help...
But at this critical moment, Song Pinghe had no time to pay attention to this good-for-nothing son, and immediately ordered the housekeeper: "Take him back to the inner house."
If you continue to let this good-for-nothing son stay at the front, I'm afraid it will shake the morale of the army.
After seeing off his son, Song Pinghe quickly led the people back onto the gatehouse. Once on the gatehouse, he looked towards the top of a low hill a hundred feet away.
Song Pinghe had seen the long-distance running of the bandits here before.
At first glance, it turned out that it was indeed the case. White smoke was already rising from the top of the short hill opposite, and the thieves were busy continuing to reload.
I'm afraid it won't be long before the rebel army's third round of shelling comes.
Seeing that the rebel artillery shells had just penetrated the courtyard wall and flown in, he was worried that his courtyard wall could not withstand the rebel artillery bombardment.
At this time, the housekeeper on the side exclaimed: "The rebel army's cannons are coming up too."
Looking in the direction indicated by the housekeeper, we can indeed see a group of thieves pushing multiple light cannons up.
The light cannons of these bandits are also quite strange. They are not mounted on carriages like the light cannons of the officers and soldiers, nor do they use wooden mounts. Instead, they have an iron cannon stand with two large wheels on both sides.
This bombardment is coupled with a small short-barreled gun barrel, so that it looks a bit nondescript.
These thieves pushed these small cannons by hand and continued to approach from about three hundred meters away.
This made Song Pinghe very anxious. At least ten small cannons came up from the opposite side. If they were to bombard the courtyard wall, not to mention the courtyard wall, but the guards and young men on the courtyard wall would probably be killed or injured. Quite a few.
Immediately shouted: "Where are our cannons? Why haven't we fired yet?"
There are also three artillery pieces in the Song family's nursing home.
There was a guard leader nearby who originally wanted to remind Song Pinghe that their small cannons fired from such a distance, and the probability of hitting the rebels was very low.
But looking at Song Pinghe's appearance, he held back and didn't say anything.
After a while, the Song family's artillery on the courtyard wall also opened fire, but just as they had predicted, the rebels were still about a hundred feet away. The hundred-jin light cannon they had on hand hit the enemy at such a long distance. There is no chance at all, and even if it hits, the damage will be very low.
So after running after three times, the bandit army on the opposite side still seemed fine, not even a single person lying down.
However, these three cannon shots still emboldened Song Pinghe and others.
At least, they weren't beaten unilaterally.
In this way, the two sides began to bombard each other from a distance of three hundred meters. However, as they bombarded each other, Song Pinghe's face became increasingly ugly.
Because our own artillery had been firing for a long time, no one on the opposite side was lying down, and the gunners of the rebel light artillery who were still advancing also stopped.
But on our side, the courtyard wall where the light artillery was deployed was already full of holes and cracks, and several shells even penetrated directly through the courtyard wall.
If beaten down like this, the courtyard wall will collapse sooner or later...
As if to comply with Song Pinghe's guess, as another round of artillery fire came from the opposite side, this section of the courtyard wall that had withstood many rounds of artillery fire finally failed to hold up and collapsed suddenly.
Several artillery pieces deployed on the courtyard wall also fell into the ruins due to the collapse of the courtyard wall.
Song Pinghe was stunned when he saw this scene, and at the same time, there was a strong look of horror in his eyes!
