Because Xiong Wencan mobilized troops to reinforce Nanxiong Mansion relatively quickly, basically as soon as he learned the news, he immediately notified the left army of the Guangdong and Guangxi New Standard Army stationed in Shaozhou Mansion to reinforce Nanxiong Mansion.
By the time Lieutenant General Huang Xiangbin of the Chu Army led the main force of the 7th Division and part of the 11th Garrison Division to the front line of Nanxiong Mansion, the Ming army in Nanxiong Mansion had already received a large number of reinforcements.
Lieutenant General Huang Xiangbin looked at the large number of Ming troops in front of Meiguan and the artillery deployed on the city, and frowned slightly. Unexpectedly, he arrived a step too late. The Ming troops had already deployed heavy troops here in advance.
At this time, Brigadier General Yang Xiangfei, chief of staff of the Seventh Division beside him, said: "It is impossible for us to quickly capture this place."
"I have personally visited the nearby areas before. Meiguan is not easy to navigate. Although the overall terrain is not too high, the hills are endless. Although there are small roads that can be passed, they are at most It is impossible for artillery and ammunition trucks to pass through small-scale lightly-armed troops!”
"And these trails are also guarded by enemy troops. Once we send light troops to attack through these trails, they will receive reinforcements immediately."
Chief of Staff Yang Xiangfei's words also dispelled Huang Xiangbin's plan to attack by taking a detour.
After personally observing Meiguan in front, Huang Xiangbin still issued an order: "We will decide whether to attack first or not. Arrange a group to go up and conduct a trial attack!"
As he said that, he smiled and said: "At least I have to try the quality of the other side, just in case I get lucky!"
Yang Xiangfei naturally had no objection to a probing attack, and immediately made corresponding arrangements according to Huang Xiangbin's order.
However, after the trial attack started, it was discovered that the Ming army in Meiguan on the opposite side was not a pure mob. At least it did not collapse directly after being bombarded.
On the contrary, these Ming troops even pulled out some long-barreled artillery to fight back.
Seeing this scene, Huang Xiangbin knew without guessing that there must be new standard troops on the opposite side, and there were quite a few of them, at least two thousand, plus a large number of guards soldiers to assist in the battle.
Seeing this scene, Huang Xiangbin decisively gave the order to retreat!
The enemy is well prepared. Not only does he have sufficient troops, but his firepower is not weak, and his fortifications are not bad. Judging from our current lack of ammunition, if we want to attack by force, we will probably suffer heavy casualties.
At this time, Huang Xiangbin felt a little regretful. He had been beaten too hard in Ganzhou!
When he led a team to attack Ganzhou before, a large number of artillery fire was intensively fired in order to pursue the effect. It was fun to fight, and the casualties of the infantry were not large, but the consumption of ammunition was too great. As a result, there is insufficient ammunition when attacking Meiguan. .
The main reason is that when the Seventh Division attacked Ganzhou City, most of the ammunition, especially artillery shells, had been destroyed. In a short period of time, the remaining ammunition of the Seventh Division allowed them to carry out ordinary combat missions and even fight in the field. Battles and the like are fine, but if they are allowed to storm a pass, there will be a shortage of ammunition, especially the ammunition used for the 48-pound mortar.
After Ming Jin withdrew his troops, Huang Xiangbin began to make other preparations. On the one hand, he sent troops to attack Xinfeng, and on the other hand, he urgently transported a batch of ammunition from the rear, especially the 48-pound mortar ammunition.
Among the many weapons and ammunition in the Chu army, the most powerful one is naturally the 48-pound mortar.
The senior generals of the Chu army most liked to use this kind of artillery when attacking a city.
Although the operation of this kind of artillery is cumbersome and very dangerous, and accidents often occur, resulting in casualties, its huge explosive power still makes Huang Xiangbin and other senior generals of the Chu army attach great importance to this kind of artillery.
In a critical battle, dozens of forty-eight-pound mortars were used, and all the enemies were blown to ashes.
What's interesting is that the Chu army's mortars actually had similar artillery in the Ming army.
They used to have flying guns, which were artillery pieces with ultra-short tubes that fired explosive shells, but they didn't use them much. On the one hand, their craftsmanship was not good, and the quality of the shells was not good. When they exploded, they often cracked directly into pieces. A few pieces are difficult to form into large fragments.
Unlike the shells produced by the Chu Army, the shells of the shells are all prepared with fragments. After the explosion, the shells will be fragmented according to the traces reserved in advance, forming a large number of fragments.
In addition to technological issues, it is also related to the particularity of the mortar weapon.
These days' mortars are often used in tough battles because of their difficulty in operation, slow rate of fire, and poor accuracy. At least when the Chu army fought in the wild, they basically never used them.
For the attacker, mortars are used to siege the city.
For the defender, this thing is even less useful. Compared with ordinary field guns, the range is too short, the accuracy is poor, the rate of fire is slow, and it requires more propellant.
Therefore, in terms of lethality and cost-effectiveness, they are actually far inferior to field artillery.
For the Ming army, if they had the manpower and material resources to deploy mortars at the city head, they might as well deploy a few more two-and-a-half-pound field cannons.
This is also the reason why even though the Ming army knew that the Chu army was equipped with mortars on a large scale, it did not follow suit on a large scale. It was not that they could not come up with this thing, but that they did not have the need for it.
On the other hand, the Chu army was on the offensive side, and often engaged in offensive operations, so it had a huge demand for mortars.
For this reason, the Chu Empire developed and produced several types of mortars.
Currently, there are three types of large-scale equipment: 48-jin mortars, 24-jin mortars and 18-jin mortars.
And these mortars gradually changed from iron cannons to bronze cannons.
In order to save costs in the early days, most of them were made of iron. However, it was later discovered that the cost of mortars came more from the cost of ammunition and the cost of mules and horses. As for the purchase cost of the artillery itself, it was relatively not high.
In addition, the copper-cast mortar barrel has a better service life, and under the same caliber and same range, the weight of the artillery can be made lighter, and it is easier to process and shape to increase production capacity.
Well, the most important thing is that after taking control of Daye, the Chu Empire obtained a large amount of copper here. I dare not say how much it was, but it was still enough for casting cannons.
This also made the mortars in the Chu Empire begin to be cast with copper materials.
For example, the forty-eight-pound mortar made of bronze weighs about a thousand kilograms. It fires forty-eight-pound iron-cased explosive bullets (with an external matchlock fuse). Like all field artillery in the Chu army, it also has a large double-wheeled cannon. Mount, and the height angle of the gun mount is adjusted through a spiral.
When launching, it is necessary to ignite the fuse of the shell and the fuse of the propellant at the same time. A slight error in this time interval will cause the shell to explode early or late. In the least case, it will have no effect, and in the worst case, it will kill one's own people.
Therefore, although this kind of artillery is powerful, it is very troublesome to operate.
At the same time, there is also a very critical problem, that is, the consumption of ammunition is also very large.
In order to launch a 48-pound artillery shell, and the mortar is an ultra-short-barreled artillery, the propellant required is several times more than a long-barreled artillery of the same caliber.
The propellant required to fire a 48-pound mortar is basically equivalent to the propellant required for two or even three 48-pound cannons.
This consumption may not be a big deal in modern wars, but for an era when the handicraft industry was still in handicrafts and the only machinery was powered by water, the production capacity of ammunition was already very low, and the price of ammunition was also more expensive.
However, the power brought by these huge and expensive consumption is just limited.
In every battle of the Chu army, mortars are indispensable.
Even in siege operations, the role of mortar artillery has exceeded that of the main field artillery in the Chu army.
Without a large number of mortars, the Chu army's siege ability would be greatly reduced.
The mortars and ammunition carried by the Seventh Division were consumed a lot in the Battle of Ganzhou. Although there are still some, it is impossible to meet the operational needs of the stormy Nanxiong.
After all, although the mortar cannon is very powerful, its accuracy is poor. You can't expect to kill a large number of enemies directly by pulling up a few artillery pieces and firing a few rounds.
In order to solve the problem of poor accuracy of mortars, the Chu army used a crude and simple method to directly pile up the number and engage in covering bombardment.
When enough shells are fired, an entire area can be blown up.
This theory is a bit like musketeers using muskets to fight in line.
Since precision shooting can't be played, let's play coverage shooting...
When musketeers are fighting in formation, if you aim at a target and shoot, the bullet will most likely fly to other places, but don't worry, your target still has a high probability of being hit, but the one who hits him is not The bullets fired by you are the bullets fired by your comrades...
On the contrary, your missed bullet may also hit your comrade's intended target!
After a wave of perfect exchanges, wouldn’t the hit rate go up!
This is how the musketeers played, and the Chu army's mortar troops also played this way. Every time they fought, they would pull out a lot of mortars and directly engage in covering bombardment.
So you will see that the Chu army's mortar equipment is getting larger and larger, and the caliber is also getting larger and larger.
There are already eight independent mortar regiments, and these mortar regiments are all assigned to the 48-pound mortar regiment.
Although the standard establishment is a regiment of thirty-six guns, when it comes to actual equipment, depending on the combat mission and location, as well as continued losses and other reasons, the number of forty-eight-pound mortars assigned to each regiment may vary. no the same.
Some only have more than 20 doors, while many can reach more than 40 doors.
During the war, it is very common to have shortages or over-staffing.
Except for the newly formed troops, there are few troops that are neither more nor less, just full of personnel.
The total number is probably around two hundred and fifty.
And this is only the 48-pound mortar in eight independent mortar regiments.
In fact, among the ground combat troops of the Great Chu Empire, quite a few divisional artillery regiments, independent mixed brigades, and mixed regiments were also equipped with forty-eight-pound mortars.
Adding the two together, the total number of forty-eight-pound mortars owned by the Chu Empire Army and Guards is more than three hundred.
And this is a very scary number.
Because this is not the total amount of artillery owned by the Chu army, but only the number of 48 kilograms of mortars.
The Chu army also had hundreds of 24-pound and 18-pound mortars, as well as a larger number of field artillery of various calibers.
