I want to be emperor

Chapter 242 Surrounding Wuchang
Forty miles south of Wuchang City, Zhifang.

This place is one of the camps set up by the Ming army around Wuchang City as the core.

At the same time, it can also be regarded as the rear of the camps and checkpoints of the Ming army west of Wuchang City. Before the landing of the rural protection army, there were more than a thousand soldiers stationed there.

Although there are not many troops, this place is extremely important, because this is the logistics transfer station of the Ming army in the west of Wuchang City, and it has hoarded a lot of food and grass and other materials.

And this place is the first tactical goal of the small battle group led by Lieutenant Colonel Ren Yuanqing.

At this time, the main force of thousands of people led by Brigadier General Han Ziping had already advanced towards Wuchang City. According to the scouting report, the Ming army that had originally marched westward from Wuchang City had withdrawn overnight and ran back directly to Wuchang.

Therefore, Brigadier General Han Ziping is about to lead most of the main force of the first brigade eastward to Wuchang, not to say that he will directly attack Wuchang City, but mainly to station troops outside Wuchang City.

It has three functions. On the one hand, it is to intercept the Ming army from other directions, especially the thousands of Ming troops east of Wuchang City continue to enter Wuchang City, making it more difficult to attack Wuchang City in the future.

The second is to facilitate other friendly troops, that is, a small force led by Ren Yuanqing and others to clear out the Ming army on the outskirts of Wuchang City, so as to cut off the land connection between Wuchang City and the outlying Ming army, and achieve a real strategic encirclement.

In the end, Li Chengtong and the others naively expected the Ming army in Wuchang to be stupid, and then ran out to fight with Brigadier General Han Ziping.

After all, the main force brought by Brigadier General Han Ziping to Wuchang City was actually only more than 3000 people, and the Ming army in Wuchang City originally had more than 5000 people, and two or three thousand peripheral Ming troops were gathered. There can be about 2 people.

The 3000 Ming soldiers saw a treasure thief army of more than [-] people wandering outside the city, so it was hard to guarantee that they would not have the idea that I could also fight a wave.

If the Ming army in Wuchang City really went out to fight, then Li Chengtong would wake up laughing from his dreams.

As long as the Ming army dared to go out of the city, Han Ziping's more than 3000 people could hold them back, and then other friendly troops from the First Division could quickly attack them, forcing the Ming army to have a dignified duel outside Wuchang City.

As for wanting to withdraw after leaving the city, there is no such thing as such a good thing.

When the two armies faced each other at close range, you would retreat if you wanted to. If the Ming army left the city and felt that something was wrong and wanted to return to the city, at least thousands of corpses or prisoners of war would have to be left behind.

So in fact, the possibility of the Ming army taking the initiative to go out of the city to fight a wave is infinitely close to zero. Otherwise, it is Li Chengtong's naive idea.

However, even if the Ming army huddled in Wuchang City, the rural protection army was confident enough to attack.

The reason why the river crossing campaign was launched this time was that the rural protection army had already made preparations to storm Wuchang City. Without this preparation and confidence, Luo Zhixue would not have rashly sent troops south.

In order to conquer Wuchang City, the Township Protection Army has prepared a battalion of three mortars. These three mortars have been temporarily organized into a mortar regiment. The regiment currently has 48 mortars, of which 48 are ten. There are eight catties of mortars, eighteen of which are [-] catties of mortars.

In addition, there are a large number of field artillery. The first division alone has six five-pound field artillery and 28 two-and-a-half-pound field artillery. The main force of the regiment.

At present, each infantry regiment has three [-]-jin field guns under its jurisdiction. According to the plan, each infantry regiment will have six [-]-jin field guns under its jurisdiction, while the divisional artillery regiment will be equipped with five-jin and even follow-up guns. Nine catties field gun.

In addition to the main force of the First Division, the First Cavalry Brigade also has six additional two-and-a-half catty field guns for use as cavalry guns.

This is not counting a batch of [-]-jin short-barreled artillery in various troops.

The artillery strength of the rural protection army is growing rapidly at a speed visible to the naked eye, and these have brought sufficient confidence for the rural protection army to cross the river south and storm Wuchang City.

No matter how bad it is, you can protect yourself after crossing the river.

Under this series of grand strategies of the Rural Protection Army, the First Infantry Brigade and other forces led by Brigadier General Han Ziping will arrive in Wuchang City first, and gradually clear the Ming army stationed outside Wuchang City.

And wait for more main forces from the rear to arrive to storm Wuchang City.

If you want to really storm Wuchang City, you have to wait for the pontoon bridge to be erected, and a large number of mortars, especially the 48-jin mortars, will arrive, and more troops will arrive before launching.

After all, Wuchang City's city defense facilities are relatively complete. If you attack Wuchang City rashly with light troops, it is easy to hit your head and bleed.

It was against this background that the third infantry battalion led by Lieutenant Colonel Ren Yuanqing, with a core of more than [-] troops, arrived at Zhifang Town.

After Lieutenant Colonel Ren Yuanqing's troops arrived at the place, the local Ming army fell into panic, and then a large number of Ming troops began to flee.

These generals in the Ming army have already learned of the defeat of more than 2000 Ming troops on the front line yesterday. In fact, among the 500 Ming troops in Zhifang, [-] people retreated from the front line at the beach yesterday.

And the arrival of these rout soldiers greatly reduced the morale of the Ming army stationed in Zhifang.

After they spent a day in anxiety, now they saw the bandit army killing them, and there were thousands of them at first, with cannons and cavalry, how dare they resist there, they just swarmed run away.

The active retreat of the Ming army did not disappoint Ren Yuanqing, on the contrary he was quite happy.

Because after the Ming army took the initiative to retreat, they directly dropped a large amount of food, grass and supplies. When these Ming troops were retreating, no one even had the intention to set fire to these food and supplies.

After capturing these grains and supplies, Ren Yuanqing's troops didn't even need logistics troops to transport grains and grasses, and the captured grains and grasses alone could sustain the battle for at least a month.

After obtaining a large number of captures, the morale of Ren Yuanqing's troops rose sharply, and they continued to advance eastward. Their strategic direction was to circle from the south of Wuchang City, and then go straight to the Bailukeng area along the Yangtze River in the east of Wuchang City.

This department will work with the main force of the First Infantry Brigade to clear out the Ming army on the outskirts of Wuchang City and carry out a strategic encirclement of Wuchang City.

When Ren Yuanqing's troops continued to operate, the first brigade and other main forces led by Brigadier General Han Ziping also arrived outside Wuchang.

It's just that, as many people expected, even if Han Ziping arrived outside Wuchang City with only more than 3000 bandit troops, there were a full 2 Ming troops in the city.

But the Ming army chose to avoid the battle and put on a posture of defending Wuchang City.

In this regard, Brigadier General Han Ziping was also a little disappointed.

But after thinking about it, I can't really treat all the enemies as fools, right? Even if the generals of the Ming army knew that there must be more main forces of the rural protection army behind him on the way. It will crash in minutes.

At that time, Wuchang City will have a city defense, but there will not be enough soldiers to garrison it.

Since the Ming army in the city couldn't shrink back, Han Ziping didn't bother to continue wandering around the city. Instead, he bypassed Wuchang City about six or seven kilometers away, and finally reached the east side of Wuchang City, and defeated it with Ren Yuanqing's troops. Two or three thousand Ming troops along the coastal defense line on the east side of Wuchang City were captured.

As a result, within [-] to [-] kilometers outside Wuchang City, there is no second large-scale Ming army.

The Township Protection Army only used a mere mixed brigade, about 5000 troops, to complete the strategic encirclement of Wuchang City.

This has to be said to be quite interesting, because from the comparison of the strength of the two sides, the Ming army is the one with the absolute advantage, but they have no courage to go out of the city to fight, and they don't even have the courage to break through.

After completing the strategic siege of Wuchang City, Major General Li Chengtong, who was in charge of the frontline warfare, was not in a hurry to attack the city, and let the follow-up troops continue to cross the river to transport artillery, ammunition and other supplies.

On the other hand, the Ming army continued to send troops to clear the surrounding cities. When Han Ziping's 3000st Infantry Brigade and other ministries were operating around Wuchang City, another force of about [-] troops was deployed at the landing ferry. Go around Wuchang County.

The unit is composed of an infantry battalion belonging to the second infantry brigade of the first division, a cavalry post belonging to the first division, and a two-and-a-half-pound field artillery post as the core.

In addition, there is a regiment of the Sixth Garrison Division with about 2000 people.

The unit was commanded by Colonel Kang Hongbao, Deputy Commander of the First Infantry Brigade. Its initial target was Wuchang County, and later Daye, Xingguo Prefecture, Fuchi Town and other places. Intercept troops from northern Jiangxi to reinforce Wuchang City through the plain along the Yangtze River.

On October [-], the first pontoon bridge of the Rural Protection Army was completed, and more troops and supplies began to move south.

On the [-]th, the Township Protection Army dispatched a third unit to march westward along the Yangtze River. The unit consisted of a main infantry battalion as the core, with a garrison regiment, and cavalry and artillery units. The second infantry brigade deputy commander Jia He Under the leadership of Colonel Yun, their targets were Xianning, Jiayu, Tongshan, Puqi, and Chongyang, and finally arrived at Yuezhou Prefecture.

Its strategic purpose was similar to that of Kang Hongbao's eastward advance detachment. On the one hand, it was to attack the city and capture the cities where there were not many Ming troops stationed, but more importantly, it was to intercept the reinforcements of the Ming army coming from the direction of Yuezhou.

One east and one west, the Township Protection Army sent two detachments, intending to block the Ming army in the direction of Yuezhou and Jiujiang to reinforce Wuchang, and provide cover for the main force behind to storm Wuchang.

Against such a background, a large number of soldiers, artillery, ammunition, food and grass of the Rural Protection Army are being transported from the north bank of the Yangtze River to the south bank of the Yangtze River through pontoon bridges and ships.

As of October [-], the entire First Division and the Sixth Garrison Division had crossed the river, and the First Guards Brigade, First Cavalry Brigade, and Temporary Mortar Regiment of the Guards Division also began to cross the river one after another.

On October [-], the Ming army in Wuchang City saw that the security forces had completely blocked the land connection between Wuchang City and the outside world, and tried to send sailors to break through the blockade in order to try to open the water connection channel.

As a result, a large-scale water battle broke out between the fleets of the two sides that day.

And this is a battle between the five slags and the three scumbags. It seems to be a lively fight, but there are always some inexplicable mistakes. The Ming army navy is like this, and the Yangtze River fleet is not much better.

Especially when a warship of the Yangtze River Fleet rushed towards the enemy fleet with a look of decisive battle, and was finally blown by the wind, the enemy warship did not hit, but he himself could not control the direction and rushed to the beach, Luo Zhixue went directly to the beach. The head of the city.

This navy is blind!

Major General Xu Zhixian, Chief of Staff, saw His Majesty leaving directly. After looking around, he finally whispered to the several army generals beside him: "It seems that the great cause of unifying Kyushu can only be relied on our army itself."

(End of this chapter)