I want to be emperor

Chapter 244 The General Attack on Wuchang (Burst Seeking Subscription)

On October [-]th, after several days of preparations, the Township Protection Army finally launched a formal attack on Wuchang City.

The first to appear were dozens of various field artillery and siege mortars.

These artillery launched shelling at a distance of several hundred meters from the target. The rumbling sound of the artillery began in the morning and continued until the evening, without stopping in the middle.

The soldiers transporting the artillery shells in the rear used a carriage to send boxes of various shells and propellants to the artillery groups on the front line to supply the artillery.

At the same time, the engineering unit, together with some soldiers of the garrison and civilians recruited from nearby areas, are carrying out fortification work under the cover of artillery fire.

They began to dig various traffic trenches and build parapets to prevent the troops from being attacked by enemy artillery when they approached the city walls.

At the same time, these traffic trenches can also allow artillery, especially mortars, to be deployed close to increase the hit rate.

After all, the shooting accuracy of these mortars is very poor, and the shooting range is relatively short. Although they can barely fire at medium and long distances, the effect will not be very good.

In order to obtain a relatively good shelling effect, it is often necessary to shell at a distance of about 300 meters.

And that requires the cover of earthworks.

After all, the Ming army defending the city will not just watch you pull the artillery to a distance of two to 300 meters for shelling.

People also have artillery, even if they are some traditional artillery such as General Cannon and Franc Machine Cannon, but it is not a problem to shoot two or 300 meters.

The rural protection army outside the city carried out heavy shelling and earthworks at the same time, while the Ming army inside the city suffered heavy casualties.

In fact, the Ming army in Wuchang City did not foolishly stay in the most dangerous area of ​​the city to be bombed. After all, many Ming army generals in the city had followed Tang Hui and experienced the Battle of Zhongxiang.

They are very aware of the ferocious firepower of the thieves. If they foolishly send a large number of troops to the top of the city at the beginning of the war, there will be no effect other than sending heads.

Therefore, apart from a small number of observers on the top of the city, most of the troops are actually hiding behind the city wall, and the mortars aimed at the security thieves can hit the back of the city wall and explode. They also built bulletproof behind the city wall. What about the fortifications and buildings?

However, the artillery of the Township Protection Army was too fierce. More than 40 mortars fired in turn. Even if the hit rate was lower, they could kill a lot of enemy troops after all.

After the shelling on this day, at least hundreds of people were killed and injured in the city, and a large number of buildings behind the city wall were destroyed and even caused a fire, billowing thick smoke.

Although there were more than [-] defenders in the city, and the officials in the city also recruited a large number of young and strong people in the city to help defend the city, the casualties of several hundred people were still not small.

More importantly, they can only be passively beaten, which is a fatal blow to morale.

Many people even pessimistically believed that even if the bandit protection army did not take the initiative to launch an infantry attack on the city, they would have killed or injured thousands of people in ten days and a half months if they were just bombarded like this.

Of course, that's just their filtering.

It is impossible for the artillery unit of the Township Protection Army to keep bombarding at such a high intensity without stopping.

The artillery can stand it, but the artillery can't stand it either.

Even if the artillery can stand it, the supply of ammunition will be very troublesome.

After all, artillery has a lifespan, especially the iron-cast mortars of the Baoxiang Army, which only have a lifespan of two to three hundred rounds. In this high-intensity battle, it is normal to fire dozens of shells a day.

In other words, even if the ammunition is enough, the gunners will not be tired, but they will not be able to endure such high-intensity shelling for a few days.

In fact, this is true. From the second day on, the shelling density of the Township Protection Army has slowed down a lot. Except for the suppressive shelling, it basically did not launch intensive shelling like the first day.

This also made the Ming army feel relieved in the city, and began to imagine that if the security guards were just like this every day, then they would be able to hold on for a month or even more than two or three months.

In this way, we can wait for reinforcements from other directions.

The Ming army has a considerable number of garrison troops in the southern part of Chunan, that is, Yuezhou Prefecture, Changsha Prefecture, and Hengyang Prefecture.

There are also more troops in Jiangxi and South Zhili areas.

If they can hold out until these reinforcements arrive, then they will be saved.

In fact, it was indeed as expected by the defenders in Wuchang City. The Ming army in the above-mentioned directions was preparing to rescue Wuchang.

The fastest movers were the Ming army in Yuezhou Prefecture, Changsha Prefecture, and Changde Prefecture. They began to gather troops after they learned that the thieves had crossed the river, and finally gathered about [-] troops in Yuezhou Prefecture.

And the reason why they can move so fast is purely because Yang Sichang is now in his hometown in Wuling County, Changde Prefecture.

Although Yang Sichang's recovery is still in progress, this does not prevent him from using his influence to put pressure on the Ming army in the above-mentioned places and let them send reinforcements to rescue Wuchang.

However, the tens of thousands of Ming troops gathered together with great difficulty. As soon as they left Baling City and headed towards Wuchang Mansion, they heard that a bandit protection army came from the east and captured Puqi of Wuchang Mansion.

The army to protect the thieves was the westward detachment led by Colonel Jia Heyun.

They marched all the way west from the landing ferry, first captured Jiayu, then went straight to Puqi, and took Puqi in two days.

When the Ming army in Yuezhou learned about Jia Heyun's detachment, in fact Jia Heyun was already leading troops to conquer Chongyang.

Outside Chongyang City, Colonel Jia Heyun looked at the deserted city ahead, and directly ordered: "Let the second garrison battalion prepare to attack!"

After the suppressive bombardment in the early stage, the Ming army on the head of Chongyang City has already killed or injured dozens of people, and the others don’t know where to go. In this case, there is no need to continue to dawdle. Just send the infantry to rush up and it’s over. .

Anyway, there were not many Ming troops stationed in Chongyang City, only a few hundred local guards and civilian husbands, not even short-barreled artillery such as general guns.

Not every place will be garrisoned with heavy troops like Wuchang City. The strength of the Ming army is also limited, and it is impossible to garrison troops in all cities.

Most of the Ming army in the south of Chu was concentrated in the front line of Wuchang City, and the rest was concentrated in the Yuezhou area.

As for Chongyang, an ordinary small county like Puqi, it is impossible to have many main field Ming troops garrisoned, and there are only local Ming army guards and village braves.

Facing such an enemy army, there is no need to shrink back at all, just fight and finish the job, just like the previous attack on Jiayu and Puqi.

Sure enough, just as Jia and Yun expected, the second garrison battalion, under the cover of their own artillery and musketeers and archers, rushed to the top of the city with a single charge, and then seized the city gate to welcome the army into the city.

In this way, the overall situation is settled.

Afterwards, we will continue to clear out the stubborn enemies in the city, but these Jia and Yun don't care too much, and he doesn't even plan to stay here for too long. After clearing out the organized and stubborn enemies in the city, he will lead his army Leave and continue westward.

In the future, he will send a reinforced garrison battalion to Tongcheng to conquer this county that also has no Ming army garrison.

And he himself will take the main force of the remaining [-] people to Linxiang.

It is worth noting that after advancing westward and connecting to win the three cities, the strength of Jia Heyun's command did not decrease, but instead increased from more than 3000 to more than 4000.

Naturally, these newly added troops were surrendered soldiers selected from the captives captured along the way.

According to the instructions, the officials of the military and political department accompanying the army selected the prisoners of war captured by the westward detachment during the westward march on the spot, and then replenished the No.20 third garrison regiment who entered the westward detachment on the spot.

Therefore, the strength of the garrison regiment continued to increase to 3000 people, and an additional garrison battalion was formed.

At the same time, according to the previously formulated plan, the garrison regiment will continue to expand in the future, and then directly expanded into a garrison brigade, which will be under the jurisdiction of the new eighth garrison division.

Before the Township Protection Army crossed the south of the Yangtze River, it formulated an expansion plan for two garrison divisions. The seventh garrison division was expected to be reorganized in the direction of Wuchang Prefecture, while the eighth garrison division was expected to be reorganized in the area around Yuezhou Prefecture.

Colonel Jia Heyun led more than 3000 troops to continue westward, and soon arrived in the Linxiang area.

As a result, as soon as they approached Linxiang, they discovered that a Ming army of tens of thousands of people had come ahead, that is, from the east of Baling City in Yuezhou Prefecture, trying to reinforce the Ming army in Wuchang Prefecture.

Ever since, more than 3000 rural protection troops fought a battle with tens of thousands of Ming troops about ten kilometers west of Linxiang City.

And this kind of typical field encounters, the rural protection army has always been very cheap, because the rural protection army has field artillery that moves with the army, even those short-barreled artillery of two or three hundred catties are installed on special artillery pieces. Pulled and ran on the rack.

The artillery of the Xiangbao Army moved quickly and deployed quickly. Before the Ming army on the opposite side could react, it had already approached and started shelling.

After being caught off guard by the artillery of the Xiangbao Army, the Ming army on the opposite side wanted to stabilize its position, and even wanted to launch a counterattack for a while, but then the core combat power of the Xiangbao Army's westward detachment was the third step. The First Infantry Battalion under the Corps.

Under the cover of its own two-and-a-half-pound field artillery and a batch of two-hundred-pound short cannons, this new-style main infantry battalion directly launched a line attack. The spearman launched a spear charge directly after the musketeer fired at close range.

The musketeers also wore light armor one by one, holding bayonet-mounted muskets and charging with the spearmen.

When 200 or [-] soldiers were all in armor, and more than [-] of them were still wearing heavy armor. When the rural protection army rushed over, the two to three thousand left-wing Ming troops on the opposite side were frightened and stupid...

Most of the left-wing Ming troops in front of them were just ordinary local guards, and they couldn't stop the five or six hundred soldiers of the First Infantry Battalion who were like wolves and tigers.

Ever since, the left wing of the Ming army collapsed without accident.

(End of this chapter)