I Am Louis XIV

   Chapter 477 Shuangwan Naval Battle (2)

A week before Pentecost, a mixed fleet set off from Hastings under the shelter of the night, crossed half the English Channel (French: La Manche Strait), and ambushed on the Isle of Wight, ready to ambush a fleet from Gibraltar. The big merchant fleet.

Gibraltar is a Spanish genus, because the Spanish navy minister Patinho more agrees that the second son of the Sun King Louis XIV, Charles, is the king of Spain, Carlos III, so this place controlled by his henchmen cannot be regarded as a battlefield for the time being. Or enemy-occupied, merchants still continue their business in this city that chokes off the Atlantic and the Mediterranean.

This caravan once belonged to the Great Council of Holland, and according to the spies who were placed among them, this fleet of at least thirty-five Calais ships was laden with gold, indigo, and coffee beans, with a total value of more than ten thousand Five thousand livres or more, although one-third of the ships were armed, this number of armed merchant ships would make ordinary pirates fear, but they could not be abandoned by hunters called army thieves. This plentiful prey.

The reason why it is called a mixed fleet is that this fleet is not only divided into three forces in terms of ship type, tonnage and crew, but also their owners are three completely different people - they are , Pirate Gott, Captain Cunningham of the British Navy, and Admiral Van Basten of the Dutch government-in-exile.

Although in this fleet, Captain Cunningham, as a British knight and general, has naturally become the real leader. Whether it is Van Basten or Gott, he can only be said to be his deputy, but when they are together Cunningham still couldn't help feeling headaches and unease when they got together on his "Charles I" for a meeting.

The three took their seats at the table, the attendant brought whiskey and rum, turned the switch of the kerosene lamp, and made the whole cabin bright like day-Van Basten subconsciously took out his pocket watch and looked at it. It was a quarter past three in the middle of the night. It was pitch black outside, and their discussion might not last long, after all, they were planned to attack at dawn, when the sea was foggy, and Captain Cunningham summoned them here. , probably because they don't want to happen again - when they were looting a caravan before, I don't know if it was accidental or intentional, Gott's artillery hit the mast of Van Basten's ship .

They almost fought directly, and almost let the merchant ship go. If it wasn't for Cunningham's command of the ship to chase down to the end... For Cunningham's punishment - mainly in terms of loot, these two have nothing to complain about. , but one look at Cunningham knew it wasn't over.

It makes people speechless. During the time of Charles I, Dutch merchant ships were still British pirates, and they could also be said to be the prey of officially licensed privateers. Their hatreds have been intertwined for hundreds of years. Although they now have a common enemy, But it's impossible to expect them to fall in love right away. "But think about it, you two," Cunningham said. "It's gold, spice, and indigo!" Five thousand livres, at least today, you should be a pair of good partners who can focus on fighting side by side... think about it, think about it, that's a lot of money! Enough for you to buy a big barque or Three sailboards! Or ten little guns, or whatever you want...as long as all goes well, gentlemen, as long as all goes well..."

   He looked at the two, as if waiting for their ecstatic response.

But when Gott the pirate heard this, he glanced at Cunningham, and although he was dark, Cunningham knew at a glance that he was different from them - he was a naval officer and a lord, and there was always that in his manners. I can't tell what kind of sloppy attitude it is, but if I listen carefully, I can hear a bit of familiar feeling.

Pirates grinned, even if the British Navy never left the gallows empty in docks and harbours, but who does not know that the British Navy, since Henry VII was established in 1500, was first recruited from pirates and sailors - even if there were With abundant domestic coal resources and black iron from India, they look like giants now, but the nutrients drawn by this forest tree are not clean, and even its branches are black. dripping blood.

You don't even need to go back too long. Francis Derek was a famous pirate in the era of Elizabeth I. At that time, in order to compete with Spain for the supremacy of the sea, Her Majesty the Queen not only did not punish such a criminal, but also awarded him a title and gave him a title with Some colleagues issued so-called "licenses", which are commonly referred to as privateer licenses. With this certificate, British pirates could loot the ships of British enemies with the protection of the British navy and even calmly. Feed the last Tudor kings and Stuart kings with their flesh and blood.

   This kind of business has continued to this day. According to the earliest contract, all pirates who have obtained a privateer’s license will not only hand over the spoils to the British government for sale, but also serve in the British Navy when the British go to war.

There are some smart people like Drake who can see the opportunity to climb up, and their descendants will be transformed from pirates who should be hanged 10,000 times to respectable lords, this Mr. Cunningham. I'm afraid it's also a family background. When he thinks of this, Gott can't help but laugh. However, unlike other pirates, he has no envy in his heart. Some people are happy to be a barking hound, and of course some people are willing to do it. A beast running in the wind and rain.

Gott's smile made the Mr. Van Basten raise his head. He looked indifferent as always. When it comes to his background, his identity may be more valuable than Cunningham, but he never mentioned it, Captain Cunningham. When he mentioned it occasionally, he admitted frankly that when his homeland fell into the hands of the enemy, a prominent surname brought not glory but shame, so he had given up his original surname, and only let people call him his teacher. name.

According to his age, Van Basten is the oldest of the three, but both Cunningham and Gott look much older than him. Gott has been thinking in his heart, maybe this Van Basten Mr. Sten hasn't had much trouble at sea, but Van Basten quickly proved to him that sometimes talent trumps experience. The problem is that, aside from his tactical and prejudice displeasure, Gott's brutality towards the crew and the captives is something Van Basten strongly disapproves of. "Nine-tailed cat" (flogging with a cowhide whip with nine strands at the end) or "hanging keel" (hanging the victim under the keel, allowing parasitic shells such as oysters attached to the keel to cut him bloody), and the gratuitous brutality of having the captives "walk the gangplank", "duel" on the mast, etc., which Van Basten could not bear - he could accept killing the enemy in battle, or The captives or the drowning were left to fend for themselves, but he felt that such unprovoked abuse would only make people look down on them.

For a hypocritical hypocrite like Van Basten, Gott of course couldn't see it, let alone when they acted together, Van Basten also put his thoughts and words into action, and he intervened with Gott What happened on the ship made the pirate captain furious, because this behavior was undoubtedly shaking his authority on the ship.

   Anyone who has read novels and movies related to pirates should know what will happen to a pirate captain if he loses the awe of his crew.

  So, in a later operation, Gott personally interrupted the mast of Van Bast's ship.

   When he found Van Basten looking at him, Gott's smile deepened and took on a bit of provocation. Van Basten turned his head, "Is there any update?"

Cunningham frowned, then unfolded with a sigh, "Pour wine for the two gentlemen!" he shouted, and when Gott's rum and Van Basten's wine were all in place, he nodded: " Yes, gentlemen, they are rounding Finisterre and coming to us."

   "What about the navy in Dunkirk?"

   "They're still facing off against the navy in Dover."

   "There are also two fleets stranded in Sicily and Barcelona." Cunningham said, "We don't need to worry about the French navy for the time being."

   "And we also have ironclads." Gott gave Cunningham a wink: "To our captain!"

   "To everyone, to 15,000 livres!" said Cunningham, raising his glass, touching the two, and gulping it down. They spread a thin sheepskin chart on the table, and used a magnet boat to roughly differentiate their duties. As I said before, this fleet not only has three heads, but even the body is very different.

The British naval fleet has always been based on firepower. This kind of thinking cannot be said to be wrong, because it has been extended to hundreds of years later, causing Charles I to lose his crown and head. The "Sea King" has 102 artillery pieces , was the largest in the world at that time. Later, when Charles II saw the ironclad fleet built by Louis XIV, he did not hesitate to repeat his father's past, and almost went out of his way to build such a fleet that seemed to be covered in armor. .

It is fortunate that Charles II has made many dangerous changes in order to eliminate the power of Cromwell, the former protector of the country, and to weaken the constraints of Parliament on the king. The tyrant also made his reform of the navy and ships not hindered too much - especially in the naval battle at Dunkirk, the British navy's obvious backwardness on the ships also allowed him to gain a lot. supporter.

And the opponents of change, they may also worry that the power of Charles II will be further increased, to the point of being like King Louis XIV of France - today's France is completely a country of one person, the parliament and the high court are equivalent to falsehood , but they also had to keep silent amid the cheers of the commoners as the British "priver" fleet continued to bring back plentiful spoils of war.

   Anyway, this is how this era is. No matter how cruel and harsh a king is, as long as he can bring victory, he is a good king.

The ironclad ships that Gott referred to were the four ironclad ships brought by Cunningham. Although they cannot be compared with the "King of the Sea" or the spectacle-type ships such as the "Royal" in France, they are also called It is a giant, that is to say, a first-class battleship with a length of more than 60 meters, carrying more artillery than the original "Sea King".

These ironclads are undoubtedly the capital ships of this mixed fleet. In comparison, the pirate Gott's fleet is dwarfed. Although Gott's flagship "Good Luck" is already a beautiful big three-masted ship, it is It was a wooden galley, not an iron-clad ship, and it carried only forty guns, but Gott and his crew also had four brigs, three schooners and schooners, and seven or eight. A brisk sloop and flute ship—these ships were generally used to carry loot from raids.

All the ships of the Dutch Van Basten are located between the two. Although they failed to build ironclad ships, they were once known as sea coachmen, and took the crown of Spain's maritime hegemony and overwhelmed the British navy. The Dutch fleet, even though they were almost completely lost in the last battle, they still managed to rebuild a fleet, almost all of which were modeled on the "Seven Provinces", with lengths ranging from 40 to 50 meters. About meters, they are all sailing warships, but they are lighter and more agile than the British ironclad ships, and each ship has about seventy to eighty artillery pieces.

   There are seven such ships.

All the ships in this mixed fleet have added up to more than 30. This number, even an ordinary sailing warship is enough to destroy a merchant fleet that is only escorted by armed merchant ships, not to mention that there are four ironclad ships. I have seen in this period of time how invincible it is and how difficult it is to fight - sometimes it just appears at sea level, and the lookout of the caravan will look desperate - because the artillery of this armed merchant ship is impossible. Pierced iron armor.

After they roughly determined the formation, the order of the attack, and the agreed signal, Cunningham raised his glass again and sincerely asked the two companions to temporarily put down their hatred and fight their enemies together, or to hunt down their targets. He even Privately promised Gott and van Basten that if the operation went well, he might be able to petition the Lord of the Navy to allow them to also order an ironclad.

Because ironclad ships need a lot of black iron, it is impossible for ordinary people to build such a ship without the power of the whole country. Van Basten calculated that even if the Netherlands still exists, it is necessary to convince the supporters of the Admiralty to build such a ship. A fleet can be difficult...it's too expensive, and I don't know how Louis XIV could have made such a determination.

   (end of this chapter)