On the afternoon of June 22, 1854, the White Lord used four steamships as its main force to defeat the Lucian garrison in Miaotun.

Next, the land team began to further build fortifications to prepare for the war - because the battle was actually only half-way up to this point, and there was a large Lucian team coming down the Wulong River behind, and the Lucian people were in Miaotun.

In fact, the garrison did not suffer much loss, and most of them fled. If the opponent gathered the remaining troops and launched a night attack or something, it would be impossible not to take precautions.

But why did Lusia organize a large team to come to the temple at this time? Is it because the Governor of Eastern Siberia, Muraviev, insists on occupying the eastern seaport? Isn’t it that many nobles in St. Petersburg are opposed to the tense situation in Europe?

Is it time to stir up disputes in the Far East again?

In fact, there is no contradiction between the two:

As the situation on the Europa continent worsened, Lucia found that her worries were right - the supporters behind the direct rival Ottoman Empire finally took the initiative, and these were the two powerful powers of England and France.

On January 4, 1854, 25 warships from two powerful forces entered the Black Sea to escort the transport fleet of the Ottoman Empire. Although there was no formal declaration of war or engagement, in fact military intervention was already underway.

On February 6, Lucia announced that it would break off diplomatic relations with England and France.

On February 10, Nicholas I met with the British envoy in St. Petersburg. After that, the two sides completely broke down - the pace of war continued to approach.

On February 21, Lucia declared a state of war with England and France.

At the same time, Nicholas I and his ministers carefully studied the map and discovered that there was another possible battlefield outside the Europa continent, and that was Alaska in North America - which borders the British colony of Quebec in North America. And if the opponent sends a fleet to attack

Alaska, will it attack the neighboring Kamchatka Peninsula and Pacific coastal territories?

Well, you have to be careful.

In fact, this worry is reasonable. In this war, the British and the French did attack the Kamchatka Peninsula, but the reason was completely different from what the Russians thought - the British were worried that the Russians would not be able to attack Kamchatka.

Chatka Peninsula went south to attack its caravan in the Far East, so it attacked Kamchatka Peninsula. It was not because it wanted to attack Alaska that it attacked Kamchatka. This is a typical case of fighting a wolf with a straw and fearing both sides. Both sides are under the shadow of war.

All amplified fear.

Under this concern, St. Petersburg agreed to the large-scale supply plan of East Siberia Governor Muravyov, but put two iron hoops on his head. One was that he was not allowed to provoke the Tang people when going down the Wulong River -

- You can't go to war with the whole world. Second, you must raise the manpower and material resources needed for large supplies by yourself.

In fact, this second point was not intended to embarrass Muravyov. The main reason was that the essence of Rusia was in Europe at this time, and transportation between it and distant Siberia was inconvenient. It was too difficult to supply supplies. There was no railway in Siberia at that time, only one.

The Siberian Post Road is not only far away but also in extremely bad condition.

The post road from St. Petersburg to Nerchinsk, an important town in Eastern Siberia, has a total length of more than 7,000 kilometers. It is "muddy in spring, waterlogged in summer, and full of potholes in winter." The famous writer Chekhov once described the Siberian post road this way: "

This is probably the most ungraceful road in the world...extremely difficult to walk, but very long."

Now it is winter again, and with the march on the plateau, it is estimated that the infantry has not reached 30% on the road, and will lose 30% on the road. Who can bear this? As for summer supplies, let’s wait until summer. We were beaten by a group of people in Europa. Who knows?

What kind of bird does it look like?

In addition, Muravyov can really get supplies on his own - because his full official title is Governor of Irkutsk and Eastern Siberia. In addition to Kamchatka Peninsula and Okhotsk region, he also manages Irkutsk in the Far East.

Kutsk Province, which is the upper reaches of the Wulong River, has been colonized and developed since about 1652. The mining industry is relatively developed. In short, he can really spare some efforts to support Kamchatka and other coastal territories.

In fact, Governor Muravyov has always been obsessed with his empire's plan for the Pacific Ocean outlet - Emperor Nicholas I also supported him privately. The so-called large-scale supply of the Pacific coastal area was because he was worried about the arrival of the English and French fleets.

attack, but at the same time he also wanted to take the opportunity to prove that the Far East of the empire could be connected through the Wulong River. Otherwise, why would he have made so many preparations in advance? Lucia's shipping industry was backward, and he had worked hard to build three steamships.

It was just obtained in order to open up the Wulong River Basin.

In a world without Zhixiu, the 1854 Far East Supply Campaign presided over by Muravyov was successfully completed, and he conducted four voyages along the main road of the Wulong River, which fully proved his vision and the influence of the Wulong River on the empire.

importance, after Russia's disastrous defeat in the Crimean War, it finally turned its attention to the Far East and began its continuous expansion.

But now that Naohsiu has appeared, Muravyov's large-scale supply plan has naturally encountered a huge challenge.

The Battle of Miaotun ended on the afternoon of June 22. By 8:30 in the evening, it was obvious that the moonlight was very good tonight and the fog was not thick. Therefore, the four steamships of the White Lord set sail and took the initiative to move upriver.

Attacking the Luya fleet - that's the good thing about being the boss. There is no need to explain the source of the information in detail, just a word of "secret information from Xianheng Foreign Company" will put all the questions of his subordinates to rest.

As for why they were not afraid of breaking out and warning the Lucian supply fleet in advance, it was of course because of the power of technology - although the White Lord's steamships were not as fast as horses, this meant that the distance between Pirov's winter camp and Miaotun was only 80 kilometers.

This is the situation. Animals like horses cannot run at high speed for a long time. They will be exhausted after traveling up to 200 kilometers a day, but steamships will not be tired.

The staff estimated that the speed of the Lussia supply fleet is about 128 kilometers per day. Based on the arrival at Miaotun on June 25, it is still at least more than 300 kilometers away from here. Considering that there are barren mountains and ridges with no formal roads,

Even if the Cossack cavalry is unlucky, it will take more than a day to see the supply team - considering that they can travel at night, the White Lord steamship has a speed of eight knots and can run 356 kilometers in 24 hours. Even if the countercurrent is slower, the steam

Even if the ship sets off late, it can still get ahead, so it won't miss anything.

Besides, in this barbaric land, even if the Lucians were warned in advance, there were only two ways to go: One was to turn around and go north. Will the White Lord continue to chase? Can more than 70 small boats escape?

Second, the Lu people disembarked right away. But when they disembarked in a place like this, did they bring enough supplies? If they didn’t, they would have a lot of fun. They could survive for a few days by hunting.

Therefore, as long as the Lucian steamship is destroyed, the trip will be considered a success. After all, according to the current strength of the White Lord, he can only involve him from the side but not from the front. It is okay to cause trouble, but it is not allowed to completely block the strength.

Nakahama Manjiro, the chief naval officer of the Navy, also understood this, so he also agreed with the strategy of destroying ships first.

But before he led the fleet to leave, Naohide gave special instructions:

"If the people are there and the boat is there, the general trend will be on our side. We must not be greedy for credit."

Manjiro said to himself, "It goes without saying," but he was quite happy that Naohide didn't follow him to cause trouble, so he set out confidently, "Today is the day to make great achievements!"

In fact, Zhixiu was still worried, because this time he did not block the two steamships originally found in Miaotun. The steamboat was just returned, but there was a sail-steam hybrid warship. If this also went north to meet the supply fleet in advance,

There will definitely be more fights by then.

But it was useless to worry, so Naohide had no choice but to board the ship with the others and retreat - the navy was defeated, and the White Lord could not hold on. More than 110 soldiers and 44 sailors faced 800 infantry and 100 Cossacks.

1 artillery unit and more than 200 broken troops, 1 vs. 8, is not easy to handle; and the Benzai ship is sail-powered, and it lacks power on the river road. It may not even be able to run at that time. Thinking about this situation makes me nervous.

Hemp, so Naohide and others had no choice but to evacuate first.

At about 8 a.m. on June 24, Nakahama Manjiro led

With four steamships, they caught up with the retreating Bencai fleet. At this time, Naohide and the others were about to arrive near the mouth of the Wulong River.

Seeing that the four steamships were unscathed and everyone in the navy was smiling, everyone knew that this was a great victory, and no one knew who was taking the lead. Cheers came and went, startling countless birds on both sides of the bank.

It turned out that Manjiro traveled north all night and finally blocked the supply fleet at around 1:30 in the afternoon of the next day.

Because of the thick smoke from the steamship, the White Navy's whereabouts were exposed in advance. The first thing they encountered at that time was the Lucian steam-sail hybrid warship.

The local water surface was about 400 meters wide, but Nakahama Manjiro did not fight with the enemy ships. He ordered four steam ships to fight and retreat in two echelons. It took more than half an hour to force the opponent to abandon the ship. Then in vain

The main navy approached and used live ammunition to sink the hybrid warship.

Then it was a pursuit all the way.

The enemy's reaction was also very quick. By the time the Bai Lord's steamship saw the Lu people's large fleet, the enemy had basically landed, but the firing range once again became the opponent's fatal injury. The artillery unit soon suffered all casualties.

The black powder was also exploded one after another, and the remaining enemies hid in the woods on both sides of the bank. The supplies that were not taken away in time were also burned by nine-pound grenades.

But the two steamships mentioned by Naohide have disappeared.

After thinking about it, Manjiro ordered to continue the pursuit upstream. He expected it to be true. Four and a half hours later, at around 7 p.m., the White Navy navy finally caught up with the two steam freighters. The result was self-explanatory - it was better for the warships to hit the cargo ships.

It was not easy, and they were destroyed. Soon the two wooden boats were filled with smoke, and then they were also sent to the bottom of the river by live ammunition.

It was still dark at this time, and Manjiro quickly returned to the ship after declaring victory.

That night, with the bright moon shining brightly, Manjiro chased all the way, and after more than 20 hours of sailing, he finally caught up with the Benzai fleet near the mouth of the Wulong River.

After receiving the ten remaining warriors from Pirov's winter camp, the eight ships immediately headed south - they stopped as soon as they were ready and withdrew after the fight was over.

In this northward attack, the White Lord dispatched a total of four steamships and four Benzai ships, accompanied by a standing army of 180 people and 44 watermen. The results and losses were as follows:

Direct results include the capture of a camp - Pyrov Winter Camp, the removal of a post - Nikolayevsk Post (Temple Tun), the sinking of a hybrid warship and two steam cargo ships,

There were a number of small boats - because they wanted to pursue steam cargo ships, the navy did not attack more than 70 small boats, and the number of enemies killed is unknown - the only ones that can be calculated clearly are the ten Cossack cavalry in Plov's winter camp, and the thirty in the temple camp.

Multiple corpses and a Lucian battery, other results are rather vague.

More importantly, the strategic goal was achieved, and Governor Muravyov's large-scale supply plan basically came to nothing - without steamships, the speed of supply through the Wulong River would be greatly reduced, and it might be canceled.

As for Muravyov, Naohide believed that this persevering bandit leader would be able to get out of the wilderness - the future is long, and we will still have fights in the future.

The only regret is that no trace of other ships of the Okhotsk District fleet was found in Miaotun - in fact, Naohide was a bit greedy, and it was impossible to think about it. At this time, the ice period in the northern part of the Whale Sea has not yet completely ended.

, since it did not appear in October last year, the possibility of it appearing now is very small.

As for the battle losses, they were negligible. There were no casualties. It was just a waste of some ammunition and coal.

So this expedition is another big victory!

Moreover, Naohide is planning to play something more serious in August this year, when the combined fleets of England and France will attack the Kamchatka Peninsula. Will he also take the opportunity to add some excitement?
Chapter completed!