Tongzhou City, outside the southeast corner gate, in the open space in the southeast.
The car camp formed a square formation with cut corners, which actually had eight corners. This was to enhance the density of defensive artillery at right angles.
At this time, on the corner tower, Dong Jishu, Zuo Liangyu, Hu Dawei, Meng Ruhu and others were staring at the battlefield intently. This was an extremely rare scene, a showdown between the most elite troops of the Ming Dynasty and the rebels.
There was a huge disparity in numbers between the two sides, with the rebels and the government troops being four to one. But in terms of weapons, the ratio of heavy artillery was 500 to 73. The ratio was also very disparity.
The car camp had been under the bombardment of red cannons and had been silent and silent. It did not fire back a single shot. Until it was surrounded by rebels on all sides, the rebels pushed the shield car and artillery to the firing position and fixed the cannon.
After taking the position, the car camp finally opened fire first.
This firing caused the earth to shake.
There are one hundred heavy copper-fired cannons on each side of the camp.
There are twenty-five heavy cannons on each of the four chamfered faces.
Behind the artillery truck, there are densely packed arrow towers and small artillery turrets. At the center position, there is a platform built with steel pipe scaffolding that is four or five stories high.
Obviously, that was the commanding position. From a high position, one could see the surrounding situation very clearly.
Dong Jishu saw a dark green fireworks bomb flying from the platform, very conspicuous in the clear sky. It exploded at high altitude, leaving a thick smoke.
Then, flames suddenly burst out from all sides of the carriage camp. For a while, the sound of shelling came one after another.
Dong Jishu and others clearly saw that the densely packed gun barrels were like waves, spurting out angry flames one after another, and then slowly retreated into the gun window.
In each direction, there were a hundred spherical solid bullets, whizzing out of the muzzle. The bullet holders were broken under the action of stress the moment they came out of the barrel. The shells whizzed, rotated, and flew forward.
The rebels had just fixed the artillery, and this distance was officially the combat range of most artillery in the Ming Dynasty.
They knew that the firearms of various armies of the Ming Dynasty were the best in Jizhen. They had the confidence to shoot at each other under any circumstances.
When they saw the rows of heavy artillery barrels suddenly pushed out of the gun window, they were almost stunned.
This! This! This! It's a copper-fired cannon, or a heavy-duty one. There are so many of them, but they all have the same specifications.
In the Ming Dynasty, from the frontier army to the Beijing camp, from the camp to the garrison, the firearms were all mixed. There was never an army uniformly equipped with the same specifications of artillery.
The reality could no longer help them to be surprised and stunned. Because the speed of the cannonball exceeded the speed of sound. At a distance of 400 meters, it roared in just after one second. There was no reaction time at all.
Eighteen-pound artillery shells hit the rebel formation like a violent storm.
Hu Youlu, Zhang Shengwu, and Zhao Dianming are fire gunmen. The three of them are hiding behind the wooden wall of the shield car and have already installed three bird guns. They are in the car. Behind them, there are ten people on the left and right of the car.
Responsible for pushing the cart by the shaft. There are six other people divided into two rows, between the two cart shafts, responsible for loading ammunition.
The configuration of this shield vehicle is that three people are responsible for shooting and six people are responsible for loading ammunition. A total of nine bird cannons are used repeatedly.
The three of them waited in the car for an opportunity to poke their heads out, aim and shoot, knocking out the soldiers guarding the car camp.
The vehicle moved forward rapidly, driven by twenty people. The infantrymen behind the cover rushed forward to fight hand-to-hand.
These temporary shield cars were built by removing old elm door panels from ordinary people's homes and nailing them into one-foot-thick wooden walls. There were also more than a dozen quilts nailed with large iron nails on the outside of the wooden shield walls to buffer firearms.
blow.
This thickness is enough to block musket fire. The No. 5 General Cannon and the Xiaofolang Machine Cannon also have certain defensive capabilities at long distances.
At this moment, from their perspective, a fire was shining in front, thick smoke was spewing out, and a sharp whistling sound came towards them.
Bang bang bang! A series of loud noises.
The eighteen-pound shot put hit.
The three of them were so frightened that they quickly retreated behind the shield wall. Fortunately, this round of shells did not fire at their shield car, and naturally no shells hit their shield wall.
But shells were flying from both sides.
The shield vehicles on both sides of them were hit by eighteen-pound spherical solid bullets.
Whether it is a thick quilt or a foot-thick old elm wood, there is no resistance to the cannonballs flying at high speed. The spherical projectiles rotate at high speed and hit at the speed of sound. The cotton is directly twisted into pieces and the cannonballs fly.
It penetrated the wooden wall behind without any obstruction.
The entire shield wall exploded into dozens of pieces and scattered. This is because these shield walls were not assembled from one-foot-square wooden cubes at all. Instead, door panels of different sizes, thicknesses, and degrees of decay were nailed together with large iron nails. The strength was inherently insufficient.
After being hit a few times by high-speed cannonballs, it will break into pieces and fly away.
Zhang Shengwu screamed, and a piece of wood weighing more than ten kilograms was blown away by the cannonball, and then hit his helmet.
The eight-petal helmet was flattened by the heavy blow from the heavy elm block. Zhang Shengwu's brain exploded and sprayed everywhere.
Hu Youlu and Zhao Dianming were so frightened that they hurriedly lay down on the car.
Hu Youlu trembled and saw the mess on the left. After the shell shattered the shield truck, it not only shattered the three people behind the shield wall into pieces, but also penetrated the two rows of people behind who were loading, and then fell on
On the ground.
As soon as the shell grazed the ground, it jumped up again, flew more than ten meters, and then hit the dense crowd of infantry behind.
Hu Youlu couldn't see the shells, but he did see a dozen arms, legs, and other human parts flying up. Amid the screams and screams, he saw a black figure that seemed to jump up again and flew more than ten meters.
Hit the crowd again.
Huang Tengyuan's position was relatively high, and he could clearly see that almost every artillery shell shot out a bloody alley with blood and flesh flying everywhere. The first salvo fired, 400 heavy artillery, 400 shells, at least 300 rounds
It hit the shield vehicle in front, and then penetrated the infantry group behind.
He took a breath of air. This round of shelling would inevitably result in two to three thousand casualties.
"Hurry! Let the infantry rush up quickly. Fight hand-to-hand with them. The artillery in front won't be able to hold on for long." Huang Tengyuan shouted loudly.
In this round, one-third of the various firearms that had been pushed to the shooting position were knocked out. Because the gunners in the side car are veterans, they have experienced the baptism of actual combat. They know what is the current most threatening target.
.According to the regulations, they will give priority to shooting the targets with the greatest threat.
Undoubtedly, those large and small artillery are the biggest threatening targets. Because the infantry's blunderbuss and three-eyed blunderbuss, bows and arrows are basically ineffective against armored vehicles like them. Therefore, they all aimed at the artillery vehicles on the opposite side and opened fire. Only the shield vehicles and the armored vehicles were in sight.
The crowd had no choice but to fire at these low-value targets.
After the first round of shelling, the officers of the infantry group also reacted. They immediately crossed the shield vehicles and gun emplacements in front, and rushed forward like a tide.
The commanding officer of the shield vehicle also reacted and shouted loudly: "Push the vehicle, rush forward, and engage the enemy as soon as possible!"
"Go to the opponent's wall first and reward fifty taels of silver."
"Hurry up and push the cart. Don't stay here waiting for the next wave of shells to come. If you don't want to die, just rush forward."
They are all veterans and know that it is impossible to reload heavy artillery within a minute or two.
There were no fixed-loading ammunition in this era, and the gunpowder needed to be simply weighed before being filled into the barrel. The use of paper-wrapped fixed-loading propellant had just begun in Europe at this time, and the Ming Dynasty did not yet have such advanced technology.
Therefore, they all understand that the most correct choice now is to rush forward with all their strength instead of waiting here without bombardment. As long as they run fast enough, they have few opportunities to fire. After all, the distance is less than a mile.
A thick gun barrel stuck out of the rear gun window of the car, roaring and spitting out thick smoke and flames.
Then the gun barrel quickly recedes. Under the braking of the slide rail, pulley, and rope, it slowly retreats into place.
Gao Changlin stuck his head out of the observation window to take a look, and cursed: "Have these rebels been beaten to death? They are all rushing up like crazy. Hurry up and load the next round."
At this time, a red firework bomb flew into the sky and exploded. This was an order for free fire.
"Free fire, quick reload"
The artillerymen in the car immediately took action. The second gunner took out the silk propellant pack from the wooden box next to it. The third gunner took out the cork holder from the other side, and the fourth gunner held the spherical lead bullet and put it into the muzzle.
The first gunner immediately loaded the copper-haired cannon with silk powder bags, cork holders, spherical solid bullets, etc., and pressed them firmly with the push rod. The five people worked together again to push the muzzle out of the rear gun window.
Gao Changlin saw a shield car in the distance being pushed very fast. The wheels hit rocks several times, causing the car to jump left and right and almost overturn. The two people in the car were still looking for opportunities to shoot.
"When you see that shield car, it's the one at the front, hit him. I'll take aim." Gao Changlin shouted loudly.
The four gunners immediately used pulleys and ropes to move the muzzle up, down, left and right. Gao Changlin aimed at the shield vehicle through the front sight and rear sight.
He murmured: "Don't move, yes, just walk in a straight line, okay."
The fire stick in his hand suddenly hit the fire door, and then quickly dodged to the side.
With a bang, the artillery sprayed out flames and shells, and then violently recoiled.
Gao Changlin could see with his naked eye that the shield vehicle hit a rock again and jumped up to the upper left. Then the shell accurately hit the floor of the vehicle body.
The powerful impact directly smashed the two shield vehicles into pieces. The shells were directly fired from the front and back of the vehicle floor. The shield wall of the shield vehicle was shattered, the shafts were shattered, and the floor was shattered. Then, human limbs were mixed with them and flew in all directions.
.
The cannonball shattered the shield truck and flew directly towards the crowd behind. From Gao Changlin's perspective, broken limbs and broken arms flew out in all directions. Then when he saw the cannonball landing on the ground, it suddenly jumped up again and fell into the crowd behind.
