As the messengers around Li Xuan used semaphore to pass the message to the artillery battalion tiger, over at the artillery position, the semaphore soldiers immediately reported to Xie Ziwei: "Your Majesty has an order: the artillery battalion is ordered to fire at the artillery team directly ahead!"
Xie Ziwei nodded slightly and said: "Reply: The artillery battalion obeys the order!"
Then he turned to Butcher Chen and said, "Now is the time for us to show off our skills!"
After saying this, he suddenly spoke in a serious tone to Butcher Chen and another artillery major in front of him: "The first team fired rapidly at the enemy's artillery team due north, and the second team fired rapidly towards the enemy's artillery team in the northeast.
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Butcher Chen and another artillery major immediately said in unison: "Yes!"
As the captains of the two artillery teams returned to their respective positions, they immediately directed the gunners to take aim and then load gunpowder and shells!
Butcher Chen personally went into battle and operated the aiming of an 800-pound artillery. Although he still couldn't write a complete article, he had studied artillery for so long and he already had a good understanding of artillery. According to a certain range
He is quite proficient in loading and aiming, even more proficient than most gunners.
It didn't take long before the guns of Tufu Chen's artillery team were loaded and aimed. They looked at the multiple Ming army artillery pieces that were being pushed closer by the gunners, a full 400 meters away.
Immediately, Butcher Chen gathered his strength and said: "Fire me!"
As his voice fell, the five 800-pound artillery pieces of his artillery team started to sound one after another!
In an instant, several loud noises echoed over the battlefield, and huge white smoke rose from the artillery position. The pungent smell of gunpowder smoke instantly filled the entire artillery position, but was soon blown slowly from the battlefield.
The north wind blew away.
However, the many solid-ball artillery shells that soared out of the smoke crossed hundreds of meters of sky, and then fell directly into the Ming army's artillery array.
After the shells fired by the artillery aimed at by Chen Tufu landed hundreds of meters across, they hit the ground and created a large crater, splashing a lot of sand and gravel. Then they were bounced up and continued to fly forward. A Ming soldier just happened to
On the path of the artillery shell, before he could react, he was hit on the shoulder by the artillery shell. The huge impact brought him up, and he didn't even have time to scream.
, his upper body was shattered by the impact. After landing, his whole body didn't even twitch, and he was completely dead.
However, the artillery shell still did not stop moving forward. After bouncing on the ground, the artillery shell hit a Ming army artillery truck on the way forward. The huge impact force directly hit the artillery truck.
When it was shattered and sawdust flew everywhere, even the bowl-mouthed cannon weighing dozens of kilograms on the gun truck was hit and flew far away.
After the artillery shell smashed into the artillery carriage, it still did not stop its progress, but continued to rush forward. When the speed slowly decreased, it seemed to be very slow, and it came to the feet of a Ming army soldier.
, the Ming soldier thought that the shell was no longer a threat, so he actually blocked it with his feet.
The result was far beyond his expectation. The seemingly slow medicine ball cannonball directly lifted his feet and then brought his whole body.
A scream came out of his mouth instantly, and if you look closely, you can see that the foot he stretched out to block the shell was twisted.
In this round of artillery bombardment, there were a total of ten artillery pieces, large and small, each fired at the predetermined target, that is, the artillerymen who were advancing and trying to get close to the Ming army were firing, with varying results.
If they were unlucky, the shells would be empty and would only plow out a crater on the ground. However, they did not cause any damage to the Ming army. However, some shells produced great results.
One of the 800-pound artillery shells crashed directly into a group of Ming troops who were carrying artillery ammunition, knocking these people off their feet and causing heavy collateral damage. The Ming army's gunpowder was ignited.
, causing an explosion. Although the explosion was not very violent, it still caused additional casualties to the Ming army itself.
This shot caused the death and injury of at least a dozen Ming Army artillerymen, and was equivalent to indirectly destroying a Ming Army ammunition depot.
The results of this round of shelling can be said to be quite rich. The impact of the shells was very accurate. In total, it caused at least fifty or sixty Ming army casualties and destroyed at least two Ming army artillery pieces and some ammunition.
Such results can be said to be quite generous, and can even be said to exceed ordinary standards.
The reason why such obvious results can be achieved is because this battlefield is the default battlefield of the New Army of the Tang Dynasty. They came a few days ago and carefully mapped out the terrain of this default battlefield and marked out many of them.
Shooting Zhu Yuan.
When the Ming army arrived at a certain place, the artillerymen of the Tang army did not even need to measure the distance or calculate the amount of charge. They simply loaded according to the elements marked in advance, and then aimed and fired at a certain angle.
As for whether the shot is accurate or not, that is a matter of the accuracy of the artillery itself, but human errors have been reduced to the greatest extent possible.
While the ten artillery pieces of the artillery battalion continued to fire, the Ming army's artillery troops could only stare and were unable to fight back because the distance was too far.
Although the Ming Army's artillery is extremely numerous, at least seventy or eighty if all are counted, many of the Ming Army's artillery are actually not considered artillery, because they include some firearms weighing only a few dozen kilograms as artillery.
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Therefore, most of the Ming army's artillery were actually small cannons weighing tens to hundreds of kilograms. There were only a few cannons cast in the Year of the Monkey and Horse and Moon that seemed to weigh two to three hundred kilograms.
However, another characteristic of the Ming army's artillery is that most of them are short-barreled artillery, which cannot fire solid ball shells and can only fire shot shells.
The power of shotgun shells is indeed good at medium and short range, but the range is too short and there is no way to hit hundreds of meters away.
At this time, the two sides were more than a thousand meters away, and the nearest one was four to five hundred meters away. The heavy artillery of the New Army of the Tang Dynasty could hit the Ming army more than 400 meters away, but the Ming army was unable to hit it more than 400 meters away.
The new army of the Tang Dynasty meters away.
In terms of the artillery power of both sides, the New Army of the Tang Dynasty was actually far superior to the Ming Army. The artillery battalion of the New Army of the Tang Dynasty had ten long-barreled cannons, and they were all heavy cannons weighing 500 kilograms or 800 kilograms.
In addition, according to the establishment, each infantry regiment will also have a battalion artillery team, each with six 150-pound battalion cannons. Even now, there is a shortage of artillery. Only the First Infantry Regiment and the Second Infantry Regiment have battalion artillery.
It is fully compiled, but most of the others are missing.
But in total, there are almost thirty battalion guns.
The battalion artillery of the New Army of the Tang Dynasty are all 150 kilograms of artillery. The ultimate range can reach 150 meters. In terms of range, it is much stronger than many bowl-mouth cannons of the Ming Army. Even the Ming Army of the same weight can
The Wankou cannon also had a far-reaching range as the Tang army's camp cannon.
In comparison, the artillery strength of the Ming Army was far inferior to that of the New Army of the Tang Dynasty. This also created a very favorable situation for the New Army of the Tang Dynasty, that is, the artillery of the New Army of the Tang Dynasty was unilaterally massacring the Ming Dynasty.
military.
Moreover, the targets of the massacre were the Ming Army’s artillery units!
According to the plan agreed upon before the war, the most important task of the artillery battalion and even the artillery teams of each regiment in the early stages of the battle was to suppress or even destroy the Ming army's artillery troops, and to prevent the Ming army's artillery troops from advancing within 100 meters and thus firing
Shotguns caused a large number of casualties to one's own infantry phalanx.
Among the more than 20,000 people in the Ming Army, the only ones that could pose a greater threat to the New Army of the Tang Dynasty were their artillery and cavalry units. To be honest, many generals of the New Army of the Tang Dynasty did not pay much attention to their infantry.
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Therefore, the artillery unit of the Ming Army is the highest priority target of the New Army of the Tang Dynasty!
In fact, not only artillery, but also the musketeers in the infantry, their first mission target is the enemy's artillery!
Just when Xie Ziwei's artillery battalion opened fire on the Ming army's artillery, the infantry of the New Army of the Tang Dynasty continued to advance!
Although the moment the artillery opened fire, it was already announced that the battle was about to begin. However, the infantry on both sides still did not exchange fire. Instead, they continued to adjust their formations as they continued to enter the battlefield, involving many people.
A decisive battle involving tens of thousands of people is definitely not about simply forming a few square formations and pulling them up, and then the two sides can fight to determine the winner.
This battle, with the Bronze Drum Acropolis as the center, will likely be carried out simultaneously in a radius of several miles!
Because both sides are constantly maneuvering, changing formations and positions in order to find the formation that is most beneficial to their side.
This is just like a battleship battle in the Navy. Both sides will try their best to seize the "T" in order to exert their maximum side firepower.
In this process, both parties are constantly changing.
And this is why a large-scale battle will last for a long time!
But as the distance between the two sides shortens, this maneuver will eventually stop and then evolve into a complete large-scale battle!
The artillery under Xie Ziwei's artillery battalion was firing continuously at a speed that was neither too fast nor too slow, trying to speed up the frequency of bombardment as much as possible while ensuring that the barrels did not explode.
With the bombardment, the ammunition stored in the artillery positions gradually decreased. Hundreds of solid ball artillery shells continued to fly into the Ming army's array. The gunners' physical fitness even began to show insufficient, so much so that they had to replace the artillerymen.
Come forward and replace.
The fifth team of the artillery battalion, that is, the soldiers of the artillery transport team are constantly carrying more ammunition from the rear to the front to supplement the consumption of artillery.
For this strategic decisive battle, the artillery battalion prepared at least 5,000 rounds of artillery shells!
In addition to the ammunition transported with each artillery piece, the artillery battalion's artillery transport troops also carry ammunition. The standard for ammunition preparation is 300 rounds for each artillery.
If these artillery shells were piled up in the artillery position, they would be enough to pile up a hill!
In order to transport artillery and these ammunition, in addition to the artillery team itself and the artillery transport team, the baggage army also sent two additional teams to help.
In terms of numbers, in order for these ten artillery pieces to operate smoothly, the New Army of the Tang Dynasty employed more than 500 people to serve them, as well as nearly 200 horses!
Just by looking at these two numbers, you can see why artillery is a big money hog!
When the two armies were fighting, it was naturally impossible that the artillery of the New Army of the Tang Dynasty was firing all the time, and everyone else was watching the show. In fact, about a quarter of an hour after the artillery fired, the infantry of both sides made their first tentative contact.
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It is worth noting that this first wave of contact was not a battle between the main force of the Tang army and the main force of the Ming army, commanded by Li Xuan and actually commanded by Hao Bainian. It was the Ming army in the Tonggu Guard City who took the initiative to attack and tried to break through the attack led by Li Chunjing.
The two infantry battalions intercepted and merged with the main force of the Ming army.