The walls of Xuzhou City were already covered with bomb craters. Li Laiheng stopped on one side of the battlefield and stationed his army near the tea city. He also dug trenches and built camps to confront Dorgon.
Dorgon did not allocate troops and focused on attacking Li Laiheng, who had more than 15,000 cavalry. He also considered that the support troops brought by Li Laiheng were almost all cavalry.
Even if the Qing army left its trench camp and took the initiative to attack, and happened to defeat the Dashun Army, they had no chance of annihilating Li Laiheng's troops. Instead, they might have left their fortifications and put themselves in an extremely dangerous situation.
.
Therefore, facing Li Laiheng's eager gaze, Dorgon's answer was to attack Xuzhou City with all his strength.
The Qing army's artillery fire bombarded the city with all its strength, dense rain of bullets filled the sky, and streaks of smoke and dust flew past, leaving a huge and shocking crater on the city walls and earthen forts of Xuzhou City.
The crumbling city seemed to be emitting an overwhelmed wail. Xu Du, who had organized gunmen and crossbowmen to shoot at Dorgon, was injured by the Qing army's firepower. He wrapped his arm and continued to cling to the city wall with all his strength.
Above, he led the local soldiers and civilians to repair the city wall during the break between battles.
Because the weather is getting warmer, the past method of using ice water to strengthen the city wall has lost its magical effect.
At this time, all the Dashun defenders could rely on was the joint efforts of all the soldiers and civilians in the city.
Ordinary people all rushed to the city wall, and everyone tried their best. This is no longer a problem. Men and women were lucky, even women, thinking of the massacre after the Qing army broke through the city, they all threw themselves into the war.
Yan Ermei, the most famous literary giant in Xuzhou, personally led hundreds of scribes who had the reputation of being a scholar and a scholar, and shouldered a large part of the important task of repairing the city wall fortifications.
The muddy sewage soaked through the silk clothes of the gentry. Some gentry could not bear such heavy and painful toil, and inevitably showed a look of surrender.
Yan Ermei rolled up his sleeves and tied up his hair in a high bun to prevent it from affecting his work. But it was also to preserve the "several stems of hair" on his head that Yan Ermei put down his relationship with Dashun.
The prejudice and hatred between the soldiers shouldered the responsibility of guarding Xuzhou City.
"Gentlemen, colleagues in Xuzhou City, the Donglu offensive is becoming more and more fierce day by day, and Pengcheng is already in danger. Give up resistance at this time, choose to surrender at this time, considering the heavy casualties of Donglu under the city, even if there are many
Ergon, can you restrain those beasts and let the soldiers and civilians of Xuzhou go?
The leader led his beasts to eat people. What happened to Cizhou, Daming, Puzhou, Yuncheng, and Juye? The whole city was massacred, and not a single soldier or civilian was left alive!
Even if one surrenders and abandons the righteousness of Confucius and Mencius, he still needs to shave his head, change his clothes, reward the Qing soldiers with his family property, and woo the Manchus with his wife and children.
Can anyone with a bit of blood really endure it?"
Yan Ermei's impassioned speech could not impress everyone. There was also a small group of gentry and literati. What they were thinking at this time was that even if the Qing army committed all kinds of evil and its brutality was beyond imagination, but...
But what about Nanming?
Although the foul atmosphere of the Nanming court has been widely known to everyone, it is completely different from the Eight Banners Army that was extremely murderous. Isn't surrendering to the Nanming court also a choice of loyalty?
Why do you have to suffer so much in Xuzhou city?
While everyone was talking, another terrible roar came from the city wall. As long as a red cannon shell happened to land on top of the fort or in the middle of the earthen wall, the soldiers and civilians in the city would hear the sound that sounded like the roar of Huang Zhongda.
Lu-like roar.
Then the city walls, houses, and the ground would all shake. Very few people in Xuzhou had experienced earthquakes. It was impossible to imagine how violent the Qing army's artillery fire was to have such an effect that was as powerful as the power of nature.
Isn't this a punishment from heaven?
Yan Ermei knew that he could not completely convince a small group of people with evil intentions, so he specially arranged a group of militiamen to keep an eye on those gentry, as long as he ensured that the manpower in the city could be fully mobilized.
Xuzhou City's military resources could support the King of Jin to relieve the siege.
Yan Ermei thought this way, but suddenly a wave of cheers and cheers came from the depressed and dilapidated streets in the city.
He was immersed in the work of organizing civilians to repair the city defenses, and had not noticed the changes in the battle situation outside the city for several days. He only knew that a light cavalry led by Li Laiheng himself had arrived at the outskirts of Xuzhou, and now this cheer...?
In the distance, Gu Kecheng rode on horseback and led another team of horses that had weathered the weather and smoke, entering the city from the new city gate of Xuzhou South Pass. The cavalry team entering the city, under the banner of the left army, was small in number and looked similar.
Everyone was injured, and it must have taken a lot of effort to break into the city.
However, Xuzhou had been besieged by the enemy for five days. At the moment when people's hearts were floating, reinforcements suddenly entered the city. Even though their number was very small, it was immediately inspiring and Yan Ermei couldn't help but smile brightly.
"Three walls! Three walls!"
Those veterans who were familiar with the military system of the Dashun Army all recognized the identity of this cavalry team from the reinforcement flags and orders. At the front of the team, apart from Gu Kecheng who came to greet them, there was another Zhang Hong.
He is one of the generals of the Three Walls Cavalry of the Dianzuo Army.
Zhang Hong was a cavalry commander sent by Liu Fangliang. He led a group of light cavalry and was ordered to move south of Xuzhou City. In the process, he encountered some interceptions by Manchu soldiers and the Northern Expeditionary Army of the Southern Ming Dynasty. However, in general, the enemy's encirclement network in the south was quite fragile.
The Qing army's forces were mainly concentrated in the west and north of Xuzhou City, and the south side of Xuzhou City was mainly responsible for the Ming army that had just arrived on the battlefield.
Compared with the Northern Expedition strength of the Southern Ming army and the Qing army and the Shun army, there was a big gap.
So Zhang Hong simply led this team of light cavalry, broke through the blockade of the Nanming army, and rushed into Xuzhou City.
He was a brave general. Regarding the Nanming officers and soldiers who tried to intercept Dashun's army, Zhang Hong maliciously used Li Laiheng's words to taunt him:
"These officers and soldiers... Bah! Our Dashun army is the official army now. It should be said that these new auxiliary troops of Donglu, these puppet troops of Donglu, seem to have a large number of people and excellent armor, but when it comes to hand-to-hand
Only later will we discover that their combat effectiveness is not even as good as our militia.
Except for the troops who came from the Yongwei camp, which were relatively resistant to fighting, the other troops could only shoot a few arrows into the sky, which seemed to be worthy of the royal rations and royalties paid by Hongguang.
It’s simply out of shape!”
Zhang Hong brought reinforcements into the city and his feat of easily defeating the Nanming army's interception and blockade gave the defenders a shot in the arm, whose morale and morale were shaken.
The whole city turned into a sea of joy again, and Gu Kecheng also confirmed the detailed military information that Li Laiheng had stationed troops on the front line of Tea City to confront the Qing army.
He put down his worries. After all, judging from Gu Kecheng's understanding of Li Laiheng, if the temptation was big enough - for example, annihilating most of the Manchus' capable men at once - the Jin King would always be willing to pay a sufficient price.
Before this, Gu Kecheng was still somewhat worried that the people of Xuzhou City would unfortunately become the price Li Laiheng had to pay!
"The King of Jin has arrived at the tea city, and the battle is about to begin. There is no need to worry too much about Gu Jing's strategy."
With Zhang Hong's assurance, Gu Kecheng was completely relieved. Especially when he learned that Li Laiheng had brought the most elite troops of the Dashun Army, more than 80,000 people, he was even more convinced that the victory of the battle was completely dependent on Dashun.
Military hand.
Zhang Hong said with a hurt smile:
"Gu Jinglue, the King of Jin asked me to tell you that in the past few days, the city must be extremely careful about Dorgon's dog jumping over the wall. At the same time, the cavalry and field troops must be well rested. Once the armies outside the city gather,
, the King of Jin would choose a weak point in the enemy's defense line and concentrate all his forces to defeat the Eastern captives in one fell swoop.
At that time, the combatable troops in the city will also need to cooperate with the inside and outside to attack the clearing troops with the reinforcements outside the city."