Section 92: The First Battle of Stone Mountain

Because ten people are tied up in a team, and if they are not careful, they will fall to the ground together, so the porridge is distributed among the people. The bowl that Jiang Yougong got was very light to start, and if you looked closely, it was a coconut shell. The man poured a spoonful of ginger soup into everyone's bowl.

This was obviously because he was afraid that they would get sick, and Jiang Yougong knew that the thief would never want them to die, so he was relieved to drink the soup boldly and fell to sleep.

"Master," the soldier who tied him to him whispered, "why did the thief take off our clothes?" ”

"You don't necessarily have to be a rabbit," Mr. Jiang said. He also felt suspicious, and had not heard of what the thieves were going to do when the captives were to be stripped naked. Besides, the gowns were all lost under the earthen embankment, and I didn't take them.

According to Jia Mofei, who was in charge of logistics and transshipment, the unsuccessful sneak attack provided more than 300 healthy prisoners.

"Tomorrow, as soon as the rain stops, they will be loaded onto the ship and transported back to Lingao." Jia Mofei said, "I am afraid that if I go by land, I will be intercepted by the official army rangers." Anyway, there are ships, and it is fast and convenient to transport people. ”

"Dressed with the wounded?"

"Of course not, the wounded have another ship, the conditions of the captive ship are much worse, there is a large cabin under the deck, and the upper grid hatch cover is closed. It's only half a day anyway. ”

The fiasco of the entire night attack almost happened under the noses of He Rubin and others, and the swaying pillars of light on the earthen embankment, the rows of guns and the huge voices of people all made the general extremely uneasy. The fact that the thief's firearm could fire like it on a rainy day no longer shocked him. The sudden brightness of the snow and the white pillars of light that roamed the dark sky and fields on a rainy night were far beyond his comprehension. He Rubin's hands and feet are cold: How can this battle be fought?

Ye Zhengfang and Yan Zunhe, who fled back, added many details, including that the enemy was obviously prepared, and the enemy's lights were extremely bright. All of a sudden, the officers and men were so dizzy that they couldn't even open their eyes......

There was a long silence on the entire tower. Everyone is wondering: how else can this battle be fought? Everyone expects someone else to come up with a solution.

"Adults and students thought that they should stick to the village" Qian Taichong never found a chance to speak, but now he finally has the opportunity to speak. In a few battles today, he watched from the top of the city. The battle gave him a great stimulus. The thief's "sharp firearms" and tactics left a deep impression.

Obviously, the thief is not Zheng Zhilong, Liu Xiang and the like, but he is good at naval warfare, and he is by no means inferior in foot combat. He realized that the number of bandit infantry engaged in the battle today was not large, but in the face of so many officers and soldiers fighting so tenaciously on the wall, it was obvious that they did not rely only on the words "sharp firearms".

Could it be that overseas thieves like thieves also have a sense of loyalty? He immediately dismissed his opinion. According to the Tang Daily, most of the thieves were wigs thrown by "Fujian and Guangdong traitors" and "traitors". Is there loyalty to such a fatherless and kingless person? It must be the real promise of heavy profits that makes them so willing to forget about death.

He felt a little relieved at the thought of this. In Qian Taichong's view, the word "loyalty" has nothing to do with barbarianism. After the battle, he knew that his "Six Strategies for Dealing with the Aftermath" would not be of any use for a while—there was very little certainty that he would continue to attack tomorrow and win. He had already calculated in his heart, and when he heard that He Rubin didn't want to stand up, he felt that he needed to come out and speak.

According to him: The two sides set up a village against each other, which is beneficial to the officials and the army, after all, He Rubin has the power of the whole province to support him, and the thieves have only one county, and Lingao is a barren place with few people. The 10,000-strong army of thieves is concentrated in Chengmai, and a lot of manpower is needed to transport grain and grass, and the supply will inevitably be difficult after a long time. Hold on for several months, and when the thief's food and grass gradually become unsustainable, they will inevitably be chaotic without a fight.

“…… No matter how strong the artillery fire of the thieves is, there are only more than 20 people. You can't always bombard our village with artillery. We have a large number of soldiers, and we can recruit more dead soldiers with heavy money, and plunder the grain of thieves, and over time, the thieves will be in chaos without a fight."

In fact, this plan is still the old-fashioned strategy of holding on to the army. He Rubin originally just listened to this young scholar's proposal, but now he suddenly ignited hope: yes, but it was originally the opportunity of the governor to retreat from the enemy in Changwei. It's just that the original Jihua was preparing to besiege the enemy camp in Bopu, and Zuihou forced him to retreat. Now it's time to change the place to Chengmai -

However, in order to hold on to the thieves for a long time, it is necessary to ensure the safety of grain transshipment. Once there is a shortage of food in the army, the morale of the army fluctuates, and the collapse of the 100,000-strong army is only an instant.

He held a meeting with the generals and asked everyone to dig trenches and hold on, preparing to hold on to the thieves for a long time. Shishan is an important grain station between Qiongshan and Chengmai, He Rubin strictly obeyed the order to take 2,000 men and horses there to protect the grain platform and the military grain transportation along the way, and sent staff to Qiongshan to sit on the grain and grass transshipment. He also wrote a letter to Wang Zunde, reporting that the official army had relieved the siege of Chengmai and captured a lot of thieves, but the thieves had formed a village to defend with firearms, and the officers and soldiers could not succeed in repeated attacks. As for the food and wages, we must also hurry up the transshipment.

Early the next morning, the officers and troops did not launch a full-scale attack as expected, but the whole army went out to dig trenches and fortifications under the city of Chengmai.

He Ming saw that the officers and soldiers were busy reinforcing the fortifications, and knew that the enemy had lost his sharpness, and did not dare to come out to fight again, and was ready to fight with them for a long time. This is certainly a good thing, but the enemy's 20,000 horse hedgehogs are gathered together, and all of his own troops are less than half of the opponent's, and I am afraid it will be difficult to form an effective encirclement.

"Our army cannot fight with the enemy in Chengmai for a long time. As a result of the stalemate war, we suffer. At the operational meeting, Dongmen Fuyu said, "Although the enemy has backward logistical means, he has the financial and material support of the whole province of Guangdong, and as long as Wang Zunde is willing, he can confront us as long as he wants." This is disastrous for our finances. ”

"It turned out that I was expecting He Rubin to attack again today, cripple his main force, and take the opportunity to defeat his entire army, it seems that there is no hope." He Ming shook his head and said, "Now we have to fight a siege battle." ”

It is certainly not uncommon in the history of warfare for a side with fewer people to besiege a side with more people, but the strength of the Fubo army is too small after all. He Ming was very worried about this.

At this time, the special investigation team sent a report that about 2,000 men and horses had left the camp and moved in the direction of Qiongshan.

"The enemy is about to start retreating?"

"No, He Rubin categorically didn't dare to retreat." He Ming judged, "He is rushing to repair the fortifications like this because he wants to confront us for a long time. This group of men and horses was most likely used to defend the grain station. ”

"The enemy may also be Ming Xiu Plank Road." Someone reminded.

"It's possible. But since the enemy wants to protect the grain route, we will cut off the grain route. He Ming looked at the map and made up his mind. Call me the 1st and 4th Infantry Battalions."

Just after noon, He Rubin and others were planning to arrange a fortification system. Suddenly, I received a report from Tanma: it was said that thousands of thieves had cut off the avenue between Chengmai and Shishan, and Yan Zunhe's department was defeated, and now he was fleeing in the direction of Chengmai

"Where's General Yan?"

"Life and death are unknown," Tanma said in a trembling voice, "There is no banner of General Yan in the rout. ”

"Revisited" He Rubin lost color for a while, and the thief unexpectedly cut off the road in the rear, and he immediately ordered the Chinese army to garrison the guerrilla Sun Changzuo to take 500 men and horses to collect the rout along the way according to his great order. Later, he ordered Zhao Ruyi and the main generals to come to the meeting to discuss.

"As soon as General Yan is defeated, our army is in danger," He Rubin said in a deep voice, "The enemy army will break General Yan's headquarters, and when he turns around, he will attack Shishan and seize my grain platform."

The thief defeated Yan Zunhe's subordinates in one fell swoop, and the next step must be to attack and occupy Shishan. With only 500 troops to defend the mountain, the enemy can defeat the 2,000 people, and it is not difficult to capture the mountain. As soon as the stone mountain lost its grain, the road was cut off. As soon as the grain route is broken, the collapse of the whole army is imminent

This terrifying prospect sent chills down the shoulders of all those present.

He Rubin immediately arranged the defense of each battalion and ordered all armies to guard the camp and not to run around in a noisy manner, let alone withdraw from the defensive ground without authorization.

"Generals, now we are in a place of unforeseen circumstances" He Rubin said sharply, "Our camp is firmly entrenched, and the overall situation has not yet reached the time of irretrievability, the thieves are just relying on the excellent equipment, and the thieves have less food and less food, and our army can turn defeat into victory as long as they recapture the stone mountain and protect the grain road."

At that moment, he ordered the Fubiao battalion stationed in Xiaoyingchang to guerrilla Sha Jianbi and immediately lead the whole army to withdraw from Xiaoyingchang.

"You will take the men and horses of your headquarters to the stone mountain, defeat the thief, and ensure the safety of the stone mountain." He Rubin said, "If the enemy takes the stone mountain, you must also take it back." ”

"The humble general understands" Sha Jianbi knows the severity.

"I'll give you another 2,000 men."

Sha Jianbi has just led the men and horses to dispatch. The bad news soon came: Shi Shan had fallen and after the thieves broke through Yan Zun's headquarters, they immediately turned back and captured Shi Shan, taking all the military rations stored in Shi Shan.

"Three thousand thieves have lined up in Stone Mountain" Tanma came again to report, "and there are cannons"

"Cannon?"

"Yes, according to the rout, the thief has a number of cannons, and it is extremely powerful. General Yan didn't know that he had a cannon, so he was caught off guard and was killed by the artillery."

He Rubin didn't want to hear it again, and this series of bad news made him almost despair. However, he managed to maintain his composure and continued to deploy his forces in case the thieves took advantage of the chaos to besiege his camp. Because he heard that the enemy had artillery, he ordered Li Guangsu to bring 2,000 men to reinforce Sha Jianbi later.

Sha Jianbi led 3,000 men to open the camp gate and hurriedly followed the post road to Stone Mountain. Of course, such a big movement can't hide from the observation post and the special investigators. A few minutes later, the 1st and 4th Infantry Battalions, which had formed positions near Stone Mountain, received the news.

Zhu Mingxia and Xiong Maozhang, commander of the 1st Infantry Battalion, were cleaning the battlefield and building fortifications. The two infantry battalions received the order early in the morning and immediately rushed to the rocky mountain at a rapid marching speed. Xiong Maozhang's 1st Battalion seized the Ming army camp in Shishan with the shelling of three 12-pounder mountain howitzers and a resolute bayonet charge, captured more than 300 prisoners, and captured 780,000 catties of grain stored in the grain station and several hundred chicken carts transporting grain. The 1st Infantry Battalion then lined up at the foot of the rocky mountain.

The 2,000 men and horses led by Yan Zunhe rushed all the way, and were constantly harassed and sniped by the special reconnaissance team on the way. Several generals were killed. The hearts of the people are in turmoil. Fortunately, the soldiers knew that this was going in the direction of Qiongshan, and everyone rushed desperately as long as they could reach Shishan, they would have more chances to live. Yan Zunhe urged the troops to march all the way because he had to rush to Shishan before the thieves completed the garrison, and the infantry fell behind a lot. Zuihou he rushed to Stone Mountain with only 1,200 people.

The red flag was unfurled, and a gray battle line was already waiting at the foot of the stone mountain. Yan Zunyu saw that the enemy had not yet built a camp, and only a trench was there to cover the whole army, and the number of soldiers was only about 1,000. But he has no superiority in troops. He had already seen the advantage of the thief's firearms yesterday, and it was very small to win immediately.

He retreated to a hill on the opposite side of the rocky mountain, ready to set up camp and wait for the arrival of the follow-up troops.

But the Fubo Army had no time to give him this opportunity. At 11 o'clock at noon, accompanied by two 12-pounder mountain howitzers, Zhu Mingxia commanded the 4th Infantry Battalion to launch a fierce attack on Yan Zunhe's troops with a company column from the flank of Shishan.

Yan Zunyu was caught off guard -- under the constant harassment and shielding of the special reconnaissance team, he was unable to grasp the movements of the enemy forces in the vicinity. At this moment, the men were sleepy and the morale of the soldiers was low, and suddenly a new army came out from the flank, and he hurriedly ordered a thousand generals to take 300 men to meet the battle, in order to temporarily delay the enemy's momentum and buy time to line up.

These 300 men were defeated in an engagement under the onslaught of the 4th Battalion, and Yan Zunhe had no choice but to personally lead the main force to meet the battle. His men and horses could not withstand the firepower of the Fubo army and were forced to retreat, Ye Zhengfang took his own soldiers to supervise the battle everywhere, barely maintaining the order of the men and horses, but all the soldiers and horses were still forced to retreat to the foot of the stone mountain.

The 4th Battalion was like a hammer, and the 1st Battalion, which was formed in a horizontal formation at the foot of the mountain, was an anvil, and the more than 1,000 hungry soldiers could not withstand such a front and rear attack, and the whole army was crushed at the foot of the stone mountain. The remaining seven or eight hundred men were taken prisoner. Only the soldiers who straggle escaped.

Xiong Maozhang sat on a low wall at the foot of the rocky hill smoking pipes, and his soldiers stripped naked and dug trenches, which had to be further deepened and widened to effectively contain the onslaught of the enemy. In the distance, the ground was littered with knives, guns, weapons, armor and flags that had been captured from the battlefield. The bare-ass captives, tied up in strings, were being escorted to the original Ming military camp on the mountain. There is now the temporary headquarters of 2 battalions.

Zhu Mingxia rode a captured jujube red Mongolian horse back and forth, which was a general's mount, very miraculous. Zhu Mingxia has dark skin and short shaved hair. It looks like a very tough look. What hung on his waist was not the standard Fubo Army Army officer's command knife, but the folding pattern steel Tang knife that he himself customized in the old time and space, and it was beautifully decorated.

"It's a good horse." He rode his horse to the side of the low wall, turned over and dismounted, "It's just that the harness is not good, and I am not used to the old-fashioned saddle." ”

"We are infantry officers," Xiong Maozhang spat out smoke rings, "you don't want to be dragoons." ”

"I want to be a horse, don't I." Zhu Mingxia patted the horse regretfully, and asked a captured officer and soldier to take the horse away and send it to the stockade on the mountain.

"It was said on the radio that another 5,000 officers and soldiers had come, 3,000 in front and 2,000 in the rear. We had a total of 1,080 people, and we had 100 casualties just now. ”

"It's not a big problem." Zhu Mingxia opened his map bag and spread out the map, "The enemy is in a hurry and uses the most taboo tactics to add oil. We'll just keep beating him up and wait for work. Three thousand against one thousand eight, we still have a chance to win. ”

All in all, the tactics remain the same. The 1st Infantry Battalion relied on simple field fortifications to defend it, attracting officers and men to storm the front, and after the battle entered a stalemate, the 4th Infantry Battalion fought out from the flank, directly swept its flank, and crushed it. As long as there is a strong shield of the officers and soldiers by the special reconnaissance team, it will be difficult for the officers and men to discover such a simple tactical coordination. They could only rush like blind men on blind horses to the predetermined positions of the 1st Battalion, and then hit their heads and broke the bloodstream.

"As long as we don't let them go to Qiongshan, we don't have to wipe them out, and the prisoners don't have to be caught in a hurry - we can't deal with them if we catch too much. This official army camp is still there, let the defeated soldiers flee to Chengmai and let He Rubin send someone to contain it. Crippled the troops, it was a frightened bird that would not be useful at all, but would drag down the morale of his entire army. ”

"That's it," Xiong Maozhang nodded, "How much ammunition do you have now?" I'm running out of ammunition, only a hundred rounds per infantryman. ”

"I'll give you twenty rounds each. I am an assault force, and fifty rounds for one person is enough. When the time comes, the bayonet will be red directly," Zhu Mingxia said and wrote a note, taking care of the orderly: "Go, give the battalion quartermaster, and let him send 20,000 rounds of ammunition immediately." ”

"It's a pity that there aren't enough shells, and we're still a little less manned."

Although the four 12-pounder mountain howitzers that played a decisive role in the battle were light and could be easily dragged by a few people, the weight of the shells and gunpowder was not small, and more than half of them had been consumed in the battle just now.

"It's okay, and grenades." Zhu Mingxia is very confident, in his opinion, having artillery is nothing more than a smoother battle and fewer casualties, but there is no suspense about the outcome of the battle.

"The two battalion commanders have found the body of the Ming general." A corporal came in a hurry to report.

"Oh? Go and see" Zhu Mingxia suddenly came to his senses, and the two of them walked towards the sanitation team that was cleaning the battlefield together.

A corpse in armor was lying on a stretcher, looking like it was about thirty or forty years old. The armor on his body is very exquisite, it should be a kind of scale armor, not the rough iron armor that the infantry wears, only connected with iron sheets, he and Xiong Maozhang know very little about the armor, but from the pattern, decoration and brocade used for the trim of the armor, we know that this armor is by no means available to ordinary officers, and it must be a general.

At that moment, a few people were found from the surrendered troops and generals to identify, and they quickly recognized that this was the Huizhou general Yan Zunyu who came to reinforce the grain station.