Brave

The "old ironclad" turned the rudder suddenly, almost towards it

The "Free Trade" collided, and the distance between the two sides quickly approached.

"Lean in. Hit them in the face! Captain Hull shouted loudly, cheering up his men.

The Americans of this era also properly belong to the fighting nation, basically the whole people are red-necked, and they generally believe in the creed of not being cowardly, that is, recklessness.

Although the French Rao first round of shelling caused them heavy losses, it did not dampen their morale, but seemed to have the effect of stimulating anger.

The distance between the two battleships quickly approached, from about a hundred meters to eighty meters...... Sixty meters...... Forty meters...... Captain Hull was about to give the order for a salvo as he counted the distance, but the Frenchman on the opposite side fired another volley.

The superiority of the rate of fire of the rear-loading guns was unmistakable, and in fact, if it weren't for the lack of skill of the gunners, they would have been able to fire this round of salvos more quickly.

Now the distance between the two sides is less than forty meters, and even with the use of old-fashioned artillery, it will not be missed.

So in this round of salvos,

All nine cannons of the "Free Trade" hit the target. Unlike the last round of shelling, when the French spared the United States

How high the defense of the "super cruiser" is is not very stable, so special armor-piercing shells are used.

As a result, some armor-piercing shells clearly had the problem of excessive power, and as a result, they did not achieve the maximum lethal effect.

So during this round of firing, Captain Zola ordered the shells to be replaced with armor-piercing personnel to kill Sha. This kind of shell is still a solid shell, because the fuse of a reliable high-explosive shell used in the cannon has not been able to get out, until now, the reliability of this thing has never been reliable, and there have even been more than one accident in the experiment where the fuse was activated when it was fired, and then the shell blew the barrel open.

The armor-piercing officer killed Sha is actually a long pig iron cylinder, but there are several deep grooves in the front part of this cylinder, and the entire bullet body is also full of deep grooves.

In the process of penetrating the ship's plank, such shells will create a large number of stress concentration points due to the presence of these trenches, and as a result, fracture and fragmentation will occur.

Although it still can't be compared to high-explosive shells in terms of power, compared to armor-piercing shells that are prone to one shot and two holes, once this thing penetrates the opponent's shipboard, it will cause much more damage.

So the losses for the Americans in this salvo were even greater. This round of shelling almost let

The gunners in the lower gun deck of the "Constitution" were reduced by a third. But the morale of the United States was not beaten down by this round of shelling.

The "Constitution" continued to approach until it reached about thirty meters.

"Fire!" Captain Hull shouted.

Many of the cannons on the two-tier gun deck on the "Constitution" had already been damaged in the first two rounds of shelling, and more importantly, the crew had suffered heavy losses, which made many of the cannons no longer under their control.

Of the twenty-three cannons, only eighteen were fired. But Captain Hull was confident that even with only eighteen guns, this round of shelling would be a heavy blow to the French.

Because at such a distance, it is almost impossible for them to shoot short. But reality gave them a heavy blow, and although not a single American was killed, it knocked down the morale of the United States at once - the shells fired by the Americans were all there

The "Free Trade" bounced back on the external steel plate. Plopped and fell into the sea. At such a close distance, it is impossible to penetrate the hull of the French ** ship, which is basically announcing an artillery bombardment or something, which is already useless, and their cannons will not be able to penetrate the hull of the French ** ship anyway.

"Lean in! Lean in! Get ready for a jumper! Captain Hull yelled. Since the artillery battle does not have the upper hand, then the jump battle is the only hope for a turnaround - now the smoke coming out of the chimney of the French ** ship is getting thicker and thicker, and their steam engine will soon be ready to use, and they will definitely not be able to jump out of escape.

Now, rush over and wrap the cables around the foremast and the opponent's foremast, then fight it out in close hand-to-hand combat.

This is indeed the time of the year,

The only chance for the Constitution to win.

In the ideal mode of combat envisaged by the "Free Trade", hand-to-hand combat should be avoided as much as possible. This is also normal, to be able to win by walking the dog and flying a kite, why should you engage in a broadside battle?

But that doesn't mean

The "Free Trade" will not be able to fight a broadside war. Even for the broadside battle,

The "Free Trade Number" has also made some special preparations. At first, it was proposed that it should be equipped in the bow and stern as in the same way as the clippers

"Greek fire". But everyone soon found out that the battleship was equipped with Greek fire, and many times, it would be very dangerous, such as looking for grapeshotfire from the opposing warship

The "Greek fire" may not necessarily set its ship on fire. So it was equipped on battleships

The proposal of the "Greek fire" was rejected. But another proposal was applied, and that was to equip it on warships

"Broadsword" to deal with the enemies who jump in the gang. So in many places on the free trade number, such as masts and the like, they were hung

"This square facing the whole deck is all here

Under the cover of the "broadsword".

The "Constitution" leaned up,

The American troops on the "Constitution", led by Captain Hull, who wielded a sharp sword, rushed up

The deck of the "Free Trade". Not a single Frenchman on deck could be seen. This made Captain Hull instinctively feel bad.

But now the situation is already a tiger - can you still go back like Sima Yi?

Now I can only go all the way to the dark, all the way to the end.

"Follow me!" Captain Hull shouted as he brandished his sword as he led his soldiers in the direction of the tail tower, and some of them fired indiscriminately at the tail tower.

Just as Captain Hull and the others were almost rushing to the tail building, there was an explosion

The deck of the "Free Trade" rang out, and countless iron balls swept across the deck like a storm, and those rushed up

Not a single American soldier on the deck of the "Free Trade" was knocked to the ground.

The "Constitution" had a total crew of 400 people, and in the previous artillery battle, they had already paid hundreds of casualties, and at this time, on the deck of the Free Trade, nearly 100 people fell at once.

What's even worse is that these nearly 100 people are almost the entire one

On the "Constitution", almost the most combat-ready personnel. And the captain and first mate are all missing Zheng today

The USS Constitution suffered nearly half of its casualties, and it had lost its command, so it could have been completely in disarray.

At this time, the soldiers of the brigade poured out of various hatches on the deck at once. They were armed with the latest revolvers or double-barreled shotguns

The USS Constitution killed the past. now

The remaining forces on the "Constitution" were no longer enough to withstand these French attacks, and soon,

Several of the most critical positions on the "Constitution" were contained, with the Americans below deck and the French throwing melons directly through the hatch.

After a burst of melons, the American cry was heard below: "Don't lose it, we surrender!" "After the fighters took control of all the key positions on the entire ship, the figures of the battle losses of both sides were also counted.

In this battle, the French lost eleven men, all of whom were on board

Killed in the battle that followed the USS Constitution. Twenty-six people were wounded, most of whom were also on board

In the battle after the "Constitution", only one guy fell on the deck on his side, and then the palm of his hand was slashed by an American bayonet dropped on the ground.

The U.S. military lost 222 people in the battle, and most of the remaining 100 people were wounded to varying degrees, and only two people were really intact.

"Hey, Captain, win pretty." After seeing this number, Victor congratulated Captain Zola.

"The main thing is that they have misjudged our strength, and once this miscalculation occurs, they will not be able to turn back. In fact, I was thinking that the command of the American captain just now was actually not too much of a problem, and his decisiveness and resoluteness were also very admirable. If it hadn't been for us, even if it was a first-class battleship like the Victory, he would have performed much better. At this time, Zola began to sing praises for the American captain who died in battle.

However, this is also normal, and in general, it is always good to praise the enemy. If I am defeated, it is not because I am incompetent, but because the enemy is too strong; If you win, then you have to brag about how tough the enemy is, otherwise, it took a lot of effort to win a group of s13s, so what is glorious?

"This boat is okay, right?" Victor looked at the seized

"Constitution," asked.

"It's a good boat, and although it suffered some damage during the battle, it's a good ship when it's repaired. Well, we're not far from Santo Domingo, and we can take the boat to Santo Domingo as well. Captain Zola said,

"But we were attacked by the U.S. ** ship here, and I think the situation on Santo Domingo's side has probably changed somewhat. Mr. Treville, I wonder if these changes will cause trouble for your mission. ”

"Ah," Victor,

"Thank you for your concern. You're right, most of Santo Domingo has had some things going on that isn't going our way. But isn't that why I'm here to deal with this situation? In addition, your victory today is really helpful for my mission. I am confident that, with your victory today and the sincerity of France for peace and development, Governor Toussaint-Louvitur should be able to make a rational choice. ”