The three warships in the midst of the fierce battle all noticed the British move, but because the British were still flying the American flag when they retreated, the French on the "Free Trade" still regarded them as Americans.

"When did the Americans sell their teammates like this?" Zola had some dealings with Americans before, and in his impression, although the Americans were a little rude, they were relatively honest, and all of them were thick-eyed and big-eyed, and they didn't look like people who were good at doing this thing.

But the British didn't care what they thought, they just accelerated and ran. As soon as they left, the whole situation of the battle immediately changed radically. The French fleet in the harbor began to leave the port, and the French immediately had one more frigate and three small gunboats on their side. Even counting only the number of ships, the French began to gain the upper hand.

Naturally, the USS America, which was approaching the "Free Trade", also noticed this change. Colonel Matthews, who was in charge, immediately realized that they had lost the battle, and that in the present situation, even without taking into account the reinforcements of the French, it would be difficult for his two ships to defeat the steamship of the French. Coupled with the reinforcements of the French, it was difficult to escape, not to mention winning.

But even so, the USS America had to approach first and open fire on the enemy ships in order to save the USS Capitol from being beaten and unable to fight back.

The distance between the two sides is getting closer and closer, and the "America" has approached more than 200 meters from the port side of the "Free Trade".

The nine cannons on the port side of the "Free Trade" had not been given a chance to fire before, and now that the enemy ships were approaching, they naturally opened fire on the "America".

At a distance of more than 200 meters, the rifled guns still achieved good results, and two of the nine shells successfully hit, and one of them hit the bow mast of the "America" very accurately.

The shell had an almost devastating effect. The bow mast is where the jib is hoisted, and in addition to providing most of the power to sail against the wind, it is also essential for the various maneuvers of the sailboat. Now, after a single shot, the stout bow mast snapped in two.

The broken bow mast fell directly into the sea. And this mast is also wrapped around a large number of cables, which are tied to sails and connected to other masts. It suddenly fell into the sea at high speed, and the cables that were still attached to it suddenly stretched straight and pulled the other masts of the ship to the right, and the bow of the ship suddenly tilted.

"Quick, cut the cable!" Matthews hurriedly ordered.

The Americans behaved quite well, and several sailors pounced on them with axes, and in a few quick axes cut the ropes, avoiding an even greater crisis. But after losing the bow mast, the speed of the USS America dropped significantly, and control became difficult.

"Signal to the 'Congress' for them to retreat." Faced with the current situation, Matthews issued a new order gloomily

"Now, let's fight desperately, hold off the enemy, and cover the retreat of the USS Capitol."

Matthews' order was sent out with a semaphore. But the "Congress" has also been beaten badly by the "Free Trade" at this time. And because it is significantly slower than the French in terms of speed, it is still a big question whether the "Parliament" will be able to escape.

But in fact, the "Free Trade" also faced a problem, that is, it had a limited number of shells.

The "Free Trade" uses a rear-loading rifled steel cannon, which uses shells that are different from ordinary shells, and has a much higher technical content. The kind of big iron balls used in other artillery can be made everywhere, but the shells used in rifled guns are not produced in the Americas. It all had to rely on the ship's own shells. One of these shells is one less. The Free Trade must also leave enough shells behind to keep it safe on the way back.

At the time of this voyage, the Navy's mission for the "Free Trade" was mainly to verify the ship's long-distance sailing ability, and it did not take into account that there would be so many battles. And they felt that as long as the speed was fast enough, the "Free Trade" would not be much dangerous, so they even deliberately brought a little less ammunition to fit more, which in their opinion would be more helpful for long-distance experiments.

So at this time, the Americans are certainly complaining, but the French are also anxious about their ammunition. Now the ammunition stock of the "Free Trade" has reached a dangerous line.

On the other hand, in the absence of high-explosive shells, it is almost impossible to sink a large ship like the USS America or the USS Capitol by just relying on solid shells. Even to reduce the requirements to the point of incapacitating enemy ships requires a very large number of shells. And the remaining shells of the "Free Trade", even if they want to achieve the second goal, may not be enough. So, now the USS Free Trade is faced with a choice, which of the two American cruisers to keep.

Captain Zola quickly made the decision to abandon the "Congress" and attack the "America" with all his might, leaving it as long as possible. This is not only because the "America" has suffered a certain amount of damage to its navigational ability, and it seems easier to keep her, but also because capturing a ship in the name "America" obviously sounds more powerful than capturing a ship in the name of "Congress".

In a sense, it is a bit stupid to use the name of a country or nation to name a consumable item such as a warship, which can easily be lost in war, or even in peacetime. Because ships of this type, once lost for some reason, are a huge blow to the morale of the entire country.

For example, in the later World War II, Sandezi stupidly named an attack ship used for death adventures "Deutschland" at the beginning, and then waited until the war began, and suddenly found that this cargo was going out to work, and it would probably not be long before the newspaper would publish the news "Germany sank" or "The Royal Navy sank Germany", you say how unlucky this is. If you don't go out to work, won't the boat be built in vain? In the end, Santoku had to change the name of the ship first, and then let her go out to work, thus successfully turning "German sinking" into "Lutzov sinking".

And Sandezi's ally Foot Basin Chicken also used the name of his own nation to name the battleship "Pressing the Dock", but when it was time to use it, he was worried that the loss of this thing would be too bad, and it turned out that this cargo was really pressing the dock most of the time.

So when the "Congress" tried to distance itself from the battle, the "Free Trade" did not catch up, but turned directly to the "America". Because he was very confident in his own defense, the "Free Trade" didn't even bother to grab the T position, and directly aimed his own side at the side of the "America". Of course, this will give the "America" more opportunities to shoot, but as a target, the projection area of the "America" in the direction of the side of the ship is also much larger than the direction of the bow, and the direction of movement of both sides is the same, and the hit rate of shooting at such a target will be much higher. Considering that the "Free Trade" is now short of shells, it is clear that every shell can be used more efficiently by attacking from this direction.

Taking advantage of the superiority in maneuverability, the "Free Trade" has always maintained a distance of about 50 meters from the "America", and at this distance, the artillery on the "Free Trade" can ensure a fairly high hit rate, while the cannons on the "America" cannot touch the suspended steel armor of the "Free Trade" at all.

In addition, the cannons on the "Free Trade" have an astonishing rate of fire compared to the artillery of this era, allowing them to fire at least three or four shots in the time that the opponent fires a cannon, so although there are only 9 guns on one side of the "Free Trade", the number of shells per unit time has exceeded that of the "America" in a perfect state, so after a few rounds of salvos, the gun compartment of the "America" is a mess, which can be said to be a river of blood.

The "America" tried to get up and ram the "Free Trade" more than once, but the "America", which had lost its bow smash, was quite clumsy in turning, and the steam-powered "Free Trade" was already more agile than her. Naturally, such a move will not lead to anything.

Soon, only two or three guns on the port side of the "America" were still firing, and the frequency of their fire had dropped considerably - apparently, even the remaining guns were estimated to have suffered casualties, so much so that the rate of fire was reduced.

Usually at this time, it is time to hang a flag of surrender on the opposite side.

"It's time for them to surrender, too." Captain Zola looked at the "America" not far away and sighed, "They have done their best, and now surrender is not a loss of honor." ”

At this time, on the mast of the "America", a small red flag in the shape of a long triangle was raised.

"They raised the St. George flag." Zola sighed, "Also, this ship is the 'America', and she must fight to the end no matter what." God forbid, we don't have a single warship called the 'France'. ”

"St. George's flag?" Victor, who was obviously not very familiar with these things in the navy, asked, "I remember that the flag of St. George should not be the flag of the red cross on a white background in England?" ”

"That's the flag of England." "But here in the navy there is another flag of St. George, which represents the courage and despair of the battleship. Well, it's the side over there. The meaning of that flag is to fight to the end and never surrender. ”

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