"Commander, if there are no more reinforcements, we will withdraw. Our 88th Division fought here for three days, and for three whole days, two divisions of the Japanese army attacked the Yuhuatai position, and only one division of our 88th Division defended us. ”

A colonel came to Sun Yuanliang and complained.

Of course, this is what belongs to the blind ghosts, and the 74th Army is in a position next to them.

Of course, compared to Sun Yuanliang still flirting with a few prostitutes at this time, this blind ghost doesn't seem to be a big deal.

The officers and soldiers of the 88th Division fought bloody battles on the front line, but Sun Yuanliang, as the army commander, flirted with prostitutes here, as if he was commanding the army to fight.

It is estimated that the soldiers who fought bloodily below knew the news, and they were so angry that they picked up their guns and came to Sun Yuanliang to settle accounts.

"Junzao, now the Yuhuatai position is in danger, this Nanjing City can no longer be defended, we have to make plans as soon as possible!"

"Plan ahead?" Sun Yuanliang sent away a few prostitutes, and then said dissatisfiedly, "What are you going to do?" The ships in the port have been looted by Tang Shengzhi's bastard, can we still cross the river? ”

"Junzao, if Yuhuatai is lost, there is no danger to rely on Zhonghua Gate, and it is a matter of time before Nanjing is lost. As soon as Nanjing misses, more than 100,000 troops in Nanjing will rush to Xiaguan, if we don't plan early, so many routs will pour into Xiaguan, how can we retreat? ”

At this moment, there was a sudden sound of hurried footsteps outside, and a soldier covered in blood came to the military headquarters and said in a lost voice to Sun Yuanliang.

"Military seat, the Yuhuatai position has been lost!"

"What?" Sun Yuanliang was shocked, "What about Brigade Commander Gao and Brigade Commander Zhu?" ”

The Gao Brigade Commander in Sun Yuanliang's mouth is Gao Zhisong, the commander of the 264 Brigade, and the Brigade Commander Zhu is Zhu Chi, the commander of the 262 Brigade.

"All dead, most of the thousands of brothers in the two brigades are finished!" The man who came cried loudly.

Hearing that the brigade commanders of the two brigades were killed in battle, and the officers and soldiers below were killed and wounded, Sun Yuanliang was taken aback and hurriedly commanded his side.

"Quick, we must guard the Zhonghua Gate, and we can't let the Japanese army break through the Zhonghua Gate!"

"Yes!"

After the irrelevant people left, Sun Yuanliang looked at a few cronies around him, hesitated for a while and said, "Come on, you go and gather your respective troops and go to Xiaguan with me, Nanjing City can't be defended, I don't want to die in Nanjing City." Don't forget to bring those boxes with me! ”

Those boxes are naturally the belongings that Sun Yuanliang collected during this time, and there are several large boxes, and I don't know what they contain.

"Yes!"

With Sun Yuanliang's order, these cronies ran fast, as if they had rehearsed many times in advance, so skilled.

After a while, while the remnants of the two brigades were holding on to Zhonghua Gate, their commander Sun Yuanliang ran away with his cronies.

However, in the end, Sun Yuanliang failed to escape to Xiaguan because he was blocked back by Song Xilian's 78th Army.

Song Xilian's 78th Army (actually a 36th Division) was responsible for defending Xiaguan, including Rujiangmen, which was an important passage connecting the city of Nanjing to the Xiaguan wharf.

Sun Yuanliang was blocked back by Song Xilian's troops before he left the city, not that Sun Yuanliang did not dare to break through, but that Song Xilian ordered machine gun fire and directly killed dozens of Sun Yuanliang's troops.

Originally, Song Xilian looked down on Sun Yuanliang, but now the front-line soldiers are fighting bloodily, and the head of the first army actually ran away.

In Song Xilian's view, Sun Yuanliang is a deserter, so he is naturally not welcome. Even if he shot and killed the other party, he had a valid reason, he didn't get the order to retreat, and Sun Yuanliang just ran away, isn't it retreating without permission?

And Sun Yuanliang saw Song Xilian shoot directly, and he didn't give any face, so he had no choice but to withdraw to Zhonghua Gate.

At the same time, the 74th Army was also blocked back by Song Xilian, because the 74th Army sent people to build a pontoon bridge and wanted to cross the river.

However, the news of the loss of the Yuhuatai position also spread to the Nanjing Garrison Headquarters, and Tang Shengzhi was immediately anxious, Yuhuatai was lost, and the Zhonghua Gate was in danger, how could this be defended?

No way.

Tang Shengzhi directly called Lao Jiang, saying that Yuhuatai was lost, Zhonghua Gate was in danger, and Nanjing might not be able to hold it, so he decided to retreat at night.

Lao Jiang saw that Tang Shengzhi was going to give up Nanjing and retreat, and he immediately became anxious.

I won the battle two days ago, why can't I stop it all of a sudden?

However, Tang Shengzhi was resolute, Lao Jiang couldn't do it, so he called directly, so that Tang Shengzhi could retreat when he couldn't defend. But Lao Jiang still added, that is, from the political aspect, I hope that Nanjing can hold for a longer period of time.

In the same way, Lao Jiang also sent letters to Luo Zhuoying, Liu Xing and others, but Tang Shengzhi didn't care, with Lao Jiang's written order, what was he afraid of.

So Tang Shengzhi ordered a meeting of all army commanders and division commanders in the city, nominally to discuss the current battle situation in Nanjing, but in fact to arrange retreat.

However, Tang Shengzhi asked everyone at the beginning of the meeting if they could continue to hold on, and then none of the generals below answered, looked at each other, and then bowed their heads and remained silent.

Song Xilian hesitated for a while and wanted to speak, but seeing that so many colleagues didn't speak, he finally sighed and stopped talking.

Tang Shengzhi was not surprised by the reaction of these generals, so he took out Lao Jiang's order and said to the generals, "Now the enemy has surrounded the capital. The capital is the location of the mausoleum of the father of the nation, and at this time of great enemy, if Nanjing does not sacrifice one or two generals, we will be sorry for the spirit of the prime minister in the sky, and even more sorry for our supreme commander. I have always advocated defending Nanjing and fighting the enemy to the end!

However, the chairman of the committee issued an order for us to withdraw from Nanjing as soon as possible, which made Tang and me a little embarrassed. Since everyone has no opinion on whether they can continue to hold on, why not discuss whether this Nanjing will be defended or not? ”

After speaking, Tang Shengzhi looked at everyone, and finally Luo Zhuoying and Liu Xing both said that they could abandon it. In fact, they also received orders from Lao Chiang, who hoped that they could continue to hold on, but also gave an order that they could retreat.

And the two didn't have much confidence in holding Nanjing, so they chose to abandon it in the end.

Regarding the views of the two, more than 20 division commanders and army commanders present echoed one after another, and it seemed that these people had long since wanted to defend it, but no one dared to take the lead in speaking out.

"This is the retreat plan formulated by the headquarters, everyone can take a look, and if you have opinions, you can put them forward!"

Saying that, Tang Shengzhi signaled Zhou Wei to send a retreat plan that had been formulated a long time ago. Roughly speaking, except for the headquarters, the 78th Army Division, and a small number of troops crossing the river by boat from Shimonoseki, most of the troops broke through from the front.

However, there is no specific plan for how to break through the front, and this is the problem. However, after the dissatisfaction of the Central Army, Tang Shengzhi issued another verbal order.

It was stipulated that if the 87th Division, the 88th Division, the 74th Army, and the Teaching Corps "could not all break through, they could cross the river and assemble at Chuzhou when there was a ferry." ”

And this means that Tang Shengzhi's order is a bit of a child's play, and the order is changed day by day, which also lays the groundwork for the disaster that follows!