In early September 1637, off the coast west of Cape Town.

The weather was clear, the sails were full of open sails in the storm, and the turquoise waves stretched as far as the eye could see, making it look like a boring afternoon.

But all this illusion was broken by the continuous rumbling of cannons on the surface of the sea. The two fast cruisers, the "Yangwu" and the "Yangwei", relied on their superior speed and mid-to-high firepower in the same tonnage, and beat an armed merchant ship flying the British flag to the point of complete temper.

Only half an hour later, the British ship, which refused to surrender, was sent to the bottom of the sea by the guns of the task force. The Abbot (a Dutch merchant ship captured from the Gambia River), who had been watching the battle, sent a number of dinghys, and the sailors rowed to the area of the British shipwreck and began to rescue some British sailors who had fallen overboard.

"It's the third British merchant ship intercepted in a month, right?" On the battleship "August 10th" in the rear, fleet commander Lu Ming put down the telescope he had been holding and said to himself.

"Yes, the third!" His adjutant, Second Lieutenant Sang Kai, said with some excitement, "And they are all merchant ships of the East India Company, the first two are carrying spices, and this one is carrying tea and silk, but unfortunately, they have not had time to capture." The shareholders of the East India Company, who had been eagerly awaiting it in London, were to be disappointed, and the ship full of their hopes of making a fortune would never return home. Ha Luha, maybe they thought they had encountered a storm, after all, this is normal, no ship on this route in the Far East can go back and forth safely forever. I don't know what the captains of the East India Company think, is this route so peaceful, and they don't even implement the escort fleet system. ”

"That's because there's no need." Lu Ming said. "The ocean is so vast. The odds of a small fleet meeting on the surface of the sea are not high. You see that it took us so long to intercept three ships. Perhaps in a place where we could not see, thirty, fifty ships had passed safely. The British didn't even know whether their missing ship had been pirated or stormed, as was the case in this era, and the Far East was extremely profitable, but the risks were also unusually high, and they were prepared to suffer certain losses. Hey, what's that?! ”

As Lu Ming picked up the telescope and looked carefully, Sang Kai also hurriedly looked over. Good guys, that's the big fleet!

"The whole fleet is in a column formation, and quickly seize the upper hand!" Lu Ming decisively ordered, although it is not clear which country's fleet is opposite, but it is always right to be careful.

Since the two transport ships of the Nanhai Transport Company, the "Penglai" and the "Yingzhou", were still moored at the dock of the Hezhongbao for rest, only seven ships of the task force remained on the sea. Two of the battleships were in the lead, two frigates followed, and the transport ship "Abbot" was hiding on the inside of the main battleship, and her meagre firepower was not enough to participate in naval battles of this level. As for the two "Yangwu"-class fast cruisers, they cruised outside the other warships as usual. Prepare to use its high speed to harass and attack the weak links of the enemy fleet.

The fleet on the opposite side finally showed the true face of Lushan, this is a large fleet from the United Kingdom! Only in terms of enemy ships observed so far. There were already more than six, two of which were warships, and the remaining four were armed merchant ships; Farther away, beyond the sightman's sight, several towering masts were faintly visible, which unmistakably told the people on the east coast at sea that an unknown number of ships were following them.

Fight or go? The officers on the battleship "10 August" invariably set their sights on the master of the entire fleet, Rear Admiral Lu Ming.

"Hit!" Lu Ming gritted his teeth and gave an order. There is a slow-moving transport and supply ship "Abbot" in his fleet, and if he escapes, he will inevitably leave it behind, which Lu Ming cannot tolerate. In that case, let's just fight the British! The seven ships on his side, six of which are professional naval warships, and there are two super battleships with powerful firepower, which may not be lost to the British.

Since the commander gave the order, the officers immediately scattered to the deck and began to command. The whole fleet quickly gained the upper hand, and then pressed against the British fleet in front; The two Yangwu-class fast cruisers landed on the other side in tacit understanding, outflanking the British at a speed of more than 9 knots to 10 knots, their pointed bows beautifully splitting the waves, like a flying fish swimming in the waves.

The loose formation of the British began to adjust from the first moment of the attack, but it was extremely difficult for them to adjust their formation in the downwind direction. Seeing that the easterners had rushed to within a thousand meters, the English gave up their useless efforts and began to adjust their course, rushing towards the easterners, preparing to start the chaotic battle that they were good at. As long as they managed to hold off the enemy for a short time, the ten ships that followed them would quickly rush up and defeat the enemy's fleet with numerical superiority.

"Boom! Rumble! After entering a distance of seven or eight hundred meters, the bow guns of the battleship "10 August", which had taken the lead, took the lead in firing, and the straight trajectory ran out of kinetic energy and fell into the sea after passing over the deck of the British battleship at the forefront.

After the "10 August" fired the first shot of the day, the 12 guns on the starboard side of the fast cruiser "Yangwu" fired the first salvo of the day. Taking advantage of the fact that the British warship was attracted to the right, she took advantage of its high speed to speed all the way, quickly approaching a British armed merchant ship on the periphery, and fired a salvo at a distance of more than 500 meters.

Han Dezhi, captain of the "Yangwu," was unusually good today, and half of the shells hit the target in the first salvo. Six rusty solid iron balls struck the enemy ship's deck and stern with unknown effect. The "Yangwu", which had been hit, did not like to fight, and after seizing the time to fire a few more volleys, it quickly broke away from contact with the enemy ship and pounced on the next target.

Behind her, the fast cruiser "Yangwei" performed the same trick, ravaging the British's sluggish and bulky armed merchant ship at a distance of six hundred and fifty meters, and then drove away.

The distance of 650 meters was within the optimal range of the guns on the battleship "Yangwei", and this distance was really embarrassing for the British, who were accustomed to firing at 300 meters. They also tried to fire back more than a dozen shells at the Yangwei, but most of them missed, and only one luck shot hit the target, but it did not cause any noticeable damage.

And at this time, the main battleships also began to engage the British ships. The two British battleships appear to be 750-800 tons, armed with nearly forty guns, most of which are small-caliber guns, as can be seen from the telescope. The largest caliber guns were no more than 18-pounder cast-iron guns, and there were only four of them, and the main ones were 12-pounder and 8-pounder guns.

Sure enough, it is worthy of being a warship running an ocean-going route, both in terms of tonnage and firepower, which is much stronger than the British ships encountered by the task force before.

However, such a firepower configuration is not enough for the "10 August" class battleships with a displacement of nearly 1,000 tons, thickened decks in important parts, and a large caliber heavy gun of more than 18 pounds, and they may only be able to bully and bully the East Coast frigates that are following behind the two battleships.

The battle was one-sided from the start.

The British ships were bombarded by a large number of 32-, 24-, and 18-pound long-barreled cannons, and their planks were splashed, and their ships were killed and wounded. From a distance of 800 meters to 400 meters, the two British battleships, which had received numerous shells, finally got a chance to return fire.

Their solid iron ball shells destroyed one of the 10 August crews and wounded two gunners of the adjacent crew. At the same time, the bow mast of the "Common Market" was interrupted by a shell, a gun on the bow gun deck was destroyed, and several shells were fired in the bow galley, resulting in several casualties.

However, such damage was tantamount to tickling for the two battleships, and they quickly destroyed the enemy's stubborn resistance one by one with more ferocious artillery fire. Grapekey shells and explosive shells fired from the 18-pounder and 12-pounder short-barreled guns continued to achieve results on the enemy deck, and British sailors and gunners suffered heavy casualties in heavy artillery fire, and the enemy's counterattack became weaker and weaker.

"Commander, there are a large number of British ships ahead, eight or nine in number...... No, there are ten! Sir, pay attention, ten British ships appeared ahead! The lookout cried out in tears.

Even at the most intense moment of the battle, Lu Ming, who was distracted and concerned about the situation ahead, was relieved when he heard this. Taking advantage of the moment when a sea breeze blew and the smoke cleared, he raised his binoculars and took a closer look ahead: sure enough, several British ships appeared in the field of vision, which appeared to be armed merchant ships. And behind these armed merchant ships, there were two warships that were hurrying over.

A total of sixteen ships were in the front and rear, four of which were battleships. Lu Ming quickly estimated the comparison of the strength of the two sides, and found that it was really difficult to say. On the one hand, there are only six ships capable of fighting, but all of them are professional warships with many guns, adding up to a total of 246 large and small guns (the "Abbot" is equipped with 8 small-caliber copper cannons); The British estimated that the sixteen ships had almost 260 guns, and the number of guns on both sides was about the same, but the guns of the people on the east coast had some advantages in caliber, and the British, due to the large number of ships, could use more guns at the same time than the people on the east coast.

Thinking of this, Lu Ming suddenly became a little entangled. This is obviously a large-scale fleet organized by the East India Company, and it has allowed itself to meet unexpectedly, how should this situation be carried out now? (To be continued......)