Chapter 2 Japan Sends Troops to Jeju Island The Sino-Japanese Naval Battle

In the temple of Edo (Tokyo), Japan, Tokugawa Ietsuna, the fourth general of the Tokugawa shogunate, was discussing with his staff. Today's topic is Ezo Island.

Although, Ezo Island is a desolate and cold place, and the Tokugawa family, who own a lot of fertile land, do not take it to heart at all. The Tokugawa family thought that it was the stupid Matsumae family who were willing to be there with those wild people. However, Ezo Island was occupied by the Ming Dynasty, and the daimyo of the Matsumae Domain was captured, which the Tokugawa family absolutely could not tolerate.

Although Tokugawa Ietsuna had only been in charge of the shogun for two years, unlike his predecessors, he was ambitious in that he wanted to fulfill the last wish of his predecessors to conquer Korea and then China. He believes that in the past few years, the reason for doing nothing in the past few years is to accumulate savings in order to accomplish the glorious mission. Unexpectedly, before he took action, the people of the Ming Dynasty came to the door by themselves, and the Tokugawa family could not tolerate it no matter what.

What made Tokugawa Isetuna even more unexpected was that the dozens of ships they sent to intercept the ships of the Ming Dynasty did not stop a single big ship, and the samurai who had supported the Matsumae family on Ezo Island in the past were also defeated by losing their troops, which made today's meeting very depressing.

After a moment of silence, an old man (shogunate official) said, "Shogun, I don't think I'm sorry to worry about Ezo Island. As long as the weather is warm and the sea does not freeze, we can send some flag warriors to solve these laborers who came from far away in the Ming Dynasty. Although they have great firearms, it is difficult to say whether they will be able to get enough food on Ezo Island and whether they will survive the cold winter of Ezo Island. Our elite samurai recuperate and recuperate, and we can recapture Ezo Island for the Matsumae family without the beginning of spring, and vent this evil breath for our Tokugawa shogunate. I think what we should worry about at the moment is that the incident of the Ming Dynasty itself illustrates. This shows that when we were closing off and defending the country to accumulate strength, the Ming Dynasty was not idle, and they already had the strength to develop outward. I don't think their target will be as simple as Ezo Island! ”

"Didn't the intelligence keep saying that the Ming Dynasty was constantly rebelling and had already made a mess?" Tokugawa Ietsuna asked.

"Yes, it's true. However, there is also information that there is a force called Yaogang among them, which has sprung up and occupied almost half of the Ming Dynasty, and even their fierce rivals the Mongols and Qing Dynasty are not their opponents. The old man said, "There are also some claims that are very appalling, and we have never believed them." But if you don't believe it, you can't believe it, they have now used coal to drive big ships, and this time we failed to intercept the big ships that emitted black smoke, which can come and go at will without the help of the wind, and our sailing ships can't fight against them at all. ”

"We must not let the Ming Dynasty completely slow down, we must take advantage of their lack of recovery as soon as possible to give them a fatal blow." Tokugawa Ietsuna patted the table and said.

A side servant (shogunate official) said: "Actually, I think the warships of the Ming Dynasty are not terrible to be driven by coal, the Ming Dynasty is very far away from us, how much coal can they carry on a ship, our ships do not use coal, and if they don't fight with them in close combat, we will entangle with them, and when they have no coal, we will besiege them." ”

"They might send ships supplying coal to follow the ships and supply them." It was said.

"Then we'll concentrate on their supply ships." Tokugawa Ietsuna said.

"Oops! "It's not good," Lao Zhong said, "if the Ming Dynasty really plotted against us, they wouldn't have sent ships over so easily, and they would have known that the warships needed supplies." ”

"Hmmm! What do you mean? Tokugawa Ietsuna looked at Lao Zhong eagerly.

"They have just finished a war with North Korea, and they can't supply in North Korea," Lao Zhong said, "and they will definitely find an island at sea for supplies." ”

After listening to this, Tokugawa Ietsuna got up and left his seat and came to the front of the map. The rest of the attendees also got up and gathered around.

Tokugawa Ietsuna pointed to Tsushima Island and asked, "Could it be here?" ”

Lao Zhong replied: "It is possible, the Tsushima Strait here is the only way for their ships to pass, it is possible." But I think they're more likely to be here. Lao Zhong said and pointed to Jeju Island.

"Yes, yes!" Tokugawa Ietsuna said a few words and said, "This is a long way from us, but it is a safe supply base on their way to us. Attacking us, this is a good base for a forward exit. ”

After saying that, everyone followed Tokugawa Ietsuna back to their seats.

After sitting down, Tokugawa Ietsuna said: "The Chinese have a saying, "The first strike is the strongest!" I think we should preemptively occupy Jeju Island. ”

"Then there will be another war with North Korea!" Lao Zhong said.

"North Korea? Hum! Tokugawa Ietsuna said, "They have not been beaten by the Ming Dynasty yet!" ”

The side employed person smiled and said, "Hehe! When the Koreans were the strongest, that was what they were, if it weren't for the help of the Ming Dynasty, they would have been one of our vassal states a long time ago.

"I think it's time for us to compete with the Ming Dynasty." Tokugawa Ietsuna said, "We will immediately prepare a naval army to take down Jeju Island as soon as possible, and we must take the lead!" ”

As a result, the kiln gang and the Japanese thought of everything together! The target was aimed at Jeju Island, but the Japanese came one step too late.

After Tokugawa Ietsuna made up his mind to seize Jeju Island, he immediately began to prepare. In the end, they mobilized more than 200 warships carrying more than 10,000 army officers and soldiers to take advantage of the favorable wind to march to Jeju Island.

Just as they were approaching Jeju Island, they intercepted a clipper ship sent by North Korea from Jeju Island to deliver a letter back to North Korea. After interrogating the Koreans on board, the Japanese learned that Jeju Island had been occupied by the Ming Dynasty. At this moment, the Japanese were not small. However, they heard from the Koreans that there were not many ships coming from the Ming Dynasty, and the Korean officers and soldiers were preparing to launch a counterattack to drive the Ming people out into the sea. In fact, the North Koreans who delivered the letter did not see what the ship of the Yaogang people looked like, and it was impossible for them to know that the few people they gathered on the island were not enough for a dozen Yaogang people.

When the Japanese heard about this situation, the generals under their command discussed it, and they decided that no matter whether the Koreans could drive the Ming Dynasty people into the sea or not, they would have casualties in a bloody battle, especially since the Ming Dynasty did not have many warships, and they were all close to the port, and it was inconvenient to maneuver, and their sudden attack would definitely catch them off guard. They all felt that this was a good opportunity to report the humiliation of the defeat of the Liang Naval War.

Therefore, the Japanese warships were arranged, and they quickly entered the battle state, and sailed in formation towards the port of Jeju.

The soldiers of the kiln gang on the top of the hill who were looking out with their sighting equipment spotted the Japanese warship from a distance, but the target was too far away for them to see where the ship came from.

Mu Yi and Zheng Zhilong did not expect to encounter Japanese warships here, but Mu Yi ordered the ships of Yaogang to light up and leave the berth to prepare for battle.

It wasn't until the lookout post kept reporting that a large number of warships were found, and Mu Yi and Zheng Zhilong both judged that the Japanese were coming. Because the warships of the DPRK just want to come, they will not concentrate such a large number of warships so quickly. At that time, they judged that the Japanese must have received the news that they had sent troops to Japan and came out in advance to meet the battle. As for how the Japanese managed to get the news so quickly in advance, they still don't know. But what is clear is that with the number of Japanese ships, this is another Sino-Japanese naval battle after the Battle of Luliang.

Mu Yi said: "This time we will completely defeat the Japanese. When Mr. Zhang gave us a report on the Battle of Luliang, he said that although we won the Battle of Luliang after the Battle of Luliang, we did not take the opportunity to attack Japan and completely subdue the Japanese, which was a very big mistake. We can't afford to make that mistake again this time. ”

At this time, Zheng Zhilong's brain had already entered a state of excitement, and he didn't care about saying anything else to Mu Yi, so he proposed to Mu Yi: "Commander Mu, I don't think we should let go of a Japanese ship this time." We first gathered all the warships close to the coast, took advantage of the fact that the Japanese did not understand us, lured them closer to the coast, and then took advantage of the firepower on our ships and on the shore to suddenly open fire to consume the Japanese ships as much as possible, and then took advantage of the advantages of our steamships to attack and chase after the Japanese ships. Our speedboats and landing craft could get close to the Japanese ships and attack the Japanese wooden boats with heavy machine guns. ”

Because they wanted to build forts all over Jeju Island, Mu Yi and his team brought 20 130 cannons to Jeju Island this time, and now they can be used.

When Mu Yi heard this, he immediately agreed: "Okay! Lao Zheng, just fight according to your method! Our artillery on the shore must also open meat first! ”

Through the radio, Mu Yi and the others made it clear that all warships and artillery on land should point their guns at the sea.

Ten speedboats were unloaded from the big ship, the engines were also started, and the landing craft were all retreated to the sea, ready to set off for battle.

It is very strange that the Japanese people have learned from China in terms of culture and art, but they have always had the ambition to destroy China. Although they had been very jealous of fighting the Ming Dynasty after the defeat at the Battle of Luliang, they were still not convinced by the Chinese from the bottom of their hearts. They found many reasons after the defeat in the Battle of Luliang and made excuses for their defeat. The main thing is that because Toyoda Hideyoshi died, they were ambushed by several times the size of the Ming Dynasty and the Korean coalition forces when they were retreating under the will of the will. Therefore, from the heart, there are still two words "unconvinced!" ”

Therefore, when the Japanese generals commanded the overwhelming warships to rush to Jeju Port, they were arrogant one by one, eager to immediately fire at the ships of the Ming Dynasty, and then rushed to the island to cut off the heads of the Ming Dynasty.

When the Japanese ships kept getting closer, they found that the stupid Ming army and the warships were still leaning on the coast, weren't they waiting to be beaten? The generals of the Japanese navy already felt that victory was in sight, because they were facing some guys who did not understand naval warfare. But they also found strangely that the ships of the Ming Dynasty were not small, some of them had no sails, and they were all emitting black smoke. They knew that the warships of the Ming Dynasty were really driven by burning coal, which they did not understand. Many of them are still thinking about not sinking them all, leaving a few ships, and seeing what kind of tricks the Ming Dynasty is making, how can they burn coal to drive ships?

The formation of the Japanese fleet was very neat, and at first glance it was well-trained, and they were overwhelmingly pressed over, although the officers and men of the Yaogang Navy did not pay attention to their ships at all, and they all had the intention of waiting for hunting, but the quiet waiting also made the atmosphere very depressing.

Zheng Zhilong took a look at the Japanese warship that pressed over and used the radio to divide several areas for sea targets. After giving back to the warships and shore artillery, the area of their respective responsibilities was assigned. The heads of each region are assigned goals.

At this time, in naval battles, firing more than 400 meters is a long-distance shot, and even so, it is necessary to rely on the density of the shells and use the probability to hit the target. Especially when the sea is rough, accurate aiming is not at all.

As long as you grasp the law of waves, shooting at a target like a ship at close range is like shooting a gun at the head.

When the Japanese drove the sailing ship to the Yaogang warship, they thought that with their numerical advantage, they would be able to defeat the Ming Dynasty Navy and these warships had no power to fight back, but after they gradually got closer, they found that there were not many ships of the Yaogang people, but they were all huge ships with amazing tonnage. The first thing they saw was four 5,000-ton ships that were a little farther away. But when they got closer, they found that there were no cannons on these big ships, and it turned out to be toothless tigers, and the Japanese were happy again.

Just when their ship was still six hundred meters away from the four large ships, and was almost within the firing range of their guns, the cannons of the kiln men opened fire.

Due to the wind on the sea, the sound of the kiln men firing their cannons was very small when it reached the Japanese ship, but they were surprised by the explosion effect of the cannonballs falling on their ships and the water column that exploded when they fell into the sea. In the first round of shelling, twenty 130 guns on the shore of the Yaogang people were fired, sixteen 130 guns were fired on four steel-hulled warships, four 130 guns were fired on four steam ships, four 130 guns were fired on two 1,000-ton ships, 2 infantry on 5,000-ton ships also opened fire with 20 infantry guns, and five 65-mm guns on five landing craft also fired. At the same time, twenty 12.7-mm machine guns on the 5,000-ton ship also opened fire.

A total of forty-four 130 guns, plus their artillery, suddenly opened fire like a tsunami, and the Japanese were stunned at once. Because, not only had they never seen a powerful cannonball, but more importantly, more than a dozen ships in their fleet were shattered or injured at such a distance.

The command ship of the Japanese was a relatively large tonnage ship, which could weigh more than 800 tons, but a 130 shell hit their bow, and the entire front of the ship was blown up at once, and the commander-in-chief of the Japanese fleet was blown up all over blood. But his command ship had already begun to tilt, and the Japanese sailors hurriedly sent their general to a dinghy in the face of constant shells. At the same time, the big ship, under the pressure of the sails, toppled into the sea. Shortly after they left the boat in the dinghy, the ship was hit by a shell that shattered its entirety.

After several rounds of artillery fire from the Yaogang people, dozens of Japanese warships had already been sunk, but some Japanese ships also began to fire back with "dong dong" when the distance between them and the big ships in Yaogang reached their firing range. This inspired the fighting spirit of the Japanese, who kept charging forward. However, the Japanese ships that fired their cannons at the big ship did not hit the big ship, and they were immediately counterattacked by the concentrated fire of the big ship. The dense 12.7-caliber heavy machine gun bullets smashed them to a thousand holes, many of which pierced directly through the hull, and seawater poured into the ship through rows of fist-sized bullet holes, and there was no way to plug the leaks. The more unfortunate ships were concentrated by the infantry artillery, and they all fell apart at once.

As a result, the Japanese ships began to sail around the big ships.

As the Japanese ships continued to be wrecked, the Japanese also found that the situation was not good, and they all felt that it was time to retreat. However, the command ship of the Japanese was destroyed, and they did not expect that their largest ship would be suddenly destroyed like this, and there was no plan for the destruction of the command ship. Plus the commander of the Japanese was carried to another ship and fell unconscious. These stubborn Japanese had no choice but to continue to charge forward according to the original order. However, it was not until the Japanese ships were more and more accurate by the Yaogang people and nearly half of them were destroyed, that some of their ships were seen, and one of them was flying the flag of retreat. Because the captain of the ship, which was carrying the commander-in-chief of the unconscious Japanese army, had long understood that if he did not retreat, the whole army would be destroyed. The commander-in-chief was already unconscious, and it was impossible to give any more orders, but it would not work like this. Just when the ship was cut out of a row by a string of heavy machine-gun bullets, and the sea water continued to pour in, he knew that it was time to abandon the ship, and at the same time hung his heart and hoisted the flag of retreat

Due to the dense density of ships on the sea, the retreating flag could be seen on the ship close to the ship, but the retreating flag could not be seen from a distance. Because during the day, they generally used the drum to transmit the signal first, but the drum on this ship had been missed and could not be beaten.

This caused even greater confusion for the Japanese fleet. Some boats suddenly turned around, but the boats behind did not understand what was going on, and did not know whether they were afraid to turn around and flee, or if they were ordered to retreat, and as a result, the sea was in chaos. However, the people of Yaogang are not chaotic, and they take special care of those ships that come sideways, because the ships are more bullet-surfaced, and they can basically shoot one ship at a time.

Without waiting for the Japanese fleet to return to order, the large and small ships of Yaogang were dispatched at the same time. Now the Japanese sailing ships knew it was time to escape. However, where can their speed compare with the speed of the Yaogang ship, especially the speedboat of Yaogang, which gives full play to their advantage of being flexible and fast, when they pass by the Japanese ship quickly, they use heavy machine guns to punch a series of holes under the waterline of the Japanese ship, because they can't plug such loopholes. Those landing craft, don't look at the flat-bottomed wave resistance, but they turn fast and agile on the water, especially when they are unloaded. They also approached the Japanese warships and fired with heavy machine guns and sixty-five-millimeter guns. At close range, their threat is no small. The steel-hulled warships of Yaogang and the steamboats, two thousand-ton warships, were fired directly at 130 caliber cannons. At this time, none of them was willing to shoot with 203 caliber cannons. Because the 130-caliber cannon hit the Japanese warships, which was already a big and a little useless.

The sea chase was going on, and the infantry of Yaogang asked the fishermen of Jeju Island to sail out to sea for money. They salvaged prisoners.

Mu Yi told them to keep the uninjured ones because the construction of Jeju Island would start immediately, and it would take a lot of labor.

The sea chase lasted until the afternoon, and finally ended with more than 30 Japanese ships seeing that there was nowhere to escape, hoisting the white flag and surrendering.

Until the evening, the Yaogang warships patrolling around confirmed that no Japanese warships had escaped.

When he returned to the shore, he confirmed that more than 181 Japanese warships had been sunk, 31 warships had been captured, and more than 6,000 Japanese officers and men had been captured.

Mu Yi asked the telegraph operator to report the battle to the kiln with a code. Because of this incident, they asked the Yaogang side not to report it, and now the Japanese did not know that their powerful fleet had been destroyed. Muyi: They're going to attack Tsushima Island!

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New progress in "Memories of the Southern Song Dynasty": the Battle of Yashan, the defeat of the Yuan army, the counterattack of the Song army, and the landing in Fuzhou.