After the "parade type", there is the "sea parade type".

The "Champion" sailed through the parade formation, and after completing the "parade", it turned the bow of the ship and returned to the starting point. Then make a U-turn again, stop the car, and restore the state before the parade began.

The "Shooting Voice" began with the parade, and the parade formation sailed past the "Champion" in order of combat ships, landing ships, and logistics ships, and was reviewed. Among them, the combat ships are arranged in the order of cruisers, destroyers, frigates. The ships were about three chains apart, and the entire formation of the first ship, the "Shothorn," and the stern ship, the "Virginia," was nearly seven nautical miles long -- almost 25 miles.

When drawing up the plan for the military parade at sea, Du Lide, Ding Ruchang, Qiao Bailun, and others, according to Guan Zhuofan's meaning, whether it is a "parade of ships" or a "sea parade," have appropriately lengthened the distance between the front and rear ships -- the ships of this era, after all, are only sail-steam hybrids, and they are no more than modern warships.

However, Guan Zhuofan wanted to use the method of lengthening the distance between the front and rear ships to "lengthen" the entire parade formation, so as to deepen Cixi's impression of "strong ships and sharp guns, and a steady stream", strengthen and even enlarge the image of this fleet in her mind, and achieve the goal of maximizing the benefits of this "parade" in the imperial sister.

The results are very good.

The sea field of vision is so wide that it is far beyond the land, and when the ship under review only sails in front of the "Champion", the front ship and the rear ship are in the field of vision, and the sailing speed of the warship is far beyond the running of people, so the viewer will not feel that the formation is loose. There is also no feeling of incoherence.

What about the Queen Mother?

Start with the "parade". To the end of the "sea split". More than an hour and a half. From beginning to end, Cixi stood on the railing on the front bridge without ever sitting down - including when the "Champion" turned around and returned to the starting point after completing the "parade". You know, the same is standing for a long time, on a bumpy and undulating ship, than on flat ground. But how tired is it - how much more so a person who is riding a ship for the first time?

After the "Champion" turned around, Guan Zhuofan asked the Queen Mother to sit down and take a nap - the journey back to the starting point was not counted in the ceremony, and it was possible to sit down. But Cixi said that she was not tired, and still stood and listened to Guan Zhuofan explain to her, the names, types, tonnage, firepower, and so on of each ship.

From start to finish, there is no tiredness.

Not only that, for three hours, the waist of the royal sister. Always straight; The full chest is always high - except for the hand holding on to the railing. The whole posture can be regarded as "standing slope".

It's not easy to stand in a military posture for three hours in a row.

The flame of passion has been burning in Cixi's body. The mental excitement was so extreme that she didn't feel physically tired at all.

No matter how huge the "Champion" is and how powerful it is, it is only a boat, and there is a way that it is impossible to defeat the wolves by the evil tigers, and it is impossible to rely on it and the "Shooter" to fight the world. But now what is in front of us is a whole fleet - if this fleet was in hand back then, would the British and French still be able to fight in?!

Cixi did not forget that most of the fleets in front of her were not her own ships - these ships would not go to war with Yingyi and Fayi for themselves. But the man beside her had convinced her that in the near future, she would have such a fleet - perhaps even more powerful than the one in front of her!

The exciting prospect made her blood boil, and in the process of "sea separation", she even had this thought: It's a pity that I'm not a man!

Ahem, good thing you're not a man.

By the time the "sea split" ended, it was nearly noon. Guan Zhuofan invited the Queen Mother to return to the cabin to pass the meal and rest, and after an hour, the "drill formation" and "artillery drill" began before the time was set to be held -- the former was a combat formation drill for the parade formation, and the latter was a live-fire exercise at sea.

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At two o'clock in the afternoon, the signal flag of "Operation on Time" was raised on the signal mast of the "Champion", and the "rehearsal" officially began.

There are three types of battle formations in the formation drill: "a long snake", "double dragon into the water", and "wild geese spread their wings".

The bridge of the "Champion" is limited in height, standing on the top and watching the many ships on the sea "rehearsing formations", advancing and retreating, turning left and right, if you are not an expert, you have to watch a lively situation, how to "change the formation" and what "formation" it has become, in fact, it is not very clear to see.

In order to let the Queen Mother understand the various "formations" -- otherwise, the effect of the "array" would be greatly reduced -- Guan Zhuofan specially found someone to make a "disk" the size of a Go chessboard with a magnet, and made 22 small ship models, each of which was inserted with a name tag, and the name of the ship was marked one by one from the "Champion" below; Under the bottom of the model boat, a magnet is embedded, which can be firmly attached to the "disk", bumpy and undulating, and will not slip off.

On the sea, ships come and go; On the "disk", Guan Zhuofan then fiddled with the corresponding ship model. In this way, how the "formation" changes, the Queen Mother can see it clearly.

Kindness: It's so sweet!

The first to appear is the "Long Snake Formation".

The so-called "one-word long snake" refers to the "single column" used in the "parade style" and the "sea column type", that is, the ships are lined up in a column that is connected from end to end. However, a slight difference from the "parade type" and "sea split type" is that the distance between the ships and the ships in the "single column" of the battle formation is much closer.

This "one-word long snake formation" can be regarded as a standard battle formation in the era of sail warships.

The guns of the sail battleship are mainly set on the sides of the ship, therefore, facing the enemy sideways, is a natural choice for the sail warship. With the improvement of ship handling performance and gun range and power, the importance of early fire attack and gang jumping tactics decreased, and finally, the standard battle line tactics were formed in naval warfare in the era of sail warships:

Before the battle, the opposing sides first lined up their respective warships in a column - that is, "a long snake"; The fleets of both sides then marched side-by-side in the same direction, or staggered in opposite directions, and shelled the enemy with their inboard guns on the march.

At this time, the mid-sixties of the nineteenth century, was an era of transition from sail warships to ironclad warships, and the power of warships had developed into steam sail hybrids, but the setting of artillery was still not fundamentally different from the era of sail warships. Although the bow guns and stern guns have been strengthened to a certain extent in some ships, as far as the entire warship is concerned, it is still dominated by gunwales -- including the latest Warrior-class "Champion".

The Royal Navy of the British Empire still clearly stipulates in the "Combat Doctrine": "In the event of a full-scale attack, the detachments should use the most advantageous advantage possible to fight the adjacent enemy; All ships of each detachment should do their best to keep a line of troops in line with their detachment commanders......"

In order to demonstrate the "formation," the parade formation left the exercise area and then re-entered.

The first to appear on the horizon was the "Shooting Horn". Then, "Vice Admiral", "Maryland", "Jefferson", "Mississippi River", ...... The second appears.

The last one is the USS Virginia.

The whistle of the "Shooting Trumpet" sounded for a long time - this was not shouted to the companions behind him, but to tell the Queen Mother: We are going to "set up a formation".

Little Edward issued the command of "left full rudder", and the "Shooting Sound" turned sharply to the right, and on the clear blue sea, the huge hull of the ship drew a huge white wake.

Wait a minute! "Left full rudder" - "sharp right turn"?

Hey, helmsman, you're mistaken, right?

Make no mistake.

Modern ship steering commands, based on the bow of the ship, "left rudder" means the bow turns to the left, and "right rudder" means to turn right. But in the middle of the nineteenth century, British ships carried out a strange "tiller command" - based on the stern: "left rudder", and the stern turned to the left - that is, the bow turned to the right; "Right rudder", the stern turns to the right - that is, the bow turns to the left.

It was not until the beginning of the twentieth century that the conservative British completely abandoned it in favor of the internationally accepted ship-bow steering directive.

Alas, it is really not easy to reform this matter.

*(To be continued......)