The 18-pounder howitzer attack was completely unexpected by the Spaniards, who lost two well-trained gun crews in one fell swoop. Pen, fun, pavilion www. biquge。 Info But fortunately, the Spaniards in Cavite did not lack artillery crews, the cruiser "Santiago" was burned, but because it was on the dock, the loss of the artillery crew was not very large, but the cannons were sunk into the sea, and a lot of port equipment was also burned in that fire, so it could not be caught in a short time, so on the fortress, there are still only four small cannons.

The gunners of the other two guns naturally saw what happened to the crews of the two guns just now, and they naturally knew that they had become the target of the next round of shooting. The gunners were almost tempted to abandon their cannons and run away, but the fear of the whip made them temporarily stop in their positions and continue to reload the cannons. Their guns are smaller than their opponents, and they should naturally reload much faster, so before they fire this round of fire, the Chinese should not have had time to fire at them.

Although they were very nervous, the training under the leather whip all this time still worked, and they still completed the loading, and at this time, the Chinese's shield car seemed to be approaching a little.

"Elevation angle 9, ready, fire!" Squad leader Pepe shouted. Both cannons roared at the same time, and two shells fired at the shield cart on the opposite side. At the same time, he also saw two red lights flashing on the gun base opposite.

"Hide!" Pepe shouted, and flew to the side, trying to dodge as much as possible from the enemy's shotgun, which had an exaggerated range.

At the same time that Pepe rushed out, the shrapnel fired by the Model Army had already flown above their heads. One of them exploded smoothly, and the dense rain of bullets took away most of the artillery group, while the other shell malfunctioned, and instead of exploding, the shell flew over Pepe's head and hit a house in the port area.

A frightened Pepe stuck out his head to look across and saw that the enemy's shield cart was missing.

One of the two shells fired by the Spaniards in the second round hit the target, but this attack was only a feint, and there was no one behind the shield cart except the soldiers pushing the cart, and the shells easily pierced the thin planks of the shield cart. Unlike Jianxin's shield cart, which uses double-layer thick planks and a wet quilt in the middle, the model army's shield cart is very thin, so when the cannonball penetrates it, it can't transmit much energy to it, which also makes its fragments not as deadly as the fragments of Jianxin's shield car after it is broken. But the shell still caused casualties, and after the shell penetrated the shield cart, it actually hit a soldier pushing the cart directly, and directly smashed the soldier to pieces.

However, such casualties were not enough to stop the advance of the Model Army, and the remaining four shield wagons continued to advance slowly, while the Spaniards also gritted their teeth and withstood the losses, and sent a new artillery crew to continue firing at the shield wagons of the Model Army. After paying the price of more than a dozen gunners, he finally succeeded in "destroying" all the remaining four shield cars.

"Stop the attack." Song Ran gave the order, so the first feint ended like this, in the offensive, the model army paid the price of one dead and one wounded, practiced the combat method of suppressing the opponent's artillery by covering the shrapnel with shrapnel, and brought dozens of casualties to the opponent. The numbers were good in terms of exchange ratios, but they were not enough to shake the Spaniards' defenses.

"Maybe tomorrow morning, the Spaniards will be able to come up with a countermeasure." This is the opinion of Zheng Zhihu, who watched the game from behind.

To say that Zheng Zhihu's premonition was still good, after dawn the next day, Zheng Zhihu found that the Spaniards on the opposite side really came up with a solution.

"These Spaniards are still quite fast." Zheng Zhihu put down the binoculars and said.

On the wall of the small fortress of the Spaniards, the Spaniards erected a canopy on top of the gun emplacement with wooden supports, covered with a layer of logs, and several layers of quilts and other things on the logs.

"Can our shrapnel penetrate this?" Zheng Zhihu asked.

"If a solid bullet can easily penetrate it, but a shrapnel can't penetrate these things." A young man replied. This young man was a technician sent by the artillery factory to observe and record the performance of shrapnel grenades, surnamed Shi, and his name was Shi Lei.

"Can you hit this with a solid cannonball?" Zheng Zhihu asked, but after asking, he laughed first, "Forget it, if you can directly hit this with solid shells, you can directly hit their cannons with solid shells." ”

"That's what the second general said." Shi Song replied, "If you want to hit their cannons directly with solid shells, you can only wait for the kind of cannon that the major general said." ”

"Actually, there is a way to deal with that thing." An artillery officer suddenly said, "Their bracket is not strong enough and should not withstand the blow of chain shells." However, we don't have ready-made chain bombs here. ”

Chain bullets are a common weapon in naval warfare, and this time it was a land battle, so although the 18-pounder gun was equipped with chain bullets, it did not come with chain bullets.

"Chainbomb?" Zheng Zhihu squinted his eyes and stared at the other side for a while, and then said, "Good idea, but it's not ......in a hurry."

Ten days later, in the early morning, the fog was foggy, and the air was so humid that it seemed that water could be wrung out with a twist. Zheng Zhihu touched the new batch of strange-looking shield carts made by the Marine Corps with his hand, pushed its thick baffle hard, and then asked, "Can this thing really block those Spanish shells?" ”

"Second general, we tried it with captured Spanish guns. This thing should be able to withstand the Spaniards' shells at about a hundred paces. Moreover, the shells of the Spaniards easily bounced off them. It's just too heavy. Song Ran hurriedly replied.

This kind of shield cart is sturdy, using two thick layers of wooden planks, sandwiched in the middle of another layer of cotton wool, and then wrapped in the innermost layer to prevent the shield cart from being penetrated, but a large pile of raw cowhide flying out of the back of the shield car. However, this is not the strangest part of this shield car, the strangest thing is that the shield in front of this shield car is not placed vertically, but has a very large bevel angle to the ground. In the case of such a thick plank, such a large bevel is used, which naturally makes this shield car much heavier than Jianzhi's shield car. So if it weren't for the fact that the terrain in this section was very flat and even a little downhill, Song Ran felt that it would be really difficult to push this thing.

At this time, the sun came out, and the morning fog was gradually about to disperse. Zheng Zhihu squinted his eyes and looked in the direction of the Spanish Fortress in the distance, and then said, "Let's start!" ”

As fog began early in the morning, the Spaniards stepped up their vigilance. Ferreira, the officer on duty, looked ahead with wide eyes, but he couldn't see anything in the fog. After a few more moments, Vava, the hound, suddenly barked wildly, and apparently, it might have heard something.

"Everyone's on alert! Get ready for battle! Ferreira decisively sounded the alarm bell and issued such an order.

A few minutes later, the commander of the city defense, Lieutenant Colonel Fran, also rushed to the city walls.

"Is the enemy coming? This damn fog! "Frandaw.

"Commander, our hounds have noticed movement over there, but unfortunately the fog is too big to see clearly." Ferreira replied.

"That must be what those Chinese rats are doing there. Our hounds can smell their stench. Fran said, he looked around again, and saw that several soldiers around him were ready to defend, so he nodded and said, "Fran, you did a good job." If they don't come, it will be strange if they don't come. ”

At this time, the sound of wooden-clad copper-clad wheels rolling on the ground was gradually heard from a distance.

"They're coming! It should be a shield car. Fran said.

By this time the sun had risen a little more, and the fog had begun to disperse a little. The silhouettes of eight shield carts in the distance slowly emerged from the mist.

"Artillery ready to shoot! Infantry get ready to shoot! Fran gave the order to prepare for battle.

During these ten days, the Spaniards were not idle, and they extended the canopy, which had originally covered only a few gun emplacements, to cover almost the entire fortress wall, providing not only artillery but also infantry with a fairly good defense against shrapnel shells. And also managed to fish up two small cannons from the sea.

The shield cart continued to approach as the Spanish artillery began to fire at the shield wagon.

The sun is getting brighter and brighter, and the fog has basically cleared. Fran finally saw the strange tilting shield carts on the opposite side, and saw that the solid cannonballs fired by his cannon would actually bounce high up after hitting the shields of the shield carts, and then fall far behind the shield carts.

"Damn, this thing is so strong! I don't believe I can't beat it! Fran scolded, "Keep fighting!" ”

Suddenly, a shield cart staggered after a shot and stopped, apparently the cannon that ricocheted and failed to penetrate their armor, but still damaged the shield cart's running mechanism. However, the other shield cars were still slowly moving forward. The shield wagons advanced to a distance of about a hundred paces from the guns on the fortress before coming to a halt, and then several small cannons peeking out of the barrels behind the shield carts.

Of course, the cannons that can be pushed by manpower can't be too big, but in fact, these are only small 3-pounder cannons. This kind of cannon is no longer available in the model army, but the Zheng family bought a lot of these things for the Chinese in Manila, so it is not difficult to get a few temporarily.

Under the cover of the shield wagons, the Model Army began to fire at the Spaniards' gun emplacements with three-pounder guns at a distance of about a hundred paces. The Spaniards also fired at the three-pounder guns with cannons and heavy arquebuses.

It was also at this time, a little further away, that the two artillery crews of the Navy were ready to shoot.