On the open-air fort on the top of Nanshan Mountain, Tabuqi looked angrily at the British warship in the billowing smoke at the bottom of the mountain, and after several gunners adjusted the angle of the gun barrel slightly, they signaled that they could run away, and Tabuqi immediately lit the Krupp heavy gun in the middle himself, only to hear a boom, dozens of kilograms of shells flew out, and the bow of a large cruiser 3 kilometers away from the mountain. The flagpole at the bow of the cruiser was suddenly crooked, and the large rice-shaped flag fell into the water.

More than a dozen gunners on the top of the mountain shouted loudly, and Tabu waved his hand: "Come again!" As he spoke, he prepared to carry the cannonballs.

He was at the top of Nanshan Mountain, and he saw it most clearly.

On the one hand, nearly 20 warships, mainly the Pacific Fleet, hid behind the Dahushan Fort in the center of the Pearl River General and kept firing at the invading foreigner fleet, and on the other hand, six large-caliber single-door gunboats newly purchased by the Nanyang Fleet hid in the Beiwan of the Taiping Waterway and behind the Nanshan Fort and kept firing at the onrushing foreigner fleet.

But the foreigner fleet is menacing, and Tabuqi once commanded the sailors in the Hunan army, so he naturally knows the power of the foreigner's warship. He roughly estimated that the foreigner's fleet was only afraid of nearly a hundred warships, and the dozen or so warships at the front, even if he looked at it from the top of Nanshan Mountain, felt like a small mountain, difficult to shake.

Tabuzi had just seen through the telescope that a large warship had been hit by several shells from the Weiyuan battery group at the foot of the mountain, but it only left a few potholes in the side panels, and it was still almost unaffected, firing at the battery while slowly approaching the battery.

What was hateful was that nearly half of the small warships of the British army abandoned the batteries and divided into two groups to pursue the Pacific Fleet and the Nanyang Fleet in the Taiping Channel, which were hiding behind the Dahushan Battery. In particular, more than a dozen gunboats and shallow water steam gunboats had already clinged to the river bank below the Weiyuan Fort and rushed into the Taiping Waterway, struggling to bombard the six large-caliber gunboats that had not yet reacted. In a short time, a large-caliber gunboat was billowing with smoke, and it seemed that it had exploded and caught fire, and the remaining five gunboats were obviously invincible. If he hadn't just ordered the Nanshan Fort to turn around and fire at the more than ten foreign gunboats, sinking a shallow gunboat, damaging one frigate and one gunboat, and scaring the more than ten foreign warships back, I am afraid that the other five gunboats would not be spared.

Foreigners are good at naval warfare, and it's really not a lie. Tabuzi sighed secretly, even if their own naval guns have a huge advantage in long range, but in this naval battle they didn't play much at all, and only the day before when a small number of warships bombarded it had some effect, and now such a large-scale naval battle, forced up by the foreign warships, the foreigners relied on the number and firepower of their warships, plus they were good at naval warfare, and the warships were very skillful, and the advantage of artillery range was wiped out at once.

Tabuqi couldn't help but sigh that there is still a big gap between his country's navy and foreign powers.

At this time, a soldier of the captive army ran to him with a bloody face and reported loudly: "Report to the deputy division commander, there are a large number of foreign infantry attacking under the mountain, and Zhang Daquan, a soldier of the division headquarters guard battalion, is on the order of the battalion commander Rong Weishan to request support!" ”

"It's only been one morning, and Rong Weishan's kid can't stand it?" Tabuzi shouted angrily: "What about the second regiment, they eat? Thousands of people can't withstand a few foreign devils? Wait, how many foreign devils are here? ”

"Deputy division commander, the foreigners who are attacking are only afraid of thousands of people, when the commander and deputy commander of the second regiment led the brothers of the second regiment to intercept the enemy troops in the Taiping waterway, in order to cover the retreat of our reconnaissance battalion and the brothers of the other second regiment, they died bravely, and the chief of staff of the second regiment was shot and died in an ambush of the enemy in Xinwan last night. Now Rong Weishan, as the commander of the reconnaissance battalion, took over the second regiment and the reconnaissance battalion, and led the remaining brothers of the second regiment and the reconnaissance battalion, a total of more than 800 people, to retreat to the first trench under the South Mountain to block the enemy! Battalion Commander Rong said that there are many foreigners, and they are not afraid of death, but they are afraid that they will not be able to support it for long. The situation is extremely critical, please ask the deputy division commander to quickly lead a group of brothers to the rescue! ”

Tabuqiyang's eyes widened and he was taken aback: "Thousands? When did the foreigners have so many land soldiers? Didn't those spies say that the foreigners' soldiers were all dragged in Singapore? He immediately looked stunned, and a trace of sadness flashed in his eyes, but it was gone in a blink of an eye, but his eyes were slightly red, and he muttered silently in his heart: I only hope that Master Zhang can receive the previous letter and lead his troops to help as soon as possible.

Thinking of this, Tabuqi shouted: "There are so many foreign soldiers, why don't you call for help earlier!" Lost so many brothers. Alright, artillery brothers on the mountain, hurry up and don't stop, hurry up and open fire to kill the enemy! The brothers of the first regiment, and all the remaining brothers of the division headquarters, all bring your muskets and ammunition, and follow me down the mountain to kill the enemy! ”

He shouted to a soldier beside him: "Herald Company, go to the two of you and this Zhang Daquan brother to rush to the battalion commander Rong Weishan first, pass on my order, and if you can't resist it, you will retreat back to the second trench to defend!" Brothers are not afraid of sacrifice, but they can't sacrifice senselessly, and it is worth using more trenches to kill foreigners! ”

After speaking, Tabuqi reluctantly glanced at the Pearl River to the west, turned around and led the whole army to go down the mountain to reinforce it.

At the foot of the mountain in the southeast of Nanshan Mountain.

Inside a trench.

Rong Weishan was disgraced, looked at the foreign soldiers in front of him with a vicious face, and roared angrily: "Shoot me to death!" With that, the trigger of a Krupp breech-loading rifle in his hand slammed into the forehead of a British officer three hundred meters ahead.

As the gunfire rang out in the trench, thirty or forty of the British soldiers who were half-crouching and staggering up the gentle slope fell in response. Immediately, the front platoon of the British soldiers also half-crouched and fired at the trench, and a row of green smoke came out, and more than a dozen soldiers of the begging army who had just finished firing and had not had time to shrink their heads were shot with a muffled snort and fell backwards in the trench.

The war is unusually fierce!

Since the morning, Rong Weishan has led the division headquarters guard battalion to guard the wooden bridge at the three gates of Niutou Mountain, and until now, the hard fight has not stopped at all.

At the beginning, the battle went smoothly, and the carefully prepared explosives were detonated, blowing up the wooden bridge, leaving the 300 Indian men and 200 British soldiers who rushed across the wooden bridge in a lonely situation.

But what happened next surprised him. The British were clearly determined to take the fort today, and were well prepared, and the blowing up of the wooden bridge did not stop them for long, and in only half an hour, the British not only repaired the wooden bridge, but also reorganized a large number of troops to attack by erecting a pontoon bridge composed of several rafts through the engineer battalion.

Seeing that the situation was not good, the other battalions of the 2nd Regiment led their troops to come to the rescue from the northeast of Nanshan, and the two sides engaged in a fierce battle at the foot of Niutou Mountain. Relying on the advantage of the range of guns, the captives ruthlessly killed and wounded a large number of enemies, but the British army was too numerous, coupled with the proper organization, fearless of death, and stubbornly used the Indian men who accompanied the army to act as a meat shield in front of them, and consumed the firepower of the captive army. At this critical moment, the commander of the 2nd Regiment issued an order to retreat, and at the same time, he and the deputy regiment commander led the officers and men of the 2nd Regiment to meet the British troops who had rushed up, covering the retreat of other officers and men of the 2nd Regiment and the friendly troops of the guard battalion to the Nanshan defense line further behind.

In that battle, the attacking British army suffered six or seven hundred casualties, and nearly 1,000 Indian civilians were expelled as cannon fodder and killed in battle, while the defending beggar army also suffered five or six hundred casualties.

Subsequently, at noon, after more than two hours of preparation, the British troops occupying the area around Niutou Mountain organized a second full-scale attack and launched a direct attack on the Nanshan defense line.

However, this time the British soldiers did not use Indian people as meat shields and cannon fodder to attract firepower like they did in the first attack on the Niutoushan defense line, and this time they had enough preparations. Taking advantage of the favorable opportunity when the Weiyuan Fort was busy shooting British warships in the river and had no time to take care of other things, the British army directly called on troop carriers to transport more than 30 field guns from the southern end of the Taiping Waterway, and placed the field guns in front of the Nanshan defense line with Indian men and soldiers.

Subsequently, the British began artillery bombardment and equipped grenades specifically against the defenders in the trenches. Under the concentrated fire of more than 30 field guns, many officers and men in the trenches were killed and wounded. The defenders also immediately adjusted several artillery pieces to counterattack, but after all, the number was too small, and they were preempted by the field artillery, and only one or two shots were fired, and they were targeted by several field guns of the British army to concentrate on fire, and the artillery was destroyed and killed.

However, the Nanshan Fort on the top of Nanshan Mountain was at this time bombarding the steam gunboats at the mouth of the Pearl River and Taiping Water Road in the northwest with all its might, and there was no time to think about anything else, and because of the topography of Nanshan Mountain, the trees facing the direction of the Pearl River coastal defense were only cut down, and the field of vision was not clear at the foot of the east mountain on the back of the fort. As a result, the Nanshan Fort was unable to support the defenders of the defensive line, and Rong Weishan and them were in an extremely difficult situation.

Fortunately, there was a trench that was mostly half a human depth, otherwise the casualties would have been more serious. But even so, the defenders in the trench were killed or wounded, and the original number of thousands of people was slowly reduced to only seven or eight hundred men.

At this time, because the personnel were sparse and the soldiers were ready to lie down in the trench, the British field artillery was no longer so powerful. However, the British commander who commanded the attack had obviously planned it a long time, and before Rong Weishan could breathe a sigh of relief, the British army gave the order to charge, and under the cover of field artillery, nearly 3,000 British troops launched a charge in front of the trench defense line that was less than two miles long. The other nearly 2,000 British soldiers also began to advance to Nanshan from the steep north of Nanshan.

The situation has become critical.

The so-called Nanshan defense line is actually mainly protected by the land behind the Weiyuan Fort, a total of two. The first is a trench of nearly two miles under the relatively gentle slope on the east side of Nanshan, and the second is the Nanshan Fort and a cement retaining wall and Tibetan ditch of several hundred meters on the northeast side of the Nanshan Fort from Shetou Bay to the mouth of the Taiping Water Channel. Because the south side directly faces the river, it is all near the river stone wall, it is difficult to walk, and there is Weiyuan Fort fortification, therefore, if you want to conquer Weiyuan Fort and Nanshan Fort by land, there are two paths, one is to overcome the first Nanshan trench defense line, and then occupy Nanshan Fort, you can condescendingly and directly attack Weiyuan Fort Group, of course, this is the most deadly; The second is to bypass the first Nanshan trench defense line from the north, and climb over the second cement retaining wall, so that you can directly attack the Nanshan Fort from the mountain, and from the flat ground to the southwest, you can attack the Zhenyuan Fort and Jingyuan Fort of the Weiyuan Fort Group from behind, and then capture the entire Weiyuan Fort Group.

Just when Rong Weishan was anxious, there was a cheer behind him: "The deputy division commander has arrived with reinforcements!"