In this way, three trenches were dug in the east, south and north of the city, which could cover the crossbow guns and cannons on the city wall and resist the counterattack of the opponent.

In order to cover the besieging soldiers, the front moat was less than 100 meters away from the city wall.

Behind the trenches, several forts were built with rammed earth to bombard the city.

Early in the morning of the third day, the sky was clear, and Yang Lin gave an order, and the siege began.

Among them, the most powerful is the more than 20 big Buddha Lang machine guns that Yang Lin personally mastered, each about one meter five long, weighing seven or eight hundred catties, which are copper core iron body iron mold casting rear loading guns.

In peacetime, it is towed by two carriages, and in wartime, it needs ten people to operate at the same time.

Before the Opium War, Chinese artillery did not have a gun mount, and it was very cumbersome to operate by adjusting the angle of the gun body mainly by padding wooden blocks under the gun body.

As a traverser, of course, he was well-informed, and the cannon was fixed to the two-wheeled vehicle, and a layer of wooden planks was installed in the back to resist the rebound during firing.

The position of the barrel on the wheels was adjusted to adjust the angle of the barrel.

At present, more than 20 Franc cannons are distributed on five rammed earth batteries 200 meters from the city wall, and with the assistance of four soldiers, the gun commander has completed the aiming work.

A soldier removes the loaded gun from the barrel, puts it in the mother, and with the assistance of two gunners, it is reloaded, and then separates the two sides.

The igniter ignites the rope with a burning torch, and the flames snort and burn, and then explodes.

Several flashes of fire burst out of the muzzle of the gun, and then landed around the city wall, due to the use of scattered bullets, although the shooting distance was close, but the lead was scattered in an area of more than ten meters, and the momentum was very amazing.

After the firing is complete, the gunner takes off the sub-gun with cotton gloves and prepares for the next round of reloading.

A gunner first used a solid cylindrical rag soaked in water to poke a wooden stick into the barrel to extinguish the flames in the barrel, lower the gun, and remove the debris from the barrel.

But this is not safe, after the gunner has finished clearing, the other gunner will use a slightly damp solid cylindrical pig's hair rag to poke into the barrel to remove the residue in the barrel again.

Although the work is tedious, the explosion of black powder can produce residue, which can affect the performance of the gun barrel if not cleaned up, and accidents can also occur.

Even in the later era of yellow powder, cleaning the barrel was essential in the early days.

After the clearance, with the assistance of four gunners, the reaiming is completed, and at this time, the loader is ready to reload with lead gunpowder and ignite the shot.

Four or five meters behind them, four soldiers were clearing their guns and reloading them with lead gunpowder so that the shooting would not be interrupted.

In the era of black powder, it often took 2-3 minutes to fire the Big Franc cannon, which seemed very cumbersome to modern people, but it was a powerful weapon at the time.

In addition to the more than 20 big Franc machine guns personally mastered by Yang Lin, each battalion has six No. 3 Franc machine guns, although they weigh less than 200 catties, each equipped with 5 gunners, and their scatter range is less than 100 meters, but the solid bullet is more than 200 meters.

These No. 3 Franc cannons, which were commanded by the battalions themselves, now fired more solid bullets, each weighing about a catty, and fell on the city wall in all directions, and those who were hit were bound to be seriously injured.

Now seeing more than 100 artillery pieces of the Volunteer Army, everyone is hiding behind the daughter wall and trembling, the people are criticizing everywhere, the hearts of the troops are unstable, and everyone has no determination to fight to the death.

Gao Wengui is more than 30 years old, but he has followed the eight generations of kings for more than ten years, and he has never seen the formation of the southern expedition and the northern war, but he has never encountered the firepower of the volunteers.

After a fierce battle for half a day, seeing that there were many casualties on the city wall, Gao Wengui was in a dilemma, not only afraid of the volunteer artillery in the distance, but also worried about the volunteer infantry under the city wall.

Although the city wall was not attacked for half a day, the trench was only more than 100 meters away from the city wall, and there was no moat to shield it, so the defense was extremely weak.

During this period, the volunteers jumped out of the trench many times, and some even put the ladder on the city wall, but fortunately the soldiers used their lives, so that the other party could not succeed.

The only prayer now is probably that the Fran cannon in the distance has been blown up, and in such a hot weather, the continuous shelling will probably have been blown up long ago, according to past experience. (Clay mold casting, poor cooling method, poor cannon quality)

But it was extremely disappointing that from morning to night, the guns of the Volunteers kept ringing non-stop, and there was no explosion at all.

After cleaning up the casualties, the number of dead and wounded reached 300 in one day, and everyone was very puzzled, and rumors flew all over the army.

Gao Wengui complained bitterly, and Yang Lin did not dare to be sloppy, originally hoped to besiege the city to send reinforcements, mobilize all units of the Great Western Army by besieging Suining City, which was heavily fortified by the Great Western Army, and then annihilate the other party in the movement.

However, the scouts reported that the Great Western Army marched more than 30 miles a day, and there was no intention of speeding up the pace of the march at all.

And Zhang Dingguo's Bai Wenxuan Division's personal soldiers were one person and one riding army quickly, although they had reached Shehong County, which was a hundred miles away, they stopped moving, probably trying to avoid the risk of advancing alone.

Could it be that the other party has seen through his conspiracy to besiege the city and send reinforcements?

After thinking about it, Yang Lin decided to continue to cast a long line to catch big fish.

The next day, the various units continued to attack the city, in addition to organizing various artillery teams to shell in the distance, but also organized soldiers and horses to attack the city, hoping to force Zhang Dingguo to lead his troops to save by increasing the siege pressure.

Of course, most of the troops invested were newly formed or reorganized from the surrendered troops, but even so, everyone dressed in cotton armor and iron armor poured under the city wall, and under the cover of artillery fire, regardless of the bows and crossbows and guns that flew from the city wall, desperately climbed up the city wall.

Although it was a feint, the momentum was very strong, and there were many casualties on the city wall, and in some places it was smashed beyond recognition by iron balls.

Even so, the reinforcements of the Onishi Army did not speed up the march at all, and it was still about thirty miles a day.

In this way, five days later, the main force of the Great Western Army had already left Yuxian County and advanced in the direction of Shehong, and Zhang Dingguo and Bai Wenxuan's pro-army in Shehong had no intention of coming to help.

Seeing that the soldiers of the various departments were slackening, Yang Lin knew that he would no longer dare to spend it.

On this morning, he secretly ordered the battalions to select the brave men, and suddenly attacked at noon.

With a swarm of bees as a signal, more than ten doors and a swarm of bees were suddenly pushed out of the trench, and after being ignited, hundreds of rockets flew into the sky, and then fell on the city wall in unison, with a grand momentum.

At the same time, the death squad jumped out of the trench and rushed to the bottom of the city wall, braving the rain of falling bows and crossbows, holding a rattan card in one hand and a ladder in the other.

Seeing the sudden change of tactics of the volunteers, although the Great Western Army suffered heavy casualties, Gao Wengui understood that now was the moment of life and death, and in order to defend the city wall, he pulled out his sword and forced everyone to break through behind the daughter wall to defend.

But this is the stage for the earth-shaking thunder to play, Suining is an ordinary county seat, the city is only seven or eight meters high, and those with better tendons can easily throw a pound-heavy sky-shaking thunder on it.

Now, in order to cover the siege of the death squad, dozens of grenadiers have already stood under the city wall, and everyone has thrown the ignited earth-shattering thunder on the city wall.

The explosions came one after another, and the Great Western Army, which had just poked its head out and was ready to counterattack, suffered a large number of casualties, and some of them retreated in even more panic.

Those death squads have many battlefields, how could everyone let go of such a great opportunity, climb up the ladder and jump into the city wall, and then wield a big sword to fight with the soldiers who rushed over.

Gao Wengui's face was covered with blood, but he was reluctant to think that his heavily fortified city was easily breached, and rushed over several times to fight with the other party.

But in addition to the more than 200 personal soldiers around him who were willing to fight to the death, the other Huguang people who came with him and those guards retreated one after another.

Looking at the more and more volunteers gathered on the city wall, Gao Daxun, a chess and card officer, grabbed his shirt and said, "General, withdraw."

The Volunteers were strong and strong, and their artillery was fierce. If you stay in the green mountains, you are not afraid of no firewood, even if you take your life, you can't stand it. ”

The group of brothers under his command wandered all over the world, and they had no base feelings at all, and they often took the lead in withdrawing when the battle was unfavorable.

Although Gao Wengui wanted to defend to the death, his brothers did not do it, so he had to jump on his war horse and escape from the West Gate.

After six days of fierce fighting, the Volunteers captured the heavily fortified city of Suining by the Great Western Army. If it seemed to the ancients that this was a model of siege, it was too slow for a large number of volunteers equipped with hot weapons such as Franc cannons.

It was estimated afterwards that if it were not for the purpose of besieging the city and sending reinforcements to annihilate the main force of Zhang Dingguo's Baiwen Xuan Army, if he took the lead in exerting force, it would only take two days at most to break through Suining City.

At present, Zhang Dingguo's Bai Wenxuan Division's Great Western Army is only more than 100 miles away from Suining, and the reinforcements of Zhang Wenxiu's Department led by Di Sanpin have just arrived in Anyue, which is only 150 miles away from Suining.