On December 6, the 26th year of the Republic of China (December 6, 1937), more than 100,000 people from the 6th, 9th, 16th, and 114th divisions of the Japanese army advanced rapidly from the east and south to Nanjing, and occupied the first line of Zhenjiang, Gurong, Chunhua, and Qiling Pass respectively.

After three days of fierce fighting on the 6th, 7th, and 8th, all the positions on the periphery of Nanjing were lost.

On 8 December, more than 100,000 Japanese troops from the 3rd, 6th, 9th, 16th, and 114th Divisions, as well as the 5th and 6th Heavy Artillery Brigades, arrived at the offensive positions designated by the Shanghai Dispatch Army Headquarters.

Sun Yumin has been guarding Guanghua Gate since six days and has never been to that small courtyard again.

Chen Yun and the others were also blocked by stones and several soldiers, and they did not take half a step out of the courtyard gate.

Listening to the sound of artillery and gunfire getting closer and closer, Sun Yumin was not afraid, but had an inexplicable excitement. Maybe it's the woman you love watching you, or maybe it's because there's an escape tunnel.

Sun Yumin, Gao Tuan Deputy and Zhou Hainan divided the labor, Sun Yumin was in the city tower bunker, Zhou Hainan was in the big bunker in the outer city of the city gate cave, and Gao Tuan deputy was in the inner city gate bunker.

This assignment was to take care of the deputy of the second cargo regiment, but he didn't do it, so he had to go to the front line. Zhou Hainan was impatient, so he had to switch with him.

Sun Yumin didn't expect this change, and he almost had a big problem.

Early in the morning of December 9, the sky was just dawning.

A loud roar was heard in the sky, followed by a terrible air raid siren in Nanjing.

Sun Yumin stood on the city tower, looking at the black-pressed group of planes flying in the sky in the distance, and sighed in his heart: This day has finally come.

Sun Yumin walked into the pumpkin-shaped bunker on the city tower, and the two soldiers outside immediately covered the entrance with a few sandbags and ran down the city tower.

There were not many soldiers in the second battalion on the city walls, and although there were machine gunners and machine gunners in the small pillboxes, ammunition men and spare machine gunners were still hiding under the city walls.

The black-pressed group of planes flew over the city of Nanjing, without encountering the slightest resistance.

Thundered......

Japanese heavy artillery began shelling before the planes dropped bombs.

The two anti-aircraft artillery and anti-aircraft machine-gun positions in the east and south of the city did not fire a single shell, and without firing a single bullet, they were covered by artillery fire from the ground. When Tang Shengzhi received the report, the expensive Sorotong anti-aircraft guns and anti-aircraft machine guns imported from Germany, as well as the soldiers of the anti-aircraft machine company, were all bombarded by the 96-Type 305mm heavy howitzers of the Japanese heavy artillery wing.

The Japanese bombers in the sky began to drop bombs, and the Japanese fighters escorting the escort swooped down and strafed the various defenders' positions.

The city of Nanjing was shrouded in the sound of huge artillery fire, and countless fires rose in the city along with the sound of explosions.

The fortifications and sandbags on the city wall were bombarded and flown down under the bombardment of shells, and the few soldiers on the city wall were not survived by artillery fire and machine-gun attacks.

Sun Yumin, who was in the bunker, was so shocked by the explosion that he couldn't hear anything. Several people in the bunker were even stunned, and the shooters who were holding the triggers of their machine guns covered their ears with their hands.

The Japanese planes flew away from the city of Nanjing after bombing and strafing for dozens of minutes.

Before the Nationalist troops on the various positions could recover their senses, they heard the piercing and continuous shrill screams of artillery shells in the air, which was the sound of heavy cannon shells of the Japanese army.

Sun Yumin is not afraid of cannon shelling, because his position is now basically empty. In addition to destroying many city wall bricks, the shells that blew up the city walls and towers caused damage to the soldiers of the second battalion made many people temporarily deaf. The bridge over the moat was blown up yesterday as soon as the outlying troops returned to the city, and the hole in the left gate was also closed by stones hanging from the tower.

The cannon shelling lasted almost twenty minutes and there was no sign of stopping.

Sun Yumin's ears gradually adjusted to the powerful explosion, and as more and more different shells broke through the air, something was suddenly wrong in his heart.

I looked out of the shooting hole and was taken aback.

Seven or eight Type 95 tanks had already driven to the moat, and the Type 94 37mm guns on the tanks were frantically bombarding the city gate. Dense Japanese infantry was already everywhere, and some even jumped off the moat.

On the stone piers and bridge slabs of the Guanghuamen Bridge that were blown up, more than a dozen Japanese soldiers had already climbed up.

Sun Yumin kicked the machine gunners and machine gunners who were still squatting on the ground with their ears covered a few times, picked up a Makqin, pulled the trigger, and a rain of bullets poured down on the Japanese soldiers on the side of the moat, and more than a dozen Japanese soldiers fell under the rain of bullets in an instant.

The other shooters in the bunker quickly pounced on their positions, pulled the trigger one after another, and several tongues of fire pounced on the devil soldiers under the city walls.

The machine guns also began to roar, and several 20mm shells hit a Japanese tank, but unfortunately the 20mm shells could not penetrate the tank's armor because of the distance.

Seeing this, Sun Yumin shouted urgently: "Don't hit the tank, hit the infantry first." ”

The shelling continued, many mortar shells, grenades, cannon shells, heavy grenades fell on the city walls and inside the city, and what was even more terrifying was that several shells landed on the shelter positions under the city walls, and one shell shattered a bunch of soldiers.

Broken bodies and severed limbs and stumps were scattered everywhere under the walls, and the blood slowly pooled into a stream of water, flowing down the lowlands.

The air was filled with the pungent smell of gunpowder, mixed with the stench of charred and charred human corpses, which combined with the strong smell of blood was disgusting.

Sun Yumin couldn't help but suspect that the Japanese tactics he had learned in his previous life were compiled by people, at least in the battle in front of him, the indiscriminate artillery bombardment and infantry artillery coordination of the little devils were very tacit and mature.

Sun Yumin did not expect that it was not that the Japanese army's tactics were already so powerful, but because this was a siege battle, the four or five meters high city wall of Nanjing City could be used as a good reference line, so that the Japanese artillery could bomb boldly without worrying about accidental injury.

Some of the strange scar battles he saw from the Anti-Japanese War drama in his previous life could not have appeared in real battles. Therefore, the lessons learned in this battle are something that Sun Yumin will never forget for the rest of his life.

Bullets and shells were fired from only this one pillbox on the entire Guanghuamen position, and not a single gunshot had been fired in other places. Including the huge bunker under the castle tower and the small bunker in the doorway next to it.

Sun Yumin was nervous, he handed the heavy machine gun back to the machine gunner to operate, pushed open the sandbag blocking the exit, and yelled at a spare ammunition man, hurry down and tell them to go up to the castle tower to defend.

The ammunition man climbed out of the sandbag at the exit and rushed down the stairs, shouting as he ran: "Battalion command, all go up the wall and return to the position." ”

Sun Yumin shook the phone frantically, but no one answered, and the two bunkers downstairs still didn't fire a single shot.

The bunker where Zhou Hainan was located in the inner city gate suddenly frantically spat out tongues of fire, and two heavy machine guns and light machine guns opened fire at the same time.

Sun Yumin's heart is not good: it's over, what he was worried about has finally happened.

This damn second cargo group vice.

The pillboxes in front didn't fire, but the pillboxes in the back line fired, and a pig knew what was going on.

The men of the 2nd Battalion rushed to their positions on the walls and began to shoot, and all kinds of fire were fired, including the powerful machine guns.

The casualties of the Japanese troops under the city increased sharply, but because they came up too late, the little devil had already gained a foothold under the city.

The power of the mortars and grenadiers was soon revealed, and the soldiers of the 2nd Battalion on the city walls suffered heavy casualties under the bombardment of the shells.

The Japanese Army's Type 93 heavy machine guns and Type 11 light machine guns were also constantly suppressing the heavy firepower of the 2nd Battalion.

The tanks by the moat were like fierce steel monsters, firing shells frantically, although the 34mm shells did not hurt the bunker, but the loud explosion gave people a very big auditory impact.

The eight mortars of the second battalion finally sounded, and the power of the machine guns and heavy machine guns on the upper floors began to be demonstrated. The casualties of the Japanese troops in front of the city gate began to multiply, but they did not retreat, and the Japanese troops in the open space were firmly in place with the help of tanks and the corpses of the fallen soldiers.

The small bunker under the castle tower suddenly resounded with the roar of a heavy machine gun, followed by a violent explosion, and Makqin's voice disappeared. The machine guns in the inner city gate bunker where Zhou Hainan was located also stopped firing.

Under the indiscriminate shelling of Japanese cannons and heavy howitzers, the officers and men of the second battalion on the city wall suffered heavy casualties.

Sun Yumin's heart trembled with pain, and he hadn't smoked for a long time, and he picked up another cigarette in his hand. In his reflection and summary, he was also thinking about how to reduce casualties and how to recover the first line of defense that did not fire a single shot: the large blockhouse in the outer city gate.

While he was pondering, a group of gendarmes ran up the stairs of the city wall.

Sun Yumin was startled, thinking that he was coming to cure him for the crime of losing the first position, but he saw the second regiment commander Xie Chengrui running up with a person wearing a military police uniform and no military rank, and got into the pillbox.

Looking at Regiment Commander Xie, who braved the rain of bullets and bullets to go up to the front-line position, Sun Yumin was very moved, and reported with red eyes: "Please ask the regiment commander to punish the crime, the position of the city gate cave under the city tower has been lost." ”

Head Xie didn't speak, walked up to him and hugged Sun Yumin heavily, and said, "Good brother, well done." ”

The military police officer who came in with Commander Xie also patted him on the shoulder and said, "Battalion Commander Sun really deserves to be the elite of the national army's elite!" Do you know that the 87th Division, which was also a German armament division, had already suffered nearly two regiments of casualties before barely repelling the Japanese attack. It's good that you kid, with such a few casualties, the position is still firmly in your hands. ”

Sun Yumin had no intention of asking for credit, and he never forgot the mistakes he had made, and said anxiously: "Two commanders, you have to lose your company first, and I will take someone to take him back from the lost position." ”

The gendarmerie officer stretched out his hand to stop him and said, "You have worked hard, let my men go and take back the position." ”

The battle was still raging, and the 2nd Battalion on the city walls, supported by fresh troops, began to ease up. Under the organization of the company platoon commander, some soldiers began to carry the bodies of the fallen soldiers under the city wall, and the seriously wounded were also carried down by the soldiers and sent to the field hospital of the corps. Many of the lightly wounded were bandaging their wounds by themselves, and there were only two hygienists in the second battalion, who were completely too busy, so the soldiers could only help each other bandage them or hastily bandage them themselves.

Probably seeing that many soldiers had entered the city gate, Lieutenant General Yoshizumi Ryosuke, commander of the Japanese Ninth Division, organized a large amount of heavy firepower to assist the Wakisaka Wing who was attacking Guanghua Gate with heavy troops, and the shells fired by hundreds of 150mm howitzers of the Japanese Sixth Heavy Artillery Brigade fell one by one on the Guanghuamen position, and the firelight was accompanied by a huge explosion, producing mushroom clouds, which continued to rise from the Guanghuamen position.

The commander of the 2nd Regiment could not bear the annihilation of the 2nd Battalion, so he ordered the 4th Battalion to enter the position to take over the defense, and the 2nd Battalion withdrew to the rear to serve as a reserve.

Sun Yumin was impatient and had to obey orders.

Many soldiers of the second battalion watched the death of their brothers who lived and trained together on weekdays, and they refused to leave the position with red eyes. In the end, it was only under Sun Yumin's anger that he slowly withdrew.

Sun Yumin did not retreat, and the regiment commander was still on the front line, so he was naturally embarrassed to go.

In a conversation with Commander Xie, he learned that all the ministries had suffered heavy losses.

The frontal defense lines of the 87th Division, the 88th Division, the Teaching Corps, and the 48th Division (1) on the front line from Purple Mountain, Zhongshanmen, and Guanghuamen to Zhonghua Gate and Yuhuatai encountered a general attack by the Japanese army.

During the morning of fighting, all the positions of the Nationalist troops on the frontal battlefield were subjected to full saturation shelling by two Japanese heavy artillery brigades and two other field heavy artillery wings. According to the statistics of the Japanese army after the war, the 5th and 6th Heavy Artillery Brigades and the two field heavy artillery wings fired nearly 10,000 rounds of artillery on the 9th.

When the second battalion returned to the dilapidated station that had been bombed, Liu Tou, the leader of the cooking squad, was taking the cooks to fill the basket with steamed buns, looking at the officers and soldiers with low morale and many wounded, a few tears fell from Lao Liu's cloudy eyes, he stretched out his hand to wipe it, and shouted to everyone: "Brothers, have worked hard, come and cushion your stomach first." ”

Liu Wenzhi and Zhang Xiaohu saw that everyone ignored him, so they took the lead and walked over, grabbed two steamed buns, and shouted to the officers and soldiers: "Brothers, only when you are full can you have the strength to fight devils, and when you are full, you have the strength to avenge the brothers." ”

The two of them stuffed steamed buns into their mouths as they walked towards the camp, and when they passed by Lao Liu, they patted him on the shoulder with heavy hands.

They also know that Lao Liu Tou is not easy, and the losses suffered by the cooking squad in this bombing are not small, and only four of the eight cooks have appeared now, and they know the result without asking them.

The third and fourth companies of the 2nd Battalion were not withdrawn because they suffered relatively small battle losses, and Sun Yumin was unwilling to hand over the 2nd line of defense that he had worked so hard to manage to other troops, even if it was a brother unit of the 2nd Regiment.

Sun Yumin wanted to leave a place for the soldiers to hide in the second battalion, and in this kind of battlefield of life and death, without solid fortifications to guard, no matter how disciplined troops were, they could not withstand the bombardment of heavy artillery and aerial bombs.

There was another loud roar in the sky, and Sun Yumin in the pumpkin bunker stood behind the two regiment leaders and frowned.

Several tank cars under the moat under the city tower were brought by Regiment Commander Xie and three were blown up under the bombardment of two anti-tank guns carried up the city tower. Leaving three immobile iron lumps in place, the other tanks turned around and fled at an accelerated pace. Regiment Commander Xie was worthy of being an artillery master who had returned from studying in Germany, and he personally operated the anti-tank guns and hit two of them.

It was only a short time since the Japanese artillery fire stopped shelling, and before the officers and men of the defenders could catch their breath, a dense group of Japanese planes appeared in the sky, and this was already the second batch of bombers and attack planes of the day.

Note (1) The 48th Division and the 41st Division were the caretaker troops of Xu Yuanquan of the Second Corps, stationed at the Wulong Mountain fortress, and in the retreat sequence, they were originally to be the last to evacuate Nanjing City. As a result, under the command of Xu, they were the first to evacuate at Huangnidang on the 12th, which prematurely exposed the Xiaguan Wharf to the Japanese guns, resulting in the only retreat of the Nationalist army defending the city being cut off. As a result, more than 90,000 elite members of the national army died in Nanjing.