Da Da Da ......

The heavy shoulders were subjected to a lot of recoil due to the continuous firing, the body of the light machine gun and the body of the machine gunner were shaking rhythmically, the obtuse angles of the foot brackets at the front of the machine gun were rubbing back and forth on the windowsill leaving two obvious scratches, and the bullet casings that jumped out of the chamber fell to the floor in strings like broken beads.

With a strip of ammunition completely "swallowed into the belly" of the machine gun, the Heavy could already feel the heat of the barrel, and he quickly dragged the machine gun down the window and placed it on the floor, and the co-gunner, wearing thick gloves, immediately replaced the barrel that was so hot that it was about to deform. For a trained machine gunner, this process takes only 30-40 seconds, plus the time to reload the new cartridge, 1 minute can rejuvenate the light machine gun, but the "Firebird", a rough barrel similar to the Lewis machine gun, is aesthetically far inferior to the legendary G-42 machine gun made with stamping technology, and is limited by the rate of fire and range, and the "Firebird" does not have the conditions to become a general-purpose machine gun.

When the machine gun returned to the battlefield, the British infantry was still rushing through the street crossing, and a fierce battle broke out in several houses around the street, but the British had a huge advantage in numbers to make this house-to-house battle unavoidable.

The two machine gunners upstairs were upstairs upstairs when the door was slammed and smashed, and although their machine guns had killed no less than 50 British and Canadian soldiers in the previous few minutes, the British and Canadians rushed forward as if they had been stimulated, and even if they threw grenades at any cost, the German paratroopers still felt like they were out of water.

If Chen Tian sees this scene, he will definitely think of the dog sea tactics in a certain game. The British here have indeed fallen into a state of frenzy, they have no regard for their own lives, they do not hesitate to step over the bodies of the dead or the dead, many no longer stop to aim and shoot, and the bayonets on their rifles have become the only weapons in their eyes.

"Boys, it's time for us to play!"

As he stormed the street, Shields held a gun in his left hand and a grenade with the bottom cap unscrewed in his right, followed by the paratroopers in the same position, while others clenched their rifles in both hands. These paratroopers were excellent soldiers from one out of ten or even one out of a hundred, and it was difficult to tell whether it was right or wrong to use them in bayonet battles at this time, after all, they crossed the street behind them, and the bridge over the Fording River was within reach.

After biting out the fuse with his teeth, Shields threw the grenade into the crowd of British soldiers 20 meters away without much effort, and the first wave of grenades thrown by the paratroopers caused the British charging queue to fall down one by one, and the German paratroopers who entered the street one after another blocked the British army's path with their bodies and bayonets. In front of the German soldiers, the British soldiers fearlessly rushed through the wall of smoke formed by the explosion of the grenade, and the sharp bayonets on the rifles they held diagonally also emitted a terrifying cold light.

"Oh......"

Before the two armies intersected, a loud and earth-shattering cry erupted in the ranks of both sides. The two completely different colors converged in an instant, and the narrow street was suddenly overwhelmed by two crowds of people. In the era of cold weapons, the inferior side sometimes chose to meet the superior in the terrain in an area where the terrain was not open, in order to take advantage of the opponent's inability to fully deploy the opportunity to make up for the lack of their own numbers, this tactic can still play a non-negligible role in the era of machine guns and artillery after many years.

The crowded streets simply did not have enough room for maneuver in hand-to-hand combat, and Shields accurately parried the bayonet stabbed by the British soldier in front of him, but the opponent's bayonet was not far away, and Shields' subsequent backstab was also blocked by the opponent with the body of the gun. After a few smacks of the two bayonets, Shields stepped forward and used the barrel of the gun to dock the other's rifles, both of them trying to take advantage of the opportunity to push the other to the other, and the two faces immediately closed to less than 20 centimeters, and they could even see the bloodshot in the eyes of the other due to the rage. Shields, who had a slight upper hand in strength, pushed hard, and quickly raised his right hand towards the British, and the sound of the broken facial bones of the person who was hit was extremely clear. The British soldier fell to the ground with his face covered after a scream, and Shields did not hesitate to go down with a bayonet to calm him down completely, and the killer's body was suddenly covered with the blood gushing out of the slain, and the person standing had a hideous face, and the person who lost his breath did not look blind.

Right next to Shields, the killer was replaced by a British soldier, and the color of the slain's gray uniform did not change much after being stained with blood, but the pain of that moment did not diminish at all.

The soldiers involved in the bayonet battle had little chance to shoot, so the sound of gunfire and explosions in the streets became much more sparse, replaced by the roars of the victors, the screams of the losers, and the helpless wails of the dying. Although the direct casualties of the bayonet battle on both sides were not as fast as a single machine-gun fire, the yellow offensive tide of the British and Canadian troops almost came to a standstill, and the few German soldiers were stuck in the middle of the street like a gray embankment.

This should be the best time for snipers to play, and the attacking officers exposed to the streets are shot one by one according to their rank, and sometimes a medium-range bullet can make a beautiful string of sugar gourds after hitting the intended target. Hildrand hit a Canadian major with his first shot, but the Canadian soldiers next to him discovered where he was hiding, and a dozen rifles fired desperately at the roof where he was, the pop of the bullets hitting the planks forced Hildrand to move again, and it was only a matter of time before the wooden attic and roof were completely shattered by the bullets.

Thousands of British and Canadian infantry had filled several nearby streets like rivers during the flood season, and in some of the remaining German firepower points near the junction, the defenders no longer needed to take aim, all they had to do was shoot, throw grenades, and shoot again, and the opposing soldiers waited for the harvest like wheat in an autumn wheat field.

Eventually, the town went crazy with the battle, and what had been a peaceful place a day ago was now a temple for the fighters and a slaughterhouse for the slaughterers. Soon, the German paratroopers ran out of grenades and rifle bullets, and they drew their pistols and opened fire one after another, and when the few rows of pistol ammunition were also exhausted, they did not hesitate to pick up their rifles and charge out while loading their bayonets.

Finally, after paying a total of nearly 20,000 people, the Anglo-Canadian forces successfully cleared most of the German firepower points in this town, and the defenders' firepower could no longer stop the advance of the coalition forces. The German soldiers on the street were still resisting, but the remaining 2,000 or so Allied infantry formed a sledgehammer with their bodies, and it gradually began to shake the flesh-and-blood embankment of less than 300 German paratroopers remained.

With the three red flares rising on behalf of the retreat, the resistance of the German airborne troops in the town area west of the Fording River Bridge was declared unsuccessful.

"1 company and 2 times after the palace! The rest withdrew to the bridge! ”

Although the blood of the battle was surging all over her body, Shields still sensibly obeyed the order to retreat, and the situation here was quite clear, the Anglo-Canadian forces were constantly clearing the houses on both sides of the street during the advance, the German machine guns and machine gunners deployed in the vicinity were either killed or forced to evacuate their original positions, the riflemen mostly joined the hand-to-hand combat in the streets, and most of the snipers had stopped firing and moved to the rear firing points.

Thankfully, the paratroopers did not turn this retreat into a rout, after all, the town was only the first line of defense to guard the bridge, and under the cover of more than 100 rearguard soldiers, the remnants of the German soldiers in this town retreated to the bridge, where there were relatively strong bridgehead defensive positions.

The western township was lost, and the German paratroopers in the eastern township faced a very difficult test. The first two British cavalry regiments launched a tentative assault, and after dropping behind the corpses of hundreds of men and horses, the British cavalry abandoned the attack and turned to assist the infantry behind them in carrying equipment and guarding the nearby area. The British infantry who disembarked from the first train were small, no more than 10 infantry companies in the queue, but the artillery they carried on the train was the last thing the German paratroopers wanted.

Lieutenant Colonel Garris's face was very ugly as he saw through the binoculars as the British soldiers pushed a large caliber of field guns three or four miles out of town, but the more than 2,000 British cavalry loitering around the infantry and artillery had no idea of taking the initiative.

Just after 1 o'clock, 18 carrier-based bombers flying from the direction of the beach appeared in the sky south of the Fortin River Bridge like saviors, and the continuous take-off and landing and bombing made the pilots and planes gradually tired, but they still came.

In the face of the German aircraft group, the British reconnaissance plane that had been hovering nearby had already fled, and the Allied infantry who had just occupied the town area of Qiaoxi ignored it, and they attacked the bridge like wounded beasts without waiting to clear the battlefield. The British troops on the east side of the bridge did not say much, these British officers and soldiers were the first time they encountered the enemy aircraft on the battlefield, and there was no cover nearby for them to hide, they at most stopped to watch the German bomber group, or continued to push the heavy artillery under the shouts of the officers.

At this point, the decision of where to bomb the bomber group had been put in the hands of Lieutenant Colonel Garris, and he had to make up his mind as soon as possible whether to throw the marking flare to the west of the bridge or to form an arrow pointing to the east of the bridge. After much deliberation, Garris decided to direct his own fleet to bombard the British infantry to the east, while at the same time transferring a battalion of reserves to the bridgehead to strengthen the defense.

Soon, the paratroopers lit a dozen red signal fireworks at the entrance to the town east of the bridge, and from the air, an unstandard arrow pointed to a stopped train on the railroad to the east, where there were thousands of British cavalry, infantry, and several cannons.

After seeing the guidance signal from the ground, the commander of the bomber group made a right turn to attack, and his lead "Ostrich I" was the first to turn and began to reduce altitude.

Seeing this scene, General Reeser, who was standing on the west side of the Fording River, felt sad for a while, if it had not been for the fierce bombardment of the German army, his artillery would have probably destroyed this town with artillery fire, and now the town should not be lying on the ground with his soldiers.

Just like the bombing of Riesser's department, the British troops in the east were also bombed on the spot, and most of the bombs of the German planes were dropped on the train, and after a while, the damaged locomotive overflowed with steam, and the carriages behind were also blown up several cars, and the Vickers machine guns arranged on the roofs of several carriages roared desperately, but in the face of the German bombers whistling by, their bullets seemed to be alone. The British infantry, who had already dismounted, threw down their cannons and scattered to dodge, while the cavalry was blown up in all directions, and the ground trembled under the explosion of German aerial bombs and British ammunition.

While the British had managed to organize decent anti-aircraft fire, the bombardment of the German aircraft was nearing its end, and the vicinity of the train was in shambles, and the ground was still littered with bits and pieces of disgusting stuff, the clean snow was showing a patch of dirt from east to west, and a few small hills nearby were as ugly as leprosy.

The result of the 2nd Bomber Squadron of the German Navy was to blow up a British train, blow up 2 British 120-mm guns, damage 3 guns, reimburse 35 boxes of British ammunition, 37 British infantry, 29 cavalry, and 26 horses, and the British 13th and 17th Cavalry Regiments of Scotland and the English Salito Infantry Regiment were to damage one German bomber.

When the German bombardment was over, the British soldiers with snow, mud or blood stains on their faces got up from the ground in disarray, and they were not busy cleaning up the mess, but looked to the west one by one, watching the German bombers dragging black smoke in the direction of Fortin. The plane carried so much resentment that the British officers and men cheered as if it had won a great victory as it flew lower and lower and finally landed on the ground a few hundred meters from the town. This atmosphere even infected the Anglo-Canadian forces on the west side of the bridge, who took advantage of the situation to organize a new wave of charge, but unfortunately they were defeated again after leaving more than 200 bodies in front of the bridgehead that the Germans had contracted to defend.

The British cavalry were like hungry foxes at this time, and the German bombers lying on the ground were like pigeons that were injured and unable to fly. Without waiting to regroup, the cavalry rushed over in twos and threes. The Germans in the town immediately sent a small group of paratroopers to the rescue, but the German bomber group did not rush to leave, they continued to fire the British cavalry with machine guns in the rear, and the cavalry had to dodge again and again or stop to return fire with cavalry rifles.

When the paratroopers arrived next to the plane, they found that both pilots were badly wounded, the plane's engine was still emitting black smoke, and the emergency landing almost killed it, but fortunately it only tilted to the right side during taxiing and broke its right wing. After rescuing the pilots, the paratroopers threw several grenades into the cabin to blow them up.

"It's not a big deal to capture a plane on the ground!"

Looking at the burning German bombers, the acid foxes comforted each other with disdain.

After exhausting all the ammunition, the German bomber group set out on the homecoming, which caused a lot of mental and material damage to the British, but these were far from stopping the British offensive. Soon after, the second and third trains arrived on the east side of the Fortin River Bridge, and more and more artillery aimed their guns at the town on the British artillery positions in front of them.

"Pass my order, all the soldiers in the town will retreat near the bridge!"

Garris had no doubt that the British would raze the town, even though there were still many British residents in the town, and after all, the lives of a few hundred people were far less important than a battle that would largely determine the fate of a nation. The only thing the British could not shell was the bridge, which was of great strategic importance to them.

Sure enough, the two paratrooper battalions stationed in Qiaodong Town had not completely withdrawn, and the fierce artillery fire of the British army smashed over their heads and faces. In the breathless intensity of the explosions, houses built in the last century and even the last century were reduced to rubble, and as the British shelling continued, even the stones and bricks in the ruins were gradually crushed to powder. The German paratroopers guarding the perimeter of the bridge watched coldly at the scene, as the inconspicuous town was destroyed, as hundreds of lives died in the flames.

Forty-five minutes later, the British artillery fire had ceased, and there was not a single house in sight in the town, all the broken walls were no more than a man high, and the heat of the explosion evaporated people's blood and scorched their bodies, so that there was no sign of death in the rubble.

Garris was glad that he had withdrawn his troops in time, but he knew that the battle would only get more brutal.

At 2:35 p.m. on the 27th, the first British infantry from Southampton launched an attack on the Fording River Bridge, and after 20 minutes of fierce fighting, more than half of the 3,500 British infantry were killed and wounded and repulsed by the Germans. During this time, the Anglo-Canadian forces in the west launched their last attack, and after losing nearly 1,000 men, the two divisions from Taunton were no longer able to charge again, and the British attack on this side was temporarily halted until the arrival of the follow-up army.

At 3:25 p.m., the British army east of the bridge launched a second wave of attack, this time with as many as 6,700 troops, including 1,200 cavalry, and the British advanced to less than 20 meters from the bridge, and finally the German soldiers repelled the opponent through fierce hand-to-hand combat. After the second battle, only 2,000 German paratroopers were left defending the bridge, and the overall loss reached 60%, and the German commander, Lieutenant Colonel Garris, was once again ready to blow up the bridge.

At 3:50 p.m., the 8th train from the direction of Southampton arrived near the Fortin River Bridge, this train carried 18 armored cars, and 5 British Army's latest small Nomad tanks, at this time, the armored commando team of Guderian's mixed armored division had successfully passed through the British line, and with the cooperation of the 2nd and 3rd Airborne Regiments, advanced to only 2 miles from the bridge, the first land steel collision in human history will make this battle of the bridge the most classic battle of the war.