"The first row, detouring from the left; the second row, moving to the right, waiting for an opportunity to enter the woods; In the third row, continue to shoot, do not aim at the armored vehicles, and hit the British soldiers outside; The fourth platoon is waiting for my order, ready to charge! ”

The man who commanded the orders on the side of the road was of moderate stature and average looks, and he stood out from the crowd solely because of the standard field uniform of the German Army, as well as the signature pointed helmet on his head. The German officer www.biquge.info with his piercing eyes and loud voice, his Irish accent would have sounded jerky to ordinary Irishmen, but the Irish armed men in front of him were always able to carry out his orders.

Next to the man, who was in his early thirties, stood a middle-aged man who looked like a cook, who was always staring straight ahead, and judging by his expression, he was the real leader of the group of Irish armed men. According to the secret agreement between the Irish Brotherhood and the German government, the German officer who came to Ireland was only responsible for training soldiers in peacetime and advising the Irish commander in wartime, but could not directly command the troops.

At the moment of fierce fighting, both middle-aged fat men and German officers did not care about the eyes of others.

Ahead, as the British soldiers who had entered the woods returned to the side of the road, the fire to stop the Irish attack was greatly increased, and they moved the heavy machine guns captured from the enemy to the edge of the woods, and coordinated with the armored vehicles on the road. If the Irish armed men relied on their numerical superiority to force an attack, they would inevitably be strewn all over the field under the intensive fire of British machine guns and rifles, but the Irish adopted a roundabout strategy and always kept a certain distance from the British army, so that the British army could not take much advantage, and the two sides formed a fierce confrontation situation.

Until a new balance-breaking force emerges, no one can bring down their opponents.

On the attacking side, a young man dressed in a gray cotton cloth jacket and carrying a rifle rushed forward and reported to the German officer, first to the middle-aged fat man and then to the German officer: "Cavalry! A troop of cavalry came from the northeast, and it must have been British cavalry! ”

The middle-aged fat man turned his gaze to the German officer, who walked a few steps east, raised his binoculars and glanced at them a few times, and said, "Give the second platoon an order to cover the withdrawal of friendly troops from the woods." ”

"Huh? Are we going to retreat? The young man who came to report the news widened his eyes and looked very reluctant.

The German officer glanced at him with a cold gaze, and the young man's expression shrank in an instant like a vegetable leaf thrown into a hot pan.

"It may be difficult to destroy this British army from a military point of view, but from the perspective of the whole situation, it will be a heavy blow to the British, and it will be a great encouragement to all the Irish people, even if half of them are lost......"

"If they only had one machine gun, we might have lost half of them and wiped them out, but now they have an armored vehicle and a squad of cavalry coming here, and we can't win, at least not here."

Perhaps feeling that his tone was too cold, the German officer paused and added: "Retreat does not mean defeat, but to avoid unnecessary sacrifices, and to look for opportunities to defeat the opponent." ”

The fat middle-aged man nodded, "I understand!" Just do as you say! Mr. Ensign. ”

In just two cigarettes, the Irish fighters who attacked the British were all out of battle. The British soldiers, who felt that they were in a difficult situation, were surprised to see the Irish armed men slowly retreating, but when their own cavalry roared, they were relieved: it turned out that the opponent was afraid of the might of the British cavalry and took the initiative to retreat!

After consulting with the cavalry officers, the commander of the group of British soldiers decided to leave a small number of soldiers to clean up the battlefield, transport the bodies of the fallen officers and soldiers and the wounded back to the station, and personally lead 50 soldiers, carrying captured Maxim machine guns, and follow the cavalry in two trucks to pursue the Irish armed men who had just arrived, and strive to eliminate them before they retreated to the city.

This cavalry unit that "scared away" the Irish belonged to the Scotland's North Ayrshire Hussars, a wartime reserve unit that replaced the Scottish Oxfordshire Volunteer Cavalry Regiment sent to the French battlefield to defend Ireland. Due to the peculiarities of the cavalry units, the cavalry composed of reserve soldiers was not inferior in any respect, except that the tactical quality was slightly inferior to that of the standing troops, and although this group of cavalry was only 60 men, the momentum of the march was more spectacular than that of a battalion of infantry. Commanded by a young and vigorous cavalry lieutenant, the Scottish cavalry chased the retreating Irish men at a galloping speed.

Within a quarter of an hour, the rabble of Irish armed men appeared in front of sight.

Although they despised the Irishmen who had colluded with the Germans and took advantage of the trouble, the cavalry lieutenants did not attack rashly, and in order to have the effect of surprise, they deliberately avoided the main road, crossed the fields and streams, and quietly detoured back to the flank of the Irish armed men, but also reached the edge of the port area of Cork. Standing on the clock tower in the harbor and paying attention, it is not difficult to spot this low-key stealthy British cavalry unit.

The British soldiers were not much slower than the cavalry in their trucks, and when the cavalry reached their ideal position, they also exchanged fire with the opposing rearguard troops, and were attacked by grenades from the Irish who were lying in ambush on the side of the road, losing one truck at first and a dozen soldiers incapacitated. However, this was nothing in the eyes of the cavalry lieutenant, and seeing that the main force of this group of Irish armed men stopped by the side of the road, as if preparing to fight the British soldiers who were chasing him, he proudly drew his cavalry sword, shouted "attack", and immediately rushed out in the lead.

Hearing the sudden shout, feeling a slight tremor from the ground, those Irish Volunteer soldiers who retreated with the wounded were stunned for a moment, and then raised their guns in a hurry, most of the first bullets were floating, when they were busy reloading, the British cavalry had rushed to the front with terrifying speed, they held their sharp cavalry swords, ready to rush into the crowd to start a bloodthirsty slaughter, but the crowd suddenly threw a number of things that looked like short sticks, at this time, The cavalry did not have the opportunity to stop charging or turn their heads to evade, they had to respond to the opponent's grenade attack, and the explosions at close range lifted some riders off the horseback one after another, and some of the horses weighing three or four hundred kilograms seemed to hit an invisible wall, and the whole flipped over and fell to the ground, and some seemed to be pushed by a huge hand, and the four hooves left the ground and planted on the side, and what made the British cavalry behind was deeply frightened was that there were constantly such "short sticks" thrown out of the crowd, The smoke and dust from the explosion formed a terrifying barrier......

There were explosions behind him, and the cavalry lieutenant knew that his cavalry team was being hit, but in this case, he had no choice but to go all the way to the end. I saw this British cavalry officer rushing into the ranks of the Irish militants on horseback, slashing left and right fiercely, his sword falling and falling, and the warm blood splashed on his face, making his face extremely hideous. In a matter of moments, at least seven or eight Irish armed men fell under his cavalry swords, and the bayonets that stabbed diagonally were nimly blocked by him. Suddenly, there was an open space ahead, and he had already killed in the opponent's array, but when he turned around, he saw only a few people following, and the smoke and dust of the explosion "swallowed" his troops, and he didn't know what the condition of the troops was at this time.

The cavalry lieutenant suddenly felt his blood surge, he waved the cavalry sword in his hand, turned around on horseback, shouted "charge" in his mouth, and tried to lead his men to kill another enemy piercing, but the gap that had just been opened had disappeared, and the Irish armed men who had just filled their positions raised their guns and pointed their guns at each other, and not far behind them, a German officer wearing a pointed helmet appeared in the sight of the cavalry lieutenant.

"Damn it!" The cavalry lieutenant only had time to curse in his heart, no matter how much he wanted this guy's head, the oncoming bullets made him lose all hope in an instant, and the Mauser bullet that had killed hundreds of thousands of people on the European battlefield passed through his chest, and another life in its prime fell.

The German officer standing in the crowd watched coldly as the British cavalry lieutenant fell off his horse, turned around expressionlessly, and shouted in a loud voice: "Alternate firing in each squad, keeping a steady interval!" ”

With a flurry of guns, the British cavalry dismounted, the smoke and dust cleared, and the field on the left side of the road was filled with the corpses of riders in khaki uniforms and their fat horses, plus the middle and right sides of the road, and the total number of dead cavalry was exactly sixty.

At this time, the 50 British soldiers attacking along the road were still unaware of the disastrous encounter of their own cavalry, and they were full of thoughts that these fierce British cavalry would crush the enemy, and all they had to do was to cooperate with the battle and clean up the battlefield. However, as the gunfire and explosions in front gradually subsided, the Irish armed men responsible for blocking the rear of the hall showed no signs of collapse, and quietly, the British soldiers found that armed elements in civilian attire appeared on their left and right flanks one after another, and their marksmanship did not dare to compliment, but they were firing calmly and orderly, which was like the platoon gun formation in the era of smoothbore guns, when the shooting accuracy of a single rifle at about 100 meters could be described as nine out of ten, and they had to rely on a neat and dense array of guns to improve the hit rate.

As the casualties of his own soldiers continued to increase, the British commander knew that he could not wait for news from the cavalry any longer, so he hurriedly ordered a retreat, but the two trucks had been beaten by the other side and could not be used at all, and the British soldiers had to withdraw on foot, but they were bitten very tightly by the enemy's pursuers, and as a result, they went earlier and earlier, until they were trapped by bullets fired from all directions. Unable to get reinforcements to rescue them in a short period of time, the British commander finally raised the white flag in order to avoid the doom of all the people being killed.

(End of chapter)