Li Shixian's reaction was extremely fast, he scolded the general Huang Chengzhong for being incompetent, and at the same time sent a large army to counterattack Li Hongzhang to prevent him from encircling the Taiping army, and stepped up the attack on the besieged Huai Army cavalry battalion.

Li Shixian knew very well that if he could hold on to the present with more than 1,000 soldiers, this cavalry unit must be the elite of the Huai Army. And according to his understanding, the Huai army has been inflated in more than a month, how many elite forces are there in such a force? Li Shixian believed that the destruction of this 1,500 cavalry troops was more important than defeating the 10,000 Huai army.

I have to say that Li Shixian's vision is extremely accurate, and he still firmly believes in his judgment at this moment when he may be surrounded.

Fan Ruzeng, the commander of the rebel army, personally led the charge and became the last straw that broke the camel's back with his fierceness that was not afraid of death.

The cavalry force of 1,500 people was completely defeated because of the arrival of Li Hongzhang's reinforcements, and the cavalry commander Pan Dingxin was seriously injured and unconscious, so the cavalry naturally lost resistance, and finally these people chose to surrender.

After solving the Huai cavalry, Fan Ruzeng transferred his troops and began to block the attack of Li Hongzhang's troops. In this fight, they found that it was also the Huai army, and the strength of the outnumbered people was far from good. In addition to guarding against being hit by bullets, they are completely pressing the Huai army.

On the other side, Li Hongzhang, who was supervising the battle, could no longer hear the sound of the battle inside the encirclement, and the expression on his face was quite gloomy.

"Dashuai, what should I do?" Liu Bingzhang asked in a low voice. At this time, fools know that Pan Dingxin's cavalry troops are afraid that they will be more auspicious.

"Order the artillery, give me a hard bang!" Li Hongzhang was red-eyed, the cavalry of the three battalions was his elite, and if he lost this elite, the strength under his command would be lost at least one-third.

Liu Bingzhang didn't dare to slack off, my lord was completely hurt this time, 1,500 elite cavalry! It's the work of adults.

Liu Bingzhang ordered all three battalions of artillery to take position and began to launch an artillery bombardment of Li Shixian's troops.

The artillery purchased from Western arms dealers was much more powerful than the native artillery, and the power of the artillery fire was no longer its lethality, but its deterrent.

What is the concept of five battalions of nearly 300 artillery firing together? Anyway, the entire Taiping Army's position shook as if there had been an earthquake.

Li Shixian's face in the camp changed greatly.

This is the power of modern artillery that King Chung said? It's really extraordinary.

The morale of the squire was destroyed by a single shot, and many soldiers even retreated in fear, no longer having the previous bravery.

Fan Ru was furious and ordered his own soldiers to behead the retreating soldiers on the spot, while waving the broadsword in his hand and roaring loudly.

"Give it to Lao Tzu, who dares to retreat Lao Tzu will kill him alive!"

Fan Ruzeng is not very old, but he is a veteran on the battlefield. He went to the battlefield at the age of 11, and it has been ten years now, not only did he not die on the battlefield, but he was baptized by the war and grew step by step to the position of the commander of the rebel army.

Fan Ruzeng was illiterate, but his sense of war was extremely keen, and he understood that the enemy's artillery fire was indeed terrible, but it was not invincible, and as long as he overcame the fear in his heart, the damage caused by the enemy's artillery fire was very limited. As the saying goes, veterans are afraid of guns, and new recruits are afraid of guns, and that's why.

How to suppress the fear in the hearts of soldiers? Fan Ruzeng chose to suppress his fear with greater fear.

Under Fan Ruzeng's fierceness, the rebel army settled down, and although the soldiers lurked and stopped attacking, the fear on their faces slowly dissipated.

Except for Li Shixian's Chinese army, the other armies were completely chaotic, and many soldiers collapsed. And these chaotic troops also became the main direction of attack of the Huai army.

How many Taiping troops still had resistance after the artillery fire opened the way? The answer is almost nothing, many Taiping soldiers hid in the corners of the wall or in the pit in terror, and some even jumped into the well in panic, which made them have no resistance in the face of the Huai army rushing up.

While Li Shixian was shocked by the erosion of several lines of defense, he also saw that the situation was not good. He decisively gave the order to withdraw the troops, and at the same time ordered the best Fan Ruzeng's troops to resist on the spot and cover the withdrawal of the army.

Fan Ruzeng's army moved extremely quickly, and they launched a counter-charge under the fire of the artillery, and beat the morale-boosting Huai army back.

The victory of the counter-charge stabilized the front and bought time for the withdrawal of the large forces of the Taiping army.

At the same time, Huang Chengzhong, who was confronting the Taiping army twenty miles away, also discovered the reality of the other party, Huang Chengzhong was extremely angry, but he could only turn around and evacuate when he looked at the fire of the retreating army in the distant sky.

"Li Hongzhang, Huai Jun, firearms, some skills!" Li Shixian, who was retreating, looked at the firelight behind him with a somewhat solemn expression.

As everyone knows, just now on the Taiping Army's position, seeing some of the corpses of the Huai Army cavalry on a messy mountain road, Li Hongzhang's face became even more ugly.

In order to expand these Huai troops, he frantically made IOUs in Shanghai, and in order to form cavalry, he even dragged people to contact the Mongol king Golqin, and got 3,000 war horses from him. Who would have thought that his cavalry unit not only did not make meritorious contributions, but was also defeated by the enemy in the first battle, and even those dead and alive horses were all taken away by the Taiping army, and some of the dead Huai soldiers were also searched.

"Li Shixian! You damned thieves! Li Hongzhang shouted angrily.

After cleaning the battlefield, it was found that the Taiping army had 5,000 corpses, according to the proportion of battle losses under normal circumstances, the Taiping army lost at least 10,000 soldiers in this battle, the Huai army lost 1,500 cavalry in three battalions, and more than 3,000 infantry casualties, which seemed to be a little smaller than the Taiping army, but Li Hongzhang understood that he had actually lost this battle. Li Shixian's Taiping army came and went like the wind, and even though it suffered heavy losses in the face of artillery, it was extremely orderly when retreating, especially the several decisive counter-charges organized by his troops behind the palace, which almost reduced the artillery threat to the limit.

Through this battle, Li Hongzhang could be extremely sure that it was not Li Shixian's troops who defeated them and the coalition forces after the capture of Shanghai City, which made them have some worries in their hearts.

Thinking of the advanced weapons and equipment and fierce fighting style of that unit at the beginning, Li Hongzhang felt uneasy for no reason.

"No, we must find that strange rebel army!" He was in the light, and the army was in the dark, like a person who was always being stared at by a tiger who didn't know where to hide, which made him dare not go all out in anything, and the invisible deterrence greatly affected the strength of the troops.

Not to mention that Li Hongzhang sent people to look for the traces of the national defense army, a very special team came to Zhenjiang, and Li Mingcheng, who was sitting in Zhenjiang City to raise grain and grass for the loyal king Li Xiucheng, personally greeted him at the gate of the city.