Colonel Eyre, the captain of the ironclad ship "Normandy", who witnessed the whole process of the incident of the "Hitachi Maru" while watching the battle, wrote in his report to the French Admiralty:

“…… The Chinese cruiser Chaowu ordered the Japanese troop carrier Hitachi Maru to halt its advance and demanded that the Japanese on board surrender, and the Chinese warship fired warning guns as it raised the signal to ensure that the Japanese troop carrier knew what they meant. Pen @ fun @ pavilion wWw. ｂｉｑUｇE。 info The Japanese troop carriers replied with a signal flag, asking that they be allowed to return to their place of departure, and the Japanese reasoned that China and Japan had not declared war. The Chinese warship refused the request of the Japanese, and then sent a small boat with an officer and ten sailors to the Japanese ship to convey the captain's order, but after the hundreds of Japanese army officers and men on the Japanese ship saw the Chinese small boat, they immediately became excited, and some Japanese soldiers actually shot at the Chinese small boat with rifles, killing several Chinese sailors, and other Japanese officers and soldiers also responded, while shooting with rifles, while moving the artillery from the cabin, and firing at the Chinese warship, the side of the Chinese warship was hit on the spot. ”

"The actions of the Japanese obviously angered the Chinese, and the 'Chaowu' immediately fired at the 'Hitachi Maru', which soon sank the Japanese ship, and after the ship sank, many Japanese soldiers fell overboard, and the Chinese Navy tried to rescue them, but the Japanese soldiers were still shooting at the Chinese, and the annoyed Chinese therefore gave up their plans to be gentlemen and shot at the drowning man until they gave up resisting. By that time, the blood of the victims had already stained the sea red. ”

"This is a massacre tragedy that should never have happened, but I think the Japanese on the Hitachi Maru should bear the main responsibility for their own deaths, and if they choose to negotiate peacefully with the Chinese in accordance with international law, this should not happen." The other two Japanese troop carriers, the Sanbang Maru and the Arikoromaru, did not make the same mistake as the Hitachi Maru, and when they saw the signal from the Chinese cruiser Chengqing calling for their surrender, they immediately stopped sailing, raised the white flag and surrendered, and all the officers and men on the two Japanese ships were spared, and they were sent to the port of Jilong, where they were treated as prisoners deserved. ”

Unlike the Chinese Navy's successful interception of the third Japanese troop transport convoy, the Japanese Navy's interception of the Chinese troop convoy failed because the Japanese warships were too slow to catch up with the Chinese convoys. Unbeknownst to the frustrated Japanese navy, they had unexpectedly intercepted a Chinese fleet.

After Li Hongzhang, the governor of Zhili, sent the Huai army Zhou Shengchuan to aid Taiwan, he was worried that the Japanese ships would intercept him halfway, so he asked Shen Baozhen and Lin Yizhe to send a ship administration warship to meet them, and on the other hand, he discussed with Li Zongxi, the governor of Liangjiang, to send Nanyang warships to escort the ship and "go to Fujian for assistance." Li Zongxi gave a positive response to Li Hongzhang's request, and Shanglu said that he would immediately send warships to the south. At that time, although there were many ships in the Nanyang Naval Division, the number of steam warships was extremely limited. Most of the Nanyang naval divisions were wooden sailing ships, which could not be used for ocean-going operations at all, and could not be mobilized; Li Zongxi then decided to combine the only four very cutting-edge steam warships "Wannianqing", "Jingyuan", "Zhenhai", and "Zhenwei", which were the only ones in the Nanyang Naval Division at that time, into one team, and sent them south, with He Xinchuan, Jiang Chaoying, Yang Yibao, and Lin Chengmo respectively in charge, plus the notification ship "Feipeng" (with Liang Zifang) sent by the shipmaster, and Xie Taiping, the commander of the Yangtze River Naval Division, as the commander.

At that time, although most of the officers of the Nanyang Naval Division had the qualifications of the Ship Master School, and some of them had studied in France, whether it was the Ship Master School or the cultivation during their study in France, it was only aimed at cultivating excellent captains for the highest purpose. There is little special education on the wartime organization, operation, and tactics of the fleet. The shortcomings of the Nanyang Naval Division in this regard are even more serious, not only is there a lack of high-level officers with the ability to command modern naval warfare, but even the training of the Nanyang Naval Division in terms of flag language and formation evolution is very weak. Because of Lin Yizhe, the navigator, he often conducts fleet combat drills and has a strong formation combat capability. However, the four steam warships of the Nanyang Naval Division, except for the "Wannian Qing," the other three "Meiyun"-class gunboats were purchased from the Naval Administration through "cooperative funds" and belonged to the establishment of the Nanyang Naval Division, and they no longer belonged to the Naval Division's system.

Although Li Zongxi made swift arrangements, the Nanyang 4 warship was very slow to move, and the Nanyang 4 ship was originally going to escort the troop transport convoy, but the Nanyang 4 warship had not arrived for a long time, and the troop transport convoy could not wait and could only set off on its own.

Li Hongzhang was very dissatisfied with the slow action of the 4 ships in the Nanyang, but because the 4 ships were not under his own jurisdiction, he had no choice but to hope that the ship would receive the ship, but fortunately, the ship administration acted quickly, and Lin Yizhe quickly sent a ship to respond after learning the news, and successfully brought Zhou Shengchuan's department to Taiwan safely.

And it was only at this time that the figure of the Nanyang 4 ship appeared in Shanghai.

It turned out that after learning the news that he was going south, Xie Taiping, the commander of the Yangtze River Naval Division, who had never been out to sea, repeatedly said that he was sick and delayed, and then simply went ashore to "recuperate." After reporting his illness and resigning, he handed over all the matters of taking the four ships south to He Xinchuan, the captain of the steam fleet, and the commander of the foreign sea warships, who was also the pipe band of the "Wannian Qing" ship. Since the Nanyang 4 ship was transferred from the shipmaster to the Nanyang Naval Division, because of the long-term treatment with the Yangtze River Naval Division and other old naval divisions, the lack of maintenance and maintenance, not only the speed was not as good as before, but also the ammunition and coal were extremely lacking.

He Xinchuan had the intention of showing his skills in this battle of Taiwan, and when he was able to maneuver in many ways and make great efforts, it was easy for everything to be prepared to stop roughly when he was ready to go on a trip (there was no way to make a mistake, and a ship without coal could not go to sea for a long journey).

In order to give full play to the advantages of the ship's speed in building warships, He Xinchuan discussed with the pipe belts of the other three ships, and then immediately began to send the warships to the Shanghai dock to scrape and wash the bottom of the ships in order to increase the speed of the warships. After receiving the report that the Nanyang warship had arrived in Shanghai, Li Hongzhang knew that the Nanyang 4 warship did not have the ability to fight in formation, so he specially called He Xinchuan and asked the Nanyang 4 warship to obey the dispatch of the shipmaster and the naval division, "After the Nanyang division ship is repaired, it should go to Taiwan to meet up, and everything should obey Lin Fujun's orders, and you must not do it yourself!" ”

But neither Li Hongzhang nor He Xinchuan expected that the Nanyang 4 ship would encounter an unexpected battle.

On July 8, 1874, when the weather was hazy, the 4th ship of the Nanyang Naval Division set sail from Wusongkou and embarked on the road to the south.

When the fleet departed from Shanghai, various local newspapers carried a special report, saying that it meant that the Chinese navy was heading south to retaliate against the Japanese. Immediately after that, similar news was transmitted to overseas newspapers and media, and for a time the media became a magnifying glass of the strength of the Taiwan aid fleet, and the reports were boiling with hype, but because they had not been able to dock, the news of the dispatch of the Nanyang Naval Division did not reach the ears of Shikinori Kayama, the supreme commander of the Japanese fleet.

After the failure to intercept the Chinese troop transport fleet, Kayama Shikiri was so angry that he gave up the idea of intercepting the troop convoy and planned to blockade China's coastal areas and cut off China's maritime trade routes. After several days of searching, Shikiki Kayama led the Japanese fleet to a great deal of gains, capturing a large number of Chinese sailing ships and paddle steamers, obtaining a large amount of supplies, and sinking two pirate ships disguised as merchant ships.

At this time, Shiki Kayama did not know that Lin Yizhe had already received the report and learned the news of the Japanese fleet's activities along the coast of Fujian and Zhejiang, and it was only in order to ensure the smooth landing of the army aiding Taiwan that he did not immediately dispatch to attack.

In the early morning of 11 July, when the Japanese fleet was anchored at a temporary anchorage on its way north, it received a piece of news from Shanghai through the Japanese spies who had already been lurking on land. Mysterious intelligence providers informed the Japanese fleet of the departure from Shanghai of four warships of the Chinese South Sea Naval Division. When Shiki Kayama learned the news, he immediately decided to go north to intercept.

After arriving in the waters of Taiwan, Shikiki Kayama had already learned from the Japanese spies that the Japanese fleet that had arrived in Taiwan had been completely annihilated, and he gave up his plan to fight a decisive battle with Hayashi Yoshizhe's main fleet, and decided to mobilize the Chinese navy with a containment tactic to make it exhausted, and then seek an opportunity to launch an attack on the scattered Chinese warships to change the balance of forces between the two sides, and then carry out a decisive battle.

The ghost made the difference that He Xinchuan led the fleet south, which happened to overlap with the route of the Japanese fleet. At this time, He Xinchuan was anxious to go south to rendezvous with the shipmaster's sailor, he first sent the "Feipeng" high-speed notification ship to the anchorage of the shipmaster's sailor to report the news, and he himself supervised the Nanyang 4 ships to move all the way at full speed, but he did not expect that the Japanese fleet happened to be on their course.

At 5:30 a.m. on July 13, the sentinels in the mast of the ironclad ship "Ryuchi", the flagship of the Japanese fleet, suddenly discovered that their lead ship "Tsukuba" had displayed a set of warning flags, "Four warships are in the north!" After receiving this news, Shiki Kayama, who had been hunting for many days without getting anything, was overjoyed and immediately issued an order, "Prepare for battle!" In this way, the Chinese and Japanese fleets met unexpectedly in the waters near Fengshan Island, and when they met, the two sides sailed in opposite directions.

Seeing the flagship's order, the officers and men of the four Japanese warships, "Ryuchamp", "Tsukuba", "Mt. Fuji", and "Yangchun," immediately went into action, and soon all the gun positions were put on standby. At 7 o'clock in the morning, the sun completely jumped above the horizon off Fengshan Island, and the Japanese warships thoroughly identified the four warships in front of them as the ships of the Nanyang Naval Division to aid Taiwan. For example, the rest of the Japanese warships also changed to this wartime flag (the giant national flag used by the navy is called the battle flag, which is mainly used in combat and major ceremonial occasions), and the sails were raised to increase the sailing speed.

At this time, the Nanyang Navy Squadron finally discovered the Japanese warship that was coming towards him with murderous spirit, and He Xinchuan was agitated and immediately commanded the warship to "sail forward to meet the enemy."

Seeing that the other party was composed of four warships, one large, three and small, and the speed was not fast, and the largest warship was not as good as the "Longxiang", Shiki Kayama made up his mind and immediately issued an order to attack.

Seeing the Japanese fleet that appeared on the opposite side, it was an ironclad ship first, He Xinchuan was secretly frightened, but he did not hesitate, but immediately commanded the "Wannian Qing" to rush forward at high speed.

Since the Nanyang 4 ships had never been trained in formation combat, they were lined up in two columns when they were advancing at this time, and when they saw the enemy ships appear, the flagship raised its battle flag and then rushed straight towards the enemy ships, and the three Chinese gunboats, which were relatively slow, also accelerated and rushed towards the Japanese fleet.

Interestingly, the Japanese fleet did not seem to have the intention of fighting in formation, and when they saw the appearance of Chinese warships, they also rushed up in a chaotic manner.

Fukushima Keisenori commanded the ironclad ship "Ryuchi" to rush straight towards the "Wannianqing," and Fukushima Keitori had already recognized the other party as the gunboat "Wannianqing" -- the first steam warship of the Qing Empire, which had appeared in Japanese newspapers more than once, and he was all too familiar with it.

Fukushima Keisenori's intentions are obvious, among the four Chinese warships, the "Wannian Qing" has the largest tonnage, the most artillery, the fastest speed, and the flagship, if it can be sunk in one fell swoop, the remaining three small Chinese gunboats will be easy to deal with.

But what Keinori Fukushima never expected was that the large gunboat "Tsukuba" commanded by Ito Junyoshi Nakasa, with its own speed, grabbed ahead of the "Ryuchamp" and handed over the "Wannianqing"!

"Damn bastard!" Seeing that Ito Junyoshi dared to steal credit so blatantly, Fukushima Keisei couldn't help but curse in his heart.

The same flying scissors, the tall body of the "Tsukuba" rushed directly to the side of the "Wan Nian Qing", five 160 mm breech guns began to fire fiercely, almost at the same time, the "Wan Nian Qing" two 120 mm breech guns and one side of the three 75 mm Krupp breech guns also spewed flames, and the "Tsukuba" began a fierce firefight.

Despite the momentum that had been ready for the fire, the first salvo fired by the riveted Japanese gunners all missed, and five huge shells fired from the 160-mm breech guns landed in the sea water on the side of the "Wannian Qing" almost simultaneously, setting off a huge wall of water.

"Load! Fast! With the hoarse shouts of the gunners, the Japanese gunners first loaded the ****** into the breech cannon that exited the gun door due to recoil, and then struggled to lift a heavy cannonball with a pulley sling, and filled it through the muzzle, just as the Japanese gunners pushed the cannonball hard with the push rod to make it enter the chamber, the shell fired by the "Wannianqing" fell on the side of the "Tsukuba", and the stirred up sea water rushed straight to the gun deck, and several Japanese gunners were all drenched in soup, and some people stood unsteadily under their feet and fell to the ground at once.

The gunner was also drenched from head to toe, but he didn't care about it, he still waved the saber in his hand, shouted the operation password loudly, and instructed the gunners to operate the gun.

After completing all the procedures of the cannon operation with ease, the gunners pushed the cannon out of the gun door and were about to continue firing, when with a whistling sound, several more shells flew from the direction of the Chinese warship, which fell into the sea and exploded. This time, although the shells fired by the Chinese warship still failed to hit the "Tsukuba", the distance of the bullet was obviously closer than just now, and the fragments from the explosion flew up to the deck of the "Tsukuba" with the waves, and the two Japanese sailors who were transporting the shells were hit in the chest by the small shrapnel, and when they landed, blood splashed, and they fell to the sky screaming.

"The gunners of the Qing Kingdom are fighting so fast!"

Seeing that the Chinese warship was able to fire two salvos in the time of the first salvo of the Japanese warship, the captain of the "Tsukuba", Ito Junyoshi Nakasa, put down the binoculars, frowned, and said to himself.

Ito Junyoshi did not know that although the "Wan Nian Qing" was the first large steam gunboat equipped by the Chinese Navy and was the oldest warship among the Chinese warships, the guns now equipped with the "Wan Nian Qing" were 75 mm Krupp breech guns purchased from Germany by Hayashi Yoshizhe. Therefore, the rate of fire of the guns of the "Wannianqing" was much faster than that of the "Tsukuba".

The "Tsukuba" began a salvo again, and the huge 160-mm shells whistled towards the "Wannianqing", which was amazingly powerful, but still did not hit, but fell into the sea, and just when the Japanese gunners were desperately busy firing the third salvo, three red lights flashed from the gun doors on the side of the "Wannianqing", and then the whistling of shells was heard in the sky.

Ito Junyoshi instinctively wanted to dodge, but he only bowed down while standing on the flybridge, and when he looked up, he was knocked down by two violent explosions.

Ito Junyoshi was so stunned that he shook his head and easily stood up, only to see smoke from two craters on the deck, surrounded by several wailing wounded Japanese sailors.

In less than 10 minutes after the start of the battle, the Chinese warships achieved the results when two 75-millimeter shells fired from the "Wannianqing" hit the side deck of the "Tsukuba", killing two sailors and wounding four on the spot.

"Hurry up and fight back!" Watching the Japanese gunners clumsily operate the huge breech guns, Ito Junyoshi couldn't help but stomp his feet on the flybridge.

Just then, an officer reported to him: "Sir, the flagship has sent a signal for us to get out of the way!" ”

"What? Get out of the way? Ito Junkichi couldn't help but be stunned when he heard this.

"Yes! Sir! The flagship signaled to us to get out of the way! The officer affirmed.

"What does that mean?" Ito said with some annoyance.

At this moment, the "Longxiang" once again issued a flag: "'Mt. Fuji' and 'Yangchun' are dangerous!" Support now! ”

Seeing this set of signals, Ito Junyoshi immediately turned around and looked at the location of the gunboats "Mt. Fuji" and "Yangchun", but saw only a dense smoke of gunpowder.

And at this moment, with a loud "boom" in the distance, the Japanese sailors on the deck suddenly let out bursts of cheers.

Ito Junyoshi hurriedly raised his binoculars and looked at the "Wannianqing", only to see a large area of black smoke rising from the "Wannianqing".