The captain of the Li Wenzhong is named Jiao Qiang, a native of Xinhai, Hebei (now Huanghua, Hebei), who was thirty-three years old when he crossed over, and is now thirty-five. Pen ~ fun ~ pavilion www.biquge.info he was not very robust, medium stature, and his appearance was ordinary, which belonged to the kind that could not be found in the crowd. When he was young, his family was not well-off, but he studied very hard, and in 1931, he entered the fourth session of the Qingdao Naval Academy at public expense. Just because Jiao Qiang was not very good at interpersonal relationships, and he offended people, he was falsely accused of being a "communist", so he was arrested and prepared to be executed.

Just when Jiao Qiang was in despair, he was rescued by the underground party. Then the underground party found out that this was just a beautiful misunderstanding, because Jiao Qiang had good grades in school, so the organization comrades wanted to absorb him into it, who knew that at this time the underground organization was destroyed by the enemy, and several comrades who rescued Jiao Qiang were sacrificed, Jiao Qiang escaped with his life, and when he returned home, he didn't expect to catch up with the 77 Incident.

The invading Japanese army quickly occupied his hometown, and his relatives died under the butcher's knife of the invaders. It's just that this guy is really weak, he joined three teams in a row, and all three teams were broken up by the Japanese army, although Jiao Qiang was injured every time, but he didn't die.

After fighting in such a daze until the end of the four or five years of war, Jiao Qiang was still only a big soldier, and he numbly kept moving in with the troops, losing more and winning less. After the outbreak of the civil war, Jiao Qiang did not want to participate and wanted to desert, but in 46 years, he met Comrade Infernal Affairs who was ambushed in the Central Army. Jiao Qiang was tired of this. I deserted and ran. was caught by the organization.

When the PLA is going to execute him, the deserter, too. Unexpectedly, he encountered the attack of the Central Army of the brigade, and he didn't care about this prisoner in a panic, so Jiao Qiang was coerced by the Central Army again, followed the Central Army all the way to defeat the battle, and then fled. Of course, Jiao Qiang, who was tired of war, did not work until he crossed the strait and crossed the eighteenth century.

When he was on the ferry, the ship's engine broke down, and Jiao Qiang tried to guide the crew to fix it. It was actually repaired, so it was also valued by the people on board. After crossing over, without the scars of the civil war and the relationship between relatives and friends, although at a loss, Jiao Qiang also chose to start over, and he completed his long-standing grudge - becoming a navy galloping through the waves.

Maybe this guy was born a good sailor, he fought in the army for twelve years and was not promoted, but after he arrived in the navy, he was valued by his superiors because of his outstanding ability. The first few Qi Jiguang-class frigates, because of political factors, designated the great eunuch of the Ming Dynasty as the captain. But the captains of the latter ships have undergone a comprehensive assessment. After Jiao Qiang signed up for the assessment, he won the first place. He was appointed captain of the frigate Li Wenzhong, and the rank was directly mentioned as lieutenant colonel.

This man's experience is nothing short of a novel.

Jiao Qiang's biggest characteristic is that he is not arrogant or impatient, and he has a good memory, he has all the affairs involved in every department on the ship, and he is very familiar with how to mobilize soldiers for battle. Although he is also a relatively new captain, in the assessment, he can completely follow the combat manual and complete the task without a single mistake. Of course, in addition to remembering the combat manual, a captain's combat experience is also crucial, but almost no one in the Datang Navy now has this kind of experience.

At this moment, Jiao Qiang maintained his usual calmness, he put down the telescope in his hand, and said to himself: "A battleship, a frigate, and a sloop?" ”

The Americans thought it was a battleship and two frigates, but the real naval man Jiao Qiang was able to clearly distinguish that the largest ship was a British 74-gun third-class battleship, the smaller one was a 32-gun frigate, and the smaller one was a sloop-of-war, which generally translates to small sail warships in Chinese, with a tonnage of less than 600 tons and less than 20 guns, that is, smaller than the sixth-class ships in the naval classification. The classification of sail warships was made by the British, who called ship-of-the-line ships of the first to fourth ranks, frigates of the fourth and fifth ranks, and smaller ones commonly known as sloop-of-wars, which could include brigs or cutters.

In fact, in the colonial waters, colonial countries usually rarely use warships above level 4, a fifth-class frigate with more than 30 guns is already relatively large, and more are small sail warships with less than 18 guns, these sailboats are very fast, and the firepower is almost enough, so they are very popular. Some pirates also choose this agile and fast sloop-of-war as a ride.

Qi Jiguang class is not a Western sailing ship, it is a hard sail, there is no full sail, although in the classification of the Tang Navy, she belongs to a kind of frigate, with a tonnage of about 1800 tons, but her gun position is only 16, which are four 105 mm S1775 guns and 12 76 mm HS1772 guns (each ship may be slightly different), which is less than the ordinary small military sailing ships of the British Royal Navy, of course, the firepower is not an order of magnitude.

At this moment, the British also saw the Li Wenzhong at sea, and the British captain asked left and right with doubts: "Which country does that red flag belong to, and I haven't heard of this peculiar ship type." ”

A more knowledgeable officer said: "Although we are not familiar with this ship type, I have heard that on the other side of the North American continent, the Orientals established a country there, called the Tang Republic, and they use ships that can emit black smoke, which are quite fast, and this should be the warship of the Tang Dynasty." ”

The British captain chirped: "The entire North American continent should belong to our British Empire, how can those mud monkeys from the east deserve to occupy the land of His Majesty the King?" Also, they have nothing to do on the East Coast, this is the Royal Navy in charge of the sea, and they really don't know whether to live or die. ”

The officer said: "Could it be that the Tang people are colluding with the colonists, you see that the warship seems to protect the two merchant ships behind, is it to transport supplies to the colonists?" ”

This guess is quite accurate. It also immediately sparked the captain's wrath. The captain was leading a third class battleship. At the same time, he was also the commander of the entire small fleet, and the British were used to being arrogant on the sea, and never took anyone seriously, even if their own allied ships provoked them, they would beat them up. The sea of this era is the Colosseum with no axioms and only fists, and the law of the jungle is enforced. The warship of one country at sea sank the ship of another country, killing everyone, and the attacked country did not know what had happened to the ship. Maybe it's in a storm or missing or something. Every year, such ships disappear into the ocean, so later generations of explorers are very keen to look for sunken ships at the bottom of the sea, in search of ancient treasures.

Although on the shore of New York, it can be regarded as in full view, but the British captain did not take the Tang people in his eyes at all, the British naval hegemony is growing rapidly, although the real British to establish absolute maritime dominance, it will have to wait until the beginning of the next century after the Battle of Trafalgar, but now it has experienced the Battle of the Invincible Armada and several Anglo-Dutch wars. There was also the naval conflict of the Seven Years' War, and the British Navy was already the de facto strongest navy in the world.

No matter what new technology is used in the warships of the Datang Navy. But the British don't think that this new technology can play any subversive role, the other side is just a small colonial country, and if you beat it, you will be beaten, and maybe you can get some benefits.

As a result, neither party had the idea of greeting, although the flag language of this era has been invented, but it is still quite different from later generations.

The British battleships took the lead, followed by two small ships, forming a formation that was most common in the era, deflecting an angle towards the side of the Li Wenzhong. This method of attack has two advantages: it will be faster to aim its side at the enemy without having to disguise it again, because the side of the sail battleship is the side with the most firepower, and even until the era of World War I and World War, the navy was still keen to seize the T-position to get the best side firepower output. Secondly, the British could also directly attack the Datang cargo ships that had no force value in the rear and force the other side to respond.

Jiao Qiang saw that the British wanted to attack him, and he had no intention of negotiating peace with his opponent. This is the first meeting between Datang and Daying, and there is no friendship between the two sides full of energy, one side is dissatisfied with the powerful and challenged, plus some plans to train their own abilities, and the other side is full of hegemonic consciousness, and will not allow the provocation of the guy who has never seen it.

"If Qi Jiguang's class is flexible enough, then I can directly hit the left rudder, first point my side towards them, and repair them with a longer range. It's just that the Qi Jiguang level is still not satisfactory, if it is a newly developed free wind level, it will definitely be able to do it. Jiao Qiang thought.

Although the Li Wenzhong was in the downwind position, its main power came from the steam engine, plus the hard sails were affected by the wind on all sides, and even if it was against the wind, it could run correctly.

"Well, take advantage of maneuver and speed, seize the upper hand, and open up the attack distance." Jiao Qiang instantly mastered his tactics, which was actually a standard method of using Qi Jiguang-class frigates. The Qi Jiguang class has no iron armor, and the defense of the wooden-hulled ship is not enough, but the range of the artillery is still good, and the speed of fourteen knots is enough to fall away from the enemy.

"Right rudder 45 degrees, full speed ahead, pay attention to keep a distance of more than three thousand yards from the enemy!" Jiao Qiang ordered, he judged that the largest gun on the opposing battleship, that is, the long-barreled 24-pounder gun, the range of this gun was okay, but most naval captains preferred to close the distance to a thousand yards and fire. And three thousand yards is obviously not on their radar.

The Li Wenzhong, which was moving at full speed, rushed in a northeasterly direction, and the British soon discovered this, and the battleship captain said: "Are these oriental monkeys stupid?" Heading to the northeast, is it to seize the upper hand? Wouldn't the merchant ships behind him be exposed to us? ”

But soon, the Englishman's face became solemn: "You are running so fast, lookout, give me a speed!" ”

"Yes, sir, they're thirteen knots, oh no, they're fourteen, my God, that's fast!"

The limit speed of Li Wenzhong reached 16 knots during the sea trial, but the speed marked by the Qi Jiguang class is generally 14 knots, and the captains basically will not drive the ship to a speed of 16 knots. The steam engines used by the early Qi Jiguang and Yu Dayou were of worse quality, so the speed was slightly slower.

It's not just Li Wenzhong. Even the speed of the two civilian ships behind is amazingly fast. They turned around and left the battlefield. It was also a high speed of the fourteenth and fifteenth quarters, and Dearborn on the ship was still a little unhappy: "Then you can't watch the battle up close." ”

On the other side of the Li Wenzhong, the Guantong department reported: "3145 yards away from the enemy ship!" The enemy enters the area covered by our broadside fire! ”

Jiao Qiang was also extremely excited at the moment, he had been bumpy for half his life, more time as an ordinary army leader, and now he finally led a battleship to fight, and a sense of pride filled his chest.

"Port side, fire!"

Eight guns arranged on the side of the ship were now competing to be discharged. Two 105-mm guns were loaded with grenades, while 76-mm guns were armour-piercing. Of course, everyone knows that even a grenade is enough to pierce the other party's wooden shell. In an instant, eight shells enveloped the enemy's 74-gun third-class battleship, and the gunners obviously did not feel good in the first round of shelling, only two shells hit the target, one was a grenade, and smashed near the front mast of the ship, and the exploded shells directly swept down a group of people around, and the foremast was also broken, and a large hole appeared in the front deck, and the latter 76 mm armor-piercing shell hit the gun deck. A large hole was torn in the hull above the waterline.

"Oh my God, how can they still hit so far away?!" The British captain's previous arrogance had now turned to nervousness and fear. He didn't expect the unfolding to be like this.

However, his reaction was not slow, "The right rudder is full, open the distance!" ”

If his ship completes the turn, then their bomb area will be reduced, and the distance may be beyond the range of the Don battleships, which is obviously a defensive measure, and the British captain has been frightened by the long-range and powerful shelling of the Don, so instinctively wants to dodge this shot first.

Only two shots had already destroyed the foredeck of the battleship, and as many as three gun emplacements on the port side had been eliminated, an effect that would have been achieved by firing twenty or thirty guns in an ordinary naval battle.

It's just that, in addition to the range and power of the cannon, the British are still a little less, and that is the rate of fire!

"Reload ammo and fight again!" Jiao Qiang ordered, he saw that the other party began to turn, and decided to play another round before making adjustments.

The 76-mm guns, which had a faster rate of fire, opened fire again, while the enemy ship had only completed a dozen degrees of turning, and this round of shelling was still aimed at the battleship, and the accuracy was slightly improved, three of the six 76 guns completed the hit, two hit the upper deck and the gun deck, causing casualties and damage to the guns, and the other formed a near-miss, directly penetrating the hull below the waterline.

The 76mm guns did far more damage than the solid shells of this era, and the raging sea water poured in, and the sailors were washed out before they could even hold up the planks to block it.

Jiao Qiang should make a judgment at this time, if he wants to chase and attack the opponent's flagship, then he should take the initiative to approach, and the left rudder even turns around and follows him, but he chose a safer way, this naval captain with many bad experiences has enough patience to play with this group of Britons. He knew that Qi Jiguang's defense was not much stronger than the ships of this era, so he couldn't fight too aggressively, and it was a wise choice to hide outside the enemy's range and slowly send the enemy to the bottom of the sea with the advantage of maneuvering speed and range.

So, Jiao Qiang ordered to move forward and seize the upper hand!

At this time, the three ships of the other side had basically completed the turn, changing from a vertical formation to a horizontal formation, and the Li Wenzhong was already in their T-shaped position. In the next few rounds of shooting, the hit rate of Li Wenzhong's shooting was not high, one shot was hit in the third round, no hit was made in the fourth round, and one shot was hit in the fifth round. And the two shells that hit these three rounds also hit different ships.

"It seems that the gunner's marksmanship still needs to be improved, and our advantage over the enemy is not as huge as we thought before, and it also needs to rely on multiple hits to effectively sink."

The political commissar on the ship next to him said: "If it is a Yangwei-class 155 gun, I think one shot on the waterline will be enough to let any of these three British ships go to sea." ”

Jiao Qiang analyzed very objectively: "The hole torn by the 155 cannon under the water is indeed not something that the British can make up, and they do not have a watertight cabin structure, but they want to completely sink underwater." I'm afraid it will take a while. ”

The political commissar smiled: "How about waiting a little longer." We could have stayed out of range and watched them drown. ”

The time to speak. The Li Wenzhong had already reached the upper hand, still maintaining a distance of about 3,000 yards from the opponent, and Jiao Qiang was quite satisfied with the navigation department that was at the helm, and the navigation department was also the most trained, and their voyage of more than 20,000 kilometers from Los Angeles to New York alone was enough for them to be familiar with the ship's sailing performance. Purely in terms of seafaring ability, the sailors of the Datang Navy were by no means inferior to the sailors of the British, and of course they drove two completely different ships.

"Deal with that sloop-of-war first." Li Wenzhong, who came to the upper hand. The side side was facing the small sailing warship that was running, although the other party wanted to break free, just like a persistent wolf, Li Wenzhong always maintained a stable attack distance, which of course was inseparable from the faster speed of Li Wenzhong.

At this moment, the engines of the Li Wenzhong had slowed down, maintaining the same speed as the enemy ship, so that it would not be too fast to overtake her. The gunners on the side finally got a chance to produce a stable output, and this time they also warmed up, the gunners did not have advanced fire control, they relied on simple equipment such as handmade rangefinders. Measure the shooting elements, and then adjust the shooting.

It's a complicated set of steps. In this era, it can also be called black technology, after the gunners were given a stable output environment, their accuracy was greatly improved, and a large number of shells directly hit the miserable small ship of less than 500 tons. Even the 76 guns were loaded with grenades, and directly relying on the impact of the explosion, they tore the thin wooden shell apart.

The simple 105 gun two-round fire and the 76-gun three-wheel design, a total of seventeen shells were hit, and the ship was directly beaten out of shape, and the sailors on the British frigate next to it could not believe their eyes, because the sloop-of-war was almost no longer in the shape of a ship, the mast was broken, half of the ship's side was completely broken, the deck was gone, and she had capsized directly and slid into the sea. And almost none of the sailors above are alive, and the impact of the explosion, shrapnel, and wood chips are enough to completely baptize the life above.

There was cheers from Li Wenzhong, and all the Tang sailors were satisfied with the first result of their military career, and the more miserable the enemy, the higher they were. Jiao Qiang was much calmer, because from the beginning of the battle, he knew that these three British ships would be scrapped in this place today.

"Next." Jiao Qiang said in an unhurried voice.

The Li Wenzhong quickly adjusted its direction and glued to another frigate. The British had seen the opportunity quickly, and had already left the sloop-of-war to escape first. But they never imagined that the Sloop-of-War did not last a few minutes and completely disintegrated under several rounds of enemy shelling. And the enemy's speed is fast enough to quickly catch up with them.

The British captain had no thought of teaching the Oriental monkeys a lesson, and he hurriedly shouted: "Let the Diana be left behind, and the Hercules will immediately retreat to Boston." ”

It is also normal to make this decision, although a 32-gun frigate is already a very powerful ship in the colony, but it is not comparable to the third class battleship of the core class of the Royal Navy. Although the Royal Navy had a large number of such ships, each of them was an important possession, costing tens of thousands of pounds, and could be used in large-scale naval battles. Although they were defeated at this time, as long as they could keep the next third class battleship, then the British would not be defeated.

It's just that the idea is beautiful, and the reality is often cruel.

The Diana did not hold up in front of Li Wenzhong for long, she was like her own name, a noble lady was only destroyed and ravaged in front of the fierce general. Just like the sloop-of-war just now, the Diana was broken up, and Li Wenzhong did not have the slightest intention of rescuing the sailors, adjusted its course and chased after the Hercules, which did not run far.

Despair has completely enveloped the British. It was no longer a question of keeping a third class battleship for the British Royal Navy, how to survive the fierce fire of the Dons.

The British captain, who had lost the courage to fight, looked defeated, he knew that it was only a matter of a few tens of minutes for the other party to catch up with him, so, for the sake of his own life, he said: "Fly the white flag, we surrender, I hope the Easterners can give us a decent ending." (To be continued.) )