This time, the Qing army semi-encircled Hengshan County from the north, east and south, blocking all the land routes for the Ming army to leave the city. Pen & Fun & Pavilion www.biquge.info

Among them, the east is the main direction of attack, and the Kong Youde Department and Duoduo's family troops Manchuria are deployed here with white flags, and considering that the other two directions must be taken into account, Duoduo personally came to the east to take command; The Qing army deployed in the south was the Shang Kexi Department and the Han army with red flags, and the commander was the Han army with red flags to strengthen the mountains and the real gold; The Qing army deployed in the north was Geng Zhongming's department and the Han army's Zhenglan Banner, and the commander was Geng Zhongming, the king of Huaishun. After Duoduo personally made a guarantee that he could make up for every loss after the battle, Kong Youde and others had no reason to object, after all, the master's order was the first.

At present, the Qing army in every direction is equipped with infantry, cavalry, and artillery, and the powerful artillery and powerful cavalry echelon configuration have minimized the possibility of more than 10,000 Ming troops in the city breaking through.

The only relatively weak point of the Qing army's strength was outside the West Gate, and there were only more than 1,000 troops drawn from various departments, and the meaning of vigilance and containment was far greater than blocking and attacking. But it was also difficult for the Ming army to open the situation from this direction, outside the city was the Xiang River, and the boats stored on the river and in the city were all lost as early as the first time the Qing army crossed the border, and the absence of ships meant that it was impossible to retreat or counterattack by water.

Not long ago, Duoduo still had the last glimmer of hope in his heart, hoping that Pang Yue, who had fallen into a desperate situation, would understand the current affairs and give up resistance and return to the Qing Dynasty. In order to achieve the effect. He even added to the "Words of Persuasion" the real experiences of those former Ming army generals who had a bright future after surrendering to the Qing Dynasty. Unexpectedly, Pang Yue didn't wait for the people who persuaded him to finish speaking, and he expressed his attitude of refusal with a bang. Even if it doesn't matter, what makes Duoduo most angry is that his deceased father Khan, the Taizu of the Qing Dynasty, was also wantonly attacked and insulted by Pang Yue's bastard.

After the anger, Duoduo couldn't help but secretly laugh at the redundancy of his behavior just now, how could a diehard like Pang Yue who was determined to oppose the Qing Dynasty give up his original intention because of a word of persuasion?

Since persuasion fails, there is no choice but to fight.

With Duoduo's order, the Qing artillery in three directions began to make preparations before the shelling, adjusting the muzzle, loading ammunition, and so on.

See such a situation. Pang Yue also ordered the officers and soldiers at the head of the city to withdraw to the barricades behind the city wall to take refuge, leaving only a small number of personnel who served as guards.

Soon, with a loud bang on the artillery position of the Qing army outside the west gate, the Qing army's attack on Hengshan County officially began.

……

"Boom!" "Boom!" … The successive artillery sounds were like thunder exploding on the flat ground, and with an aggressive earth-shattering sound, they swept towards the small county town of Hengshan. Blazing shells flying at high speed hit the city towers and city walls, splashing large pieces of brick and stone debris flying wantonly. The thin layer of bricks was shattered by the first round of shelling, and the rammed earth inside the wall burst into clouds of yellow earth smoke in an instant. In the smoke and dust, it seemed that even the earth was trembling.

Long before the Qing army's artillery bombardment began, most of the soldiers of Huguang Town, who were responsible for defending various sections of the city wall, had already taken off the city. Hiding in a bunker behind the city walls.

Despite the tight schedule, with the joint efforts of all officers and soldiers. The city's defenses are beginning to take shape. On the main street behind the city gates, officers and soldiers built barricades using sacks full of dirt and stones removed from the city, and many of the surrounding houses were converted into fortifications, while buildings that might have been used by the Qing army to provide them with cover were demolished. Behind each wall, these fortifications, large and small, formed roughly three or four deep lines of defense. The first line of defense was about eighty paces from the city wall, and the distance between the lines was roughly forty or fifty paces.

In addition, the defense tasks of the officers and soldiers of Huguang Town in the city were divided as follows: the eastern city wall and the nearby blocks were defended by the trap camp, and were accompanied by nearly 1,000 firefighters drawn from the Taishan battalion and the Agni battalion; The main forces defending the north and south walls were the Gangfeng Battalion and the Broken Army Battalion; The officers and men of the Huashan battalion were also all distributed, and they were divided into three. One of the Thousand Corps and the Taishan Battalion guarded the west gate, while the other two Thousand Corps went to the south gate and the north gate respectively as a reserve for the Gangfeng battalion and the broken army camp. The Flying Tiger Battalion is on standby in the city, ready to take orders to go to reinforcements wherever the situation is urgent.

The artillery bombardment of the Qing army continued non-stop, and the sound of artillery overshadowed the tide after tide, and there was no sign of stopping for a while. Perhaps because he had already tasted the outcome of a white-knuckle battle with Huguang Town, Duoduo did not easily order the infantry to attack the city. Instead, they hoped to first destroy the will to resist and consume the resistance of the Ming troops in the city through this continuous and fierce artillery fire, and then press the whole army down.

After all, Hengshan County is a small city, and the purpose of building the city wall was mainly to defend against bandits, and the designers and builders probably would never have imagined that one day this small city located in the hinterland of the Ming Dynasty would receive such a ferocious artillery attack by foreign armies. Therefore, the firmness of the city wall is far from being enough even compared with the city walls of Ganzhou, Changsha and other places.

After more than half an hour of shelling, the east city wall that withstood the most fierce artillery fire of the Qing army was already unrecognizable, the city tower had been completely collapsed, the bricks on the wall were scattered in large pieces, the yellow rammed earth became full of holes, the battlements were also destroyed more than half, and several terrible V characters appeared at the top of the wall, and they were expanding downward step by step. In particular, the big gap, which was initially opened by the Qing army and half filled by the Ming army, became the key bombardment target of the Qing army's artillery. The hastily filled earth and stone materials could not withstand the bombardment of the shells, and collapsed one after another, and in the blink of an eye, only a pile of ruins less than a foot high was left in the gap, separating the inside and outside of the city. The other three walls are in slightly better shape, but not much better, and it is only a matter of time before they are blown down.

This time, the Qing artillery seemed to be more persistent than before, and the consumption of shells was almost out of their consideration, and they even had much less to worry about exploding. With the goal of destroying the city wall as soon as possible, multiple artillery pieces kept firing at a certain area, blasting the wall to a crumbling and precarious position.

However, the danger of exploding still has to be considered. After more than an hour of repeated bombardment, almost all the barrels of the dozens of cannons of the Qing army outside the city were red and hot, and if they continued to fight, they were afraid that they would really explode. At this time, the deafening continuous cannon sound came to an end for the time being.

After the cannonfire stopped, as Duoduo's order was issued, the Qing infantry in all three directions began to advance tentatively in the direction of the city gate. At the same time, the Ming officers and soldiers hiding under the city wall ran to the city head after receiving the early warning signal from the observation post at the city head, preparing to meet the enemy. After many battles, they also had experience, and they all knew: the artillery of the Qing army would not be fired again for a long time because it wanted to avoid overheating. At least until the Qing army's foot soldiers retreated, the city would no longer be in danger of being shelled.

As the soldiers marched up to the city, the auxiliaries carried bags of earth or carts loaded with stones to fill the gaps in the walls. In particular, the gap that has been blown open needs to be filled in time, although the filled earth and stone materials cannot withstand the next round of bombardment, but it can buy a lot of time. Otherwise, once the Qing artillery fire is completely blasted, the Qing army can be regarded as a mortal threat to the Ming army, whether it is through infantry to attack from here or drag artillery here to bombard the city.

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The layout of Hengshan County is similar to that of the rest of the counties of this era, simple and decent, with two main roads intersecting in the center of the city together with the east-west and north-south city gates respectively, forming the most prosperous area in the city. The county government is located near this meeting point, and there is a drum tower more than three zhang high on the opposite side of the county office, which is a few points higher than the city wall, and standing on the top can take in the city and even outside the city. It is precisely because of this geographical advantage that this drum tower was used by Pang Yue as the headquarters of the Chinese army, used to coordinate the defense in all directions.

At this time, Pang Yuezheng, Zhang Yunli and a group of staff officers were observing the movements outside the city from this drum tower.

"My lord, if the artillery of the Qing Dynasty continues to bombard like this, perhaps within today, the city wall will be blown down." Zhang Yunli pointed to a certain section of the city wall in the east and said worriedly, "You see, there is already an obvious crack in the city wall, and it is very likely that this section will collapse first." ”

"You're right." Pang Yue nodded and said, "But don't worry too much, the city wall has collapsed, and the fallen masonry ruins will still become an obstacle for the Qing prisoners to enter the city, and our army can also use it." What's more, our army also set up several lines of defense behind the city walls. Duoduo thought that as long as the city wall collapsed, it would be all right, and he should dream of spring and autumn, and then he would know that the fall of the wall was not a symbol of their victory, but the beginning of a sharp increase in their casualties. ”

"In the face of such a careful arrangement by adults, Qing Yu will inevitably suffer a lot." A rare smile appeared on Zhang Yunli's face, but he quickly turned worried, "However, what worries my subordinates the most is that after the city wall is blasted open, the Qingyu will drag the Hongyi cannon to the gap and bombard the city directly. The General Staff Department has made relevant deductions, once this happens, the probability of the loss of the first line of defense behind the city wall will be more than 70%, and the loss rate of each line of defense after that will also be more than 50%, and the number of casualties of our army will also increase by 4 to 50%. If our army is unable to recapture the gap in time to stop the artillery bombardment of the Qing captives, these chances will continue to increase. ”

"Of course I know that." Pang Yue said, "That's why I asked the auxiliaries to fill the gap whenever they have a vacancy, so as to prevent the Qing artillery from having a place to set up artillery." If this is true as you say, then we will have to send elite soldiers to form a death squad to recapture the gap. In any case, the war will be extremely tragic, and I hope that our army can hold out longer than the Qing captives. ”

At this time, there was a fierce sound of guns on the three directions of the city, and it was obvious that the Qing army advancing towards the city gate had entered the range of the firecrackers at the head of the city.

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