"Do you think you'll be able to get away with it? It's naïve! Duan Qing laughed. Pen, fun, pavilion www. biquge。 info

It is not unreasonable for him to say this, although the British Royal Navy released a smoke screen to prepare to run away, but their overall speed is a grade lower than that of the Datang Navy, even if the smoke screen covers their escape trajectory, but once they run out of the smoke screen range, they will be discovered by seaplanes conducting reconnaissance in the sky, and then notify the North Sea Fleet of the Tang Navy. The speed of the Datang warship is faster than theirs, so it will eventually catch up.

Sure enough, the Royal Navy fleet led by Ramsey sailed east in order to avoid it, and Duan Qing's first choice was to bypass the smoke screen and sail eastward, so an extremely unlucky scene appeared, when Ramsey's fleet came out of the smoke screen area, he found that the battle line led by the cruiser Yuan was at his 7,000-yard position.

Ramsey gave up his illusions, straightened the naval hat on his head, looked a little more resolute, and waved: "War, for the sake of His Majesty, for the honor of England!" ”

The Africa where he was not suffering much damage, but two of the remaining six warships had actually been seriously flooded and slowly began to sink, and did not follow out of the smoke screen area, and one frigate was rescuing the Royal Navy sailors who fell into the water in the smoke screen area, so there were actually only four warships that broke out of the smoke screen area, which was similar to the battle line led by Duan Qing. It's just that, except for the Africa, only one of the four British battleships was a light cruiser of more than 3,000 tons, and the other two were converted frigates of just over 1,000 tons.

The first to attack was the Datang Navy fleet, which was more trained than the Royal Navy from any point of view. In terms of gunnery, he also won a lot. The distance of seven thousand yards is for the main guns on the Dingyuan class and the Pinghai class. This is a normal attack range. Unlike British armored ships. The Datang Navy battleship is a rotatable turret with the main gun capable of simultaneously attacking enemies in one direction.

Twenty-four 203-mm guns roared and shells smashed into the enemy ships like falling meteorites. The first gun had the nature of a school fire, with only two shells hitting, but with the weight and power of the shells, it was already able to inflict significant damage on the Royal Navy warship. The stern of the Africa was directly smashed by a shell, but fortunately, this time it smashed the stern. But it was not a substantial damage to the ship, and the other frigate, which was hit, was directly destroyed from the mast and chimney above the deck, which looked much more miserable.

Along with the main guns, there were also four secondary guns of the battleship, the secondary guns of the Pinghai class were 76 guns, which could also attack at a distance of 7,000 yards, but the power was a little less, and the four 130mm naval guns of the Dingyuan class were also not a small lethal.

The British, unwilling to be beaten merely by the situation, also began a desperate shelling. Perhaps God blessed them, a nine-inch shell hit the waterline armor of the cruiser Jingyuan, where Duan Qing was located. The entire battleship shook violently, and even Duan Qing was a little unsteady on his feet. Beside him, the head of a sailor hit the table, bleeding from it.

However, the low-muzzle velocity nine-inch shells did not penetrate the Jingyuan, and the Jingyuan's hull showed signs of being hit by the shells, but the Wuzi did not move, and looked quite stable.

Duan Qing's face was gloomy and said, "Give me a hard beating!" Maneuvering, the Brits don't have fire control, and they will have a harder time hitting us at high speeds. ”

Duan Qing knew that it had become more and more impossible for the Datang Navy to fantasize about completely destroying the fleets of other countries without damage, but this did not mean that the Datang Navy could not continue to unilaterally slaughter the enemy.

Under the command of Duan Qing, the Datang Navy, which began to carry out serpentine maneuvers, immediately became more difficult to maneuver, compared to the Datang Navy, which had a more flexible turret and fire control system, the British's shelling was more rigid, and hitting the enemy in high-speed irregular movements was a compulsory course for every Datang Navy gunner, and they were also very calm in actual combat, and began to deal a greater blow to the enemy.

Luckily, the first half of the Africa was finally hit an hour and five minutes after the start of the battle.

The Jingyuan, which had been hit by a cannon, formed a straddle fire on the Africa after the fourth round of firing, and then fired a wave of high-quality shots of eight and six, and the shells hit the front and rear decks of the Africa respectively, waterline armor and other positions, causing great damage to the British sailors on the Africa, and the commander Ramsey was also directly cut off his right arm by a shrapnel from the shelling just now.

His first mate was about to say to Ramsey with tears in his eyes: "Colonel, let's surrender, such a battle is impossible to win, and you are wounded." ”

His face was even paler because of blood loss, Ramsey didn't look at the medical staff next to him to bandage his wounds, but stared at the Tang Navy fleet on the other side, and he said firmly in a low, even weak voice: "I can't surrender, I'd rather die in battle than surrender in humiliation." The Royal Navy does not need cowards, we are only willing to give our lives for England, and not to disgrace it! ”

As soon as he said this, a cannonball flew over, smashing a hole in the deck again, and the first mate, who was standing there, was blown away.

Until the last moment, the remaining three battleships had been sunk, and the half-capsized Africa was still using the only small-caliber secondary gun on the ship that was not damaged, and stubbornly fired at the Datang battleship. The shell hit a Pinghai-class cruiser and was ricocheted directly in the armored part, causing not the slightest damage.

At that time, the artillery bombardment of the Datang Navy stopped, and only the lonely Royal Navy guns were still roaring, and the shells fell into the water and smashed out a column of water.

In the bridge, Duan Qing took off his white naval officer's hat and sighed, "They are a group of respectable opponents. ”

All the people in the bridge couldn't help but nod, maybe their equipment is not as good as the Datang Navy, and their skills are not as good as the Datang Navy, but their spirit is no worse than that of the Datang Navy, and the spirit of the navy rich in maritime tradition is still glorious despite defeat.

Another shell fell into the water, and it was so difficult to hit the battleship of the Datang Navy.

Duan Qing was no longer pretentious on the battlefield, he looked at the Africa that was full of holes and was smoking and on fire, and said: "The best respect for them is to send them to the bottom of the sea." ”

He put on his military hat, his eyes were neither cold nor blazing, and with a wave of his hand, he ordered: "Open the cannon!" ”

The shells of the four Datang cruisers enveloped the Africa in an instant, and just one shelling blew the battleship to pieces. None of the hundreds of Royal Navy officers and sailors on the ship, including Ramsey, survived...... (To be continued.) )

PS: I'll tell you a joke, there was an author who thought that May was only 30 days, so he was scheduled to post it on June 1st, and then this chapter is out now. Okay, anyway, I want a monthly pass, because this chapter is an addition.