At this time, Billy was not worried about the disparity in the number of warships, but more worried about the formation of his own fleet. Just now, in order to avoid the collision of the small gunboats of the Qing army, all the ships scattered. It's too scattered......

Zuo Zongtang looked at the just-ended battlefield here on the "Victory", and was surprised to find that the leading ironclad ship of the French army, "Grace", was gone...... Could it be that they were destroyed by Xu Changshun and them? It's unlikely! But there is really no "elegant" figure to be found on the battlefield, but at the same time, there is no Qing warship left!

Zuo Zongtang also used a horizontal formation, but it was very different from the impact of Xu Changshun's death just now. The leaders were "Changsheng", "Undefeated", "Triumphant", and "Juin", the German cruisers "Nanji" and "Nanxiang" on the left flank, and the two British cruisers "Chaoyong" and "Yang Wei" on the right flank. Behind were dozens of small gunboats.

In the midst of the crisis, Billy calmed down. In any case, he could not tell that Fair had evacuated and returned to Vietnam. If he knew, he wouldn't have made a decision that he would regret for the rest of his life!

"Send a flag and tell the ships to move closer to the flagship, and Fair's fleet must be pursuing behind the Qing army. Look at their ironclads, apparently under attack from our French torographers. ”

As long as he could seize the two wings, he would be able to form an "H" shape with the Qing fleet, and use the strong advantage of his side-chord artillery fire to deal the Qing army the heaviest blow.

A contest of wits and courage began.

If everything had gone according to Billy's vision, perhaps the French Far East Fleet would have been able to change the outcome of the naval battle, or perhaps the Qing Navy would have paid a greater price even if it had won. However, in this hasty change of formation, the French fleet itself made a mistake.

The French army now has a speed of only 15 knots, except for the cruiser "Door", which can reach a speed of 17 knots, and the others such as "Victory", "Parry", and "La Pelus". For example, gunboats such as "Sony" and "Logo" had a speed of only 12 knots.

And Billy's order was for each ship to be inserted into the two wings of the Qing army at full speed, so that the two columns of the French army actually became one column. The speed of the gunboats on the other line could not keep up with the "Duer" and so on, and I saw a column of "Duer", "Shengli", "Parry", and "La Pelus" inserted into the left flank of the Qing army. The right flank was empty, and "Chao Yong" and "Yang Wei" led dozens of gunboats to rush forward and became entangled with gunboats such as "Logo" and "Sony".

The six capital ships of "Changsheng", "Undefeated", "Triumphant", "Juin", "Nanji", and "Nanxiang" plus three torpedo ships behind them faced a column of the French army and faced the attack of the main guns against the main guns.

The situation did not go in the direction that Billy had envisioned, and the three small French gunboats there were ravaged by two British cruisers and dozens of gunboats of the Great Shimizu Division, and were already dying.

Although he met the main ship of the Qing army here, it was difficult to distinguish between them, and he would not show any signs of defeat in a short time. But in the long run......

In particular, the fish and pedo ships behind the Qing army were particularly annoying, although at this time the Qing army's fish and pedo could not really hurt the French warships. But even though the needle is small, it still hurts to prick it.

In particular, after the bilge was hit and caught fire, a large amount of manpower had to be assigned to extinguish the fire, and in order to avoid the bombardment of the main guns of the Qing army, in order to avoid the bombardment of the main guns of the Qing army.

It was already 7 o'clock in the evening, and the battle had been going on for a full 7 hours. The Qing officers at the Kaohsiung Military Port had already sent a telegram to report the news that the imperial court and all the naval divisions had attacked.

Every hour, a telegram is sent to report the latest battle report, and the so-called battle report is nothing more than the continuous sound of artillery, just to tell the court that the battle is still going on. All the warships have gone to sea, and all that remains are some transport ships. After going to sea, he did not dare to approach, so he could only use a telescope to count the number of Qing warships and the number of French warships 10,000 miles away. Then he told the officers in the military port in the flag language, and Guan Xuqing watched the "text live broadcast" of the Battle of the Yellow Sea in the telegraph room! Guan Xuqing had this feeling in his previous life, watching the NBA's live text broadcast on his mobile phone during class. But today's big war is related to the fate of the whole country!

A 240mm shell was fired from the main gun of the "Triumph" and penetrated directly between the living room and the mechanical room of the "La Perus", and the consequences of the explosion can be imagined. The hatches near the living room, all kinds of instruments, and what is more troublesome is that the steam pipes leading to the upper deck from nearby were all broken, and the steam overflowed outward, and the sailors hurriedly closed the valve, but in this way, the steam rudder lost power, and the "La Perus" had to use a manpower rudder, and several strong sailors grabbed the huge manpower rudder, so that the warship could barely be *long, but it still could not escape the fate of destruction.

On the right, the ironclad ship "Undefeated" fired a shell that also pierced the front of the hull of the "La Perus", piercing a large hole in the unprotected part of the armor, and causing a fire in the inner compartment, from which black smoke gushed out. Covering the front of the battleship, the "La Perus" turned into a fireball.

In the thick smoke, La Perlus seemed unable to balance the gravitational pull from the Earth on it. The right string sank into the sea first, and the sea finally extinguished the fire that the French soldiers had been trying to extinguish but could not extinguish, and raised a layer of steam on the surface of the sea. Together with the 208 officers and men of the ship, they disappeared into the sea.

On the other side, the "Parry" is not much better than the "La Perus", but it is a pity that it was targeted by the two cruisers of the same tonnage as the "Nanji" and "Nanxiang" from the beginning, and now it is also dying and on the verge of death. The entire hull was beaten like a hornet's nest, and below the waterline was terrible, and the sea water poured in through countless holes, completely impossible to repair.

The "Victory" and "Dole" are still struggling to support, and it is Fair's fleet that supports Billy's confidence. But after five hours of waiting, he finally knew that Fell would not come.

But can the fleet in front of you really destroy the main fleet of the French army in 4 hours? He still didn't believe in what was in front of him.

At this time, the "victory" waved the flag, indicating whether it was time to choose to retreat. On the other side, the three gunboats had also been sunk, and the two 16-knot cruisers of the Qing army had already outflanked them, and there was no chance to run away if they didn't retreat.

Billy was still hesitating, even if he retreated. Where can he retreat? Back in Europe? Returning to Vietnam was only a little bit later in time for destruction, and now he still has a lot of trust in Fair. Think he has given his life for the country......

If he had been told by this time that Fair had already returned to Vietnam with three cruisers. He's going to go back and shoot that coward!

When he was hesitating, "Chao Yong" and "Yang Wei" had already surrounded him from behind.

Only then did Billy come to his senses and order the Bannerman to give the order to retreat.

At this time, the power of the "Doer" was fully displayed, with its speed of 17 knots, seven 190mm main guns, and fourteen 140mm secondary guns firing at the same time.

Shoot at "Chao Yong" and "Yang Wei" behind him. A blow like this with a close range and a high hit rate is difficult for even an ironclad ship to withstand.

The hull structures of the "Chaoyong" and "Yang Wei" were constantly destroyed, the messy broken steel plates and broken wooden planks flew everywhere, the corpses of the soldiers who were hit were thrown into the sea, and the inner compartment was also pierced many times. Large-scale fires formed in several compartments.

Due to its displacement of 5,700 tons, the "Door" did not have to take into account the problem of hull calming due to the recoil of the guns, and the rate of fire of the guns reached an alarming level.

The ultra-fast speed that "Chao Yong" and "Yang Wei" were proud of was useless in front of it, and they were beaten back at a high speed.

Although the frontal "Changsheng", "Juyin", "Nanxiang", and "Nanji" immediately came to the rescue, the "Chaoyong" was no longer under control due to the use of cheap and flammable paint, and the whole battleship was like a fireball, the fire damaged the structure of the hull, and the "Chaoyong" slowly sank......

For the first time since the start of the fight, Billy smiled with satisfaction. Unexpectedly, the ideal state of "Dur" actually appeared during the retreat.

After sinking one of the cruisers of the Daishimizu Division, the "Victory" was also greatly encouraged and bombarded the "Nanji" and "Nanxiang" that rushed up. The water column around the two battleships surrounded the two ships, and from a distance, it seemed that there was only a water column and no warships!

The "Victory" fought while retreating, often hitting the "Nanji" and "Nanxiang" who were pursuing head-on, but it did not find that the "Changsheng" and "Triumphant" on the flanks had already pursued closer.

Seeing the sinking of the sister ship "Chaoyong," the "Duer" was unwilling to leave the battlefield and sailed quickly toward the "Duer" surrounded by a group of small gunboats.

"General, it seems that the Qing people are unwilling to let us go." Billy's lieutenant said.

"Hehe, if I were their commander. I won't let you go! Let the victory come closer to us, don't fall in love with the war, and withdraw to the Red River military port first. Billy calmly ordered.

It was already 9 p.m....... The naval battle has been going on for 9 hours so far! The two sides fought from the scorching sun to the bright moon, and Guan Xuqing and the various Shangshu in the capital were anxiously waiting for the results, and they were also hurriedly making different analyses and evaluations of the different results after the battle!

From the front, the good news of sinking the enemy ship kept coming, and it seemed that the overall situation had been decided, and the victory was in hand!

However, naval battles in the dark are changing rapidly, and the situation is far from being as simple as imagined in the capital......