Several shells filled with gunpowder piled up near the chamber of the medium bomb compartment were detonated, igniting a large fire, emitting bursts of toxic yellow smoke, and what was even more terrifying was that the opening on the floor leading to the ammunition depot was actually open, and the flames were about to enter the ammunition depot. Pen, fun, pavilion www. biquge。 Several lieutenants on the info "Takachiho" shouted frantically, and organized the sailors to desperately turn the fire pump to extinguish the fire, and finally extinguished the flames and escaped a catastrophe.

However, the disaster of the "Takachiho" did not end there, as the flames had just been extinguished, and another 140-mm shell flew over, hitting the forward mast of the "Takachiho" ship, and after penetrating the mast, it exploded, and the seven lookouts and machine gunners in the mast were set on fire all over their bodies, and they were swept into the air by the air wave generated by the explosion like a burning torch, and then crashed into the sea.

Seeing that the Qianguo warship was able to accurately hit the mast at such a long distance, the Japanese naval officers and men on the "Takachiho" were all terrified.

The artillery skills of the Qianguo Navy can already be described as terrifying.

Soon after, the follow-up "Akitsuzu" and "Naniwa" of the First Guerrilla Force were also shot one after another. The No. 5 rapid-fire gun on the starboard side of the ship was hit by a 140-mm shell fired by the Qianguo warship, and a hole was blown in the gun shield, killing five officers and men including Captain Ryohei Nagata, Private Soshida Masanosuke, and First Class Sailor Mino Yukiyoshi, who were fighting near this gun position, and nine others, including Private First Class Koyoshimura Motaro. Then another 140-mm shell was hit in the stern of the "Akitsuzu-shu", and the shell fired directly into the officer's living quarters and exploded, turning the officer's living quarters into a sea of flames and destroying the 120-mm rapid-fire guns in the stern of the "Akitsu-zu-zhou". The situation of the "Naniwa" ship was not much better, first the waterline belt under the bow main turret was pierced, causing a small amount of water, and then the bow main gun room was hit by a 305 mm flowering shell, the 260 mm main gun was instantly blown into a ball of scrap metal, all 25 officers and soldiers in the main turret were killed, the entire bow was ablaze with fire, a large amount of toxic yellow smoke poured in from the command tower, the captain Togo Heihachiro and the officers were all smoked brown, dizzy one by one, in order to avoid being smoked to death by poisonous smoke, Heihachiro Togo and the officers had to withdraw from the forward command tower and fled into the alternate command tower at the stern.

On the "Yoshino," the flagship of the 1st Guerrilla Force, Kozo Tsuboi was shocked to witness the fire of four fast cruisers under the fierce shelling of the ironclad ships of the Qianguo Army, and saw that the 1st Guerrilla Force was in danger, so Kozo Tsuboi ordered the signal flag to be raised and ordered the 1st Guerrilla Group to slow down in the hope of getting cover from the ironclad ships of his own group.

Seeing that the 1st Guerrilla Force had slowed down its advance under the shelling of the Qianguo fleet, Ito Yuhiro on the "Mountain City" was furious.

"Signal! Ask them why they're slowing down?! Ito ordered loudly to the officers beside him.

Shortly after the signal flag was raised, a reply was received from "Yoshino": "The four ships of the First Guerrilla Force are seriously injured!" Ask for cover! ”

Hearing the report of the lookouts, Ito Yuhyung was even more angry: "Send another signal!" To be the first guerrilla must speed up! Quickly pass through the front of the enemy fleet and circle the right flank of the enemy fleet! ”

A series of complex signal flags were raised again, but what Ito saw was not the acceleration of the 1st Guerrilla Force, but the turn of the rudder to the left, intending to leave the battlefield.

"Tsubi coward! How dare you run away......" Ito scolded as he jumped to his feet.

Just as Ito Youheng's words fell, a piercing whistling sound came from overhead, and Ito Yuhyung couldn't help but shrink the words behind him, lowered his head and made a dodging action.

The huge cannonball fell like a meteor, flew over the ironclad ship "Yamashiro", landed in the sea not far from the port side, and exploded, and the water column rose into the sky, and Ito could even see the yellow-green smoke from the explosion.

It was as if it had rained heavily, and the sea water was falling from the sky, drenching everyone on the bridge into a soup dump.

Ito knew that the ships of his team had unknowingly entered the range of the main guns of the ironclad ships of the Qianguo.

Without waiting for his order, the two 305-mm guns of the bow battery of the "Shancheng" and the two 305-mm guns on the right side of the ship's waist gun room opened fire, but this round of salvo not only failed to hit the target, but the shells all entered the water and exploded at a long distance from the Qianguo ironclad ship, blowing up only a wall of water.

Because the main guns of the "Shancheng" and "Fuso" ships, which originally belonged to the German "Saxony" class ironclad ships, were designed with a caliber of 260 mm, the caliber of the main guns was raised to 305 mm in order to confront the Qianguo Navy, and in order to reduce weight, the diameter of the main guns was shortened, and the original caliber of 25 times was changed to 20 times the caliber, so that when the "Shancheng" and "Fuso" engaged the Qianguo ironclad ships, although they both had 305 mm main guns, the firing range was much closer than that of the Qianguo ironclad ships with 30 times the caliber.

At this moment, the advantage of the long firing range of the main guns of the Qianguo ironclad ship has been fully demonstrated.

Following the firing of the "Yamashiro," the main guns of the "Fuso," which was immediately following the "Yamashiro," also rang out, followed by the "Matsushima," "Itsukushima," "Hashidate," and "Chiyoda," which were followed by the "Fuso," also opened fire.

Seeing the earth-shattering roar of the 320-mm cannon of the "Three Views Ship" almost at the same time, Ito clenched his fists tightly.

These giant artillery pieces can be said to be the killer weapon he relied on to defeat the enemy this time.

The "Matsushima" class dome cruiser was built in 9087 by the Japanese government to counter and restrain the imaginary enemy of the Japanese Navy at that time, the "Dingyuan" class ironclad ship, the most powerful warship of the Qianguo Navy, and specially issued naval bonds. The class of warships was originally planned to be built 4 ships, but later changed to 3 ships due to financial problems, because these three warships adopted the names of the famous "Japanese Sanjing", "Matsushima", "Itsukushima", and "Hashidate" as the name of the ship, and they were also called Sanjing Ships, referred to as Sanjing Ships.

The design of the Sanjing ship was proposed and undertaken by Louis-Emile Bertin, a French ship design expert who was hired by Japan at that time. At that time, if you want to defeat ironclads with cheaper warships, there is theoretically only one type of ship with this possibility, that is, mosquito ships with small boats and cannons. However, due to its poor seaworthiness, the mosquito ship could not fight on the sea with changeable sea conditions, so Bai Laoyi proposed a dome cruiser with an enlarged hull and enhanced seaworthiness, which was actually an enlarged mosquito ship.

The mother model chosen by Bai Laoyi for the Sanjing ship is his own famous work, the French Navy's armored mosquito ship "Yellow Spring" class, with a single-masted single-chimney layout.

The displacement of the Matsushima-class dome cruiser is 4,278 tons, the length of the warship is 89.9 meters, the width is 15.4 meters, and the draft reaches 6 meters. The power system adopts 2 horizontal 3-expansion reciprocating steam engines, supporting the use of 6 coal-fired boilers, two-shaft propulsion, power of 5400 horsepower, and a maximum speed of 16 knots. In order to counter the 305 mm thick armor and 305 mm caliber cannon of the Qianguo "Dingyuan" class ironclad ship, Bai Laoyi specially arranged a 320 mm cannon of the French Ghanaian type with an astonishing caliber as the main gun for this class of warships (the gun was manufactured by the French Schneider company according to the specifications of the Ghanaian gun, of which the inner tube was made in Britain and the jacket was made in France).

This 320 mm cannon was originally designed to increase the power of the gun, and the barrel was designed to be 42 times the caliber, but in the discussion of the weapons conference held on August 30, 9087, it was worried that the gun would be too large and would affect the stability of the warship when it rotated, and it was revised to 38 times the caliber (according to the length of the chamber 12160 mm). The gun is designed with a steering angle of 285°, a muzzle velocity of 650 m/s, an effective range of 8,000 meters, 60 rounds per gun, and a choice of steel grenades weighing up to 450 kg or ordinary grenades weighing 350 kg. On the surface, these data seem to exceed the 305-millimeter Krupp cannon equipped with the Qianguo "Dingyuan" class warship, but the Ghanaian cannon, which weighs 66 tons and seems to be a powerful cannon, is only installed on a warship of more than 4,000 tons, which still causes a series of design problems. When the main gun that has been reduced rotates will still affect the stability of the warship, the shipbuilding hull will roll sideways, and if it encounters bad sea conditions, the main gun cannot be rotated at all, otherwise it is very likely to lead to the destruction of the warship. At the same time, in order to lower the center of gravity of the warship, the deck of the gun installation was designed to be extremely low, which caused a headache on the waves, which seriously affected the seaworthiness of the warship.

Ito will soon see that, constrained by these drawbacks, in the upcoming naval battle, the rate of fire of the 320-mm Ghanaian gun, which has a theoretical rate of fire of one round in 10 minutes, will be so slow that it can only fire one round in half an hour, and the idea of surpassing the "fixed distance" with a large-caliber gun can be described as a complete failure.

It can be said that it was unintentionally inserted, and what was about to really play a role in the naval battle was a large number of sub-caliber secondary guns -- 120 mm caliber Armstrong rapid-fire guns that were densely scattered on both sides of the Sanjing hull. This gun is manufactured by the British company Armstrong, with a bore length of 4801 mm, a warhead weighing 18.1 kg, a muzzle velocity of 467 m / s, an effective range of 7000 meters, and a rate of fire of up to 4-5 rounds in 1 minute. Due to the large difference in the design of the hull between the "Matsushima" and the other two Sankei ships, the number of 120-mm guns was also different.

The 3 Sankei ships may have taken into account the tactics of the 3-ship horn squad, among which the "Hashidate" and "Itsukushima" that are scheduled to belong to the right side of the 3-ship formation are similar in design, and the 320 mm main gun is installed in the exposed battery at the bow of the ship to facilitate forward combat, and the 12-inch thick open gun shield at the front is added to the open gun shield with a 4-inch thickness for protection (the left, right and rear sides of the gun shield are all closed, while the front part is open in a large area). At that time, the French ship designers believed that the front of the guns in naval warfare was difficult to attack, and the real threat to the batteries came from the small-caliber machine guns on the masts of the enemy warships, so the upper and rear defenses were emphasized), and there was a gun room under the main deck behind the main guns, equipped with five 120 mm rapid-fire guns on each side, and one on the aft main deck. The "Matsushima" ship in the Sanjing ship is more special, and it may have been initially considered to be arranged in the left side of the 3 ship horn squad for use in the broken position, so the main gun emplacements were arranged in the stern of the ship in a very strange way, and the 120 rapid-fire guns were rearranged in the gun room under the main deck of the bow, and because the space was larger than that of the other two Sankei ships, the number of rapid-fire guns was increased to 12, 6 on each side.

In addition, the Sankei ships are armed with 47 mm heavy Habekis rapid-fire guns (5 "Matsushima", 6 each of "Hashidate" and "Itsukushima"), 47 mm light Habekkaith rapid-fire guns (10 "Matsushima", 12 each of "Hashidate" and "Itsukushima"), 8-mm five-barreled Nordifeld cannons (each of the three ships is equipped with 1), 14-inch torpedo tubes (each of the three ships is equipped with 4), and the warship's sharp angle of attack under the waterline.

Due to the excessive number of armaments that occupied a large amount of the effective tonnage of the warship, the Sankei ship did not use the waterline with armor protection like the French parent "Yellow Spring", but longitudinally tiled a 2-inch thick dome deck inside the warship, and the protection ability can be said to be quite poor.

The construction of Itsukushima and Matsushima began on January 7, 9088 and February 17, 9088, respectively, at the Mediterranean shipyard in France, and was completed on September 3, 9091 and April 5, 9092, respectively. The third ship, Hashidate, began construction at the Yokosuka Shipyard in Japan on August 6, 9088, and was not completed until June 26, 9094, on the eve of the war. In the course of the service of the three ships, there were one after another design problems such as boiler leakage and corrosion, so that the maximum speed could only reach about 14 knots; although the boiler problems of the "Itsukushima" ship were repeated and the "Hashidate" ship had just been put into service and the training was insufficient, in order to restrain the "Dingyuan" class ironclad ships of the Qianguo, the Japanese Combined Fleet finally chose to bring the "Sanjing ships" into battle.

Due to the flaws in the design of the Mikei and the lack of training of the Japanese sailors, the first shell fired at the "Dingyuan" by the 320-mm gun of the "Matsushima" at a distance of 3,500 meters fell far into the sea.

Following the "Matsushima," the "Itsukushima" opened fire at the "Dingyuan" at a distance of 4,500 meters, and the "Hashidate" fired at the "Dingyuan" and "Zhenyuan" at a distance of 4,000 meters. At 12:55, at a distance of 5,000 meters, the "Chiyoda" ship at the end of the team also fired at the "Dingyuan".

After the war, some rumor-clearing officials ignored the fact that the effective range of the 305-mm guns of the "Dingyuan" ship was 7,800 meters, and blindly criticized the first round of firing from the Qianguo Navy at 5,000 meters as "blind fire." However, they did not pay attention to the fact that the Japanese Combined Fleet actually began shelling at a distance only a few minutes apart.

The waves of the Yellow Sea boiled.

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