On the afternoon of January 29, the day Britain declared war on the Empire, the Chinese and British outpost cruisers were already developing each other, and several skirmishes were taking place.

At six o'clock in the evening of the same day, the three second-class protected cruisers of the Sixth Fleet, led by the small armored cruiser Canton, once again tried to get close to the range of the main British fleet, and the first large-scale exchange of fire broke out between the two sides when they were intercepted by several British cruisers.

Four cruisers of the Sixth Fleet and five cruisers of a British cruiser squadron engaged in a firefight that lasted for more than an hour, and in this exchange of fire, both sides fired a large number of shells at each other with six-inch rapid-fire guns as the core.

After an hour of fighting, with the arrival of a British first-class protection cruiser, the small armored cruiser of the Imperial Navy's Canton was hit by a large number of shells, the gun positions of the main and secondary guns were severely damaged, and the Sixth Squadron had to abandon the plan to break through the blockade of the British cruiser and further reconnoiter the main fleet of the British.

This battle between the cruisers was quickly reported to Lin Tongshu by radio, and looking at the content of the battle report, Lin Tongshu frowned a little.

The battle report of the Sixth Squadron said that the 200-millimeter main guns and a large number of 150-millimeter naval guns on its own small armored cruisers during the battle were quite impressive at a combat distance of about 2,000 meters, but relatively few actually penetrated the enemy's main armor.

By the time of the second half of the battle, the commander of the 6th Detachment simply abandoned the use of armor-piercing shells, in favor of high-explosive shells, with the main goal of paralyzing enemy fire by killing and wounding enemy gunners.

The same happened on the side of the British, especially their own small armored cruiser Guangzhou, although its displacement was only more than 5,000 tons, but the armor protection was quite good, and the thickness of the armor on the side and the front of the turret reached nearly 170 millimeters at the thickest point.

Moreover, Harvey armor is still used, and the opponent's large number of six-inch main guns cannot effectively penetrate the armor belt of the Canton at all!

This situation surprised Lin Tongshu a little.

Earlier, he knew that the protection effectiveness of the new generation of hardened armor would be greatly improved, but he did not expect that it would be better than he expected.

Although this is only an engagement between cruisers, this situation should also arise with the main fleet.

The British's cutting-edge warships are also using Harvey armor, which doesn't mean that a large number of their own six-inch secondary guns can't be used, and although the main guns can penetrate the enemy's armor, the number of main guns is small, and the rate of fire is not fast.

The slow rate of fire of the main guns, coupled with the relatively close combat distance, although a large number of six-inch secondary guns could hit the enemy ships, they could not effectively penetrate the enemy's armor.

It seems that the scheduled decisive battle plan is about to change one or two!

This naval battle between China and Britain was strictly the first actual battle of carburized hardened armor, and although all countries knew that the protective effect of hardened armor was very good, they did not expect it to be so good.

At this time, Lin Tongshu remembered the news from the German side, and heard that the Germans had adopted a new kind of hardened armor, which they called Krupp armor, which was rumored to be even better than Harvey armor.

After the Krupp armor is also popularized in the future, I am afraid that the current firepower layout will be difficult to keep up with the pace of the times.

Perhaps, in the future, it will be necessary to increase the caliber of the secondary gun to seven inches or even more than eight inches!

Perhaps, between the main gun and the secondary gun, another large-caliber gun can be added to compensate for the lack of rate of fire of the main gun and the lack of power of the secondary gun!

On this night, the Chinese and British fleets in the South China Sea were covered by night, and it was difficult for both sides to find traces of the other side's main fleet.

Although it was said that at about one o'clock in the morning, a reconnaissance cruiser of the Second Fleet spotted the traces of a suspected enemy ship, but it was impossible to make an accurate judgment because of the night.

However, judging from yesterday afternoon's contact, the actual distance between the main fleets of the two sides was very close, and the reason why the two sides did not find each other's main fleets was because of the darkness of the night.

But that changed the next day when the sun just came up.

At 6:10 a.m. on 30 January, shortly after the sun had risen above sea level, the fog of the night was slowly dissipating, and the lookout on the cruiser Anton, which belonged to the Ninth Cruiser Detachment, which was about 15 nautical miles away from the left front of the main fleet of the First Fleet, was observing the sea surface with a large telescope as usual, when he suddenly stopped moving the large telescope in his hand and adjusted the focus.

Immediately after, a clear figure of a battleship appeared in his sight!

As a lookout, identifying battleships is his basic lesson, he can see at a glance, the battleship in the telescope that is sailing eastward is a huge capital ship, and after counting the number of main guns and identifying the appearance, he is very sure that this is the second-class battleship prestige in the British East India fleet.

Surprised, he hurriedly moved the telescope slowly, and then found many warships in the front and rear directions of the Prestige, the Captain of the Hundred, the Pavrel, the three capital ships of the British East India Fleet.

These three battleships formed a detachment and were slowly sailing eastward, and in the right rear direction of this battleship detachment, he saw a huge battleship, although it was a little vague, but he still distinguished, it was a monarch-class battleship, although he didn't know which one it was, but this one was a monarch-class battleship, but there was nothing wrong with this one.

After discovering these situations, he didn't have time to think about it, he immediately sounded the alarm, and then passed the news to the officers below!

When Guo Dongqiang, the captain of the Anton, learned that he had discovered the main fleet of the British, his face immediately became cautious, and then he quickly walked to the control tower, raised the telescope and looked in the southeast direction.

So his next step was to climb the mainmast without hesitation, and then take over the large telescope from the lookout's hands, and this time, he really saw the main fleet of the British in the distance.

Judging from the external characteristics of this fleet, there is no doubt that this is the main fleet of the British, there are at least four cutting-edge battleships in it, and behind these four battleships, there are more pillars of smoke, although for a while he could not see which of the battleships under the pillars of smoke are, but no matter what, he can conclude that the opposite is the main fleet of the British.

Immediately, he dismounted the mainmast, and then used the ship's wireless telegraph to relay the news of the discovery of the main fleet of the British.

Then he said: "Increase the speed of the battle by one level, continue to move forward, we have to find out the situation of the British!" ”

Through wireless telegraphy, although the Anton was fifteen nautical miles away from the main fleet, Lin Tongshu in the main fleet was still quickly informed of the discovery of the main fleet of the British.

During the operation on the Houyi, many combat staff officers had already begun to calculate on the charts based on the latest news and began to formulate various combat plans.

Soon after, Lin Tongshu issued three orders to the whole fleet, the first order was to eat for all the people, and the second order was that the main fleet should turn to the left twenty degrees to get closer to the main fleet of the British.

The third order was to send the fast cruisers of the 8th and 9th cruiser detachments of the fleet forward to further reconnoiter the details of the main fleet of the British.

When Lin Tongshu issued the order, the Andong was also getting closer and closer to the British fleet, and at this time, as the sun rose, the dense fog at dawn gradually dissipated, and more British fleet figures were exposed.

At the same time, the British also discovered the Anton and the other cruisers of the Ninth Cruiser Detachment behind them, they may have noticed something, and soon there were many cruisers approaching quickly, but they did not come directly to intercept the Anton, but wanted to bypass the Anton and then go deep into the northwest waters, it was obvious that the British suspected that there was the main fleet of the Empire in this direction.

Seeing the movements of the British, the commander of the 9th cruiser detachment quickly issued relevant orders, except for the Anton, which continued to conduct in-depth reconnaissance, the rest of the ships intercepted the British reconnaissance ships.

With the maneuvering of both sides, it didn't take long for another battle between cruisers to break out!

Both sides engaged in a simple but fierce offensive and defensive battle with the goal of trying to scout each other's capital ships and intercepting each other's scout ships.

At first, this kind of battle was fought only by the second-class cruisers of both sides, but as time passed, four Laurel-class armored cruisers from the third cruiser detachment of the Second Fleet of the Imperial Navy arrived on the battlefield.

Although these four armored cruisers were all old ships in service in the eighties, they were still not something that those second-class cruisers could resist, and within half an hour after the arrival of the third cruiser detachment on the battlefield, that is, after 7:30 in the morning, it sank one of the second-class protected cruisers of the British through a fierce fire attack.

After the declaration of war between China and Britain, the first sinking result!

However, the time for the four Laurel-class armored cruisers to sweep through the opponent's second-class cruisers did not last long, because soon several of the opponent's first-class protection cruisers also arrived, followed by several old battleships.

Seeing that it is not good, the third cruiser detachment is decisively accelerating the battlefield!

They were only here to assist the cruisers, not to fight the enemy's main fleet.

On the Houyi, although Lin Tongshu could not see the British battleships on the sea, he knew that the British's capital ship was in front of him, and he had already exchanged fire with his own outpost fleet.

looked at the pocket watch again, and then leaned over to look at the charts of the battle plans drawn up by many staff officers, but after a while, he directly moved the battle plan away, and then raised his head and said: "The plan has to change!" ”

Then he turned his head to the admirals beside him and said, "Order Vice Admiral Wang Liyong's fast fleet to keep course, and when it arrives, it will detour to the second half of the enemy fleet and encircle and annihilate the old battlefleet of the enemy fleet!" ”

Vice Admiral Wang Liyong's fast fleet consisted of six cutting-edge armored cruisers belonging to the First Cruiser Detachment and the Second Cruiser Detachment.

This fleet of armored cruisers, both in terms of firepower and speed, is quite good, and it is the most suitable for mobile combat.

According to the original plan, it was the simplest one-column tactic, with the capital ships lined up in a standard horizontal formation, and then seizing the T-shaped prefix, striving to concentrate the firepower of multiple ships in the first half hour of the battle, sinking or severely damaging one or more of the enemy's capital ships.

But now, Lin Tongshu has changed his plans!

The tactics of the battleships to seize the T-shape have not changed, but the six cutting-edge armored cruisers have been separated and directly attacked the rear half of the enemy! ——

(To be continued.) )