(New books for collections, recommended votes, please, please!) Your attention is the motivation for my writing, thank you! ）

Kagoshima Castle, the base camp of the Shimazu family, is here. Although the territory of the Shimazu family is not small, Kagoshima Castle is the richest. The other Kaguya Castle, Shinjo, Tsukiki Castle, and Shibushi Castle are not as good as Kagoshima Castle. It's July, and it's three months before Shimazu Mitsuhisa, the head of the Shimazu family, goes to Edo. With the establishment of the shogunate, the Wa state implemented two systems: "separation of soldiers and peasants" and "system of visiting and confessing". Every year, daimyos, their wives, and some of their retainers lived in Edo for more than three months, making Edo one of the few major cities in the world at the time.

In many cases, daimyos, their families, and retainers from all over the country lived in Edo for more than three months. Just like at this moment, Mitsuhisa Shimazu and his eldest son, Hisao Shimazu, remained in Kagoshima Castle, and his other younger sons are still in Edo.

As soon as the defenders at the mouth of the bay discovered the Mawei navy, they sent a clipper ship to deliver the news to Shimazu Mitsuhisa. At the same time that Shimazu Mitsuhisa had just received the news, the south also remembered the fierce and dense cannon fire. However, at a distance of dozens of kilometers, he couldn't hear it. However, it was this news that surprised him! The blue background tiger flag, the battleship of the Fujian Mawei Navy of the Qing Dynasty! He could react to this at once, after all, the eldest son beside him suffered a big loss at the hands of the Mawei Navy! However, this is impossible, how could the fleet of the Mawei Navy suddenly appear on their doorstep?

Avenge? Mitsuhisa Shimazu and Hisao Shimazu can only think of this reason.

Could it be that the people of the Geng family in Fujian are crazy? How many troops can he have as a vassal king, and dare to go on an expedition to attack them? Even if they can send 50,000 troops. Didn't he ask how many troops the Shimazu family had? If the troops are insufficient, they dare to come to take revenge. It's a self-defeating one! Wait a minute! More than 100 sail warships? Just kidding. When did the Qing Kingdom have sail warships!

After a while, Shimazu Mitsuhisa's brother-in-law, Shimazu Akihisa, as well as the old man Shimazu Kehisa, and several other family elders hurried over. After bowing and taking his seat, he said in a deep voice: "The Geng family's Mawei Navy has invaded us on a large scale, they must be prepared, they are eager for revenge, and their fighting spirit is very strong, and I hope you will treat it carefully." ”

"The head of the house doesn't have to be an enemy." The old man Shimazu Akira shook his head disappretently and said: "Our Shimazu family has 100,000 samurai and tens of thousands of sailors, and the Geng family's naval labor expedition." How many people can there be? Even if there are 100 warships, and there are 40,000 or 50,000 people at the top, how can they be our opponents! As he spoke, he looked at Shimazu Hisao and Shimazu Keihisa, one of these two is the son of the head of the family, the other is the elder of the family, plus themselves, they are all different in age, but the names of several people are very close, and three of them are the same! The eldest prince and the Shimazu Kukei family have always been in charge of the water division. Trouble the two sailors to go to the battle first, and stop the enemy from going ashore first. Other than that. Oda Nobuya led one of his sailors to the sea today, and I don't know if he is safe and sound now. The head of the family, please send someone to find it quickly, in addition, Oda Nobuya and the water master of the department, can find the best, if you are out, please make plans as soon as possible. Also, please give the order to quickly mobilize the family army and prepare for battle! ”

"That's right, since the Geng family dares to come, then they don't want to go back. Back then, the army of the Yuan Kingdom failed to attack our country, and the Geng family's navy will be the same today. It's really impatient for a single vassal king to dare to invade us! Mitsuhisa Shimazu sneered. It is likely that something happened to Oda Nobunra, and he immediately sent someone to look for him. Also, Hisao and Keijiu led the sailors to meet the enemy, and the others quickly prepared according to Shimazu Akihisa's words! ”

"Hey." Everyone in the hall bowed down and turned away.

Shimazu Mitsuhisa's brother-in-law, Shimazu Akihisa, is the head of the Shinjo family, but he is still under the command of Shimazu Mitsuhisa. When everyone left the room, they frowned and asked worriedly: "Big brother, the soldier who reported the news just now said that the enemy has more than 100 sail warships, which is much more powerful than our sailors!" Hisao, can they deal with it? ”

"You're too worried, when the year before last was near the end of the year, Jiu Xiong led a team to Fujian, you know, the Geng family's fleet didn't use any sail warships. However, in the past year, I heard from Taiwan's Zheng Jing that the Geng family had some sail warships, but the number was definitely not large, and it must have been that the defenders in the south were stunned and regarded other warships as sail warships. It is conceivable that the fort in the south should have been destroyed at this moment! ”

"There is another one, even if our sailors are not as good as them, it is not so easy for the Geng family's Mawei Navy to defeat us. Now, we have plenty of time to gather the samurai inside and outside the city. As he spoke, he picked up his pen and quickly wrote a warrant, and then got up and said, "If you want to gather your subordinates, I also have to quickly gather the warriors in the city to set up defenses." By the way, we have to send orders to other cities to send garrison samurai to fight, and at the same time order each city to recruit samurai outside the city and organize men. ”

"Hi. I'm going right away! Shimazu Akihisa and Shimazu Mitsuhisa also quickly left the room and hurried to action.

Shimazu Hisao and Shimazu Keihisa flew to the seashore, and then boarded a clipper to the sailor station on Lou Island. Although there has been no war for decades, the Shimazu family has not relaxed the training of sailors, and the system of going to sea every five days is set by Shimazu Mitsuhisa himself. It can be said that the more than 20,000 sailors are the biggest capital of the Shimazu family to dominate Kyushu Island, and the other daimyo who have sailors are inferior to the sailors of the Shimazu family in terms of the number of sailor soldiers and the number of warships.

However, the year before last, Shimazu Hisao had already lost some of them, and today he buried more than 3,000 people of Oda Nobuya, and now all the sailors of the Shimazu family are combined, and there are only 18,000 people left, and the total number of large and small warships is less than 150. Their warships are different from ordinary pirates, and they are closer to the sailors of the Zheng family in Taiwan. Most of the pirate gangs are small sea boats, which can usually carry about 20 people. The smallest boat of the Shimazu family's sailors is similar to that of Chinese sand boats, and the smallest can carry 40 people. The number of soldiers on other warships ranged from sixty or seventy to more than three hundred. Thirty main battleships. Compare in terms of ship size. It's comparable to the fourth-tier battleships of the Red Army fleet. Up to a length of fifty meters, but the configuration of fire, as well as the performance of the boat, is much worse.

The Mawei Navy was led by the 3rd and 5th Fleets, and continued to move forward in a V-shaped formation. It was a full 30-kilometer journey from the mouth of Kagoshima Bay to the garrison of the Loudao Wako Naval Division, and just after the fleet had marched for an hour, Wang Zhenbang and others on the Zhenyuan received a report from the soldiers fighting on the mast: "Report to the general, I have received a report from the flag of the Third Fleet that the main force of the enemy's naval division has been found ahead. ”

I heard that the main force of the Shimazu family's sailors took the initiative to meet them. Wang Zhenbang couldn't help but smile, this Kagoshima Bay is a dead end, and the sailors of the Japanese are blocked by them, so they can only take the initiative to come out to fight. Otherwise, it can only be like in Ryukyu Jinmu Bay, which was used as a live target by the Mawei Navy and used by naval gunners for practice. Now that you know that the enemy is taking the initiative to face the battle, the next step is much easier! He said in a deep voice: "Tell me to probe again, and ask about the specific number of enemy ships, their size and configuration, and the current distance from us." ”

"Yes!" The flag commander on the mast saluted in unison. Began to issue flag orders for inquiry.

Geng Jingzhong, Zeng Yangxing, Tang Zhi and a few others immediately left the cabin, and they all gathered on the deck again. Pull out the telescope you carry with you and start looking. Directly ahead, a large black dot appeared about eight kilometers away. Geng Jingzhong glanced at the streamers on the beanies worn by the marine soldiers standing on the deck, it was a south wind blowing today, they were in the upper hand, and at the speed of the fleet at this moment, it would take less than two quarters of an hour to clash with the Japanese sailors.

In the whole battle, it is estimated that Wang Zhenbang will not take the initiative to let the Zhenyuan rush too forward, after all, Geng Jingzhong is on the ship, and he is the first to ensure Geng Jingzhong's safety. However, judging from the formation of the other party, the Japanese sailors set off in a hurry, and the formation was not neat. It is estimated that in such a short period of time, their ammunition is not necessarily ready. This is also the benefit of Geng Jingzhong's repeated emphasis on raid operations. The corners of Wang Zhenbang's mouth couldn't help but bend slightly, and he groaned slightly, and then ordered: "Order the third and fifth fleets to slow down and keep to the left and right respectively, and the first and second fleets of the headquarters are close to the third and fifth fleets respectively." The 4th, 6th, and 7th Squadrons of the Headquarters followed the Admiral to engage the enemy head-on. All fleets, unfold battle queues, ready for battle. After a pause, he ordered: "At the rear, the Seventh Fleet will leave two fourth-rank warships and five fifth-rank warships to block the harbor to prevent the enemy from being defeated and escaping!" ”

The commander quickly repeated the order, and the flag commander above the mast quickly began to move the flag and began to pass the order.

In this era, the tactics of the navy are still mainly those two, one is the close-range melee between the fleets of the two sides, first the fleets of the two sides charge each other, and then entangled, there is no tactical content at all, that is, artillery bombardment, broadside warfare and the like, just like the cavalry melee on land, although this tactical method of combat has been completely outdated in later generations, but it is still the main naval combat tactics in the East. However, in the West, especially several maritime powers such as Britain and the Netherlands, after the power of artillery has increased dramatically, the broadside melee has slowly become obsolete.

The second is the tactics of the battle line. In naval battles, the warships of both sides are usually arranged in two columns, parallel to each other or in the same direction, and shoot at each other with gunwales, the advantage of this tactic is that it can give full play to the firepower advantage of the battleship, and the disadvantage lies in the simplification, stylization, and naval warfare is the same as wrestling, if the two fleets are on equal footing, they often lose and lose and cannot tell the winner, and now all maritime powers are using this method of warfare.

Like the current naval war in the West, the two major wars between Britain and the Netherlands basically relied on this tactic. As for the T-shaped formation, etc., they are all in the training subjects of the navy, but under normal circumstances, no one is a fool in naval warfare, and if you have to run to the vertical of the T-shaped battle formation, you are looking for death!

And the use of battle line tactics has a great deal to do with the choice of wind direction. The hull of a battleship that is upwind will be tilted downwind, and the horizontal angle of fire of the guns on this side is low, which is conducive to attacking the hull of the enemy ship on the opposite side; On the other hand, a battleship in the downwind direction, with its hull tilted backwards and a higher horizontal angle of fire from its gunwales, was conducive to attacking the masts and sails of the opposing enemy ships. The choice of the upwind direction belongs to the aggressive table xiàn, the purpose of which is to sink the enemy ship; Choosing the downwind direction is a defensive stance aimed at destroying the power system of the enemy ship and making it incapacitating so that it can get out of the boat.

Generally speaking, a fleet that is at a disadvantage will usually choose to have the upper hand in order to escape, while a fleet that is in an advantageous position will often choose to have the upper hand and try to achieve more results after the start of the battle. Of course, if it is to completely annihilate the enemy, the side that is in absolute advantage will also choose to have the upper hand and cut off the enemy's escape route. And when the strength of the two armies is equal, whichever side can seize the upper hand will be able to occupy the battlefield advantage.

However, the second line tactic does not correspond to the current situation. The Japanese fleet had already spotted the opposing group of warships and knew very well that they were in a weak position, but they would not choose the tactics of fighting on the battle line, and still wanted to use the first melee mode as before.

Shimazu Hisao on the opposite side had already exchanged hands with Geng's army once, and he knew very well that the artillery on Geng's Mawei naval ship was more advanced, more powerful, and had a longer firing range than them, and it was not appropriate to fight against the Mawei navy, because it would be too much of a loss for his side. This point was clearly stated to Shimazu Keihisa when he was ordered to set off. However, there are also a lot of close-range guns on the Mawei Navy ship, and the grape bullets, that is, scattered bullets, are quite sharp, and this battle is really not easy to fight. (To be continued......)

PS: Hurry up and present the second chapter, there are still two chapters today, and the little brother will work hard to make up for the arrears! Thank you brothers for your support!