The victory at the Battle of Gettysburg spurred President Lincoln of the United States, and with the timely arrival of reinforcements from the rear, by February 1863 there were 200,000 troops assembled near Washington.

With such a large number of troops, and the supply of weapons and supplies were basically in place, General Hook was also very excited, so he did not refuse Lincoln's order to send troops again.

For this sortie, General Hooke reorganized a "Great Army" with the Potomac Corps as the backbone, with a total number of 180,000 men, and on February 25, 1863, he led this great corps to take the initiative, and his first target was to attack Fredericksburg near the Potomac River.

Fredericksburg was a pretty good strategic point for holding the Potomac River, but it was only one of the many points where the Potomac River could be crossed, so before the war, there were only 3,000 men stationed here. In order to be on guard, Li added a little more troops.

As for the large forces of the Union Army, they were assembled in Winchester in the rear, with the idea of reinforcing them in time if there was a problem. And the reason for this, of course, is due to the insufficient strength of the coalition army.

You must know that in the previous Battle of Gettysburg, the Union army lost more than 20,000 people, which can be said to have hurt the vitality. Lee voluntarily retreated, no longer seeking to advance into Washington.

However, Robert. Li also knew the background of the north, and knew that once they reacted, they could continue to organize a large army to fight at any time, so if they wanted to defend their hometown, they had to be kept out.

Therefore, Robert. While asking for more reinforcements from the rear, Lee borrowed the methods of General Mead in the Battle of Gettysburg and began to overhaul fortifications near strategic points along the Potomac River, and the fortifications he built were trenches.

That's right, the Battle of Gettysburg gave Robert . Lee was impressed. In his opinion, if it weren't for the delay in the central area, he wouldn't have fought that battle so hard, and the key to the reason why the cemetery ridge in the center couldn't be taken was that they used trench warfare.

Robert. Lee's eyes were vicious, and in his opinion, trench warfare was greatly advantageous to the defenders, as long as there were enough trenches, and then the soldiers were filled in, as long as those soldiers had a little morale. It will become a nightmare for the attacker.

You must know that in this era, the weapons of the north and the south are mainly rifles and cannons, of which the rifles are mainly smoothbore guns, and the cannons are basically front-loading smoothbore guns.

The characteristics of these weapons also determine the cruelty of trench warfare, because the attacker has to pay several times more casualties than the defender if he wants to attack the trench.

Understand this. Robert. After taking the initiative to retreat, Li Huoxue began to rely on the Potomac River and built several strongholds behind the river. A large number of trench positions were dug in advance for each stronghold, and a trench defense line was to be organized on the basis of these trench strongholds.

The reason why only a few strongholds were made was because of a shortage of manpower. That's why positions were set up at key locations, according to Robert Brown. Lee's idea, wait for enough time. He also wanted to connect all these strongholds by road so that it would be easier to move troops.

Think about it, no matter where the enemy is attacking from, he has to face the strongholds on the defensive line, and if left unchecked, the troops of these strongholds can attack his rear, and if you are going to attack the strongholds, Robert. Li could use his stronghold to hold back the enemy, and the rear quickly mobilized the main reinforcements to defeat the enemy in one fell swoop.

In other words, with these trench strongholds, Robert . . . Li was able to give full play to his mobile advantages in internal operations, and he did not need to disperse his troops, but only needed to place a small number of troops in the strongholds, and the main force was assembled in the rear and stood by to reinforce the front line at any time.

I have to say, Robert. Li's tactic was quite reliable, effectively avoiding the shortcomings of his own shortage of troops, and dragging the war into the abyss of trench warfare.

It is conceivable that once both the north and the south have entered the stage of trench warfare, then in this era when there is no air force bombing, no mortars, no howitzers, and no machine guns and submachine guns, trench warfare will inevitably make it difficult for both sides to move an inch, mobile warfare will completely disappear, and everyone will have to enter a period of striving for national strength.

Of course, Robert. Although Li was extremely intelligent, it would be unrealistic to say that he could come up with these ideas so quickly, especially when so many excellent trenches were laid out so quickly.

In fact, at the Battle of Gettysburg, Robert. Lee was only touched by the trenches, but he had not studied them in detail, but soon, when he came into contact with the special effect drug contractors within the army, he received a pamphlet with pictures and texts, detailing the situation of trench warfare, and the various ways of digging trenches, as well as other rationalizations.

For example, the production of wooden fences and barbed wire has detailed instructions on it, and once there is a combination of barbed wire and wooden fences, plus a large number of rear-loading rifled guns, then the power of trench warfare will be multiplied.

That is, after reading these pamphlets, Robert. Li Cai did as he did step by step, and began to arrange the defensive line along the line of the Potomac River, first making trench strongholds one by one, and then connecting these strongholds by road to form a whole huge trench system, once the trench system was completed, the coalition army would be impregnable.

In Robert. In Lee's mind, he even had the name of this line of defense, which was called the Robert Line.

Of course, this pamphlet will not appear for no reason, it is actually the work of CIA agents of the Chinese Empire, and the purpose is to make trench warfare, a tactic of fighting for attrition, appear in advance, so that the north and the south can fight a little longer, and consume a little more.

You know, trench tactics are actually easy to steal, you use them on a large scale, I will use them quickly, and before the weapons have not yet made transformative progress, once both sides use trench tactics, it becomes impossible to end the battle in the short term, everyone can only watch each other dig trenches, iron heart to fight consumption.

The overall strength of the United States is stronger than that of the Allied States, but if there is help from Britain, China, and France, if you fight for two or three years, when everyone can't stand it anymore and the military and the people begin to become war-weary, you must still be able to succeed in becoming independent, and in this way, Li Yongji's goal will be achieved.

Li Yongji believes that there is Robert on the Eastern Front. Lee, a famous general, plus trench warfare, then the Union Army wants to take Richmond in a short time. That's not to think about.

Sure enough, on March 7, 1863, when the advance of the "Great Army" of the Union Army began to attack Fredericksburg, although there were more than 10,000 people in the front line, and the defenders of Fredericksburg were only 3,000 men, they were still beaten by these 3,000 defenders relying on the trenches and the Potomac River, and nothing went except to throw corpses on the ground.

On March 12th, Robert. Lee's Second Corps was led by Commander Stonewall Jackson. Lightly armed, they arrived at Fredericksburg first, and the defenders increased to 30,000 at once, and follow-up reinforcements were also urgently mobilized.

The increase in the number of defenders made Hook very hesitant, because he was not stupid and knew that it was not easy to fight here, so he just opened fire across the river and attacked Fredericksburg with artillery fire. But he has always refused to send troops to attack, just trying to make pre-war preparations.

It dragged on until the 16th, and in the face of Lincoln's stern urging, Hook was difficult to ride. Fearing that Lincoln would withdraw himself because of this, he had no choice but to attack.

In the early hours of March 18, cloudless, the Union Army, which had already made a lot of preparations, began a frontal attack on Fredericksburg.

The offensive began. 180 artillery pieces began to roar collectively, and under the cover of artillery fire, the army of 60,000 that had long been assembled. The forcible crossing of the Rapa Hannock River began.

Due to the large number of people, a total of seven river crossing points were selected, two of which were pontoon bridges built by sappers, and the other five river crossing points were forcibly transported by wooden boats to cross the river.

This wide-frontal way of crossing the river did cause some disadvantages to the defenders, after all, the river was too long, and Jackson's numbers were too small to be able to spread along the river like pepper noodles, which would only make the defense thin.

Therefore, Jackson didn't care about anything else, but just stuck to Fredericksburg, relying on the outer trench fortifications here, and waited for reinforcements.

Of course, although they were assembled in one place, the artillery never stopped, and Jackson used his 60 guns to constantly attack the troops crossing the river, using most of the solid bullets and grenades, but it also caused a lot of damage to the defenders.

By 3 o'clock in the afternoon, 40,000 Union troops had crossed the river and had begun a tentative assault on Fredericksburg.

As a result, it was clear that these attacking forces had failed without exception, and they could not even get past the perimeter fence and barbed wire, and left behind a large number of corpses, with more than 600 casualties.

Such high casualties made the Federation army very angry, and they sent 100 guns across the river and bombarded Fredericksburg with solid shells at close range, destroying the entire Union position.

However, when the infantry charged again after an hour and a half of artillery attack, the Confederate positions were again filled with gunfire, and the fighting Federation lost their temper, especially the wooden fences and barbed wire.

The wooden fence is a little better, but the barbed wire seems to be made up of sections of barbed wire, with many iron thorns on it, and it is difficult to break it in a short time.

You use these things with your hands, there are so many iron thorns, it is difficult for you to start, cut them with a bayonet, and cut them again and again, or even if you cut off one or two, there are so many below, you can't cut them quickly at all.

And these barbed wire fences are all connected into pieces, hammered into the ground with a large number of wooden piles, more than half a person high, and it is impossible to cross it at once, and must be cleared out first.

If it is peacetime, although these barbed wire fences are troublesome, it is not difficult to clean them slowly, but the problem is that this is on the battlefield, and the preset point of the barbed wire is exactly within the range of the coalition army's muskets, once you are blocked by the barbed wire and slow down the attack, you will become a live target for the coalition army's shooters.

In other words, most of the Union offensive forces were shot down by the Confederates in front of the barbed wire, and the casualties came mainly from their muskets, not artillery.

It was not until 6 o'clock in the afternoon, when it was dark, that in order to avoid accidental injury, Hook ordered to stop the attack, but to seize the time to let the troops build pontoon bridges, let the main force cross the river as much as possible, and strive to let all the hundreds of thousands of troops of the main force cross by tomorrow, and then fight again tomorrow.

At nine o'clock in the evening, all the soldiers of the "Great Legion" of the Union Army had crossed the river, after which Hook called for George Brown. Mead, William. Franklin and Edwin. Sumner, let's discuss tomorrow's offensive plan.

What I want to say here is that the "Great Legion" was too numerous, so in order to facilitate the command, Hook divided the corps into three divisions, which were George. The Great First Division of Mead's Command, William. The Great Second Division under Franklin's command and Edwin. The Great Third Division led by Sumner.

Division here. It is not a division in the ordinary sense, but a master regiment, one of which has four to six armies and independent divisions, ranging from 50,000 to 60,000 people, and it can be said that every great division has a strong independent combat capability.

Among them, Hooke's corps headquarters was located in George. Among Mead's great first divisions, and this first division was also the main force of the central breakthrough, and the other second and third were the left and right flanks.

Therefore. Bringing in the generals of the three master regiments under his command shows that Hook is very serious about tomorrow's attack plan, and is very embarrassed, and wants to brainstorm ideas, otherwise, he will be able to act arbitrarily and arbitrarily, and there is no need to ask for other people's opinions.

Actually, Joseph. Hook originally wanted to be dictatorial about everything, but before the Battle of Gettysburg. He himself is self-aware and knows that he is not fighting well, and in this battle, he also found a lot of problems. Especially the position of the barbed wire fence and trench, he saw it from a distance, his scalp was numb, and there was no better way, so he came to ask his subordinates if they had any good ideas.

"Do you need to ask?" Edwin. Sumner said as soon as he came up. "We have 180,000 people, more than 300 artillery pieces, and they have only 30,000 men. There is a huge disparity in strength. So, don't bother so much, let my troops attack, attack head-on, and make sure to take it there in one day. ”

Edwin. Sumner's troops had crossed the river later, so his men had not taken part in the attack on the trench position, so although they frowned a little at the barbed wire and trench position, they did not think it was a big deal.

"If you want to talk about a strong attack, it is indeed possible." William. Franklin frowned, "But that position looks troublesome, and if it is attacked head-on, the casualties will definitely be not small." ”

"It's not small." George. Meade spoke, too, "Their position is in a ring, with five trenches, and between them are wooden fences and barbed wire. If we attack, we will probably suffer heavy casualties and not make much progress. ”

Speaking of which, George. Mead looked at the others, and then continued: "Don't forget, although there are many of us, we are all new soldiers, and once the casualties exceed 10%, I am afraid that they will begin to retreat, and their position is ...... If we don't lose 30,000 or 40,000, I'm afraid we won't be able to take it. But the question is, can we lose so many people? ”

"Thirty or forty thousand? It's a little too much. "Edwin. Sumner pouted, "I don't believe it's that hard. ”

"If you don't believe me, try it yourself." George. Mead said lightly.

"I'll fight, I'll fight!" Edwin. Sumner immediately turned to Joseph. Hook said, "Let me fight, but in order to reduce the casualties, you have to transfer all the artillery to me for use!" ”

Seeing that someone took the initiative to ask for help, Joseph. Hook nodded, then looked at the other two, "Do you have any other opinions?" ”

One listen to Joseph. Hook said so, George. Mead and William. Franklin stopped talking.

Opinion? It's all come to this point, what else can I say? This Fredericksburg had to be taken, and if it was left unattended, it would be tantamount to dropping a time bomb in the rear.

In other words, if they don't fight regardless of bypassing this place, then their 30,000 people can attack their supply lines from the rear at any time, and then the situation will be even worse. Therefore, since it was decided to attack from here, this Fredericksburg had to be taken.

The discussion here is not a question of whether to fight, but how to fight. Mead and William. Franklin was an old slippery man, and he had studied engineering and construction, and he had a headache with the trench fortifications, so he wanted someone to give it a try.

In other words, Joseph. Hook came to them to discuss, but he just wanted to ask who would fight first, and the one who hit first would inevitably be the most risky, so neither of them wanted to come out first.

Now well, since Edwin. Sumner took the initiative to ask, and the two of them were happy.

Now that the person in charge of the attacking force has been found, or the person in charge, Joseph. Hook didn't say anything more, and after discussing some details, he took the initiative to dismiss the meeting.

At six o'clock in the morning of the next day, while the sky was still dark, the three hundred gates of the Great Legion roared simultaneously from three directions, and began a new round of bombardment of Fredericksburg. The Great Third Division, led by Sumner, made a move.

Edwin. Although Sumner seems to be reckless, his tactical literacy is still good, and he also knows that this Fredericksburg is difficult to fight, so he simply dispatched three corps at once. Attack Fredericksburg from three directions at once.

Although it is three directions, there are also primary and secondary, of which the enemy's right flank is his main direction of attack, and on his own left flank, Edwin. The Sumner hit 20,000 horses, and the other two directions combined were only 10,000.

As soon as the offensive began, the attacking units of the 3rd Division launched a tidal offensive. The Sumner divided the forces into five battle groups in five shock waves. Each wave of troops opened a certain distance, and then rushed upwards in waves, giving people the feeling of being outnumbered and attacking.

His plan was good, but unfortunately the first wave of attacking troops was quickly intercepted outside the barbed wire, and then in the dense rows of gunfire in the opposite trench, more than 200 corpses were left behind and fled in a hurry.

Fortunately, these retreating people still have brains, and most of them know that they have to run in both directions, so they do not cause much difficulty for the second wave of attacking troops behind.

But. The second wave of troops also encountered difficulties again, again stopping in front of the barbed wire fence on the perimeter of the first line of defense of the Union Army.

However, this second wave of troops was a little better, and they still knelt down in front of the barbed wire to shoot, playing with each other for a while. Instead of just rushing up and shooting a volley of guns and running back, as in the first wave.

It's a pity that playing with the Union troops in the trenches is the most disadvantageous, after all, the front of the barbed wire is flat. There was no cover at all, so even if the soldiers of the Union Army were shooting on their knees, the area of damage was reduced. There are still heavy casualties.

This time, after suffering 400 casualties, the second wave also had to retreat, allowing the third wave to continue to rise.

That's it, Edwin. Sumner's troops attacked in waves, but they were basically powerless against the barbed wire, and could only play counter-shooting with the opposite people outside, hoping to use this crowd tactic to inflict casualties on the other side.

However, all five waves of attacks were over, and the casualties reached a staggering two thousand, but the fire on the opposite side showed no sign of abating.

Annoyed and angry, Edwin. Sumner immediately brought in a hundred field guns and bombarded them indiscriminately at a distance of 500 meters from the barbed wire, hoping to blast the damned barbed wire with artillery.

Unfortunately, the barbed wire fences were fixed with a large number of wooden stakes, and there was a layer behind them, and even if the artillery could break some places, it would still make some holes or make some barbed wire lodging, but it could not sweep away the barbed wire at all.

The battle lasted a full day, and Edwin . Sumner used all sorts of methods, but none of them could get the troops close, but, after such a long battle, Edwin Brown. Sumner also has some eyebrows, he thinks that in order to break this position, you must first break the barbed wire, and to break the barbed wire, you must prepare a large number of sandbags and planks.

After a night's rest, Edwin. Sumner asked the troops to prepare a large number of planks, but the next day, when I saw that the barbed wire on the opposite side was thick again, it turned out that the Union troops on the opposite side took advantage of the cover of the night to secretly arrange several layers of barbed wire in this direction.

At this time, the best way is to change the direction of the main attack, but that would be too wasteful of time, after all, it is not an easy task to reorganize the attacking troops, and the main and secondary attacks have been arranged in advance, and if the light yì changes, it will take at least a day.

So, Edwin. Sumner did not change the direction of attack, still using the opponent's right flank as the main direction of attack.

This time, his soldiers in the front row took the large planks and walked cautiously forward, and when they reached the barbed wire, they covered the planks and formed a passage that allowed their people to pass through guò quickly.

Although this method is good, it is also very costly, because there are too many barbed wire, there are five layers, and if you want to pave a road with all wooden planks, you will have to suffer huge casualties in the process.

Moreover, after paving the road with wooden planks, it is equivalent to paving a narrow wooden plank bridge, and their own soldiers can only advance through the guò plank bridge, but this is similar to taking the bridge, so that the opponent's firepower is more concentrated, and their own people will greatly increase casualties when they pass the guò plank bridge.

But at this time, Edwin. Sumner couldn't care about it, so he could only bite the bullet and let people rush, and the result was wave after wave, and the best result was to rush to a distance of ten meters in front of the opposite position, and if it was closer, it would not be able to rush at all.

The reason why this is the case, the most critical problem is that the other party is too tenacious, even if it is face-to-face, it can calmly continue to shoot and fire, at this point, their own soldiers are too bad, once the casualties are more than two percent, they will collapse, and in the process of escaping back, many people are either stuck in the barbed wire, or are shot and killed by the rear, which causes panic to the people in the rear.

It was found that the casualties had reached three thousand. Sumner had to stop attacking because it was pointless to continue like this, and the exchange ratio was too disproportionate.

"Damn barbed wire! Damn the trenches! Damn cowards! "Edwin. Sumner clenched his fists hard, hateful, angry, and helpless. (To be continued......)