For the sailors on a battleship, the most difficult dangerous object to serve is not the thick cannonballs of the cylindrical spire type, but the propellant that provides the kinetic energy of the ejection of these shells. Because the explosive power of large-caliber shells is certainly destructive, but those violent explosives are tightly sealed inside the steel shells, as long as the fuse is not triggered, or disturbed by the extreme conditions of the outside world, these guys will honestly stay in the metal box and sleep soundly, until the battle makes their own thunderous sound.

And the propellant is different. These objects, which consist mainly of nitroglycerin and nitrocellulose, were stored on warships almost exclusively by wrapping them in a layer of silk fabric to prevent them from getting wet; Its chemical properties are extremely active, and once the surrounding environment changes slightly, it will trigger an irreversible combustion reaction. Therefore, among all the safe operating procedures on warships, propellant has always been the most stringent requirement for sailors. And the French learned a hard lesson in this area, and before the outbreak of the Great War, they had 4 main ex-dreadnoughts or armored cruisers sunk by the explosion of the projectile.

This time, when the high-temperature shrapnel pierced through the deck bulkhead of the Queen Mary and stabbed at a very high speed on the propellant cartridge, these hellish demons who had been awakened from their slumbering dreams instantly released all their energy in the extremely sublimated burning! In an instant, the incandescent light in the propellant depot surged into the sky, and the unparalleled high-temperature air waves rushed and rushed like a tsunami torrent; The explosion devastated the bulkhead of the deck that separated the magazine from the magazine, and this caused a large number of shells to participate in the devastating explosion!

"When the first explosion occurred, I was on deck extinguishing the part of the battleship that had been injured before. An unimaginable wave of violent air rushed towards the face. Pushed me straight off the deck. Fell into the sea 80 yards away. A huge column of water stirred up by a cannonball collapsed in the air. The waves were so fierce that they almost swallowed me up. Just as I was desperately swimming out of the sea, anxious about how I would return to the Queen Mary, she suddenly exploded so violently that it was as if a volcano had appeared in her body. The stout triangular mainmast bent and collapsed like spaghetti, and the deck and bridge were in an instant completely enveloped in flames and smoke; The battleship broke into three and capsized in less than three minutes, and I could clearly see the last moments of her four propellers spinning in the air...... "Francis, the surviving sailor of the damaged tube, recreated the scene with trepidation after the battle. "I think it must have been my sincere worship in the church that moved the Lord, which made me one of the only eight survivors of the ship's 1,266 officers and men."

The waves are dancing and the water is flying. On the deck bridge of the De Fringer, the German sailors who witnessed the sinking of the Queen Mary couldn't believe their eyes: this powerful ship with a standing displacement of 26,270 tons, armed with eight 343 mm guns, and capable of reaching a normal speed of 27 knots, was reduced to ashes under the guns of his own battleship, and this was only a little more than 5 minutes before the ship turned its guns! After hearing the short and inspiring speech of Captain Hipper, the German sailors finally burst into a tsunami of cheers: for the first time, the German sailors began to put their minds in touch with an epic victory, thinking that Britain's most powerful battle cruisers were vulnerable to their guns!

Since the Queen Mary was right behind the Lion, Betty was the first to observe the explosion. I saw the only thing left of the sea that looked like "thousands of dead fish with their bellies turned upwards". His eyes were already full of horror and anger. Obviously, he has a numerical advantage of 9 to 7, and the caliber of the main gun is also better than that of the opponent. But why in an almost normal battle, two battle cruisers on your side exploded and sank one after another? This has completely subverted his perception of the world of naval warfare since he joined the army!

"Boom!" The light surged, the arrogance flew wide, and the Moritz battle cruiser at the end of the German column was hit again; A 305mm shell slammed into the Anna turret in the bow, completely overshadowing the entire turret from the blast. However, when the light dissipated, the scene of the explosion of the whole ship that Betty was eager to wait for did not appear, and the 18,250-ton German battle cruiser was still alive at sea, and continued to fire at the British fleet with its three main turrets on the side and stern!

"The order was given, and the destroyer forces immediately made a sortie to carry out a torpedo attack on the enemy; The main fleet turned two compass points to the left and increased its speed to 24 knots, temporarily widening the distance between it and the German fleet. Seeing this, Betty gritted her teeth, and then gave an order full of pain and unwillingness, "At the same time, send a telegram to Carden, asking their old dreadnoughts to speed up, the battle cruiser is currently in a bitter battle, and urgently needs their support!" ”

"General, our antenna has been damaged by the Germans, and now we can only wave the flag and cannot contact friendly forces in another sea area." Captain Chatfield, the captain of the Lion, reminded from the sidelines. Betty paused slightly, and then said with some anger: "Then send the flag to the royal princess and let him send the telegram on his behalf!" In addition, report to the General Flagship that the German reconnaissance fleet has appeared, and the fast fleet is trying to hold them back and prepare to annihilate them in one fell swoop with the Channel Fleet that arrives later. ”

With Betty's order, a series of signal flags were raised as the Lion Battle Patrol landed; Flags of all colors and shapes flutter up and down in the air, as if they were performing a ceremonial visit in peacetime. The communications officer on the Royal Princess began to press the keyboard in front of him at a rapid pace, transmitting the electrical signals that were converted into secret words to their own ships in the distance; A cannon fodder destroyer raised a red Z-flag and began to rush towards the German fleet in a state of strong pressure and ventilation. Many of them are large destroyers of the "Acasta" class that have only been commissioned by the United Kingdom in recent years, with a standing displacement of nearly 1,100 tons, equipped with three 105-mm main guns, and a maximum speed of 30 knots. In a dogfight with the opponent's interception of cannon fodder, this destroyer had a clear advantage in firepower and resistance over German torpedo boats.

"The British want to do this trick again, but it's a pity that it's no longer the Battle of the Gulf of Helgoland!" Looking at the large number of fast ships rushing out of the gaps in the main British battle columns, a trace of fierceness flashed in Hipper's eyes, and he immediately gave a-for-tat order. The battle flag hunted, the lights flashed, and more than 30 German torpedo boats also broke through the waves from the rear of the battle patrol and rushed head-on towards the British destroyer group. At the same time, the 150-mm secondary guns on the German battle cruisers also stopped washing the decks of the British battle cruisers, and instead replaced them with howitzers and high-explosive shells, and fired heavily at the British cannon fodder.

Cannonballs whistled in the middle of the sea, constantly rushing out waves and splashing waves. After the light ships joined the melee, the roar of the original battlefield like a heavy hammer and drum instantly turned into a baptism of torrential rain. The 88mm guns on German torpedo boats fired a shell every 3 seconds, and the 105mm guns on British destroyers had a terrifying rate of fire of 15 rounds per minute. There were constant fires exploding on the ships of both sides, and those who were lucky enough to be hit in inconsequential parts were still able to continue the battle; The unlucky ones were either torn off pipes, or destroyed power, or even hit by torpedoes fired by the other side, and turned into historical fireworks forever in a moment of bloom. In the fierce battlefield of more than 70 light warships, all the officers and soldiers of the British and German sides forgot the fear that they might be crushed in the next moment, and they only wanted to leave their own eternal figure in the stage of the peak decisive battle!

"It was an indescribable scene. Countless cannonballs are like torrential rains falling on the Thames River in summer, and they are constantly shuttling through this sea area; The ships of both sides have long been mixed with each other, and it is impossible to tell who is the guy who fired these shells. The sea was boiling, my eyes were dazzled by scattered bursts of shrapnel, and the water column stirred up by the shells was as dense as the thorns in the Amazon jungle. I had nothing to do but hide behind a 2-millimeter-thick steel plate and eat canned beef, leaving everything to God to arrange. Lieutenant Hook, the second officer of the destroyer USS HOPE, wrote in his diary later.

Due to the greater tonnage of British destroyers and the fire of naval guns a notch higher than that of German torpedo boats, it was difficult for German torpedo boats to stop them in the front; Five minutes later, at the cost of 3 sunken ships and 3 heavy damage, they sent a detachment to a distance of only 6,000 meters from the German battle cruiser fleet and released torpedoes. More than twenty white lines rush through the waves at 28 or 34 knots, but beneath their slender trails of water are deadly power. The German war cruisers were forced to turn sharply, while the 150mm and 88mm secondary guns kept firing into the water in order to detonate the torpedo early.

The torpedo attack launched by the British to cover the main fleet yielded unexpected results. The German Seydlitz was unable to avoid the battle patrol and was hit by a torpedo on the side of the amidships. However, due to the location of the hit, most of the impact of the torpedo explosion was absorbed and resisted by the 45 mm highly elastic armor at a depth of 45 meters, and the Seydlitz only lost a few watertight compartments and 700 tons of water, which did not cause devastating damage. The ingress of the engine room had been brought under control, and the damaged speed of the battleship could soon be restored. (To be continued......)

PS: Thank you for the reward of zhouyu1976~~