PS: If you want to hear more of your voices and receive more of your opinions, search for the WeChat public account "qdread" now and follow it to give more support to "Time and Space Smuggling 1859"!

In the mid-nineteenth century, the principles of naval warfare, especially in land and sea confrontations, generally did not confront coastal batteries with the same range.

The reason is simple, the turret is more resistant to beating, has high accuracy, and has fierce firepower. Relatively speaking, although the battleship has the advantage of being able to move, it is limited by technical bottlenecks, when the naval guns are engaged in long-distance fire, if they fire while moving, the accuracy rate is miserable, and the distance is more than 300 meters, and it is not known where the shells are going, so in this era, unless the distance is particularly close, the naval guns have to stop the ship and anchor, and then slowly open the cannons, and they can't fire a salvo.

It is for this reason that in the developed countries of Europe and the United States, the fleet will not take the initiative to confront the batteries unless it is forced to do so, but if the range of the fleet's artillery is much stronger than that of the battery, and the number is larger, then the situation is different.

This period of artillery warfare is like this, the key is to see who has a longer range, more number, more power, once the fleet artillery fire far exceeds the artillery fire of the coastal batteries, then it is a one-sided abuse, and when the artillery fire of the batteries is all muted, generally speaking, the coastal defenders within the range of the naval guns should also flee or surrender.

Vice Admiral Augustus, commander-in-chief of the Combined Fleet, was an experienced British admiral, especially when dealing with backward countries. It is precisely because of his rich experience that he has a lot of mindset, which simply means that he believes too much in artillery doctrine and attaches importance to naval warfare but despises army and land warfare.

Therefore, seeing that the coastal batteries in Shimonoseki Port had been completely destroyed, he thought that Shimonoseki Port had lost its ability to resist, so he ordered the marines to force a landing. Go and occupy the port of Shimonoseki and at the same time plunder to make up for your losses, or enrich your pockets.

Of course, although he ordered the marines to start landing, he did not lose his vigilance, especially the night attack battle the night before, which made him remember it vividly, so he still ordered the fleet to get as close as possible to the port of Shimonoseki and use the powerful firepower of his own fleet. to provide fire cover for the landing force, or rather, to embolden it.

However, although Shimonoseki Port is also a deep-water port, there are not many berths that can berth large warships, so in order to make the best use of his naval artillery firepower and coordinate the landing force at the same time, Augustus ordered the battleships to be divided into three groups according to the size of the draft, and then the three groups of battleships were staggered in three batches according to the distance from the berth.

Other words. Ships with a shallow draft were as close as possible to the berth wharf at Shimonoseki Port, and even docked directly to transport the marines, and those with a deeper draft anchored 300 meters behind and turned sideways. facing the harbor with broadside naval guns; The deepest draft was anchored three hundred meters back, and it was staggered with the battleships in front, still facing the harbor with its broadside guns.

In this way, a situation similar to a three-stage strike is formed. Moreover, there is enough space between each other, which is equivalent to forming three groups of fixed batteries on the sea surface, which can not only provide artillery support on land. They can also cover each other, making it ideal for sneak attacks.

The so-called response to the sneak attack is not that he is afraid of anything else, but mainly because he is afraid of the Japanese warship assault and the water ghost team.

Augustus had not been in Japan for long, and he had a slight knowledge of the situation of the Japanese navy, and he knew that although the Choshu Domain was not good at navy, it also had two steam warships and no less than four sail warships, but in the previous engagement, these warships did not appear.

If it was in the face of others, the failure of these battleships to appear might mean giving up, but the Japanese are different, he knows that many of the Japanese are not afraid of death, which has been clearly reflected in the night attack last night, so he does this all the time, that is, to guard against the surprise attack of the Japanese fleet.

I am not afraid of anything else, but I am afraid that the Japanese warships will come and die together. You must know that this is a harbor, and there is very little room for maneuvering, if the opposing warships are full of bombs. medicine, and then hit it with an iron heart, then he couldn't bear it.

What's more, according to the information provided by the shogunate, although the naval forces of the Choshu domain are short of ships, they have a mysterious team of water ghosts, and in a small area, if you are not careful, you are likely to suffer losses.

In short, Augustus felt that he had the advantage now, and the more this time, the more he should be careful, as long as he did not make mistakes, victory in the war was within reach.

Perhaps Augustus's caution played a role, when the battleships were arranged in three tiers, the landing force could be said to have landed without danger, occupying the port and key points all the way, and no Japanese came out to attack.

After the vanguard of 1,000 people completely occupied the wharf at Shimonoseki Port, everyone breathed a sigh of relief, and the follow-up landing troops came ashore one after another, plus the sailors with guns, and finally the total number of the landing force exceeded 5,500 people.

After the troops landed, except for half of the men who were left to continue the defense, the rest of the men immediately rushed into the port area and began to loot the residential areas of the port.

It may be that the people of the Combined Fleet came too suddenly, and the residents of Shimonoseki Port, or Mamonoseki Port, were not evacuated in advance, and they were still living in Minatomachi, and during the previous artillery battle, except for a very small number of people, most of them did not flee, but hid at home and waited for the result.

That is to say, the people of Maguangang are still very confident in the defenders, and most of the assets cannot be taken away, and the defenders have not organized a retreat, so they continue to stay, but unfortunately, these people do not know that they are actually abandoned people, and they did not wait to repel the invaders, but were beaten in by the invaders.

The armies of the Western powers will not be soft-hearted when they plunder, after all, they have crossed the oceans and originally wanted to make a fortune, and now they have the opportunity to burn and loot, which is not a big deal.

As a result, the whole port area soon burst into cries and shouts, and if it weren't for the fact that most of the houses in this place were made of wood, they would have set fire to themselves for fear that the fire would set them on fire.

Since the order from above was to rob the wealth as quickly as possible, the actions of this group of Western soldiers were quite brutal, all in groups, and they robbed the big houses first.

Normally, they are divided into groups, first breaking directly into the big house, then directly gathering people together, and then using a few words of improvised Japanese to force each other, usually "Where is the money?" Kill if you don't say anything! Or, "Where's the valuables, kill if you don't say anything!" ”

After asking a few words, if the other party is indifferent, these soldiers will kill people in public, usually one by one, first killing young men, then young women, and finally old people and children, and when the other party can't stand it, give a place. They're going to go crazy and grab the wealth.

Of course, this is only one of the options, and the other is to forcibly loot. Usually some of the main search teams have one or two Japanese people sent by the shogunate, and they will also act as interpreters, and these people usually rush into the best house first, and the Japanese lead party will force them to ask, and it is okay to ask them, but once they do not cooperate, they will be killed one by one.

Thankfully. These Westerners are mainly interested in goods, not in killing, as long as you cooperate, as long as you can make them find their property satisfactorily. They don't usually kill innocents indiscriminately, but they don't mind killing people if you provoke each other.

Also, it may be due to the difference in aesthetics. In the course of their raids, these Westerners also rarely commit rape, not that there are none, but in relation to other acts of plunder. Less is more.

Not to mention, for example, the Edo Raid a few days ago, during those three days of unscrupulous time, I dare not say that all the Japanese soldiers who participated in the Qiang. Rape, but at least one-third of them have been involved, that is, ordinary burning, killing, and looting are usually accompanied by rape.

Therefore, the Marine Corps of the Combined Fleet attacked the port of Shimonoseki this time, and there were only a dozen acts of forcible and adultery in such a big operation, which can really be said to be a negligible matter.

Although these Westerners mainly grab things and burn. Kill. Traitor. There weren't many lewd things, but they still caused great damage to the residents of the port, and in a short period of time, the bustling port area became depressed and cried.

The looting continued for almost the morning, and in the afternoon, as evening approached, the Marines began to rotate, with the first to loot retreat to the docks to take up the duty of guard, and the soldiers who had previously served as guards at the docks were on the task of clearing up, or robbery.

However, this second wave of soldiers did not rob directly like the first wave of soldiers, but under the leadership of their respective officers, they divided into small groups and drove the crowd from house to house.

When they drove all the people out of their houses, they quickly searched them one by one, and after making sure that they were unarmed, they drove them outside to several open spaces and fenced them off, leaving some people to take care of them.

The whole operation lasted until the evening, when most of the Japanese in the port area were barely driven out and gathered in circles, and then the soldiers of the Marine Corps formed improvised barracks on the periphery of these Japanese gathering areas, and then lit torches everywhere outside, and then camped and rested on the spot.

The reason for this was because the commander-in-chief Augustus felt that it was too dangerous to rob directly, especially at night, when the situation was unknown, and he was afraid that the other party's inhabitants would hide assassins or commandos, so he used this method to minimize the danger.

It is clear that the Japanese residents were driven out and gathered together, and then their own troops were also gathered and surrounded on all sides, so that even if the Japanese were hiding commandos, they would be useless without weapons.

In this case, one's own people can be separated from the Japanese with ill intentions, and when the time comes, they will be outnumbered and assisted by naval guns, but the other side will be unarmed, and their own safety will naturally be guaranteed.

This method was not actually conceived by Augustus himself, but by Keisuke Otori, who acted with Augustus.

Keisuke Otori is Katsu Kaishu's attendant, and he is proficient in English and Rangaku, so this time he also changed his name and surname, and acted with the Combined Fleet, on the one hand, to coordinate with each other, especially to provide intelligence support, and on the other hand, he also had a learning attitude, hoping to see what the war of Westerners was all about, so that there would be a reference.

If it had been before, Augustus might have been dismissive of Keisuke Otori's construction, but since the night attack last night, Augustus also frowned a little when he saw those exchanges, so he agreed to use this method to ensure the safety of his own people to the greatest extent.

As for the robbery, everyone was driven out, leaving empty houses, and they were slowly searching from house to house, and they were not in a hurry.

Not to mention, this approach of the joint forces of the four countries is really right, at least let the initiative retreat. The defenders, who had endured for a long time, no longer dared to act rashly, and gave up their plans to take advantage of the chaos to attack at night.

It turned out that although the main forces of the Choshu Domain were concentrated in Yamaguchi Castle from the beginning, the Maguan area was very important after all, and the forts that had been painstakingly built could not be ignored, so they did not completely abandon the Shimonoseki and left some of the defenders.

However, after all, the Shimonoseki side was not the main target, so no important people were left, and only Kusaka Genrui was appointed as the town governor of the Shimonoseki area. and commanded all the fort defenders.

Originally, Mori Kei's order was that once someone attacked Shimonoseki Port, if the enemy's strength was average and he could hold it, he would strictly defend it, and if the enemy was strong and could not hold it, he would retreat quickly. And make preparations in advance for the evacuation of the army and civilians, and everyone will withdraw together and fight the enemy in a decisive battle on land in the area around the mountain pass.

In other words, the Maori plan is to fight if you can. If you can't fight it, you should withdraw in advance, and you should keep your strength first, and leave it to be useful to fight a land battle with the enemy. It is the only way for the weak to resist the strong.

However, Genrui Kusaka is a fierce man and has a deep hatred for foreigners. He has planned many assassinations against foreigners before, and the success rate is very high, killing no less than 20 foreigners.

Therefore, Kusaka Genrui did not completely obey the orders of Maori Jingqin, but planned to defend it strictly and defend it with his own strength.

Of course, although Kusaka Genrui is fierce, he is not an idiot, he also knows that his strength is too weak, and there are less than a thousand people on hand, including the defenders of the fort, among which the feudal priests, or the samurai of the Maori family, are less than two hundred.

For this reason, Kusaka Genrui recruited his friend Takasugi Shinsaku, hoping that Takasugi Shinsaku would help him.

Takasugi Jinsaku has some talents, and his initial method was the same as that of Maori Jingqin, advocating taking the initiative to retreat, but after finding that the other party would never retreat, he thought of two other methods, that is, the positive odd phase and the law.

The so-called positive and strange harmony refers to the division of the troops at hand into two troops, the regular soldiers and the odd soldiers, of which the regular soldiers are mainly to take their brave warriors from the remaining feudal warriors, and form an elite regular army with a number of 300 people, the purpose is to attack the enemy, it is to be sharp, so it is called the front team.

It was not enough to only attack the spearhead, and a large number of follow-up troops had to be assisted, so he asked Kusaka Genrui to withhold the tax revenue of the port of Seki, and then use this part of the tax to recruit ronin, wild samurai and brave commoners who had no family owners to form an irregular army of 3,000 people. The purpose of the formation of this unit is not to be the main force of the attack, but to act as a reserve army, as a supplement to the regular army, so it is also called the odd army.

In other words, the harmony of the positive and the odd is actually to engage two troops with different specialties, in which the regular soldier is responsible for the frontal white-bladed charge, for close combat, while the odd soldier is responsible for using bows, arrows, muskets, artillery and other projection weapons as a powerful supplement to the regular soldier, in order to fight from a distance.

Although this method is not worth mentioning to put it bluntly, but after all, this is a targeted training, especially the Odd Soldier Team, which uses the Western-style military maneuver that Takasugi Shinsaku learned during his travels, specifically playing in formation, so the Odd Soldier Team is more like a modern infantry.

In this way, Kusaka Genrui is usually responsible for leading the writing team of the main soldiers, focusing on fighting, and also following the orders of Takasugi Shinsaku, not paying attention to righteousness and light, but emphasizing sneak attacks, especially night battles and street battles. For this reason, the samurai of the Writer's Front team used relatively short swords instead of long-bladed katanas, in order to facilitate sneak attacks and street battles.

Takasugi Shinsaku, on the other hand, is dedicated to leading the Odd Soldier team, allowing them to maintain high-speed movement while maintaining a dense formation to the greatest extent, so that they can shoot the projectile weapon in their hands to the designated place at the fastest speed, and use density to ensure the shooting effect.

This is a method of training, and the specific defense method is to play street battles, night battles and sneak attacks with the opponent, and give full play to the advantages of being familiar with the terrain and white-knuckle combat.

In other words, at the beginning, Takasugi Shinsaku did not count on the Odd Soldiers, and the existence of the Odd Soldiers was just a cover for the Writers team.

It should be said that his method worked at the beginning, for example, during the previous artillery battle between the Shimonoseki Fort and the Shikoku Combined Fleet, it was Takasugi Shinsaku who promptly asked Kusaka Genrui to organize a two-hundred-man writing team, plus a three-hundred-man surprise team, to sneak attack the enemy's landing soldiers.

At that time, the sneak attack operation was to take advantage of the night and play night raids.

During that night attack, the samurai of the 200 Writers were each wearing two sets of armor, and the armor was covered with dark blue night clothes, and then they all held two knives, and the blades were also painted with dark blue paint to conceal themselves as much as possible.

Dark blue night walker. Or the inky blue night suit, which is actually a ninja's night costume, is generally not played by samurai, thinking that it is too inferior. However, Takasugi Shinsaku asked everyone to give up this bit of self-esteem and give priority to killing and injuring the enemy, so he personally designed this night suit worn by samurai and asked everyone to wear it.

Not only did the samurai of the Writers wear night suits on the outside, but even the Odd Soldiers wore night suits, but the Odd Soldiers did not wear armor.

At that time, when the night attack was carried out, the odd soldiers first took advantage of the night to hide in the periphery of the 504-nation allied marines. When they get close enough to be spotted if they go any further, they let the samurai of the front team take the grass in their mouths and crawl forward little by little, and when they are close enough, they jump up and charge in pairs.

At the same time as the samurai charged, the odd troops in the rear also stood up. I played Rapid Night Fire three times with a bow and arrow, that is, a dark arrow that fires without ignition and the shaft is painted black.

Since most of the samurai wore two sets of armor, it was not a big problem even if they were shot by their own people. However, the marines of the Four-Nation Alliance are all cloth-clad troops, with no armor, and they are still defenseless against arrows.

Of course, arrows are certainly not as powerful as muskets. So there were more injuries than deaths, but the main purpose of these rounds of shooting was to confuse the opponent and facilitate the surprise attack of the front team.

That's it. The more than 200 samurai of the Writer's Front Team rushed into the opponent's camp almost unharmed, and then in pairs, with the help of the night and the shouting Japanese, they began to disperse and charge.

As a result, this operation was very effective, and it was only by relying on this method to stir up chaos with the opponent's 500-strong troops, killing and wounding a large number of enemies; if it were not for the indiscriminate bombardment of the naval artillery of the Four-Nation Alliance, the other side reacted and hedged against it, plus the height and length, and the white-knuckle battle was also very strong, the results of the battle might have been even greater.

In that night attack, the landed coalition soldiers suffered more than 200 casualties, which can be said to be heavy casualties, and the attackers also paid the price of more than 100 people.

Because the Japanese side is not only the two hundred, there are also three hundred strange soldiers behind, and most of the people who died in the battle are samurai in white-knuckle warfare, which are elites, so this loss is also quite heavy for the Japanese side, but the coalition side is not clear, so they think that they have suffered a big loss, and greatly overestimate the combat power of the Japanese defenders, so as to be more careful in the follow-up operations.

In fact, during that night attack, Takasugi Jinsaku and the others were also surprised, because in their previous impression, Westerners were only sharp firearms, and once they were close to the white blade, they really didn't expect that in that extremely chaotic situation, they could still fight back, and hedge against each other, playing with their elite samurai, and even fighting well.

According to the samurai who survived, although those Westerners did not know how to use swordsmanship, they were tall and long-handed, powerful and fierce, plus the length of muskets and bayonets, and they were fierce and fearless in group charges, which was indeed difficult to parry.

Those samurai all said that they had no problem dealing with one or two, but once the other party lined up in a line, or formed something that could deal with the four squares in all directions, it would be difficult for them to get close, and later their casualties were almost all killed and injured in the process of hedging, and they were killed and injured by the white-knuckle battle in which people joined forces to charge with bayonets.

In other words, the foreign soldiers are not as good at long-range shooting as they thought before, and are not good at close-range white-knuckle combat, but they are both strong. However, all in all, the opponent's white-knuckle battle is strong in morale and unity, and if they are alone or too small in number to form a formation, then they are definitely not the opponent of the samurai.

It was precisely because of this understanding that Takasugi Shinsaku advocated not to fight hard, but to let the large army retreat, give up the port town, and do not evacuate the civilians, let the other side kill, and when the other party completely relaxed his vigilance, he took the opportunity to launch another night attack, using the terrain of the castle town to fight with the other party.

The advantage of this is that they can hide themselves to the maximum extent and kill and injure the enemy, and when the time comes, their fleets will not dare to open fire indiscriminately.

However, the idea was good, and as a result, the people of the Shikoku Combined Fleet directly drove the people to give way to the city, gave up continuing to plunder the residential areas of Shimonoseki Port, and took all the people out of the city, gathered separately in the open area, and did not give the other party a chance to take advantage of the situation, and broke Takasugi Shinsaku's move at once. (The novel "Time and Space Smuggling 1859" will have more fresh content on the official WeChat platform, and there will also be a 100% lottery gift for everyone!) Open WeChat now, click on the "+" sign in the upper right corner to "add friends", search for the official account "qdread" and follow, hurry up! (To be continued......)