Chapter 194: New World Confrontation (6)

After withstanding four rounds of shelling, the main guns of the Boston Imperial warships finally entered the effective range, although it was not the best range, but Admiral Gothall, who was forced to helplessly, still ordered to start firing back immediately. Shooting at high speed is naturally not accurate, but it greatly improves the morale of your side.

The chaotic return fire blew up a column of water around the four 'Lanting'-class battleships, which also disturbed the view of the gunners of the Imperial Navy, and the continuous firing made the battleships of St. Martin in a downwind position covered in gunsmoke, which made their hit rate drop a lot.

Seeing that the attention of the other party was attracted to the direction of the battlefleet, they immediately plugged in from the side, these ironclad ships are the product of the bow against the enemy, so it is most suitable for them to insert the bow against the enemy from the side, they rushed towards the flank of the Boston fleet in a wedge formation like cavalry.

A dozen 305-mm guns constantly fired shells at the Boston fleet, disrupting their movements. The Boston warships in the rear immediately turned their rear main guns to the side and fired back fiercely at them, and the two sides fought very fiercely.

Admiral Godard's purpose is very simple, after seeing the opponent's formation dispersed, he plans to press the whole army and sink the four 'Lanting' class battleships with the strongest firepower of the opponent in the shortest possible time, so as to establish his own superiority in one fell swoop, so he will rush straight over regardless of losses.

After losing one more cruiser, Boston's fleet finally entered its best range, and Godard immediately ordered the fleet to turn, and all the guns fired fiercely at the four 'Lanting' class battleships.

Seeing that the other side began to turn, Marshal Dinant played a little trick, he ordered the four battleships to deflect outward five degrees, and on the surface the two fleets began to sail in parallel, firing at each other, but in fact the distance between the two fleets began to quietly become farther away.

The miscalculation of the distance, which began to make repeated mistakes among the Boston Imperial gunners, and the very low hit rate attracted the attention of the experienced Admiral Godal, who could have turned the same way to the fifth and slowly approached the past, but after a 305 mm shell hit the side of a 'Lanting'-class battleship, he changed his mind.

That shell hit the side of the battleship almost straight and exploded. However, how could the low-power black powder penetrate the armor of the 'Lanting'-class battleships made of thick manganese alloy steel stamping and carburized on the surface.

After the explosion, Admiral Gothal was surprised to find that there were only some blackened marks on the hull of the other party, and even the depression was not very deep.

Seeing this, Admiral Gothal realized that his decision was wrong, these warships were more powerful than the intelligence said, and their armor was not penetrating by any of the main guns of the current countries, so he immediately gave up the attack on the four battleships and began to turn to the ironclad fleet of the Empire of St. Martin.

Seeing that the other party had changed its goal, Marshal Dinant immediately ordered the fleet to turn and pursued the enemy fleet, but they were already far away, and they had to turn again at this moment, and they could not catch up with the opposing fleet in a short time, and the ironclad ships of the second fleet had to face the huge Boston Imperial Storm Ocean fleet alone.

Intensive artillery fire began to rage near the ironclad fleet, and the five ironclads immediately felt the pressure. Soon a single shell concentrated a shipside gun room ironclad ship, which exploded like fireworks, and flew into the sky with a corner of the gun room, and then several shells hit the ironclad ship again, and it was quickly blown into two pieces and sank.

Seeing the results of the battle, Admiral Godard immediately commanded two 'Missouri'-class battleships to meet them, the main gun muzzle flashed, and a 'Xibai'-class ironclad ship also suffered heavy damage, the shell pierced its side armor and entered the ship's hull, maybe the warhead fuse failed, maybe the warship's hull was too fragile, this shell actually pierced through the other side of the hull and fell into the sea before exploding.

Although the ironclad ship escaped being blown up and sunk, the huge gap on both sides of it still greatly affected the speed, and the sailors desperately used the materials prepared in advance to plug the leak, but due to the reduced speed, the warship became a live target, and soon several shells were fired, completely destroying its hope of repair, and the captain had to order to abandon the ship.

Seeing that the ironclad fleet was under siege, the two cruisers and battleships rushed to help, and the Imperial fleet of St. Martin was about to form an encirclement of the Imperial Navy of Boston.

Although the warships of the Boston Navy were slower, they were relatively close after all, and they had already broken out of the encirclement before the other fleets could come up with it.

At this time, the cruiser fleet of the Boston Navy rushed towards the second cruiser of the St. Martin's navy, and the persimmons looked for a soft pinch, they had taken a fancy to the old cruisers of the St. Martin Empire, which were backward in performance, while Admiral Gothall's fleet was pasted to the battlefleet led by Marshal Dinant.

Just now he led the team to attack the ironclad fleet of the San Martin Navy in order to lure the opponent's battlefleet over, Admiral Gothal knew very well in his heart that the opponent's battleships were superior to his own battleships and ironclads in any direction, not only the problem that his own naval guns could not penetrate the opponent's armor at a long distance, if he blindly pursued, Marshal Dinant would definitely slowly consume himself with the speed of the 'Lanting' class battleship, so he found such a bait, and the other party was really fooled.

Not to be outdone, Marshal Denant ordered the other three fleets to besiege the Boston Navy's cruiser fleet while ordering his own battlefleet to turn in the opposite direction.

The two main fleets, which had turned in opposite directions, gradually closed the distance, and each side aimed the sides of the warships at the other. The two rows of warships staggered two nautical miles apart, and seeing that there was an opportunity to attack, the commanders of both sides gave the order to open fire.

The warships of both sides staggered past one after the other, and each of the guns on the warships began to rain their own shells on the enemy as quickly as possible. It was a battle of bayonets at sea, and both sides were red-eyed.

Despite the sparks flying on their ships and the shells falling around at all times, the artillerymen still fired shells desperately, sending greater danger to the enemy. Despite the numerical superiority, the Bostonians who did not have loaders fired slightly slower and had smaller gun calibers.