Hong Kong Island and the Kowloon Peninsula are separated by a bay, the widest part of this bay is about two miles, the narrowest point is no more than a mile, this bay is called Victoria Bay in the British population, and the Chinese people like to call it Kowloon Bay. This is a natural harbor, with an average water depth of 12 meters, and most of the British took a fancy to Hong Kong in the past.

Unlike in history, the current British army still only occupies Hong Kong Island, and the Kowloon Peninsula has not been ceded to the British, so the Taiping Army still occupies the Kowloon Peninsula. Sir Napier arrived at the largest naval base of the British army in the East, only to find that the northern part of the bay was also densely packed with mines, and the presence of these things caused the passage of the bay to become narrow.

The captain of the Far East Fleet, who was on his way to minesweep, told Napier and the others, "Damn the Taipings, they mobilized the pirates and the fishermen nearby, and every night they released mines from the Kowloon Peninsula, and I remember the first time they released mines, and the next day we woke up to find our warships surrounded by dense mines in the harbor." I bet they must have mobilized tens of thousands of people that night and laid tens of thousands of mines in the sea. So since that night, most of our ships have been trapped in the harbor. Then all they had to do was to replenish the mines every night from the north shore or from the waterways of the Ramboler, Iwo Sulphur and Lei Yue Mun, and they put hundreds of them in one night, and dozens of them in the few, in any case faster than we could clear them. ”

Napier gasped, and the captain said with a sad face: "We are worried that the currents and tides will bring mines to our anchorage, so we do not set up a lot of fishing nets to intercept them, but there are still many fishing nets that are often blown up. Damn, these Taipings used defensive weapons as offensive weapons. ”

Napier also saw this mine weapon used by the Russians to defend the port during the Crimean War. So he asked: "Why not clear it with intensive artillery fire?" ”

The captain smiled wryly, shook his head, and did not answer. Instead, he looked at his pocket watch and said, "It's almost time to start." Napier and the others didn't know why, they also looked at their pocket watches, it was exactly seven o'clock in the afternoon, the sky had already darkened, at this moment, I saw a large area of lightning-like fire on the Kowloon Peninsula in the dim north, a large area of lightning-like fire came out in the mountains over there, followed by the Hong Kong Island pier, the British troops on the shore all shouted loudly: "Hide! Enemy shelling! "Then came a heavy artillery fire.

The north bank is separated by more than two miles from here, and the Taiping army must have arranged a lot of artillery positions on the north bank. You can hit the dock and shore directly here. Napier immediately ordered the ship's artillery to fire back, but the captain hurriedly stopped and shouted: "It's useless, most of the enemy's artillery positions are hidden on the Lion Rock on the Kowloon Peninsula, they have hollowed out the mountainside, the artillery is hidden in the mountainside, we can't hit them, and the artillery will also expose the location of our warship!" They fired a few shots and then stopped. ”

Sure enough, ten minutes later, the cannon fire died down, and Peel felt extremely humiliated. The captain shrugged his shoulders and said, "They shell this time every day for a few minutes, oh yes, they don't ** on Sundays." ”

Napier frowned and asked, "Where is Lieutenant General Massimogri?" The captain said, "The vice admiral's fleet is in the deep water bay to the south, and our fleet left here is mainly for the defense of the north shore. We were afraid that the enemy would smuggle in from the north shore and attack us, otherwise we would have made a detour to the deep water bay in the south. We've had enough. ”

There are also deep water bays and repulse bays on the southern side of Hong Kong Island, with Deep Water Bay also being more suitable for use as a port. However, due to the fact that there is no restriction on both sides of the land, the tide rises and falls greatly. The wind and waves are also a bit stronger than in Victoria Bay.

The captain said: "And our supplies are also relatively scarce, the Taiping army united with the pirates of the South Seas to act together, they often attack our merchant ships and transport ships, Vice Admiral Ho's fleet has been doing escort missions during this time, last month they suffered a defeat in the Bass Strait, the Taiping Navy and the Philippine pirates joined forces to inflict heavy damage on Ho Bo's fleet, they lost two warships. ”

Napier's brow furrowed, it seemed that his previous imagination was too optimistic, the enemy had launched almost every means at his disposal to consume the British army, and the British army was limited everywhere due to the lack of effective means of counterattack.

Napier pondered for a moment and then asked, "Didn't Sir Elgin organize a counterattack?" The captain said with a wry smile: "It has been organized, Zhoushan, Chongming, the mouth of the Yangtze River, the mouth of the Pearl River, we have sent fleets to fight, but without a strong army force, the navy can not completely destroy the enemy on the shore, and in the end it is because of the ammunition and food run out, had to retreat, there are also harassment of the Taiping Navy and pirates along the way, plus in the second half of the year, the Taiping Army strengthened the military strength of the Kowloon Peninsula, often shelling Hong Kong Island, they have sixty-four pounds of heavy artillery, so our fleet has to withdraw to protect Hong Kong Island." ”

Napier asked, "What happened to the concessions in Shanghai, Xiamen, and Ningbo?" The captain's reply was, "God knows!" ”

A few days later, with the arrival of the second Anglo-French expeditionary force, the dilemma on Hong Kong Island began to be lifted, and the British had to send more ships to clear mines around Hong Kong Island in order to restore navigation and berthing capacity in Victoria Bay.

Admiral Dundas arrived on Hong Kong Island, together with the new British Minister Plenipotentiary, Sir Corrington, and the British Army's Baron John Bush. Field Marshal Colburn, Cavalry Lieutenant General Cadigan Earl James. Thomas. Brudenel, Lieutenant General George of Lucan, Earl of Lucan. Bingham; French Field Marshal Malakov, Duke Aimable. Let. Jacques. Perissier, General of the Army, Duke Patrice of Makenta? McMahon, French Admiral Hamlin, and others held an operational conference at the British Governor's Palace in Hong Kong, which was also attended by Sir Ergin, Hober, and Massimogli of the First British and French Expeditionary Force.

The British and French generals who commanded the expeditionary force this time were a very luxurious lineup, and it could be seen that the British and French did not want to fail again, and if they still failed this time, they could only make peace with the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom, and this was their last chance.

Presiding over the meeting was the new British Minister Plenipotentiary, Sir Corrington, who replaced the previous Minister Plenipotentiary for the Far East, Sir Elgin. His deep London accent made the atmosphere of the venue particularly solemn: "Gentlemen, I would like to know before we arrive. What is happening in the Far East. ”

Sir Ergin felt a little bitter in his mouth, but he still explained it in detail: "The Taiping Heavenly Kingdom probably destroyed the Qing Dynasty within three months after we evacuated the north. The Qing Dynasty government did not organize effective resistance, the Qing royal family surrendered to the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom, and then two months ago they held a grand founding ceremony in Beijing, according to the information we received from the Americans and the Spaniards, now the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom has mastered most of the Qing territory, only Tibet, Xinjiang and a few other places have not been fully controlled, but with the announcement of the annexation of Mongolia into the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom, I believe that these places will not resist for too long. In other words, the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom can now calmly integrate all its national strength to deal with the war with us. ”

Baron John of the British Army. Field Marshal Colburn knocked on the table and asked, "And what about their military deployment?" ”

Sir Elgin smiled bitterly: "In terms of intelligence work, we can say that it is difficult to move an inch. The foreign companies in several treaty ports have been surrounded by the enemy, and those who can be withdrawn have been withdrawn, and the information we now have is limited to the Americans and the Spaniards, the Prussians are good enough to wear the same trousers as the Taipings, and the Dutch and Swedes are only concerned with their business. ”

Admiral Dundas asked strangely: "Why not send a fleet to completely block the enemy's ports?" Completely cut off their business activities? ”

Sir Elgin smiled bitterly: "Our merchants in the Far East are still doing business with the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom, they are doing business with the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom through the Americans and the Spaniards, and several other countries support Shanghai as a free trade port, unaffected by the war. In fact, the main thing is that our fleet is exhausted, and the enemy has implemented the tactics of clearing the fields with strong walls along the southern coast. After our fleet left Hong Kong, it was unable to obtain effective supplies in any coastal area, and after a period of blockade, it would have to retreat due to material support problems, so we were never able to completely blockade the enemy's ports. ”

Dundas said strangely: "In the past, weren't the Qing people very happy to provide us with food and water? Why not this time? ”

Sir Ergin said: "The great eastern power under the control of the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom is no longer the Qing state of the past. They have a very strong control over the place, almost all the coastal villages are garrisoned by local village troops, and our fleet has arrived at a place where we want to go ashore to replenish the water. They would hide the food in advance, and the wells or rivers would be filled with dead animal carcasses. We have no access to water, and the Chinese civilians are hiding farther inland. Then they're going to attack our landers out of nowhere. It is said that this is the so-called people's war launched by them, and we are no longer fighting against the simple Qing government, but the entire Far Eastern power, where the people's will to resist has been fully released in the hands of the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom, which is a very terrible thing. ”

After listening to Ergin's introduction, everyone was silent for a while, and Ergin continued: "The Taiping Army that we know before has nearly 200,000 elite field troops and no less than one million local township troops, and after the surrender of the Qing State recently, we heard from the Americans that they have reorganized and armed hundreds of thousands of Qing troops, plus their newly formed several armies in the south, we estimate that their regular army has reached an astonishing one million, and the size of the township troops is even larger. On the Kowloon Peninsula across Hong Kong Island, we estimate that there are tens of thousands of field troops, and a little further away in Guangzhou, there are estimated 50,000 regular troops stationed. ”

Baron John of the British Army. Field Marshal Colburn asked again: "How are their armament?" ”

After Sir Ergin and Lieutenant General He Bo glanced at each other, Lieutenant General He Bo said bitterly: "They imported several guns and artillery production lines from Norway a few years ago, and when the United States was in economic crisis, they acquired several American military enterprises. At the same time, they are constantly developing new weapons, our Congreve rockets are copied by them, and the Russian mines are copied by them, and the effect is better than ours and the Russians......"

Baron Sidon frowned and interrupted him and asked, "Okay, we are clear, so what are our other Far Eastern allies, the Russians, doing?" (To be continued......)