The Taiping army's waterway offensive was very ferocious, and overnight the Hunan army's sailors returned to the sampan era, perhaps to be more accurate, even some of the sampans were hidden by the Hunan army's sailors in small rivers and harbors to be preserved. Then, the Taiping Army's naval division took the Yuanjiang River, the Xiangjiang River, the Zijiang River, and the Tanshui River as the boundary, and divided the Hunan army, and the patrol ships on the water were constantly coming and going, completely cutting off the waterway connection of the Hunan army everywhere.

Once it is found that there is a Hunan army on the shore that wants to cross the river, a large fleet of ships will soon arrive, and then it will bombard the shore to disperse the Hunan army, destroy the pontoon bridge and everything that can be used to cross the river. In short, in a month's time, the Hunan army may be able to steal these water systems with a small number of people, but the large team of people and horses and baggage will definitely not be able to cross it.

A month later, a large number of ships of the Taiping army swaggered along the Xiangjiang River to the south, these ships were loaded with Taiping soldiers, passing through Changsha and even Zeng Guofan climbed high and looked, Zeng Guohua said worriedly: "It seems that these long-haired brigades are going south to attack Hengyang by boat." ”

Hengyang is the place where Zeng Guofan started, if it wasn't for Rong Lu and the Hunan army to capture Hengyang, the Hunan army didn't even have a place to stay, after occupying Hengyang, Zeng Guofan expanded the Hunan army here, and created the Hunan army water division, it can be said that Hengyang is in addition to Changsha, Zeng Guofan's second piece of heart.

Zeng Guoquan hurriedly said: "Big brother, we can't sit back and watch Changmao attack Hengyang, let's immediately lead the team to support by land!" Zeng Guohua immediately said: "Hengyang is surrounded by water on three sides, how do you cross the river when you get to the north of Hengyang?" Zeng Guoquan stomped his feet and said hatefully: "Are you just watching Hengyang fall?" ”

The generals were speechless for a while. After losing the sailor, he could only watch the enemy show off his might on the water, come and go freely, in fact, the Hunan army also besieged the Taiping army through the sailor in this way in history. In the later stage of the war, the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom's Yangtze River Naval Division was completely lost, and the Hunan army relied on the strength of the naval division to calmly besiege Tianjing. But I never thought that now that time and space are reversed, it has become the Taiping army relying on the benefits of the sailors to divide and encircle the Hunan army.

In the end, Zeng Guofan still sent a team to help Hengyang from the land, and he had to send troops, otherwise the Hunan army in other places would not see hope. must be besieged and forced by the Taiping army one after another, and in the end, what is the point of leaving Changsha to defend it?

Ten days later, Zeng Guoquan and Zeng Guohua led their troops to the north of Hengyang. From a distance, they saw Shigu Mountain, which was separated by the confluence of steaming, Hunan and Leishui, and that was Hengyang, but now they could not cross Sanshui, because the Taiping army fleet was parked on the river. And Hengyang has been heavily surrounded by the Taiping army. Looking at the embers on the periphery of Hengyang, which have not yet dissipated. There are ruins and broken walls everywhere, and it can be seen that the Hunan army on the periphery of Hengyang has fought fiercely with the Taiping army, but in the end it was captured by the Taiping army.

Zeng Guoquan and Zeng Guohua and others could only watch the Taiping army begin to attack Hengyang City from the other side, the Taiping Army's artillery array was not the same as before, the Taiping Army's land artillery array was connected with the artillery on the ships of the naval division, a total of more than 1,000 cannons fired together to bombard the head of Hengyang City, and thousands of rockets dragged a long tail flame to Hengyang City, and in an instant the entire Hengyang City was trapped in a sea of flames.

Zeng Guoquan, Zeng Guohua and the others all watched dumbfounded, and it was the troops of the East Hall and Wing Hall of the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom who had been fighting against them all along. Except for the water master, they had never fought against the Taiping army in the West Temple, and it was only today that they intuitively felt that sense of powerlessness and coercion.

The artillery fire destroyed the last of the defenders of the city to fight. Under the tsunami-like offensive of more than 10,000 Taiping Army soldiers, Hengyang completely fell on the same day, and the ancient city walls and fortifications completely lost their role in the face of the extremely developed thermal energy weapons.

When the sun set, Zeng Guoquan saw the banner of the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom rising on the four incomplete walls of Hengyang City, and muttered: "Under such artillery fire, how many days can Changsha defend?" Zeng Guohua was silent for a moment and then said: "Lao Jiu, let's go back to the division immediately, if our back road is cut off by the long-haired sailor to transport the land soldiers, we are afraid that it will be difficult to even return to Changsha." ”

Fortunately, the Taiping army did not send troops to cut off Erzeng's retreat, and Erzeng returned to Changsha with his soldiers and horses. Later, a lot of leaflets popped up in Changsha City, posted everywhere, all of which were about the Battle of Hengyang, and also said that the generals of the Hunan Army could not recognize the general trend of the world for their own glory and wealth, and intended to resist the heavenly soldiers, which led to the arrival of soldiers in Hunan and called on the people of Hunan not to follow the Hunan army to send Yunyun to death.

Seeing this kind of leaflet, Zeng Guofan was naturally furious, and ordered people to collect all of them, but the next day later, the city was full of them, and then the Hunan army understood that there were not many Taiping army in this Changsha city.

After Er Zeng told Zeng Guofan and other Hunan generals about the battle in Hengyang, everyone present fell into deep contemplation.

At the end, Zeng Guofan sighed and said: "At the beginning, I was reluctant to rest in Hunan Province, more than 100,000 Hunan soldiers were scattered all over the place, and then the waterway was ended, and it was impossible to concentrate on holding a few big cities. ”

Zeng Guohua hurriedly said: "Big brother, this battle can't be fought anymore, for the sake of the future of our generals and other generals, how many soldiers and civilians in Hunan will have to go in. ”

This time Zeng Guoquan didn't say anything, Guo Songtao sighed in a deep voice: "Zeng Shuai, maybe we only have one way to surrender, if the general trend is irreversible today, if the entire Hunan land is caught in the war and lives are devastated, we will be sinners through the ages, it's a big deal that a few of us will bear all the blame, if we want to kill, we have to listen to the respect, and use a few of us for the peace of the entire Hunan land, maybe it's still worth it." ”

Zeng Guofan smiled miserably, got up and said to the generals present: "I heard that the Taiping disposes of those people to the point that they don't talk about sitting together, one person commits a crime and one person is responsible, it will not affect his wife and children, the big guy will think about it when he goes back, and we will discuss and decide in three days, and when there are many people who agree to surrender, we will surrender." ”

In the three days, Zeng Guofan no longer dealt with any military and political affairs, but concentrated on accompanying his family to enjoy the joy of family, especially Zeng Jijing's son, Zeng Guofan liked this grandson very much, and he played around with his grandson all day long, but he was not like a hegemon who was surrounded on all sides and Chu Ge was constantly fighting.

Three days later, a group of Hunan army generals gathered in the governor's yamen, still above the lobby, Zeng Guofan looked relaxed, and said without saying anything: "The princes have followed the old man for several years, although they are fighting desperately, but when Nai is not in me, now the general trend has gone, in order to avoid Hunan suffering from such a tragedy as Hengyang, today everyone will discuss the matter of surrendering, those who agree to surrender please stand on the left hand of the old man, and those who do not agree stand on the right hand." ”

At the moment, all the generals bowed their heads and were silent, although they all understood the truth that the general trend had gone, but to be the first to stand up and agree to surrender, out of the glory of the warriors, there were still some steps that could not be taken, but Guo Songtao did not hesitate to stand on the left hand side first. With the first one, there will be a second and a third, and gradually more and more people will stand on the left-hand side.

Among the generals of the Hunan army in the hall, many of them did not participate in the Hengyang interception and killing of the Taiping army's defeated soldiers, the Guangdong slaughter of the Tiandihui and the battle of Changsha, and many of them were generals who were promoted later, so they felt that the Taiping army would not be too difficult for them, so they decided to surrender. And a few unwilling people stayed on the right hand, but the number was very small, Zeng Guoquan was also among them, but Zeng Guohua sighed and said: "Lao Jiu, the Zeng family will continue, it is still worth exchanging a few of us." At that moment, Zeng Guohua walked to the left-hand side, Zeng Guoquan twitched the corner of his mouth, and wanted to take a step, but in the end he stayed where he was and didn't move.

Zeng Guofan didn't say a word during the whole process, and finally he stepped down from the handsome position, standing on the left hand side, and finally everyone stood still, Zeng Guofan sighed and said: "Since all the princes have made a decision, let's do it according to the will of the majority, if you don't want to surrender, please hand over the military talisman letter, the old man doesn't want to see you go to a dead end, you will change your clothes and go out of the city to the countryside to hide separately, I hope you can escape with your life after living in seclusion in the mountains and forests." ”

After saying that, all the generals present were sad, and a few people who were unwilling to surrender cried loudly, and after stepping forward to hand over their military talisman seals and official uniforms, they knelt down and kowtowed a few times to Zeng Guofan, and then stood up and left in great stride.

Soon there was only Zeng Guoquan left the only one who did not want to surrender, and I saw that his eyes were red and said: "Big brother, I have asked my sons in the camp in the past few days, a total of three hundred and twenty-one people are unwilling to surrender, Lao Jiu took them to make a final fight with Changmao, and it can be regarded as making my Hunan army's prestige not fall, and my wife at home will ask my eldest brother to take care of it!" In the bitter persuasion of Zeng Guohua and others, Zeng Guoquan still strode out resolutely, and no longer looked back, Zeng Guofan was stunned for a long time, and finally just sighed and said: "Let him go!" ”

On August 15, 1861, the Hunan army surrendered to the Taiping army from the commander Zeng Guofan's 130,000 Hunan soldiers and horses, the day before the Hunan army's nine marshal Zeng Guoquan led more than 300 Hunan army daring soldiers to attack the Taiping army sailor camp on the other side of the Xiang River, and finally all of them were killed, so far the Hunan army era may have ended, and the last piece of land outside the heavenly kingdom in the south of the Yangtze River was also declared to be included in the territory of heaven...... (To be continued......)