Humen, the place where the invaders had been held back more than 20 years ago, had once again taken on her historic responsibility, and this time the disparity in strength was even greater than the last, and this time she was facing an offensive on both land and sea. From ancient times to the present, there are many famous blocking battles in Chinese and foreign history, and these famous blocking battles have undoubtedly provided a strong guarantee for the final victory of our own army.

Now there is only one way in front of the British and French forces, and the remnants of the coalition army of more than 20,000 people must cross the Humen in order to escape. In order for the Taiping Army to once again create the glory of annihilating the main force of the Anglo-French alliance and completely establish the strategic initiative in fighting against Britain and France, it must block the enemy to the death at Humen.

The order brought to Liu Jintang by the carrier pigeon was to hold on to Humen for at least 24 hours, that is, a whole day, but now Liu Jintang looked at the time and saw that it was already the 30th hour, which was six hours beyond the scheduled time.

"Is there anything alive? Is there anything alive yet? Liu Jintang stood up next to a few soldiers, they were all painted to varying degrees, a battalion commander ran over with a cat, his head and face were covered with blood, he touched his face and said: "Come a few people, the cannon of the nineteenth gun position can still fight, let's go there!" ”

The battalion commander obviously didn't notice Liu Jintang, at this moment Liu Jintang was also wearing bandages on his face, and half of his hair was burned off by the fire, so he couldn't see his original appearance at all. After Liu Jintang stood up, the battalion commander noticed the bloody epaulettes on his shoulders, and immediately stood up and saluted: "Regiment commander, I didn't know it was you." ”

Liu Jintang waved his hand weakly and said: "Go, a few of you go over, come a few ruthlessly, the British think that our cannons are all blown up, let them know our strength." ”

The battalion commander went with a few soldiers, and Liu Jintang collected a few grenades from the soldiers who died in battle beside him. Then several soldiers on the forward position shouted together: "The enemy is coming, the enemy is coming, the twenty-sixth charge!" ”

Liu Jintang looked up, only to see that the road leading to the inland behind the Humen Fortress was densely packed with coalition troops rushing up in a queue. After thirty hours of holding out, twenty-five times repelled the enemy's charges, and the defenders of the Taiping Army at Humen suffered more than two-thirds of the casualties. Liu Jintang no longer has any guards around him, and even cooks, heralds, civilian staff officers, and hygienists have been sent to the front line. Liu Jintang didn't know how long he could hold on, and the most terrible thing was that they didn't have much ammunition.

"Let's get closer, hit the officer with the command knife first!" Liu Jintang shouted loudly, then grabbed a rifle and came to the pit of the front-line position.

Soon the enemy ran faster and faster, and the pesky sound of Scottish bagpipes wafted through the position, and it was supposed to be the British Scottish Highland Corps, all of whom were holding bayonets and looking at the dilapidated fortress in front of them with some fear. Will there still be a living person inside? This was the uneasy thought in the hearts of the coalition soldiers, who had always thought that there would be no more survivors in this attack, but every time the Taiping army above would surprise them.

This time the surprise came a little later, when they got close to a distance of 100 meters, the Taiping gunfire rang out, and the middle and lower rank officers in the queue suffered first, and every soldier of the Taiping army had good marksmanship, and the guns and guns bit the flesh. And they are capable of firing five to six rounds per minute, which is already quite fast. Then a grenade was thrown. Damn the grenadiers, the Coalition soldiers hate these grenadiers very much right now, their grenades always cause great casualties and psychological stress on the Coalition soldiers.

Liu Jintang threw out all the five grenades beside him, and when he touched them again, there were no grenades beside him, and he was about to look for a few grenades. I only heard the soldiers cheering: "The foreign devil ran again, ran again!" ”

Liu Jintang raised his head and looked, and sure enough, the enemy retreated like a tide again, and he immediately shouted loudly: "Hurry up and hide, the enemy is going to open fire!" Sure enough, the soldiers had not long since they hid in the anti-artillery holes in the tunnel. The artillery fire of the coalition forces struck, and the Taiping army's position was filled with gunsmoke again.

Another two hours passed, and as time went on, the enemy was trapped and fighting more and more, and the ammunition of the Taiping army had been exhausted, and when the enemy charged for the thirtieth time, the remaining hundreds of Taiping soldiers relied on stones and bayonets to repel the enemy, but soon the enemy understood that the ammunition of the Taiping army had been exhausted, and they should soon organize a stormtroop again.

Liu Jintang was stabbed in the abdomen by a British soldier's bayonet, the injury was not light, two Taiping soldiers bandaged him simply, Liu Jintang endured the pain, looked at the two tearful soldiers and smiled bitterly: "Tell everyone, don't think about surrendering, foreign devils will torture you and then kill you, anyway, it's all a death, it's better to die standing up." ”

Before the words fell, a soldier on the forward position shouted: "There is an enemy coming up with a white flag." Liu Jintang said coldly: "Let them come up." ”

Captain Morse and Lieutenant Bao Bell of the British army came up on orders, and they were ordered to persuade the Taiping army to surrender, because the British generals found that the enemy in the Humen fortress was out of ammunition, and according to their ideas, it seemed that they should be able to persuade them to surrender.

Morse and Bao Bell saw shocking corpses along the way, all shapes and shapes, and the corpses of many Taiping soldiers were entangled with the corpses of coalition soldiers, and Morse muttered, "God, are we fighting a bunch of madmen?" Bao Bell said: "Captain, they are not crazy, they are a group of determined soldiers, soldiers worthy of our respect!" ”

More than 20,000 people attacked in turns, supported by the artillery of the naval fleet, and 2,000 marines, but they had no way to take the Humen fortress, and the Taiping army that held here was indeed worthy of respect.

The two were brought to Liu Jintang, and both of them were amazed at the youth of the enemy commander, and the older Morse even felt that the young man in front of him was about the same age as his son who was far away in England.

After saluting Liu Jintang, the two explained their intentions, and Morse said gently: "Your Excellency, Commander, you and your army have fulfilled the obligations of an army, and now that you have run out of ammunition, according to our Western practice, you can surrender very decently, and we guarantee the safety and dignity of the surrendered soldiers......

Morse didn't finish his words, Liu Jintang interrupted him and said lightly: "Our obligation has not been fulfilled, unless your army completely withdraws from our land, our obligation is to defeat you, unless you surrender to us." ”

Bao Bell couldn't help but interject: "Your Excellency, you have no ability to resist anymore. Liu Jintang suddenly laughed, and he said loudly: "As long as we are alive, we will fight to the last breath!" Go back, we're here for you to attack again!" ”

With a sonorous refusal, there was no room for turn, Morse and Baubel looked at the soldiers around them, their faces were also full of determination, and none of them showed a look of fear.

On the way back, Bao Bell said weakly, "We may fail, Captain, I feel that we are facing a group of people who cannot be conquered. Morse nodded and said, "I feel the same way, but out of respect for the enemy, our next attack will be even more violent." ”

When the coalition forces were heading to Humen, the commanders of the coalition forces also let the rearguard troops carry out a blocking battle, but because they had defensive depth, they implemented the strategy of resisting layer by layer, and the command art of Baron Sidon, the field marshal, was also fully played. After the coalition army retreated from Dongguan, the two rearguard troops alternately covered each other to resist and retreat, Lin Qirong and Hu Linyi, the two main forces of the Taiping Army, also chased down all the way regardless of fatigue, and now the Taiping Army and the coalition army are exhausted, but they are all rushing for time, and they are fighting for the last willpower.

It was also because of the coalition army's section-by-section resistance tactics that the Taiping army slowed down, but soon they had broken through to Baihao Village, less than five miles from the Humen Fort, where the coalition blocking forces were making their last resistance. Both sides gritted their teeth and persevered, the soldiers' physical fitness had reached the limit, but it was the Taiping army who had the last laugh.

At two o'clock at noon on the second day of the outbreak of the Humen blockade, the pursuit force of the Taiping army broke through the blocking position of the coalition army in Baihao Village, most of the coalition rearguard troops were annihilated, and many people fell to the ground and were too tired to get up and were captured, and then the Taiping army marched south and defeated the main force of the coalition army in one fell swoop between Humen Town and Humen Fortress.

When Lin Qirong and the soldiers rushed to the Humen Fortress, they were stunned by the scene in front of them, the entire Humen Fortress was covered with dense layers of corpses, and there was hardly a living person to be seen. And it was in front of this unyielding fortress that the coalition forces were stopped from escaping, and finally surrounded and annihilated by the Taiping army in this narrow area.

In the end, the Taiping army found 26 survivors of the Humen fortress defenders from the mountain of corpses, all of them wounded, and the body of their regiment commander Liu Jintang was also found, with seven bayonet wounds on his body, and finally he strangled the throat of a coalition soldier with one hand.

On the sea in the distance, when Dundas saw the flag of the Taiping Army once again erected on the Humen Fortress, he knew that the army was finished, and he couldn't figure out why the coalition forces could not break through the Humen Fortress when they had an absolute advantage in strength and firepower. His incomprehension is the same as the fact that in later history, the generals of the United Nations army did not understand Songgu Peak, Shangganling and other places. In the end, the allied navy was unwilling to fire a few shots at the Humen fortress and finally withdrew from here, and the Battle of Humen finally ended in a complete victory for the Taiping army. (To be continued......)