Ningbo Zhenhai County Yongjiang River Estuary, here is the mouth of the Yongjiang River, its topography and Wusong Mouth are basically the same, from here can go straight into the Yongjiang River and reach the Ningbo Sanjiang Estuary, is the gateway of eastern Zhejiang, the throat of Ningbo.

Since the Kangxi period, in order to guard against the Zheng clan in Taiwan, the Qing court has always built forts at the mouth of the Yongjiang River, and after the fall of the Zheng clan, the Yongjiangkou fort was more used to guard against the pirates entrenched in the Zhoushan Islands.

The Zhoushan archipelago is the largest archipelago in China, with more than 1,300 large and small islands. The archipelago is home to natural wonders such as sea terraces and caves, and has also served as a natural haven and lair for pirates.

Although the Qing court set up Dinghai County on the island of Zhoushan, the Dinghai of all dynasties failed to completely complete the suppression of pirates, and the pirates were like barren grass, cutting stubble after stubble.

It was already the end of October, the wind direction on the sea had changed, and the slightly chilly sea breeze suddenly came ashore with a fishy smell, blowing the apricot yellow banner of the Taiping Army on the Yongjiang Fort to hunt.

Under the banner of Xinghuang, Li Xiucheng stood here straight, the monocular in his hand staring at the eastern sea, and a group of Taiping generals gathered behind him.

"It's coming! Northeast! The person who spoke was a young general in his twenties, but Li Xiucheng's cousin Li Shixian, who followed Li Xiucheng to join the Taiping Army in his early years, and has been leading troops under Li Xiucheng.

When Li Xiucheng and the generals heard this, they looked over together, and sure enough, a sail shadow on the northeast sea gradually appeared, and the fog on the sea was still not very clear.

Li Xiucheng turned around and shouted: "All the armies of the fort are on alert!" ”

At the sound of an order, the Taiping troops on the fort were busy, preparing their artillery and ammunition, and the muzzle of the gun pointed to the position where Fan Ying appeared.

Half an hour later, the shadow of the sail approached, and the generals of the Taiping Army finally saw the flag clearly. But it was the banner of the Dinghai division of the Manchu Qing Dynasty, and the large and small warships were densely arranged on the sea, and there were always hundreds.

Li Xiucheng snorted coldly and said, "The Qing Demon really plans to recapture Zhenhai in one go, and so many sea ships have come. ”

Cai Yuanlong, who was behind Li Xiucheng, said: "My lord, the Qing Demon Dinghai Division does not have so many warships, it seems that the Qing Demon must have colluded with Cai Tao or Zhang Guiping's pirates." ”

Li Xiucheng nodded and said: "Yes, Ningbo's Qing Demon Water Division was broken and surrendered by our army before it left, and the Qing Demon Water Division in Dinghai did not have many boats, and Zhang Jingqu of Qing Demon Ning Shaotai Road and Chen Shizhang, the commander of the soldiers and horses, must have recruited Cai Tao or Zhang Guiping's pirates for their own use." ”

Cai Yuanlong said with some worry: "My lord, in today's battle, we also contacted the pirate Monk Tongbao. Now that the war is imminent, even the shadow of their sea ship is nowhere to be seen, and their subordinates are worried that this pirate will turn against the water. ”

Li Xiucheng raised his hand and stopped: "No, I talked to this Tongbao monk for a long time, before he became a monk." The whole family was victimized by the corrupt officials of the Qing Demon, and he had a common enmity with the Qing Demon. It's not going to be watery. This battle is related to whether we can gain a firm foothold in Ningbo. Although the foreigners are neutral, if we can't keep Zhenhai, the foreigners will not hesitate to choose to help the demons. We will win this battle, but not by outsiders, but by ourselves! Command all batteries to prepare for battle! ”

Although Ningbo was captured by Li Xiucheng's troops, the Qing army fled to Dinghai with Zhang Jingqu of Ningshaotai Road, Chen Shizhang, the commander of soldiers and horses. In order to redeem their crimes, the two gathered the regimental training and village warriors in Dinghai and the vicinity, and promised the pirates to use heavy profits as their subordinates to jointly counterattack Ningbo.

Since learning the news that Zhang and Chen had fled, Li Xiucheng ordered Cai Yuanlong, Li Shixian and others to strengthen the Yongjiang Fort. He expected that the Qing army would organize a naval counterattack, and contacted the Tongbao monk early in the morning as a foreign aid to actively prepare for war.

The Qing warships approached, and they saw a lot of variegated flag ships from the telescope, and these ships were all pirate ships. After looking closely for a while, Li Xiucheng discovered that the Red Flag pirates of Zhang Guiping's department and the ships of Cai Tao's pirates were among them.

Li Shixian said angrily: "Zhang Guiping and Cai Tao are both in the Qing Demon Array, and these demons have colluded together!" ”

Li Xiucheng put down the binoculars and smiled slightly and said: "Cai Tao and Zhang Guiping were born as pirates, and they have been on the sea for more than ten years. Do you think they're going to really help the demons? Hehe, it's good that they don't join forces with the government, if they join forces, the Qing Demon will be defeated. ”

As he spoke, the Qing warships had approached the fort, but they stopped one after another, and the flagship of the Qing army's naval division desperately raised the flag, but none of the pirate ships took a step forward.

Li Shixian was amused when he saw it: "Haha, the Qing demon wants the pirates to come up and die first, and the pirates are not stupid, stop the ship and anchor and do not move forward, so commanding the Qing demon will be defeated." ”

Li Xiucheng smiled faintly and said: "After a while, I will send an order to all the armies, if the Qing Demon and the pirates send ships to attack together, only the pirates will be attacked, and the Qing Demon will not be fought for the time being!" ”

Li Shixian's eyes widened and said, "Don't hit the demon's ship?" ”

Cai Yuanlong is older than Li Shixian, and he also understands Li Xiucheng's intentions, and said with a smile: "My lord, this is to sow discord and make them suspicious of each other, and it will be even more difficult for the demons Zhang Jingqu and Chen Shizhang to control the pirates." ”

After a cup of tea, the Qing army seemed to have discussed with the pirates, and dozens of large and small ships of the Qing army's naval division were in the lead in the naval array, and the two wings were Cai Tao and Zhang Guiping, two pirate warships, and dozens of large and small ships each, anchored and sailed together to rush to the Yongjiang Fort.

After entering the firing range, the sea ships and the batteries fired at the same time, and for a time the deafening sound of cannons roared, and the smoke of gunpowder billowed on the batteries and on the sea.

Whether it is the Qing army sailors or the pirate fleet, the style of the sea ships is mixed and impure, including red single sea ships, fast crab ships, lucky ships, and even large sand ships. Some of these ships can carry more than ten guns, and some small boats can only carry a few guns, and the caliber of the cannons is also different, and the range of the guns on several large ships of the pirates is about the same as the range of the newly purchased foreign guns on the Taiping Army batteries, but the number is very small, and the pirates have these guns through smuggling with foreign merchants.

After being suppressed by the guns on the turrets at the longest range, the ferocity of the pirates was aroused, and they beat the drums of war, waved their flags and shouted, and the oars and sails were all in unison, and they quickly closed the distance.

Soon the pirates realized that something was wrong. The artillery on the fort only bombarded the pirate ships on both wings, but the Qing naval division ships in the center were moving steadily and calmly, except for the occasional outrageous cannonballs flying by, there was not even a column of water stirred up by the cannonballs around the Qing naval ships.

After an hour of fierce fighting between the two sides, the pirates suffered heavy losses, three large red single ships were sunk, and more than 30 sand ships, fast crab boats, and lucky ships of various types were sunk, killing and wounding hundreds of pirates. On the Taiping side, only three forts were damaged.

Soon the pirates threw down the ships of the Qing army and fled back to their own positions, and the Qing army saw that the ships on both wings had withdrawn, and they knew with their butts that the Taiping army's artillery fire would soon fall on their heads. The ships of the Qing navy also fled back in a panic, sinking several sampans laid down by the pirates on the way. These small sampans were left to rescue the pirates who had fallen into the water, and after being knocked over by the ships of the Qing navy, the pirates shouted and cursed, and even some fierce pirates began to shoot at the Qing ships.

See the withdrawal of the Qing fleet. The artillery of the Taiping army also stopped, and quietly watched the sampan of the pirates on the sea to rescue their comrades who had fallen into the water.

Li Shixian said: "These pirates and Qing demons are not in harmony. They all expected each other to rush first. Such a cowardly person will not be able to achieve a big deal at all. ”

Li Xiucheng pondered for a moment and said: "It is also very troublesome for them to stop in the open sea and not leave, and the strategy of His Royal Highness the King of the West is that a large number of ships will go south in a few days, and these scum must be eliminated." ”

Cai Yuanlong sighed: "It's a pity that we don't have a sailor, although we have captured a lot of warships of the Ningbo Qing Demon Sailor, but there is a lack of people to drive the boats." Monk Tongbao has not seen help for a long time, which is really embarrassing. ”

Li Xiucheng frowned and said: "We are in a hurry, the Qing Demon is even more anxious, the Qing Demon Zhang Jingqu and Chen Shizhang lost Ningbo." The demon court will definitely not let them go, if they can't recapture Ningbo, it must be a crime of stealing their homes and killing their heads. Let's just wait and see who has the patience. ”

The two sides were in a stalemate until the afternoon, and I don't know how Zhang Jingqu and Chen Shizhang played with Cai Tao and Zhang Guiping.

The Taiping army is also waiting for the battle, Li Xiucheng saw the movement of the Qing army's naval division, and instructed Li Shixian: "The Qing demon is pressed on the whole line, it must be to attract our firepower head-on, it is very likely to send a group of soldiers and horses to land and attack the fort from the weak point behind our battery, you take a thousand soldiers and horses to the flank patrol over, and if you find that there are enemy soldiers landing, you will hit it hard!" ”

Li Shixian immediately clenched his fists and led the order, and the two sides began a vigorous artillery battle on the sea on this side.

This time, the Taiping army did not show mercy in the artillery battle, whether it was the Qing army or the pirates, the artillery on the fort roared for a long time, and the barrels of the guns were doused with water several times to cool down. After an hour of fighting, the Taiping army even bought dozens of Congreve rockets from foreigners.

Congreve rocket is the sharp weapon of the British army, it was widely used in the last Opium War, it can shoot hundreds of zhang, with a solid wood as the tail, eight or nine feet long, the barrel of medicine, two feet long, three inches large, with thin copper or tinplate for it, the cylinder is surrounded by six holes to ignite the fire, the wood of the tail of the arrow, with iron rod tightly penetrated in the cylinder, and the barrel is penetrated through the sharp wooden ruler. Wood powder or iron such as the barrel of a gun, two of the three are subject to the fire of the medicine, and one of the third is subject to the firecracker medicine, the arrow is ignited by the medicine, the barrel bursts, the fire is scattered, and the fire is in full swing.

Li Xiucheng got this batch of rockets from a few British businessmen at a high price, but this kind of rocket is rarely traded by the British army, and it belongs to the protective munitions, so Li Xiucheng did not get much.

A large number of Qing naval warships were attacked by rockets and caught fire, and at the same time, news came from Li Shixian's side, sure enough, thousands of Qing troops and pirates wanted to land on the shore a few miles away from the fort, and went around the back of the fort to attack, but were beaten back by Li Shixian's troops.

After Li Xiucheng got the report, he stroked his palm and said: "Good fight, this time there is nothing to do about the demons." ”

Cai Yuanlong sighed lightly: "If we have a sailor from behind at this time, these clear demon sailors on the sea will not want to get out of a boat!" ”

Before the words fell, the lookout on the fort shouted: "A large number of sea ships are coming from the east, and it is unknown whether they are friends or enemies!" ”

Li Xiucheng and Cai Yuanlong immediately looked to the east, and sure enough, hundreds of large and small sea ships drove in the eastern sea, Li Xiucheng hurriedly opened the binoculars and took a look, and shouted happily: "It's the warship of the Ningbo Seahorse Gang, and the ships are all seahorse flags!" (To be continued......)