The moonlight obscured the clouds, sprinkling her reflected daylight between the gaps in the clouds, and when it was bright and dark, it made the beauty of the night even more mysterious, and such a peaceful night sky was about to be broken.

At three o'clock in the morning of the second day when the Taiping Army declared war on the British and French forces, the three infantry battalions of the First Regiment of the First Division of the First Field Army of the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom slowly approached Tianjin City from the east, south, and north in the night, followed by the artillery regiment of the division headquarters. After more than ten days of day and night marching, the soldiers of the Taiping Army have become accustomed to night marching, camouflage camouflage and strict marching discipline allowed the Taiping Army's covert operations to succeed.

At the same time, a large number of people in the vicinity of Tianjin fled their homes because they were hiding from foreigners, which also greatly reduced the chance of the Taiping army's actions being exposed. A small number of people who stayed behind chose to stand on the side of the Taiping army because of the Taiping army's measures such as not disturbing the people and distributing food.

After the three infantry battalions were lurking in place, the artillery regiment behind them immediately deployed, and this time the artillery regiment that went south first carried mainly light six- to eight-pounder guns, and the most carried was the Taiping Army Type 1856 rockets that prevented the British Congreve rockets. With this kind of rocket shining in the southwest battlefield, easy to carry, easy to launch and other advantages, so that it won the love of the Taiping artillery, this battle, the colonel of the first division artillery regiment Su Ji ordered his subordinates to carry a total of 5,000 rockets, and the rest of the light six-pounder guns, eight-pounder guns and so on are only a small number of carrying. The lightweight of the artillery also made the Taiping army, which went south to raid Tianjin City, more swift in action and more perfect in concealment.

The night in the sky was even darker, and the hands of the pocket watch in Su Ji's hand pointed to three o'clock. Several rockets rose into the sky from the rear of Shuangtang Village, where the headquarters of the 1st Division was located. After seeing the signal, Su Ji shouted at the artillery who were already ready around him: "The war has begun. Brothers! War is an act of violence that subordinates the enemy to our will! We must understand this war and let the foreigners clearly understand the confidence of our Han people to rejuvenate and rise! Let them know that we are not weak and deceitful like the Manchus! Let them get out of the land that should have been occupied by us! Attention units! Fire at the intended target! ”

In the past ten days, the Taiping army has sent many scouts to reconnoiter the Tianjin area first, and it is undeniable that the scouts of the Taiping army are people from this land after all, and they have unparalleled advantages in language, skin color and other covers. As a result, their reconnaissance operations were more effective than those of coalition reconnaissance teams. Su Ji had a complete defense map of the allied forces in Tianjin, and the artillery observers also went to the vicinity of Tianjin to observe the target on more than one occasion, either in disguise or lurking. Therefore, outside Tianjin, the batteries and some peripheral positions of the coalition army have long been locked on the map by the artillery of the Taiping Army.

In the first round of artillery hits, a thousand Type 1856 rockets dragged a long tail flame, flying towards the target one after another, the copper tail positioning makes this rocket more accurate than Congreve rockets, and the improved thrust part can be loaded with more propellant charge, so that it can fly farther, and the changeable warhead realizes the rapid transformation of incendiary bombs and explosive bombs. And each soldier can carry several of these rockets, and the launcher is also very simple, these are the advantages of this rocket.

When the signal rockets of the Taiping Army soared into the sky, they had already attracted the attention of the soldiers of the British army stationed in the three batteries outside the city. The lookout sentries of the 15th Punjab Regiment of the British Army saw three dazzling rockets, and these lookout sentries were still in amazement, behind the canal embankment a kilometer away. A large number of rockets with tail flames wakes them up!

"Enemy attack! There's a rocket coming! Several sentries let out a terrible scream, as the rockets fired far less loudly than the artillery. So the soldiers in the large fort did not hear the movement, when they heard the warning. Loud shelling was already blowing up inside and outside the battery.

The three small forts were attacked by more than 300 rockets in a few seconds, and Su Ji used explosive bombs and incendiary bombs in the first round of shelling, so in addition to a huge explosion in the British battery, it was quickly covered by flames, and the entire sky over Tianjin City was lit up.

General Sutton was awakened from his sleep by the sound of explosions outside the city, and he was busy until about one o'clock in the morning to prepare for the arrival of coalition reinforcements tomorrow.

General Sutton, who quickly put on his military uniform and picked up his gun and saber, quickly ran out of the house, several British officers also came out of the house in rags, and Major Winston, the officer on duty, ran over angrily and said loudly: "General, it is the three batteries outside the city that have been attacked by enemy artillery!" ”

General Sutton cursed: "Damn, who is the enemy? How many people are coming? Why was it shelled without hearing the sound of artillery ... ”

Major Winston said loudly: "It should be a weapon like Congreve rockets, there are a lot of them, and the explosions are incessant!" ”

"Gather the soldiers immediately and prepare for battle!" General Sutton shouted loudly as he ran outside the envoy's yamen, "Winston, you stay here to deliver orders, Major Samir and Major Belham, you come with me, and we will go to the city wall to have a look!" ”

General Sutton and his entourage mounted their horses and rushed to the south gate, except for the panicked British soldiers on the street, the Chinese people seemed to be very calm, no one came out to see the excitement, and every house closed its doors, as if the war had accustomed them to such a way of evading.

The city wall of Tianjin first appeared 600 years ago, and Huang Fuxiu, the secretary of the Ministry of Industry of Yongle in the Ming Dynasty, was ordered to build the city of Tianjin Wei, and there was a city wall. The construction of the wall adopts the ancestral technology, which is known as "rammed earth to build a city" in history. Four earthen walls enclose Tianjin into a rectangle that is long from east to west and short from north to south, like an abacus, which is "abacus city". The walls were densely packed with battlements of arrows, and archers could release arrows from behind; At intervals, there is a section of the wall protruding from the city wall, which resembles a horse's face, so it is called "horse face", which can eliminate the dead end of the defense. A tall turret was built at the corner of the city wall to keep an eye on the enemy; In the four sides of the city wall, the city tower and the city gate are set up, and the town guards the four directions, connecting the inside and outside; An urn castle shaped like a pocket was also built inside the city gate, which was specially used to encircle and suppress the enemies who broke through the city gate.

Different from later history, the first effective enemy of the Tianjin city wall was actually the Taiping army, and in later history, this Tianjin city caused a lot of casualties to the invading Eight-Nation Alliance, so much so that the Eight-Nation Alliance later agreed to demolish the Tianjin city wall from a military and health point of view.

At this time, General Sutton stood on the corner tower of the Guiji Gate of the South Gate and looked out with a telescope, only to see that the two forts outside the South Gate and the one on the bank of the canal to the east were all covered in flames.

"Damn the Taipings, they attacked us!" General Sutton's judgment was very accurate, and Major Samir was shocked and said, "The fifteenth Punjab regiment is finished!" "There were more than 1,000 Indian soldiers of the Punjab Regiment stationed inside and outside the three batteries, and more than 300 Indian soldiers were stationed inside and outside each battery.

As if he was afraid that the outer batteries would still have the ability to return fire, the second round of rocket artillery was coming, and this time General Sutton saw clearly that the enemy was attacking from behind the embankment on the bank of the canal, and he immediately shouted: "Where is our artillery?!" Let them shoot back that way right away! ”

Major Belham replied embarrassedly: "General, we don't have a suitable artillery to return fire......"

"Damn it, let the cannons on the walls roar! The Qing army can use it, why can't we use it?! Don't you know that in a few moments, those rockets will fall on our heads? General Sutton roared loudly, and the British soldiers at the head of the city all looked at General Sutton, and at that moment everyone thought that General Sutton was already angry.

Soon the British soldiers began to fiddle with the artillery on the city wall, but before they were ready to fire, a third round of rockets had already landed at the south gate, and in an instant explosions and flames fell on the heads of the British soldiers.

"The general is dangerous here, let's go down first!" Major Belham shouted loudly, the city wall was obviously the target of the Taiping army's next artillery bombardment, although the Qing artillery on the wall head to scare the enemy was not intended to be used by the British army, but in the eyes of the Taiping scouts and artillery observers, they were just as threatening. So, unfortunately, every section of the wall with artillery at the south gate was attacked by artillery.

General Sutton drew his saber and shouted to the soldiers around him: "Get down the wall, the enemy is already targeting us!" Damn it, hurry up and go down! "When he saw the third round of artillery bombardment, in which the enemy's rockets landed so accurately on the section of the city wall where the artillery was placed, General Sutton knew that his military disposition was clearly grasped by the enemy, and that the British army in Tientsin was like cattle and sheep on a board to be slaughtered.

Flying stones, shrapnel and steel balls, and flesh and blood all over his head, General Sutton left the blood-stained south gate wall under the escort of two majors and a line of guards, and hundreds of British soldiers frantically shot under the wall, hiding from the artillery fire at the foot of the wall.

At the foot of the city wall in Tianjin, most of the shacks and thatched huts built by the poor people, and the later Eight-Nation Coalition Army demolished the Tianjin City Wall because of health problems, these city walls provided cover for the dirty shacks and thatched sheds, so the Eight-Nation Alliance Army would choose to demolish the city wall from the perspective of hygiene.

At this time, these shacks and thatched huts under the city wall became the medium of ignition, and soon the fireballs and sparks rolling down from the city wall ignited them, and the common people inside fled in all directions, and the entire south gate of Tianjin fell into a sea of fire...... (To be continued......)