The British naval commanders on the Woerda were stunned, and Grant was a little incredulous that the naval fleet of the Taiping Army dared to raise the red flag representing the war? Don't they know that there is a huge disparity in strength between the two sides?

Colonel Grunt was very angry, the thick brown beard on his lips kept trembling, obviously he was already extremely angry, and he said loudly: "General, you should teach these yellow-skinned monkeys a lesson!" Several of the other naval officers also had angry faces, and they felt as if they had been humiliated.

The British Empire's Far East Navy seems to have suffered a series of setbacks lately, and the British Far East Fleet has been suffering humiliation since its failed attack on Russia's northern ports. After the outbreak of the Nissan incident, the British navy blockaded the city of Guangzhou and bombarded the city of Guangzhou, thinking of venting a bad breath, but did not expect that this time the Qing court did not know which tendon was wrong, and actually agreed to the request of Britain and France, and let the British and French envoys go north to Dagukou for negotiations. As a result, the British Navy ended the bombardment of Canton and hurriedly escorted the envoys north, but the negotiations broke down, and the Allied fleet suffered a defeat at Dagukou, and the fleet was forced to withdraw to Shanghai.

The bad luck had not yet dissipated, and after returning to Shanghai, the British and French finally decided to send a large-scale expeditionary force to conquer the Manchus, and when Grant led the fleet back to Hong Kong, the British navy of the Far East Fleet thought that this time they would always be able to raise their eyebrows. Unexpectedly, before the expeditionary force reached Hong Kong, the news of a major uprising broke out in India, and the expeditionary force could not come, not to mention, Grant even had to send a part of the ships of the Far East Fleet to India to support.

After the strength was severely weakened, the British fleet had to resort to blockading the mouth of the Pearl River. And Ye Mingchen's strange proposal to use Guangdong Province to protect himself and exchange trade for peace actually won the approval of Bao Ling, and the two sides maintained great restraint. Keep each other's active areas, but don't attack each other across bounds. As a result, the British Far East Fleet felt even more aggrieved, and they did not even have a chance to shell the city of Guangzhou to vent their anger.

The waters off the mouth of the Pearl River have always been an area of activity for the British fleet, and the purpose of Grant's trip with five warships today was only to watch the Taiping army and navy fighting against the Manchus, but he knew that this request had not been approved by the Taiping army beforehand. But he didn't care, the British fleet was rampant in the Far East, where did it need someone else's permission to act? As a result, his actions and unkind words provoked a strong backlash from the Taiping army. This angered the British naval officers who had been depressed for a long time.

When was the proud Royal Navy of the British Empire treated like this? Seeing that the Taiping Army's red single boats hoisted the red flag and seized the upper hand, they quickly assembled at the mouth of the Pearl River, and the intention of blocking the British fleet from entering the mouth of the Pearl River was obvious, but Grant, who had always been good-tempered, was also angry this time.

"The boiler is on fire. Drop the sails! All gun emplacements are ready for battle! Let's enter the Pearl River at full speed! Grant said in a loud voice with anger: "How can we, the Royal Navy of the British Empire, be threatened and intimidated? ”

The five British warships quickly adjusted their ranks, including two destroyers, three frigates, and a total of more than 300 guns, all of which were converted steam-sail dual-powered warships. The largest, the Woerda, reached a displacement of two thousand tons. The tonnage far exceeds that of any Taiping warship, but there are more than 40 red single ships of the Taiping Army, which is also a force that cannot be underestimated.

In response to the hard break of the British ships, the Taiping Army sent a sand ship to make the most difficult negotiations, asking the British fleet not to approach the Pearl River Estuary again, but the British fleet replied that they had a combat mission, and to shell the Humen Fort, they must enter the Pearl River Estuary!

Sailors on both sides nervously prepared artillery and shells. The helmsmen and sailmen worked hard to steer the ship, and the steam power of the British ship showed its excellent performance. The downwind position did not affect the fleet's marching speed in the slightest, and as the distance between the two sides became closer and closer, the atmosphere over the Pearl River Estuary became more and more solemn.

With two booms, a Taiping Red Single Boat at the forefront fired two solid shells, and the projectiles landed half a nautical mile in front of the British fleet, apparently the Taiping Army was firing cannons to warn them not to approach any further.

Grant was annoyed, but he was still sensible, this was not the time to start a war with the Taipings, and the two sides had an agreement first, although their actions were rude, but the British fleet could not be the first to shell each other. Just as Grant was about to give the order to slow down, the Avenger frigate on the left flank of the Woerda suddenly fired three shells, and they were flowering shells loaded with sufficient quantities, two of which accurately concentrated the red single boat, and the poor red single ship of less than four hundred tons suddenly flew sawdust, and the fire rose to the sky, and two huge openings were blown open on the side of the ship!

The navies on both sides of the British and Taiping armies were stunned, and Grant could no longer hold his breath, he stood up and angrily pulled the cable on the side of the ship, and shouted angrily to the lookout at the lookout: "Did I give the order to open fire?!" What is the Avenger doing?! ”

The innocent lookout had to hurriedly raise the flag and ask, and at this time, the captain of the Avenger, Captain Smith, was also cursing through gritted teeth, "Which bastard fired the cannon?!" ”

The first mate's answer left Smith speechless, "Colonel, it's the shells fired from the eighteenth, nineteenth, and twentieth gun positions, and the soldiers at the three gun positions are hungovers and still haven't woken up, and they bet to see who can hit the Chinese ship first!" ”

Smith shouted angrily, "Arrest them!" Ignore military orders and wait for court-martial! ”

At this time, it was useless to arrest people, seeing that their own ships were hit, the Taiping Army's red single boats began to fire back, although each red single boat could only carry a dozen or twenty guns, but the absolute number of red single boats had an advantage.

In 1857, the Manchu Qing Dynasty and the Anglo-French coalition army had a naval battle in Guangzhou, and Huang Kaiguang, the commander-in-chief of Qiongzhou Town of the Qing Army, recruited more than 60 red single boats, together with more than 100 patrol ships, stationed on the Sanshan River in Pingzhou, preparing to launch a general attack on the British army at the Dahuangjiao Fort. In order to relieve the threat of the Chinese naval division, the British fleet commander Maximogli had no choice but to kill the horse and lead more than 20 warships to attack a group of Chinese division ships anchored in Lianxi in the north of the Dongjiang estuary. After three days of continuous fighting, 28 ships of the Qing Navy Division were destroyed, but the losses of the British army were not light, several ships were destroyed, and many people were killed and wounded.

Massimogli's nephew, Seymour, who led the Eight-Nation Coalition into Beijing in 1900 and was defeated by the Boxers and then returned to Tianjin, participated in the naval battle as a midship. He said with some apprehension in the center of his memoirs: "The 'Hong Kong' that led us has run aground...... Many shells hit it at once...... Commodore Kepel's ship was smashed to pieces and sunk...... The open-top motorboat I was travelling in was also pierced by a cannonball and sank, and at the same time an officer on the Goofy was blown in two by a cannonball, and his body was thrown over our heads. ”

It shows that the red single ships at that time were not without the slightest power to fight back against the British fleet, on the contrary, the red single boats of the Taiping Army were equipped with new guns that were not inferior to the British fleet in terms of range and shells, so the number of guns was about the same, but the difference in the number of ships was revealed.

The Avenger was hit by three shells first, and the Taiping Army fired this time was not a solid bullet, the flowering shell opened two openings on the port side of the Avenger, and more than a dozen red single boats began to besiege the Avenger, while the poor Avenger could only fire at two or three red single ships at most.

Grant saw the scene of the Avenger being hit by the retaliatory artillery of the Taiping army, and he was so anxious that he didn't care about whether to start a war or not, he immediately ordered the rest of the ships to fire at the Taiping army, and be sure to cover the Avenger from the battlefield.

The artillery bombardment on both sides lasted for half an hour, and Grant did not want to expand the conflict any longer, so he ordered the British ships to retreat, but the guns on the two batteries of the Taiping Army did not fire, and the red single boat had already driven away the British fleet.

After retreating to a safe distance, Grant found that the Avenger had begun to sink, and had to order the officers and men on board to abandon the ship, while the other four ships were also damaged to varying degrees.

The Taiping army sank eight red single boats, although the number of red single ships is large, and the firepower is not weak, but their tonnage is small, very indurable, often one or two shells are enough to sink a red single boat.

The conflict between the two sides at the mouth of the Pearl River began quickly and ended quickly, and when their respective fleets disengaged, both sides began to rescue their soldiers from the water and report to their superiors.

In this naval battle, the British sank a battleship, killed more than 30 people and wounded more than 100. The losses on the side of the Taiping army were greater, eight ships were sunk, more than 180 killed and more than 100 wounded. Most of the Taiping soldiers died in battle, mainly once the Hongdan boat was blown up and sunk, it was often difficult for the soldiers on board to escape from the whirlpool and drown.

When Grant led the fleet back to Hong Kong, it was already evening, and the consul of Guangzhou, Pa Xiali, quickly sent someone to send a message to Bao Ling, who was far away in Shanghai, and urgently summoned the British and French military and political leaders in Hong Kong to discuss countermeasures.

The arrogant British, of course, were furious, ignoring the fact that the conflict was caused by the provocation of the British fleet, and clamored to pull the entire remaining Far Eastern ships out of the river and send all the Taiping detachments to the bottom of the sea.

The French, on the other hand, gloated and reminded the British of the current situation, and that it was not a wise choice to declare war on the Taipings, because the conflict was obviously initiated by the British first, and it was in the case of a temporary treaty with the Taipings, the British could not stand the law, and it was better to expand the war.

Grant had already begun to regret his decision on his way back to Hong Kong, and while the British Navy was capable of sending the Taipings' weak navy to the bottom of the sea, how could their large army deal with it? Once a full-scale war breaks out, Britain will suffer heavy losses, how to ensure the safety of the British in Shanghai, Ningbo, Fuzhou, Xiamen, these treaty ports? And the UK's trade losses would be very terrible figures.

Under the persuasion of the French consul De Burley, the British reluctantly agreed that the French would intervene in the conflict, but the British demanded that the commander of the incident be punished, that the loss of 200,000 taels of silver be compensated, that the Taiping army apologize, that the Taiping army should not interfere in the actions of the British navy in the future, and so on. (To be continued......)