The day after the conclusion of the Sufu Provincial New Deal Conference, which lasted for more than half a month, the good news of the Guangde Campaign and the Yangzhou Campaign reached Suzhou almost at the same time. Xiao Yungui, who was holding a banquet to bid farewell to officials from all over the country, read out two good news on the spot, and the entire Xiwang Mansion burst into thunder, followed by the whole Suzhou City, and the soldiers and civilians celebrated the victory of the Taiping Army together.

Guangde ancient called Tongwei, the Eastern Han Dynasty Jian'an first set Guangde County, the name is intended to be "the emperor's grace is vast, the emperor is vast", so far it has been more than 1,800 years; It is located in the southeast of Anhui Province, at the junction of eight counties in Jiangsu, Zhejiang and Anhui provinces. Guangde is adjacent to Hangjiahu Lake in the east, Su Xichang in the north, Xuancheng Wuhu in the west, and the Taiping Army in the west hall can be connected with the Taiping Army in Wuhu to form a piece, and the counties of Lushui and Gaochun in the north will also naturally become the territory of the Taiping Army of Tianjing.

As early as when Xiao Yungui went to Tianjing, Chen Yucheng's troops in Huzhou gathered 15,000 soldiers and horses to prepare to launch the Guangde Campaign, further consolidating the battle situation in the west of Sufu Province and opening up the connection with the Taiping army in Wuhu. As Xiao Yungui obtained the support of the Eastern King in Tianjing, the Eastern King also made it clear that Yang Fuqing of the Eastern Palace would attack Jiangxi after the beginning of spring, so Xiao Yungui asked Chen Yucheng to launch the Guangde Campaign and take it first.

In this way, the line from Zhenjiang to Danyang, Jintan, Liyang, and Guangde is in the hands of the Taiping Army in the West Temple, and it is another line of isolation from Tianjing for Suzhou, Wuxi, Huzhou and other places backed by Taihu Lake. Xuancheng can let the east hall soldiers and horses to occupy, after the beginning of spring, the east hall can go south to Jiangxi can start from here, the west hall garrison Guangde can be, the entire Yangtze River Delta rich land is in the hands of the west hall. Moreover, the land of Guangde is rich in coal, and can be mined for decades, and the Guangde coal mine was only mined in the nineties in the later generations, and the reserves are also very large, which is also conducive to the development of Xidian industry and commerce.

Guarding Guangde was Chu Yong's fierce general Liu Changyou. After Jiang Zhongyuan's army defeated Suzhou and Hangzhou last year, Liu Changyou was ordered to lead 1,000 Chu Yong and thousands of green battalions and regiments to train soldiers and horses to defend Guangde. Guangde, Xuanxuan and other places faced the Taiping Army, and the officials and gentry in the city were in panic all day long, and there were several police officers a day, and there were many people who wanted to flee south.

After Liu Changyou's soldiers arrived, they sealed the four gates of Guangde with mud and stone stakes, leaving only one small south gate for military needs to enter and exit, and the entire Guangde did not allow the people and gentry to flee. Liu Changyou vowed to die with Guangde City, and the news spread, and the gentry and wealthy families in Guangde cried every night.

After Chen Yucheng's soldiers and horses arrived in Guangde, he fought fiercely with the Qing army in Xiaofenshan, Shuangmiao, Qiancun Temple and other places on the outskirts of Guangde. The Taiping Army's Western artillery with flowering shells was powerful, and Chen Yucheng tried a new method of warfare in this battle, that is, to unify the artillery of the whole army and use it.

Later, the historians of the Qing court described it as follows: "The thieves bombarded the small tomb mountain camp with more than 100 cannons, and the bullets rained down like thunder. The rocks are shattered, and the people and horses are all eroded. The thieves pounced on them with their infantry. The small grave mountain camp was almost defenseless. The general Ma Cheng and the garrison Jin Huan led the remnants of the army to resist it, and the thieves surrounded and beheaded them, and the two generals and dozens of soldiers were martyred at the same time, and the camp fell. ”

In fact, in the first round of salvo artillery of the Taiping Army, the Qing general Ma Cheng and the garrison Jin Huan were all killed and wounded by flowering bullets, and the Qing army scattered and fled without the command of the main general. After a few rounds of salvos. Chen Yucheng sent an infantry team to catch up, and it took almost no effort to capture the small tomb mountain camp. In this shelling, Chen Yucheng's troops received a total of 60 new Western cannons and 15 six-pounder cannons from Xiao Yungui. There were 20 eight-pounder cannons, 25 howitzers, a total of 60 cannons, and the rest still had more than 50 old-fashioned artillery pieces of the Taiping Army, totaling more than 110 cannons.

According to the proportion of artillery in Napoleon's selection, according to Napoleon's selection, a corps of 40,000 people with 60 cannons of various types, Chen Yucheng's artillery configuration ratio is quite terrifying. In the Opium War, a salvo of more than 100 guns of the British Navy's battleships also brought such terrifying firepower.

Xiao Yungui divided all the new Western artillery owned by the West Hall into two this time, one part was transferred to Chen Yucheng's department, and the other part was transferred to Luo Xuan's department for use, just to let the Taiping army feel the existence of this terrifying firepower, so that the Taiping army could have a more intuitive understanding of Western firearms, so that the soldiers and generals could change some old-fashioned ideas from the bottom of their hearts. After all, in modern warfare, artillery is the god of war.

After clearing the periphery of Guangde, Chen Yucheng surrounded Guangde, and Chen Yucheng, who tasted the sweetness, no longer played any cave siege, and in the face of Guangde's short city wall, Chen Yucheng directly ordered the artillery team to draw gourds in the same way, and concentrated artillery to bombard the city. Three days later, most of the short and dilapidated earthen city wall of Guangde was blown down, but the Taiping artillery continued to bombard the gap, so that the Qing army could not organize troops to plug the gap. At night, Chen Yucheng led his troops to break into the city, and the battle was not until dawn to clear the Qing army in the city.

More than 4,000 Qing troops under the guard general of the Guangde Qing army, Liu Changyou, the general of Ganzhen in southwest Jiangxi, Ai Yanhui of Tongzhi, Xingfu of the county, Song'an, deputy general, and Dai Wenyuan, the general of the staff general, were annihilated, and more than 2,000 surrendered. The Taiping army only suffered more than 1,000 casualties, most of which were killed or injured in street battles after the Qing army desperately resisted after entering the city. However, the casualties of the Taiping army in this battle were still far smaller than those of the Qing army, but they benefited from the use of artillery. After this attempt to concentrate on the use of artillery, the Taiping army began to consider the problem of artillery and infantry coordination.

Compared with the Battle of Guangde, the Battle of Yangzhou was much harder. Although the Jiangbei camp in Yangzhou was broken, the Qing army of Shengbao and other departments retreated and stuck to Yangzhou, Yangzhou salt merchants donated money and organized regimental exercises, and more than 10,000 people from Caoyun Caoding helped the battle, and the Qing army gathered nearly 40,000 people in Yangzhou to defend the town.

Because the Taiping army cut off the luck, tens of thousands of Cao Ding who relied on Cao Yun to eat gathered in Yangzhou, heard that the long hair was coming, these Cao Ding were surging, and they had to help the officers and soldiers to suppress the thieves, and Zuihou Shengbao selected more than 10,000 elite people to accompany the army. Although these Cao Ding are surging, after joining the army, they also need food and salary, and they can't move these uncles who are used to eating and taking from Cao Yun without food. Zuihou or the salt merchants in Yangzhou donated a large sum of silver, so that Cao Yong's food and salary could be gathered.

After more than 30,000 people from Luo's headquarters went north from Guazhou, Lin Fengxiang led more than 10,000 soldiers and horses, 3,000 foreign guns, and more than 100 cannons to Zhenjiang. Then Lin Fengxiang sat in Zhenjiang to dispatch, and Luo Xuan led troops to attack Yangzhou.

Luo Xuan made a mistake, he did not concentrate on the use of artillery like Chen Yucheng, but divided his troops into four ways to attack Yangzhou.

At first, the Taiping army crossed the river, taking advantage of the old practice of the first day of the year, the Qing army's defense was lax, and broke through the old camp in the north of Jiangbei in one fell swoop. After Shengbao experienced the defeat at the beginning of his tenure last time, he was very disciplined in military regulations, and he also knew that the long hair on the opposite side would often launch surprise attacks when he didn't expect it, so it didn't break for thousands of miles, and the Qing army stuck to the camps around Yangzhou.

The raid did not yield much success, and the Taiping army was caught in a battle with the Qing army for the outlying camps in Yangzhou. Because the land of Yangzhou belongs to the alluvial plain of the Yangtze River Delta, there are many rivers and ponds on it, and when the troops were dispatched, Yangzhou encountered a heavy snowfall that was rare in a hundred years, resulting in muddy roads, and the Taiping army's soldiers, horses, artillery, and baggage were extremely difficult to transport, and it was very difficult to fight in battle.

Due to the difficulty of transporting heavy baggage and artillery, the officers and men of the Taiping Army could often only eat some cold and hard dry food, and when they were thirsty, they took ice and put it in their mouths, and then braved the shotguns and artillery of the Qing army to rush up, which was a huge casualty of casualties.

Fortunately, in the following days, the weather improved, the snow melted, and some of the frozen canals thawed, and the Taiping Army's sailors were able to transfer to the canal, and the Taiping Army's baggage and other transports were improved to a certain extent. After several days of hard fighting, the Taiping army finally cleared the periphery of Yangzhou City, and the Qing army retreated to the city.

After the various departments arrived at the city of Yangzhou, Luo Xuan convened the generals to discuss the method of attacking Yangzhou.

Yangzhou city is an important town, the city is high and the pond is deep, the big city, the clamp city, the fort city is very much, there are Qi good reinforcement city defense before, later Shengbao also repaired the city defense again, the defense is extremely tight.

After the peripheral battle, the Qing army lost more than 10,000 soldiers and horses, but Shengbao was cunning and cunning, and they all consumed Cao Ding, salt merchant group training and other departments in front, and their own soldiers and horses lost very little, and there were still more than 30,000 regular soldiers of the Qing army in the city, and tens of thousands of people recruited by Shengbao to help defend.

There were more than 8,000 dead and wounded on the Taiping army's side, of which nearly half of them were injured and sick due to frostbite and illness caused by heavy snow, and even many southern soldiers did not know the truth of the snow, and after the sun came out, they stared at the snow and suffered from snow blindness. Due to the fact that the Taiping army also lost a lot of troops, the strength of the Taiping army was not sure of victory against the Qing army in the city.

After the generals discussed, they complained about the heavy cannons, the difficulty of transporting them in the snow, and when the cannons arrived, the battle was over, and it took a long time to fire the cannons, and the cannons were inaccurate. At this time, Lin Fengxiang sent a letter to Luo Outline, and King Yanxi suggested that Luo Outline concentrate the artillery and use it in a salvo.

Zuihou Luo also seemed to understand that the scattered use of artillery could not reflect the power, so he ordered all departments to concentrate artillery on the southern section of the city wall of Yangzhou City.

The power of the artillery has increased greatly after concentrating, and although a salvo is also time-consuming, it is also very terrifying for the ancient city wall of Yangzhou City to launch hundreds of projectiles at a time. The corner tower and the city tower of the south gate disappeared after several rounds of shelling, and the artillery and soldiers of the Qing army at the head of the city suffered heavy losses. The masonry and stone crashed, and although they took refuge under the city, there were many wounded. The soldiers and civilians of the city were all shocked. ”

Then the destruction of Yangzhou City was only a matter of time, but due to the lack of strength of the Taiping Army, Shengbao led his troops to flee, and the battle of Yangzhou was still a rout, and it is estimated that more than 20,000 Qing troops followed Shengbao to escape from Yangzhou City.

War has always been the best driving force to promote military, scientific and technological change, after Guangde, Yangzhou two battles, the Taiping army began to use artillery on a large scale to attack the city, can not help but let many generals of the Taiping army begin to think about one thing, if against the army of the great powers, in the face of such a powerful artillery fire, the performance of the Taiping holy soldiers can be better than the Qing army? (To be continued......)