Chapter 142: Surrender

Standing on the towering Cambridge of the Neptune ironclad cruiser, looking at the roar of cannons in the distance, Henrik was extremely regretful and at the same time had a faint doubt in his eyes!

"Captain, we can go over and watch the battle now!" Beck, who had been with him for several years, could understand what he was thinking from the subtle expression on Henrik's face!

Hearing his words, although Henrik was very moved, he shook his head firmly in the end! From the direction and speed in which the two sides left at that time, it was inferred that they were now hundreds of nautical miles away, and even with the maximum speed of the Neptune, it would take at least an hour to rush over, and after an hour, perhaps this sudden outbreak of naval conflict would have ended! At that time, they would not have anything to gain except seeing only the corpses floating on the surface of the sea and the sinking warships! Rather than spending coal and supplies to see a war that is destined to fail, it is better to stay where you are and wait for the final result!

"Baker, do you think these cannons are wrong?" asked Henrik, frowning tightly, and asked slowly, somewhat incomprehensibly.

"Isn't the sound of the cannon?"

Hearing his words, Baker couldn't help but be stunned!

But as he listened carefully for a while, he became a little confused! Now he somewhat understood why Henrik asked this! Because, these distant explosions were too dense! Even the ten warships on both sides together did not have such dense and continuous artillery fire!

"Baker, do you know what yard speed is the fastest of the Kingdom's newest medium-caliber guns of 100mm caliber or higher?" asked Henrik, as if talking to himself.

As the first mate of the Neptune ironclad cruiser, he was of course very concerned about the development of his own navy and the development of weapons! So after hearing Henrik's question, he replied almost without thinking: "Three shots per minute!" Captain!"

"Yes, three shots! But listen to the sound of these cannons now! If we calculate the speed of three shots per minute, we need at least 50 medium-caliber naval guns to achieve this kind of density! But judging from the armament of the warships on both sides that we have observed at the beginning, it is obvious that this number cannot be reached! Moreover, from these cannon sounds, I cannot hear the sound of the heavy naval guns on the Dutch ironclad ships 'Jewel' and 'Grand Duke', so it means that at least these two battleships did not participate in this naval battle! So, that's even weirder!

Looking at Henrik, who was lost in thought, Baker listened intently, and sure enough, there was no dull and slow roar of heavy naval guns!

"We all know very well that the Dutch's warships can and artillery shè speed! If there is really any variability in this war, it must be those new warships that may be the Chinese People's Army Navy! We don't know anything about their xìng ability and combat power!" Henrik muttered to himself looking in the direction from which the cannon was coming from.

At this moment, with his many years of military experience and intuition, he realized that this speculation that the combined forces of the Netherlands and Portugal would easily land and win the final victory in the war at home could be very variable! Even, because of the sudden appearance of the mysterious navy and new warships of the Chinese People's Army, it may eventually lead to the defeat of the two countries! If this is the case, then the British Empire must be prepared for the rise of a powerful Chinese force or country in the East Indies! And there will also be a new member with good strength in the world!

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"Captain, two of our boilers have been blown up by enemy shells, and now the speed of the battleship has dropped to 8 knots, and the main gun in the stern and the three secondary guns on the side of the ship have all been lost, a chimney has been blown off, the deck is damaged in many places, and on the left side of the hull, two meters from the waterline, a large hole with a diameter of fifty centimeters has been blown open by the enemy shells! Although we have blocked it, the sea water is still constantly penetrating into the cabin, and now the bilge has accumulated a lot of water! Moreover, our pumping machine has also been damaged by the enemy's warships! There is no way to drain the water in time! If there is too much water in the cabin, I am afraid that our speed will drop again!" said the first mate Lorenz bitterly.

Hearing his words, Cornelis's brow furrowed into a high pimple! They thought of how badly damaged their ships were! Moreover, the slowness of the course in the course of the battle was almost no different from a live target under the enemy's guns!

"It's only been less than five minutes since the battle began?" Cornelis muttered to himself palely, looking at the half-raining shells around him and the battleships that were already on fire in many places.

"Boom......!"

At this moment, a cannonball flying from the left rear of the Prince, pierced through the 235mm flank armor of the bow main gun, drilled into the turret, and blew up the entire main turret under the powerful power of the delayed fuse and the new smokeless powder of nitroglycerin! Fortunately, the Dutch did not pile the shells on the deck like the Russian warships, otherwise they would have been able to detonate all the ammunition and blow the Prince's body into two sections!

Embarrassed to get up from the ground, Cornelius ignored the severed arm that burst in through the observation window in front of him, and looked pale at the only remaining main gun of his battleship!

It's a pity that apart from the broken gun mount and a large black burning hole, the 180mm naval gun weighing fifteen tons will never be seen again!

"Captain......?"

Glancing back at the frightened expressions and pale faces of everyone on the bridge, Cornelius sighed deeply, he understood that the Prince, which had lost its two main guns, was no longer much of a threat to the enemy, and as for the remaining 75mm speed guns, it was okay to deal with torpedo boats, but it was really impossible to engage the heavily armored cruisers!

Looking at the five enemy ships in the distance that were still firing at the Prince from a distance of five thousand meters, Cornelius knew that he could no longer support the rescue of the other warships that came with him!

"Lorenz, hoist the white flag, we surrender!" said Cornelis in a lonely end.

Hearing his words, the surrounding Dutch officers and soldiers couldn't help but secretly breathe a sigh of relief, the less than five minutes of battle just now really gave them too much shock! The cannonballs that rained down and the helplessness that could only be beaten passively had already knocked out all the morale and confidence of the Dutch! In addition, the two main guns were destroyed, and the main weapon of return fire was lost, and the crew of the Prince, who was already doomed, was unwilling to sink with the ship! To them, it was the most important thing to live themselves!

"Old Chen, the Dutch have surrendered!" Looking at the white flag gradually rising on the rail pole of the Prince, Wen Liangshen said in surprise.

"Yes, this is the first battle of our Seahawk frigate!" Listening to the cheers coming from Cambridge, Chen Jin glanced at this old classmate who would only call himself captain on formal occasions with a smile, and said in a happy tone.

"But what do we do with this battleship, should we just throw it here?" After Wen Liang's mood stabilized for a while, he looked at the Dutch battleship that had been parked at sea in the distance, and asked with some pain on his face. Although the navy's new warships are constantly being launched into service, it is still far from the huge number of warships needed to protect tens of millions of square kilometers of sea area! Moreover, the Huo Jiajun Navy, which is already frightened, does not want to give up any warship that can increase its strength, let alone an ironclad cruiser that can be regarded as advanced in the world!

Listening to his words, Chen Jin also looked at the battleship in the distance with some pity!

"Alright, Lao Wen! We have more important tasks to complete! Give up this battleship!"

"That's it!"