Chapter 2123

Since the first Majesty-class battleship was put into service at the end of 1629, the Haihan Navy has basically continued to build this type of main warship at a launch rate of one to two ships per year. Although the tonnage of the Majesty-class battleship is still in the navy In the eyes of the generals, it is not really a large warship, but with its significant advantages in comprehensive performance such as firepower, speed, and endurance, it has few opponents in East Asia in this era.

The Majesty-class battleship has taken into account both sail and steam power during the design stage, and has left a certain amount of space for the upgrade of subsequent models of power equipment and weapons and equipment. Therefore, although naval generals are more interested in more advanced steam ironclads , and even experimental ships such as the Black Shark have been built, but considering that the current external environment does not pose a real threat to the Haihan Navy, the Executive Committee believes that it is not necessary to spend huge sums of money to build more advanced ships for the time being. battleship, so the Majesty-class battleship will still be the main flagship of the Haihan Navy's fleets in the foreseeable future.

In this military operation to attack Hirado, a total of three majestic-class warships were dispatched, two of which belonged to the East China Sea Fleet under Shi Diwen, and the other warship from the Northern Fleet went to the west coast to compete with the Fujian Navy. Divisions fight together.

With the strength of the majestic class battleship, it can be said to be a sledgehammer on the battlefield against the Japanese warships with relatively primitive combat methods. After the steam engine on the ship was turned on at full power, the speed quickly increased to more than three times that of the Anzha ship. It had to catch up. The distance between the two sides did not take too long. When the Hirado navy was still about a few dozen feet away from the front, the Haihan battleship took the lead in opening fire.

Majesty-class battleships are equipped with a cannon on the bow that is specially used when chasing enemy ships. The barrel of this 135mm caliber cannon is longer than the cannons on both sides of the ship, so the range and accuracy are also better. Under ideal sea conditions, you can basically hit wherever you point within fifty feet, which is very useful for bombarding the stern rudder of enemy ships when chasing them.

The VIA in pursuit only fired two shots, and then hit the stern of the enemy ship closest to it, making a hole the size of a washbasin above its stern rudder. The gunner on the VIA could even faintly hear what followed. The screams coming from the enemy ship.

Although this shot did not hit any vital parts of the ship, it immediately plunged the ship, which was at the end of the Hirado naval force, into chaos. Seeing that the opponent was getting closer and closer to him, the commander of the ship also Ignoring that Shota Ishimura had previously issued an order for all ships to move eastward and evacuate the battlefield, he tried to further change direction and escape from the large force to the north. This way, if the Haihan battleship behind wanted to pursue the large force, it would not bite him again. Don't let go yourself.

The idea was correct, but the only problem was that the speed at which the VIA caught up was too fast. Before the ship had completed its turn, it had already entered the effective range of the VIA's port gun.

The firepower output from the sides was much denser than the bow cannon. As the rumble of cannons sounded, the Guan ship, which was shortened to about ten feet from the Weisheng, was immediately baptized by cannonballs. Moreover, the Haihan Navy Obviously, targeted arrangements were made for these Japanese sailing ships with thin hulls. The cannonballs used were not large solid cannonballs, but grapeshot known as "deck reapers".

These projectiles were enough to penetrate an inch-thick ship's plank at close range. After several grapeshot rounds hit the lower deck, the entire starboard oar of the ship almost immediately stopped rowing, and the ship's speed immediately slowed down.

Come down.

However, the Weisheng did not continue to waste ammunition on this ship, and continued to pursue the Hirado navy fleeing ahead along its original course. Before the people on board the ship had time to rejoice, the Weibang followed closely behind.

They had already arrived, and the shells that were poured into it this time were all big ones. In one round, several holes were made near the waterline of the ship. Before the people on the ship had time to rescue the casualties, they had to jump in first.

Otherwise, even if they survived the bombardment, they would not be able to escape back to the temporary base in the north in a half-sunken boat.

However, Shi Diwen had no intention of letting anyone leave the battlefield. The two flagships were responsible for the rapid pursuit and carried out the first round of strikes on the Hirado navy fleet, while several expedition-class warships slowly followed to clean up the battlefield.

For an enemy ship like this that has been hit and is unable to leave the battlefield quickly, naturally there will be latecomers responsible for finishing the damage to make it sink faster.

After that, a closed ship tried to use its arms as a chariot to block the direction of the Weisheng, but the bows of the Majesty-class battleships were equipped with stainless steel rams. Although this thing was rarely used, it was always used.

It is the standard equipment of the Majesty-class battleship. When the two ships collided, the Weisheng relied on its tonnage advantage and strong collision angle to effortlessly smash the enemy ship into two pieces, while its own speed was only slightly affected.

There was only a little impact, but the hull was not seriously damaged.

This result is also equivalent to a warning to other warships of the Hirado Navy. It is extremely unwise to fight with the Haihan warship. It is even difficult to achieve the purpose of delaying time. The only thing they can do now is

What they need to do is to give up the idea of ​​resisting and try to speed up their flight and escape separately, so that they may have a chance to escape from the battlefield.

But now even escaping has become a luxury. The sailing performance of these Japanese warships is so bad that they can't even rely on splitting up to escape from the two Haihan warships, the Weisheng and Weibon, that are chasing after them.

One after another, each ship was overtaken and gave a round of close-range artillery fire without hesitation.

A rough calculation shows that every naval warship that was hit took at least six or seven shells. If you were lucky, you might be able to continue to struggle to escape, but if you were unlucky, it might start to sink on the spot.

Shota Ishimura knew that the risk was extremely high when he took on this mission, but even so, it was hard for him to imagine that the real fighting situation would be so passive. Not to mention the Hirado navy he led opened up the battle formation and fought with

The opponent is facing off head-to-head, and now it is difficult to do so even if you want to cause some trouble for the opponent to delay the escape.

The most powerful weapon on the Anzha and Seki ships is the musket, but when used in the current combat environment, the effect is almost non-existent. The musketeers aim and shoot during the ups and downs of the sea.

For targets on enemy ships, the hit rate is basically left to chance.

Several ships tried to use ignited arrows to attack the Haihan warships, but they quickly failed because the Haihan naval guns had a far greater range than arrows, and these warships often lost control of the warships before getting the best chance to shoot.

They have already been baptized by a round of artillery shells. At this time, there are only a few people who can use bows and arrows to launch a counterattack, but this will lead to more violent artillery attacks.

After an hour of this sea pursuit, more than 70% of the participating ships of the Hirado navy had been destroyed. This was the result of Ishimura Shota ordering to evacuate the battlefield from the beginning instead of fighting head-on. If he was outside the Hirado Strait,

If you make a slightly impulsive decision, or if you make a decision to quit fighting a little slowly, you may not be able to survive even an hour.

Seeing the two Kaihan battleships still chasing relentlessly from behind, Shota Ishimura regretted more and more that he had accepted this life-threatening job. He now only hoped that the heavy casualties of his group could really give the Hirado clan some breathing space.

As for whether the other group of people led by Wei Zhiqin can open up a situation on the west coast of Hirado Island, Shota Ishimura no longer has high expectations.

But in fact, the navy's attack did not do much to relieve the pressure on Hirado Port. The number of warships originally invested by the East China Sea Fleet in the port artillery battle was less than half of the total, and the fleet chasing Ishimura Shota was only

One-third of the warships were dispatched.

This means that at this time, more than half of the warships of the East China Sea Fleet are still in the waters of the Hirado Strait. Even at this time, the Hirado Domain has another naval fleet that wants to rush into the Hirado Strait to liberate Hirado Port.

, and still inevitably get a beating.

In fact, after the landing of Kaihan cut off the land escape route to the south, the chance of survival left for the Hirado clan has become smaller and smaller. Ordinary civilians may still be able to escape to the south from the mountains and forests in the central part of the island.

to escape the flames of war, but as the ruler of the Hirado Domain, Tagawasuke and the thousands of feudal troops under his command would never be able to escape in this way.

There are thousands of land and sea troops under his command. If you want to escape at this time, the people's hearts will be completely dispersed. When the time comes, it won't make much difference whether the Haihan people will destroy the Hirado clan or not. Tagawasuke knows this very well.

, so he just secretly sent Tagawa Nanzaemon and his son out, but he had no intention of escaping. If he died on Hirado Island in the future, at least there would be an heir who could continue the Tagawa family business.

Tagawa's order to Wei Zhi was to hide in the open sea and wait for opportunities. After figuring out Haihan's attack routes, he would then try to attack his retreat from the sea, hoping to force the enemy to retreat voluntarily by attacking the enemy's supply ships.

When formulating this battle plan, both Tagawasuke and Wei Zhi believed that the Hirado Domain should be able to survive for six or seven days without the navy participating in the war, but they did not expect that they would have to show up under the pressure of the enemy's offensive on just the first day.

All the resources deployed in Hirado Port were lost. And the opponent did not regard Hirado Port as the only target of attack. Taking advantage of the lively fighting here in Hirado Port, they had secretly implemented a landing at another place, and

Without hesitation, the Hirado clan's escape route was cut off.

To put it simply, the tactics prepared by the Hirado Domain in advance had very limited effects, but the opponent's actions were somewhat beyond the expectations of Tagawa Suke and his staff - the opponent's actions since the beginning of the war were more efficient than theirs.

The expectations were much higher. They thought it might take their opponents three or four days or even longer to complete things, but their opponents accomplished everything on the first day of the war.

This also greatly disrupted the Hirado clan's response plan. A considerable part of the originally formulated combat plan had to be overturned, such as the current actions taken by the navy. Wei Zhi did not dare to continue to sit on the sidelines, otherwise he said

There was no certainty that the city of Hirado would be able to survive until the third day. He could only take action in advance and try to alleviate the pressure currently facing Hirado from the sea.

Of course, if Wei Zhi could learn which unit of the Haihan Army was currently landing at Boxiang Bay, and that this unit had cut off traffic on the island, he might modify his action plan and cancel the enemy luring and surprise attack.

These unrealistic battle plans were instead designed to meet the feudal army in the north of the island to break out from the sea at night.

However, the backwardness of reconnaissance methods and the lack of key information made it difficult for Wei Zhi to make an accurate judgment on the situation. Although he tried his best to formulate a comprehensive and comprehensive plan, many combat methods were simply not available when the strength gap between the two sides was too large.

The method was implemented. For example, Shota Ishimura, who was sent to lure the enemy in the Hirado Strait, was simply unable to command Japanese warships with low combat performance to achieve the desired results.

Another example is the plan to sneak attack on Boxiang Bay, which was not what he expected. It would be able to steal enemy troop transports and supply ships on the west coast. What awaits Wei Zhi here, in addition to dozens of large and small battles from the Fujian Navy

In addition to the ship, there is also the flagship Veineng from the Haihan Navy's Northern Fleet.

Even if the number of warships under Wei Zhi were doubled, there would still be a significant gap in combat effectiveness between the two sides. Therefore, instead of having a chance of success, the sneak attack plan would turn into a situation where people were seeking death.

Fortunately, Wei Zhi had dealt with both the Haihan Army and the Fujian Navy in his early years. Anyone who had suffered losses would be more cautious. He did not let the fleet rush into Boxiang Bay rashly, but sent two troops first.

The ships moved forward, one went into Boxiang Bay to find out what was going on, and the other moved between the entrance of the bay and the Izuki Strait in the south to confirm whether there was any trace of the Haihan armed fleet nearby.

This prudent arrangement temporarily saved Wei Zhi's fleet. The two ships had already seen the dense warships in Boxiang Bay while they were still outside the bay. They immediately turned around and left, not daring to stop and take a closer look. Waiting for the Fujian Navy

The ship chased them out of the bay. The two Chinese-style warships belonging to the Hirado Navy had already shot fireworks signals into the sky, notifying Wei Zhi in the distance to evacuate immediately.

The sailing performance of Wei Zhi's warships, which were based on Fuchuan, was much better than that of Japanese warships. As soon as he saw the danger signal from the scout ship, he immediately adjusted the sails, turned around, and ran north.

He didn't even consider the option of direct combat.

"These bastards are here, but they can run away faster than the rabbits!" Xu Yuzhuo looked at the dots of sails on the sea in the distance on the deck, knowing that he couldn't catch up, and he was very angry at the moment.

He had already calculated that this would be the place where the Hirado Navy must rescue him. He originally planned to withdraw the fleet from Boxiang Bay in the afternoon and deploy it to the fishing port at the southern end of Isatsuki Island, which is more than ten miles away, and make way for the entrance to Boxiang.

Bay and the channel of Furue Bay, waiting for the Hirado navy to appear here and then take a retreat, but the timing was still a little bit off. Seeing that the situation was not good, the opponent simply ran away, causing all his plans to fail.
Chapter completed!