Forty-eight years of Qianlong

Chapter 485 Battle of Usolye ([-])
Beginning in 1784, Zhao Xin fought against Japan, the Manchus, and Tsarist Russia for six years. Although each time he relied on excellent training and advanced equipment to win more with less, he had never once faced So many enemies.

There are more than 6 Russian troops on the plain north of the Belaya River, more than 30 Russian troops around the "Zaymka Fortress" more than 2 kilometers away in a straight line, and there are 1 Russian troops in Cheremhovo.

As the old saying goes, if there are tens of thousands of people, there will be no boundaries;In the entire East Siberia, the total number of the Northern Navy is only more than 7000 people.To say that Zhao Xin wasn't nervous at all would be an absolute lie.

For this campaign, he carefully planned for nearly two years.D30-122 alone has prepared more than 100 guns and 75 rounds of shells; Beihai Town has also accumulated more than 100 1mm guns and more than 1000 shells; as for other types of ammunition and shells, he also prepared They have hoarded a lot, such as more than 152 million rounds of rifle bullets, [-] rounds of mortar shells, and countless other military supplies.Compared with these, those [-] caliber cannons are nothing.

In order to prevent the Russian spies from discovering the deployment of the North Navy's weapons and equipment, many of the equipment were quietly transported by Zhao Xin to the secret warehouse in Irkutsk like ants moving house.

It looked as though it was well prepared, but in fact it wasn't much at all.The more advanced the weapon, the faster the rate of fire, and the higher the density of firepower, the more astronomical the number of bullets consumed in a battle will be. AK is very enjoyable to use, right?When recruits are nervous on the battlefield, they often fire more than a dozen bullets in one shuttle, and they can't hit anything.Even if it is a semi-automatic rifle, it takes ten clicks to fire ten bullets in a blink of an eye.At present, only some veterans with squad leader qualifications in the North Navy will be equipped with AKs as a supplementary firepower for infantry squads.

On the Western Front in the early morning, as the Russian right-wing infantry column advanced at double pace, the artillery was quickly left behind by them.When the forward observation station discovered this situation and obtained Zhao Xin's consent, they immediately notified the 24 82mm mortars attached to the rear of the main position to fire and bombard the Russian artillery.

The base gun was the first to fire. The first rapid whistling sound passed through the air. With a bang, the shell exploded ten meters north of a Unicorn gun. The flying shrapnel killed three Russian gunners on the spot. , wounding five people.

Whether it is a howitzer or a cannon, since the projectile lands obliquely when it lands, and the shell is spindle-shaped, there are more fragments on the side of the projectile and fewer fragments on the front and rear, so the fragmentation range is roughly the same. A rectangle that is wide horizontally and narrow vertically.For example, the wound circle of a 122 grenade is a radial range with a width of 60 meters and a depth of 20 meters.

The trajectory of the mortar shell is a high parabola, and the projectile body is almost vertical to the ground, so its fragment killing circle is approximately a circle, and the shrapnel is evenly spread around. The killing circle of the 82mm mortar high-explosive shell is a circle with a diameter of 36 meters, and its killing circle area is only more than 122 square meters less than that of the 100 grenade.

boom!The gray-black soil fell like raindrops on the heads of the Russian artillerymen.But before they inspected the loss of personnel, the smoke from the first explosion had not yet dissipated, and the second roar came again. This time, the shell landed five meters in front of the unicorn cannon, killing and wounding it on the spot. More than a dozen people and an 800-kilogram unicorn cannon were overturned to the ground.

The face of the Russian artillery captain in charge suddenly turned pale, and he hastily greeted his subordinates loudly: "Guys! Retreat now!"

At this time, a gunner who had just got up from the ground shouted: "Captain, the driver is gone! We can't fire the cannon!"

The captain ignored him and shouted, "No more! Get back!"

Historically European armies up until the early nineteenth century had a serious problem hindering artillery field mobility.Due to the existence of the "regimental agent" system, the artillery horses have always been provided by private contractors, and the drivers in charge of driving the horses are not soldiers.Some armies did not even sign horse supply agreements and hire drivers until well before battle.So when the battle started, the contractors would try to bring the draft horses to the rear to prevent them from being killed by enemy fire and cause irreparable damage, and the drivers would try to stay as far away from the front line as possible.

In this way, the artillerymen had no choice but to drag the artillery themselves if necessary, or they had to drop the artillery and flee for their lives, leaving them to the enemy.

However, it was too late for the Russian army to retreat. When the North Navy's forward observation post quickly reported back the shelling situation, the other 23 mortars opened fire immediately, and the artillery position on the front left wing of the Russian army immediately fell into a battle of blood and fire. hell.

In just two rounds of shooting, more than 40 rounds of high-explosive shells ravaged the Russian artillery positions with gunpowder power far exceeding this era. Only two of the more than 100 Russian gunners survived.However, this is just an inconspicuous wave in the boundless sea of ​​people on the battlefield. It churned and then disappeared.

The hussars who were in charge of guarding around the artillery positions hurried back to the rear and reported the situation. General Bolkons, who commanded the left-wing corps, was a little surprised when he heard the news. He finally understood the horror of the enemy's artillery described by Suvorov.

Are orderlies to be sent to make the infantry and cavalry retreat?

However, this idea only flashed in his mind, and then he ordered his officers to go to the headquarters, asking for more artillery to be dispatched.

"Tell Your Excellency the Commander-in-Chief that I need at least forty Unicorn Cannons."

At this time, the infantry of the left-wing group of the Russian army, facing the sparse bullet rain from the opposite side, has rushed to more than 400 meters outside the Beihai Navy's position. The endless barbed wire, all gasped.

The light cavalry in charge of reconnaissance in the front came back and reported that the height of the barbed wire fence was 1.5 arshin (one arzin is 0.71 meters), the depth was more than four arshin, and the east to west stretched for almost three versts. Both ends reached Belaya. riverside.This news made several leaders of the team look shocked, such a width can't jump even if the horse speeds up.

"The Tartars are crazy! They make these things out of good steel!"

In the eighteenth century, iron was one of the main exports of Tsarist Russia.As of 1790, the annual steel output of the Tsarist Russian Empire exceeded 16 tons, and the export volume also exceeded 6.5 tons, ranking first among European countries.However, in this era, the greatest use of steel is to make weapons. No one has yet made precious steel into barbed wire to stop enemies on the battlefield.

Although there are many passages in the barbed wire fortifications of the Northern Navy, for the tens of thousands of Russian troops in a tight formation, if they pass through the gaps that only allow two or three people to pass through, it is bound to disrupt the formation of five people in a row .

How to do?The head of the Russian army had no time to hesitate. Behind his regiment were three whole regiments of light cavalry.Once they hesitated, the rhythm of the entire left-wing offensive would be completely disrupted.

At this time, the not-so-intensive bullets fired from the North Navy position were still reaping the lives of the soldiers, and some people in the front row were shot and fell to the ground from time to time.Although some wounded Russian soldiers wailed, the soldiers who stepped forward from the back row just stood silently, and no one would bend down to rescue them.

This is the case in the era of line warfare. When someone falls in the queue, there is no timely battlefield rescue. In order to maintain the order of the formation, those injured can only wait for the team to pass, and then the militiamen who follow will clean up.

"Destroy these barbed wire fences! Send someone to find some planks behind!"

Orders are better than no orders, even bad orders.Following the order of the regiment commander, the battalion commanders of each column immediately let the tall grenadiers under them line up and ordered them to use grenades to destroy the barbed wire fence.

The headgear of the grenadiers is different from that of the ordinary musketeers, and they all wear a somewhat comical, bishop-like brass front beveled hat, which is easy to distinguish in the queue.Dozens of grenadiers first took out a "slow match" similar to a fire pocket from the brass tube on their shoulder straps, blew it hard a few times, waited for the fire to light up, and then took out a pomegranate from the diagonal bag behind them A large grenade was ignited on the fuse made of beech mixed with black powder.

boom!boom.
Gunpowder smoke filled the air, dozens of iron ball grenades exploded near the first barbed wire fence, and the empty cans and glass bottles hanging on it were jingled.However, when the smoke cleared, the Russian army discovered that their grenades had no effect on the barbed wire.

The officers were helpless, so they issued a second order to the soldiers: "Dig out those stakes!"

The problem is that any infantry soldier who went to the battlefield in this year still carried tools. The Russian soldiers had to take off the dagger or bayonet from their waists and start digging holes under the wooden posts.

At this moment, the atmosphere on the battlefield became a little weird.The sporadic shooting from the northern navy on the opposite side suddenly stopped, leaving the Russian army a little confused.The soldiers in the front row of the Russian column were all struggling with the barbed wire. They managed to dig out the earth and rocks under the wooden stakes, and after pulling them out forcefully, they found that it was useless to just pull out the first wooden stake; The first wooden pile is arranged in a staggered manner with the first one, just like thorny vines.

The hands of many Russian soldiers were cut with blood by the butterfly-shaped blades on the barbed wire, but they had no choice but to pull out one after another.

As time went by, the first barbed wire fortification had been filled with tens of thousands of horses from six regiments.The infantry were anxiously waiting for orders, while the horses under the cavalry were also circling in circles restlessly.

Fortunately, there were a lot of people and strength. More than half an hour later, the 100-meter-long barbed wire fence was finally cleared away. The uniforms of the Russian soldiers who were in charge of the cleanup were scratched to pieces, with blood marks on their faces and hands.The piled up barbed wire is like a huge monster covered with spikes, densely tangled in one place.

"What a waste of good things these Tartars are! Using such a strong wire for repelling horses."

"Who says it's not! But we have tens of thousands of people, and they want to stop us based on these? Just dream!"

"Hurrah! Forward!"

However, the joy only lasted for a moment. The Russian hunters had just advanced a few meters, and then they were distraught to find that in front of them there was a low-pile barbed wire fence that was two feet high and seven feet deep. The iron wires of the blades are densely distributed vertically and horizontally.

The Russian army suddenly surged with fury, the vicious "Tatars", can you still fight happily? !

A battalion commander angrily ordered his hunters to stand in three rows and shoot at the North Navy position 200 meters away.

Contrary to what many modern people imagine, the line infantry in the age of fuzzlocks did not fire from the first row, but the third row took the lead, and after a period of time, the second row and the first row. In this way The purpose of doing this is to keep the rifles of the first row of soldiers loaded as much as possible so that they can deal with the enemy's cavalry at any time, or save them for use at the most critical moment.

At the end of the eighteenth century, although there were some differences in the rifles of European armies in terms of caliber, barrel length, barrel installation method, butt shape, flintlock design and cleaning rod, but in terms of rate of fire and effective range The difference is not huge.

A soldier on the battlefield usually carries 50-60 rounds of bullets. The so-called bullet is a cylindrical paper roll, which contains a spherical lead bullet and the gunpowder required to launch the lead bullet.At the same time, the firing speed of the soldiers is not very fast. A well-trained soldier can shoot 5 rounds of live ammunition per minute in a short period of time, but in general, such a firing rate cannot be achieved at all; the Russian infantry until 1811 It is only stipulated in the regulations that soldiers practice loading to reach the level of shooting 3 times per minute. Before that, it was all up to the regiment and battalion commander himself.

However, for various reasons, the rate of fire in actual combat is lower than that stipulated in the doctrine, and it will continue to decrease during the course of the battle.At the beginning of the battle, the flint is brand new, the fuse holes are clean, and misfires are rare; but as the battle progresses, the misfire rate will become higher and higher.Another reason for the reduced rate of fire is that the gunpowder cannot be completely burned, and the residue will gradually accumulate on the inner wall of the barrel, making it very difficult to load lead bullets. The barrel must be completely cleaned after dozens of shots.In addition, if fired dozens of times in succession at a relatively rapid rate, the barrel becomes too hot to touch.Finally, soldiers also show signs of fatigue over time.

By the way, in a battle in Europe at the end of the eighteenth century, the average infantry needed to consume 200-500 rounds of ammunition to kill an enemy.

The reason why the Northern Navy stopped shooting at the enemy infantry was of course not to allow the Russian army enough time to pass through the barbed wire.Zhao Xin's original plan was to let the left-wing troops of the Russian army pass the first barbed wire fence before attacking. The depth of 100 meters in front of the formation was the Shura field he set up for the left-wing Russian troops.

However, the left wing of the Russian army did not intend to be idle. While waiting for the planks to be brought from the rear, the heads of the regiments ordered the 4-pound and 6-pound guns located between the infantry and cavalry to attack the northern navy from the positions on both wings of the formation. The positions were bombarded.

"Beep~~beep beep!"

"Everyone pay attention to concealment!" On the North Navy's position, except for the soldiers hiding in the hidden bunkers, everyone else in the trench retreated into the artillery holes under the fortifications.

The two wings of the Russian army 400 meters away roared and smoke billowed. More than a dozen solid bullets fell on the front and rear of the Beihai Navy's fortifications. , but constantly rotating and rolling around.

Some people may think that the solid bullets of the smoothbore era will be safe as long as they are not rubbed?To tell you the truth, big mistake, you forgot the shell blaster!
According to historical records, during the Russo-French War in 1812, when a Russian artillery officer was cleaning the barrel, a solid bullet from the enemy flew over his head and behind him, and the officer fell unconscious on the spot. , his head, neck and back were darkened and swollen.Although he still woke up later, the power of the solid bullet shock wave can be seen.

The time has come to 7:30 in the morning. In the North Navy Command, Sheng Haizhou reported to Liu Sheng that the drone found that the Russian army's center and right-wing group had been dispatched, and the vanguard was still one kilometer away from our main position.

Bei Haijun has endured for so long, just waiting for this moment.Liu Sheng shouted excitedly into the walkie-talkie: "Zhao Xin, the enemies have come out! Let's start!"

On the northern naval artillery position on the south bank of the Belaya River, more than 200 artillery pieces of various types have taken off their camouflage, and the muzzles of more than 100 D30 guns protrude from the bunker, pointing diagonally at the sky.

At this time, the heavy fog over the northern fields had been blown away by the wind, and the sun had jumped completely above the horizon, and then disappeared in a dark cloud above it.After a while, the sun tore through the edge of the dark clouds, and the more than 200 cannons in the glade were all dyed with a layer of gold, and their outlines were bright and shiny.

Following Zhao Xin's order to "start shooting", the 36 standard guns in each artillery regiment fired first.

Like the infantry, the artillery of the Northern Navy also adopted the "three-three system"; a battalion had 18 guns, while a regiment had 54 guns.The benchmark guns were tested in units of companies, which meant that Zhao Xin placed four regiments of artillery on the south bank of the Belaya River!
A squad of 122 howitzers needs 8 people, and a squad of 75mm guns needs 3 people, and the more than 2000 people present already account for two-thirds of the artillery of the North Navy.Fortunately, with Zhao Xin, the artillery positions did not need too many people responsible for transportation, so the staffing of each artillery regiment was reduced by more than half.

Artillery squad leader Li Yansheng has been suffering for this day for more than a year.Since the day he joined the Beihai Artillery Corps, apart from his daily military training, he has been cramming with mathematics without black or white.Whether it's secret formulas, trigonometric functions, or even the mastery of various calculation tools and sighting equipment, this former Qing army artillery co-leader who only attended a private school for a few years suffered a lot.

During the past year or so, Li Yansheng wanted to retreat countless times, but for the encouragement of those comrades and instructors, he would have given up long ago.Just three months ago, after he passed the math test that stumped countless people, 32-year-old Li Yansheng couldn't help but burst into tears.

With the rumble of guns on the position, after the 36 reference guns completed two test firings, the company commanders who received the forward observation post and UAV reconnaissance data immediately issued a firing order.

"Full shooting! Target No. 106, enemy infantry group, grenade instant fuze, No. 3 charge. Scale 6-00, direction 30-00. 4 salvos!"

After receiving the order, Li Yansheng immediately found out the correction amount of the focused fire direction from the "correction amount calculation table" according to the number of charges, the gauge, and the distance from the main gun to the reference gun, and corrected it in the direction of the reference gun.After the observer and aimer quickly adjusted according to the correction amount, Li Yansheng shouted: "Fire!"

When the artillery of the Northern Navy on the south bank of the Belaya River launched a violent bombardment to the various departments of the Russian army, there was a burst of artillery fire that resounded through the sky on the Irkutsk-Cheremkhovskaya Plain. One after another, the shells sprayed out from the terrifying barrel, across the moist air and clear sky, accompanied by the chilling whistling sound, and shot at the Russian troops in three directions, left, center and right. Throw it over.

The North Navy's counterattack has officially begun!
　The battle is too difficult to write!Changed back and forth several times.

　　
　
(End of this chapter)