Rise of the 1630s South America

Chapter 21 Training

"Scatter before the first sentry!" Chang Kaisheng, the first sentry chief of the First Battalion of the New Army, roared, and five rows of 5 soldiers in blue military uniforms and big caps quickly held their guns in a column formation. Step forward and spread out in a line, with an interval of about half a meter between people.

Chang Kaisheng looked at the fairly neat formation and was a little satisfied.After nearly 20 days of training, this group of people finally has some appearance.

"First platoon, fast-paced and level-up shooting! Get ready, start!" Following Chang Kaisheng's order, the first platoon of 15 soldiers on the far left, led by the platoon leader, marched forward with small brisk steps.After entering the range of the muskets, under the command of the platoon leader, the whole platoon began to reload nervously. After loading the ammunition, the platoon leader shouted "Ready... Release!", 16 muskets aimed at the target 80 meters away A salvo was fired.

"Second row, half-turn right and shoot forward! Get ready, start!"

"Three rows, go forward one word; four rows, turn half to the left and go forward; five rows, turn half to the right and go forward; three rows, prepare to... let go!"

With the sound of the password, the officers and soldiers of the whole sentinel kept rehearsing the content of these daily drills.

"Report!" Chang Kaisheng was observing the training carefully, when suddenly the voice of the battalion messenger came to his ears.

Chang Kaisheng turned around, bowed back, and motioned for the other party to speak.

The messenger is also a cross-traveler. He is 19 years old, but he is very burly, and the military uniform on his body is a bit too small.

"Order of the Battalion Headquarters: The whole battalion will conduct a joint operation at 10 o'clock, and all posts must gather at the wharf cargo yard before 9:30, above!"

"Decree! Gather at the freight yard at the wharf before 9:30." Chang Kaisheng replied.

On December 12th, the whole battalion joint exercise day set by the Ministry of the Army, from now on the three posts will stay together for a long time for training.In the past, each of the three outposts performed drills separately, and they trained separately in formation, military discipline, basic skills, etc. according to the infantry drill code formulated by the Ministry of War.

Army Commissioner Peng Zhicheng, after watching the training of each sentry separately a few days ago, felt that the whole battalion could conduct a joint training, so he arranged today's training.

9:15.Chang Kaisheng chanted and led the 82 officers and soldiers of the first whistle into the wharf yard. He was surprised to find that the second and third whistles had come ahead of schedule.

Chang Kaisheng did not dare to be negligent, and commanded the troops to change from a column to a horizontal team, and lined up in 5 rows on the open space to the left of the second post.After queuing up, he and deputy whistler Jiang Zhiqing stood at attention in front of the first row, looking ahead.

Army Commissioner Peng Zhicheng, who is also the battalion commander, scanned the troops in front of him with a serious face. Liao Meng, a former PLA non-commissioned officer, current army minister and deputy battalion commander of the first battalion, stood behind him on the right side, and the orderly stood behind them; And standing in front of them is Zhu Liang, the editor of the infantry drill code and the battalion training officer.

"Stand at attention! Look to the right!" Zhu Liang shouted in a loud accent, and then began to check whistle by whistle.

The whole battalion is divided into three posts to stand horizontally, the first post is on the left, the second post is in the center, and the third post is on the right.The two chief and deputy whistle officers of each whistle stand two steps in front of the center of the first row of the whistle, and the leader of each row stands one step to the right of the head of the right row of the row.The whole battalion stood in silence, their eyes following Zhu Liang's figure.

After a little inspection, Zhu Liang ran up to Peng Zhicheng and stood still in small steps, saluted, and reported, "Report to the battalion commander! There are 250 officers and soldiers in the first battalion of the New Army, and 250 people will go out this morning. The actual number is correct! Above!"

新建陆军250人（无后勤人员）的暂定编制具体包括：营长1人、营副1人、作训官1人、传令兵1人；下分三哨，每哨哨长、副哨长各1人；每哨分五排，排长1人，士兵15人；总计250人。

"Take it easy!" Peng Zhicheng saluted back, then walked to the ranks of the guards, corrected a few soldiers who were not neatly dressed, and then returned to the front of the ranks.

"The first battalion of our newly-built army is the first unit of the executive committee. It has been three weeks since its establishment, and everyone has trained for 20 days." Peng Zhicheng said, "In my opinion, everyone is very active in training. , very hardworking. Before joining the army, most of us were ordinary people, and only a few of us had military or combat experience. It is not easy for you to be able to do what you are doing in a short period of time. I am proud of you! Our enemy is brutal , Inhuman pirates, they want to take our lives and rob us of our property, this is something we will never allow! We will defeat them, use their blood to prove our bravery, and fight for victory!"

"Fight for victory!" At this moment, whether it is the officers and soldiers of the crossing or the Swiss immigrant soldiers, everyone has a feeling of common hatred.

"Next, the training officer will arrange the content of the joint training of the whole battalion." Peng Zhicheng stepped aside after speaking, ready to start observing the training.

"This time our enemies are pirates roaming the Caribbean. Their combat style is more ferocious, and the number is unknown." Zhu Liang said, "But no matter what the enemy is, we still follow our own rules. Drill the whole battalion to disperse forward shooting method, the whole battalion to move forward shooting method, the whole battalion's small platoon forward shooting method and so on; in addition, there are coordinated drills with artillery. Of course, the individual skills training of soldiers cannot Abandon it. Next, a skill competition will be held every week, with individual units, platoon units or sentry units for the competition, and the losing party will deduct part of the bonus to the winning party."

"From now on, the whole battalion will march and shoot. Stand at attention! Look to the right! Look forward!" Zhu Liang shouted the password: "Hold the gun! Let's walk!"

"Load the gun...stand still...raise the gun...ready-let it go!"

"Quickly load...raise the gun...ready-let it go!"

"Under the gun... stop the gun and stand at attention!"

"Hold the gun...start walking...stand still...kneel down and get ready-let it go!"

"Turn to the left in three teams...Raise your guns...Get ready—let it go!"

"Change from column to line, and the whole battalion starts to walk...Stand still...Four rows prepare-let go! Quickly pack...Get ready-release!"

The more than 200 officers and soldiers of the whole battalion were training mechanically in this way. Peng Zhicheng watched for a while, and then he and Liao Meng left the wharf cargo yard and went to the artillery testing ground.At this time, an artillery unit is also training here.

这支炮兵部队的番号为新建陆军独立野战炮兵第一哨，哨长为前解放军炮兵出身的杨旭。野炮第一哨编制为45人，拥有六门4磅炮、两门8磅炮、弹药车8辆、芬兰挽马30匹（借用）；具体人员包括：哨长1人、副哨长1人、炮目8人、炮手24人、马夫10人（借用）、兽医1人（借用）。

This artillery can be said to be a brand new unit. Unlike the port fort artillery, which still has a certain proportion of skilled gunners, this unit can be said to be full of novices.

The accuracy of artillery in this era is limited, and there are no good sighting equipment on the battlefield.Yang Xu didn't know how his European counterparts in this era measured distances. He only knew to teach the gunners under him what he thought was reasonable based on the current conditions.For example, to measure distance on the battlefield, he decided to use fingers and eyes to measure distance.

To put it bluntly, this method is actually very simple. It involves the simple principle of similar triangles in mathematics, that is, calculate the similarity between the length of the thumb and the height of the measured object, and then multiply this ratio by the length of the arm to roughly get the measurement. The distance between the object and itself.

While the army artillerymen were practicing with their thumbs wide open, Peng Zhicheng sent someone to send two military binoculars with ranging function. Yang Xu's face was covered with black lines when he saw it.

By measuring the distance to the enemy, the artillery can effectively strike the enemy by adjusting the angle of the muzzle and adding or subtracting the charge.Of course, this method requires you to have a full understanding of the performance and parameters of your artillery first, that is, you need to know how far your artillery can shoot under the condition of XX charge and XX elevation angle.This requires drawing a detailed shooting table. There is no way to trick this, and the data can only be obtained through a large number of test firings.

It just so happens that artillery also needs to be familiar with the launch process, and these two things can be done together.Moreover, these test firings are not without other functions besides drawing shooting tables. The arsenal can improve the design, production process, etc. based on these data.

The army is training intensively, and the navy is naturally not far behind.Not to mention the coastal battery under the command of Navy Commissioner Wang Qinian, their training methods are similar to those of the army artillery.

In addition to coastal artillery, the navy currently has several ships brought over during the crossing, namely the Yunsheng No. [-] passenger and cargo ship, a tugboat, and four non-powered barges.To be honest, these ships have been almost forgotten by the executive committee to the corner in the past year.Without him, the status of these ships is rather embarrassing.

Although the equipment on board was well maintained, the lack of fuel and spare parts made the executive committee dare not use these ships lightly, so they could only half-seal them there and talk about it later.But this time when they heard that the enemy would come from the sea, the Executive Committee suddenly became calm.Although it is said that the port defense artillery has strong firepower, it is difficult for the enemy to rush in.But these ships are the cusps of the executive committee, and it hurts to touch them.

Therefore, Wang Qinian had no choice but to let the original Yunsheng No. 24 chief mate Wang Tiehammer and chief engineer Han Dezhi bring a group of original crew members back to the ship again, put some sandbags on the exterior of the buildings on the deck, and hang some on the outside of the ship's side. steel plate.Finally, Wang Qinian asked people to move the four 18-pound and two [-]-pound long-barreled naval guns newly produced by the artillery workshop to the deck, and built several turrets with sandbags. The taste of the ironclad ship is neither fish nor fowl.

(End of this chapter)