I am the prince of the Ming Dynasty, I don't give up

Chapter 632: Battle of the Three Kings (VI)

The shrapnel bomb has always been regarded as a secret weapon by Zhu Houxuan. It has never been used on the battlefield before, just for this moment.
The power of the shrapnel shells on the battlefield now brought a huge shock to the Southern Army just as Zhu Houxuan had imagined.
At the center of the explosions, craters were formed, the surrounding land was scorched, and wisps of black smoke were rising. The huge explosions seemed to shatter people's eardrums, and the strong shock waves spread in all directions like surging waves.

The air was filled with the pungent smell of gunpowder, blood, and dust. The originally densely packed army formation was torn apart by the attack of shrapnel shells. The soldiers' terrified eyes, painful expressions, and mutilated bodies formed a tragic scene like hell on earth.

Chaos and despair quickly spread in the army. Some soldiers were calling out the names of their comrades, some were groaning in pain, and some were looking at everything around them in a daze, not knowing what to do.

The explosion of shrapnel not only caused great physical damage to the soldiers, but also dealt them a heavy psychological blow. Faced with this sudden destructive force, the soldiers' courage and faith were shattered in an instant. They began to doubt whether they could survive this cruel war and whether they could win this war.
This fear and despair put the entire army on the brink of collapse. The reason they did not collapse was firstly because of the psychological inertia brought by their usual training; secondly, many people were confused and did not know what to do.
But the well-trained Union artillery did not stop at all. They fired three rounds of shells in one minute, and more shrapnel shells fell into the Confederate formation.
The firing rate of the needle-prick ignition trigger fuse was less than 40%, and more than 60% of the shrapnel shells did not explode, but only played the role of a solid bullet. However, this kind of firepower projection density has never appeared in this world, and it is far beyond the tolerance limit of the Southern Army.
The emergence of shrapnel completely changed the situation on the battlefield. After rigorous training, the Southern Army was able to withstand the Northern Army's artillery fire that created bloody alleys in the formation. Although the bloody alleys were also scary, one artillery shell would only affect three or four people. However, when shrapnel landed in their extremely tight formation, one shell could affect at least a dozen people, and the killing efficiency was doubled.
So after the subsequent shells fell, the bombarded Confederate troops completely collapsed.
At this time, no order could make them move forward. The punishment for retreating, the whips of the officers, and the supervision team in the rear were not as frightening as the continuous exploding shrapnel.
Guo Xun looked at the troops covered by the smoke of explosions with bloodshot eyes. These explosions made the tactics he had trained so hard become a joke.
Zhu Houcong also fell down on the chair on the watchtower. His hands and feet were cold. He had realized that things were not going well, because the fleeing soldiers in the front had already begun to attack the troops behind.
The Confederate collapse was immediately seen by Union observers in the basket of a hot air balloon hovering over the artillery position.
Each artillery position is tethered to a small hot air balloon, which floats at an altitude of 40 to 50 meters and serves as the eyes of the artillery position.
The observer in the hot air balloon basket quickly calculated the distance, wrote down several parameters on a piece of paper, put them in a bamboo tube, and then threw the bamboo tube out of the basket.
The officers on the artillery position quickly picked up the bamboo tubes and issued orders according to the parameters written on the bamboo tubes. The artillerymen quickly adjusted the muzzles and fired.
This wave of shells landed further away, landing in the second row of troops, continuing to spread the chaos.
The second row of troops collapsed even faster, because they were already terrified by the tragic situation of the first row. When the shrapnel fell into their ranks, they collapsed. The supervisors wanted to play a role, but were dispersed by the terrified soldiers with bayonets and bullets.
The Northern Army's artillery continued to modify the firing parameters and continued to fire at the farther formations to create greater chaos.
That's why they let the Confederates get so close before they started shelling them.
Liu Di ran back desperately like a frightened animal. He didn't know when he lost the flintlock in his hand.
Oh, no, the bayonet of his flintlock rifle was stuck in the chest of a member of the supervision team who was trying to stop him from escaping. He tried to pull it out but couldn't, so he just dropped the weapon and ran for his life.
He ran away in panic, but accidentally tripped over a corpse on the ground.
He tried desperately to get up, but found that the pebbles on the ground began to tremble. He focused his eyes and put his ear to the ground, only to hear a thunderous sound approaching quickly.
After the first row of the Confederate Army fell into disarray, the Union cavalry officers gave the order to charge.
The cavalrymen held their horses' bellies tightly, leaned forward, held their spears or sabers tightly in their hands, and their eyes showed fanatical fighting spirit.

The horses seemed to sense their masters' determination. They held their heads high, their hooves flying, and rushed forward like a black torrent. Their manes fluttered in the wind like burning flames. Their hooves stepped on the ground, raising clouds of dust that covered the sky and the sun.

The cavalrymen were in a charging formation, closely connected to each other, as unstoppable as a steel torrent. They charged forward through the gaps between the infantry formations and soon surpassed the Union infantry who were advancing to the beat of the drums.
Their speed was getting faster and faster, and their momentum was getting stronger and stronger, as if they were going to crush everything that stood in their way.

When the cavalrymen approached the enemy, they issued a deafening shout of killing. This sound was like a sharp sword piercing the enemy's heart. When the enemy soldiers saw the cavalry charging, they showed terrified expressions on their faces and became even more confused.
The Northern Army had 150,000 elite cavalry in its battle sequence. Although it was already the era of flintlock rifles, flintlock rifles were not enough to eliminate cavalry. Cavalry still played an extremely important role on the battlefield.
Of course, the Northern Army's cavalry would not charge the strictly ordered line infantry formation, because they really couldn't charge. The horses would stop charging when they saw the dense bayonets, and the firepower of the strictly ordered line infantry formation was enough to crush the cavalry's charge. Similar battles had occurred many times on the battlefields of the Western Regions before.
The main task of the Northern Army cavalry was to attack the line infantry formation that had become broken by the bombardment, to penetrate and cut through it, and finally the infantry would clean up the battlefield.
This is a very typical Napoleonic tactic.
(End of this chapter)