Nanyang Storm 1864

Chapter 289: France sheds blood but not tears

"Fire! Concentrate your fire!"

"Boom, boom, boom, boom..."

Major General Zhou Laonian rode his horse back quickly and as soon as he arrived at the position, he loudly gave the order to fire without wasting a moment.

The artillery unit was already ready. The French positions in front were densely packed with rows of personnel and artillery. There was no need for any test firing at all. They could just open fire and work hard.

So five artillery squadrons, with 5 ten-pound Parrot rifled field guns, opened fire at full power, firing a round of salvos in a deafening salvo.

All of these artillery fires hit the French artillery positions accurately. Amid exclamations, they smashed down like dense raindrops, bringing about one bloody storm after another.

In the first round of test firing, the Parrot rifled field gun achieved a high hit rate of over 70%.

In an instant, the French artillery positions were turned upside down.

Only one salvo

They destroyed four 4-pound cannons, three 20-pound cannons, and more than ten carriages. The French artillery suffered as many as twenty or thirty casualties. The wounded soldiers with broken arms and legs fell to the ground, rolling in pain and screaming.

After seizing the initiative with one move, the subsequent Chu field artillery squadron immediately started working hard.

With only a slight adjustment, they could unleash a torrential barrage on the French positions, churning them into a turmoil.

The French positions were not willing to be outdone. In a hurry, only part of the French artillery launched a counterattack, but there were still seventy or eighty artillery pieces. The focus of the counterattack was also the artillery positions, and some artillery pieces even aimed at the infantry columns.

The round shells fired by Napoleon's cannons, within the range limit, still had more than a dozen shells hit the infantry ranks, rolling and jumping all the way, creating a bloody alley.

The French artillery's counterattack also caused as many as thirty or forty casualties among the Chu infantry.

This was only part of the French artillery going berserk; nearly half were preparing to relocate. Seeing the bombardment begin, they hurriedly untied the horses pulling the cannons, and together they turned the guns around.

In the blink of an eye, the second round of artillery fire from the Chu State artillery came crashing down again.

Some of the shells hit the chaotic French positions, instantly destroying the artillery carriages. The huge explosions and flying artillery parts swept across and hit several nearby draft horses.

The horses, which were in pain, stood up and neighed in agony, dragging the artillery carriage madly. Along the way, they smashed the carriages blocking the way, knocked down several artillerymen, and made a mess of the position.

All this chaos made Lieutenant General Lefort so angry that his face turned green. He walked forward quickly, took out the revolver from his waist, aimed at the two draft horses running towards him, one in front and one behind, and pulled the trigger.

"Papa...papa..."

Several bullets were fired at close range. The draft horse that was hit let out a mournful cry and fell to the ground with its heavy body. It struggled wildly with all four hooves, but soon became motionless.

Following the example of Lieutenant General Le Fort, other French officers drew their pistols and shot the restless horses directly in the head, killing them first.

At this time, the third round of artillery fire followed, causing blood to splatter on the French positions, the exploded soil to fly high, and the broken limbs and arms to be blown away.

In just four or five minutes of concentrated artillery fire, each Parrot rifled field gun fired six to seven shells, and more than 400 shells brought blood and gore to the French positions opposite, causing huge damage to the enemy.

Just this short while

A total of more than 40 French artillery pieces and 70 to 80 horse-drawn carriages were destroyed, and 320 to 330 French soldiers were killed or wounded, achieving impressive results.

In contrast, the French artillery quickly took up their positions in an emergency situation, risked huge casualties, and still methodically re-set up the artillery and quickly launched a counterattack.

The fierce counterattack of the French artillery destroyed eight artillery pieces of the Chu artillery and caused more than 400 casualties on the Chu side, most of whom were infantry.

The Chu soldiers suffered heavy casualties, while the artillery positions suffered relatively little damage. The reason was that the French artillery allocated nearly half of its artillery firepower to attack the Chu line infantry who were ready for battle, resulting in heavy casualties among the Chu infantry.

Just from this point of view
The French Army is one of the best armies in the world today, and it is absolutely worthy of the title. Its profound combat skills and extremely high artillery level are worth learning from.

At this point, heavy artillery bombardment from both sides was fully launched.

The Saigon Expeditionary Force used 52 artillery pieces against the French artillery with more than artillery pieces. The rumbling sound of artillery continued, and the two sides began to hurt each other more brutally.

"Everyone, listen up! Move forward with guns!"

At the command of the Chu infantry commander, the band played a powerful soldier march, and the soldiers standing in formation began to march in unison, approaching the enemy.

Rather than standing there and being killed by enemy artillery fire, it is better to take the initiative to attack. At least you don’t have to fear the coming of death all the time and you can die with more dignity.

French Commander Lieutenant General Lefort saw the Chu expeditionary force pressing forward and coldly ordered his men, "Glory to the great France! Order the Royal Army soldiers to advance! To strive for new glory."

"Yes, sir."

The order was passed down, and the French army's formation also moved. They marched forward following the beat of the band's drums and fought without showing any weakness.

After a few minutes
The French commander, Lieutenant General Lefort, felt something was wrong. The artillery firepower of the Chu State's Saigon Expeditionary Force on the opposite side was extremely accurate, causing heavy casualties to their own artillery.

Only these ten minutes

Lieutenant General Lefort's artillery lost nearly half of its artillery again, with almost forty guns destroyed, while the enemy lost only one-third of its artillery, about thirteen or fourteen guns.

"Oh, God! It's the damn Parrot rifled field gun. Order all artillery units to stop attacking the infantry, turn the guns around, concentrate fire on the enemy's artillery positions, and kill them all." Lieutenant General Lefort shouted angrily.

He mobilized a total of 146 artillery pieces, but in less than 20 minutes, he lost more than 52 of them, leaving only artillery pieces.

If the artillery force was dispersed to attack the enemy's line infantry at this time, the French artillery would probably be wiped out.

The chaotic battlefield situation distracted his attention, and after finally suppressing the situation, Lieutenant General Lefou only recognized the model of the enemy's artillery at this time. To be honest, it was too late.

Although the Chu State's Saigon Expeditionary Force only had 39 artillery pieces left, their fire was more accurate and deadly. The soldiers on the artillery positions took off their uniforms and started working hard.

Carrying shells, cleaning the barrels, loading gunpowder and pushing shells in, with complete disregard for personal safety.

At a distance of 2,500 to 2,600 meters

The high precision of the Parrot rifled field gun was fully utilized, and it launched precise targeted strikes on the few remaining artillery pieces in the French positions, with a very high hit rate.

After another round of concentrated artillery fire, as many as 12 French artillery pieces were destroyed.

This was the most artillery salvo that destroyed the French artillery in one go after more than 20 rounds of concentrated artillery fire. Almost one out of every three shells hit the target, which dealt a heavy blow to the French artillery.
In the blink of an eye, only 52 of the original 40 artillery pieces were left.

Under the pressure of great fear, many French artillerymen's movements became deformed and their accuracy was disappointing.

In the subsequent round of artillery counterattack, 40 shells destroyed two enemy artillery pieces and killed and wounded nearly 20 people. Such results are really unworthy of the reputation of the French artillery.

When the artillery levels of both sides are not much different, the advanced nature of the weapons is highlighted.

The Chu artillery became more and more confident as the battle went on. In the following round of precise salvos, they destroyed another nine French artillery pieces and killed or wounded thirty-two or thirty French artillerymen.

At this point, the French had only 31 artillery pieces left, and were completely at a disadvantage.

"Stop advancing! All soldiers, hold your guns level."

"aim……"

"Open fire..." Lieutenant Colonel Huo Chongshan, the commander of the newly formed Seventh Regiment who was commanding the soldiers to march in unison, saw from afar that the French soldiers had stopped advancing, so he immediately waved the command knife in his hand and gave the order to stop advancing and prepare to shoot.

“Pah pah pah… pah pah pah pah…”

“Pah pah pah… pah pah pah pah…”

The Chu expeditionary force and the French soldiers stopped about three hundred and forty to five hundred meters apart, and almost took aim, raised their guns, and fired one after another.

Accompanied by the crisp sound of gunfire like popping beans, which was so dense that it was difficult to distinguish the order, round after round of dense explosions rang out.

Deadly rain of bullets flew between the line infantry of both sides. The scorching bullets broke through the soft flesh, gouging out countless streaks of blood. Accompanied by muffled sounds and desperate screams, the soldiers of both sides fell down like wheat being cut.

Thousands of rifles fired at the same time, and the smoke from the gunshots on both sides of the battlefield gathered together from tiny clouds of smoke to form a huge smoke, which spread with a strong smell of gunpowder.

Major General Zhou Laonian, who was supervising the battle in the rear, held up a monocular telescope with a stern expression, carefully observing the current situation on the battlefield, and soon a barely perceptible smile appeared at the corner of his mouth.

After a round of salvos, smoke rose up.

The casualties of both sides are clear at a glance. The French army suffered about 320 to 330 casualties, and the Chu army suffered about 170 to 180 casualties. Why is there such a big difference?
In fact, on the right wing, the French casualties were roughly equal to those of the Chu army, with about a hundred people each.

But among the native vassal troops who made up two-thirds of the French formation, the gap in casualties was much larger.

The first row of more than a thousand indigenous vassal soldiers were equipped with more than a hundred hand-held rifles and two to three hundred flintlock rifles. The remaining five to six hundred soldiers were holding cold weapons such as swords and guns.

After a volley of line infantry fire

The indigenous vassal army caused seventy to eighty casualties among the Chu soldiers. Most of the casualties were caused by the powerful raised guns. A small number of Chu soldiers were hit by flintlock muskets, which could only be considered bad luck.

The Chu soldiers performed steadily, firing volleys of sharp Manila rifles, causing more than 200 casualties among the French indigenous vassal troops.

But this is just the beginning

Loading the homemade musket was very time-consuming, and cleaning the barrel was not an easy task. Just when the enemy was busy and nervous, the second and third rounds of volleys from the Chu soldiers came one after another, causing serious casualties to the French indigenous line infantry.

In particular, the indigenous vassal army, which occupied two-thirds of the French formation, had its first row almost wiped out in the two subsequent rounds of rifle fire, and more than 500 people were killed or wounded again.

The French side did not fire a single shot, which meant that after the first round of line infantry volleys, the Chu soldiers suffered more than 70 casualties, while the opposing indigenous vassal army suffered heavy losses of more than 700 casualties.

The new Manila rifles were reloaded very quickly, and after advancing more than 20 meters, the Chu soldiers fired three more volleys, which basically wiped out the first and second rows of the French indigenous vassal troops on the left wing, with more than 1600 casualties.

As the distance got closer, the Chu soldiers' volleys of fire became more lethal.

The dense corpses of the French indigenous troops lay scattered on the battlefield, and the flowing blood had dyed the golden wheat fields a bloody red. The scene was extremely tragic.

At this time, the French indigenous vassal army was shrouded in great fear of death, and was in a commotion of continuous retreat.

In the front, a large number of rifles and flintlock rifles were mixed with the bodies of soldiers, and no one dared to pick them up. In the back, many native soldiers holding knives and guns were scared to wet their pants, crying and shouting, wanting to escape from this horrible place full of death.

However, they were quickly shot to death with pistols or hacked to death with sharp blades by the fierce French supervision team, forcing them to continue to press forward.

On the right wing of the French army, which was mainly composed of white troops, the exchanges between the two sides were more normal.

The French army was equipped with the Chassero striker rifle, while the Chu army was equipped with the Manila rifle, which was improved based on the Chassero striker rifle. The performance of the two weapons was similar, and the training of the soldiers of both armies was also ambiguous.

Therefore, the casualties in the line infantry fire between the two sides were roughly 1:1.

The French lost more than 300 officers and soldiers again, and the Chu lost between 320 and 330 officers and soldiers again, with little difference.

Seeing the hope of defeating the main formation of the French army, the Chu side could not wait to launch the third and fourth rounds of line infantry volleys after the line infantry pressed forward dozens of meters.

And at this time

The main formation of the French line infantry, which was mainly composed of indigenous soldiers, was in chaos. Some were crying and shouting, some were rushing out of the line to die, some were staggering and unable to walk, and some were hiding behind others stealthily. The entire French line infantry formation had long been disrupted.

After suffering the third and fourth rounds of deadly volleys of gunfire, these native servant soldiers fell down like wheat being cut, with casualties reaching as high as 1,300 to 1,400 people.

Then came the fifth and sixth rounds of volleys of gunfire. The native vassal army, numbering more than 5000, suffered as many as to casualties in round after round of bullet rain.

The casualties they caused to the Chu army were only more than 70 people at the beginning.

The indigenous soldiers who managed to survive at last were like rabbits whose nest had been blown up, fleeing all over the mountains and plains, and were completely out of control.

"It's done..."

These two words suddenly appeared in Major General Zhou Laonian's mind, but now is not the time to celebrate.

The newly formed Seventh Regiment on the right wing was facing tremendous pressure from the French white army opposite. In the fierce exchange of fire between the line infantry, the casualties of the Seventh Regiment were close to a thousand, but it still held out against the French attack.

Similarly, the newly formed 7th Regiment launched a fierce counterattack, causing nearly a thousand casualties to the French troops in the front.

Both sides were like bulls with red eyes. Even though they were covered in wounds and panting heavily, they refused to give in and butted each other with their sharp horns...

For the first time, Lieutenant General Lefou felt the powerful pressure from the Chu army. His face turned grim and he sent all the reserve forces consisting of naval soldiers and armed white civilians, totaling 1,400 to 1,500 people.

They formed a long horizontal line, intending to block the main force of the Chu army that was coming to encircle them.

From above

At this moment, the French army formation was like a reversed "L" shape, with a little over 2000 troops remaining, almost all of whom were white soldiers and white armed civilians.

The morale of the Chu army, which had defeated the main force of the French indigenous vassal army, soared. With a total number of more than 7,600 people, they quickly surrounded the French army from the center and left, forming a larger "L" shape and attacking the French army with dense rain of bullets.

In the rear, the Chu army still had more than 4000 reserve troops that had not been deployed, while the French side had no reinforcements.

At this moment

The long-awaited artillery support from the Chu State also arrived in time. More than 30 artillery shells whizzed in and slammed into the French army ranks, creating more than 30 bloody alleys in a blink of an eye, causing casualties among fifty or sixty French soldiers.

Broken arms and limbs flew around as the earth exploded, and screams were heard everywhere.

Round after round of deadly and intensive bullet attacks cost the stubborn French their lives. The piles of corpses were spread out in the golden rice fields. The scene was extremely tragic.

"General, we have been defeated. Let's retreat quickly. If we don't, everyone will be left here." The officer beside him tried to persuade him.

At this time on the battlefield, there were only more than a thousand people still able to persist in the bloody battle.

Under another round of intensive rain of bullets, a large number of people fell down like dogs' teeth, and in a blink of an eye, there were two or three hundred casualties.

Seeing this, Lieutenant General Lefort's facial muscles trembled uncontrollably. He gritted his teeth in pain and ordered, "Retreat! Retreat and fight the enemy to the death."

"Yes, General."

"Retreat, retreat quickly! Quickly..."

After the order to retreat was issued, the French officers and soldiers who had just insisted on fighting to the death immediately turned around and ran away, their speed was even faster than that of rabbits.

(End of this chapter)