Nanyang Storm 1864

Chapter 303 The Devil's Legion
Nothing in the night

The next morning, Major General Courbet, Deputy Commander of the Anglo-French Allied Forces, personally arrived at the front line. Also arriving were Major General Cameron Boggs, Deputy Commander of the Allied Forces and Commander-in-Chief of the British Indian Corps, and a dozen colonel-level officers.

They came to the artillery position in neat clothes, looked at the black muzzle pointing straight ahead, the shells and gunpowder bags neatly stacked next to the artillery, and seemed very satisfied that the artillery was ready for firing.

"Have the artillery positions been deployed?"

"Report to the commander, everything is ready."

"It's 7:40 now. Order the artillery to bombard me for minutes. Tear all obstacles in sight into pieces and blast a path. Start now."

"As you command, sir."

The British and French allied forces set up artillery positions on both sides of the jungle. After receiving the order, they immediately opened fire fiercely. The rumbling sound of artillery echoed in the mountains for a long time.

After the British and French forces launched their artillery bombardment, the Chu army artillery on the valley's defense line also opened fire, responding with more accurate and deadly artillery fire.

For a while, shells were flying everywhere, and the battle was very lively.

After a while
Major General Courbet, Major General Cameron Boggs and some officers fled into the camp in a panic, looking towards the direction of the Chu fortress with eyes full of surprise and doubt.

The artillery pieces on the Chu fortress roared in unison, as accurate as if calling a roll call.

Black shells rained down, destroying the British and French artillery positions on both sides one by one, throwing people and horses to the ground, leaving corpses strewn everywhere, and broken limbs flew into the sky in the exploding fireballs accompanied by the desperate howls of soldiers.

After successively destroying the two artillery positions of the British and French forces, the artillery on the fortress's battery shifted its muzzles and bombarded the temporary wooden fence camp.

Round shells fell like raindrops, and driven by huge inertia, they bounced around in the camp and hit the soldiers everywhere. Anyone who was touched by them would be killed, and anyone who was touched would be injured.

While smashing the carriages, the shells randomly changed direction, creating one bloody alley after another in the densely packed camp of soldiers.

Tents one after another were blown over by artillery shells and then caught fire. Flames half a person's height rose up, making the camp a mess.

Soon, the artillery fire from the Chu fortress subsided, allowing the British and French forces to catch their breath. They hurriedly dragged the burning tents to the open ground to prevent the fire from spreading.

They didn't know that Major General He Ruolin, who was guarding the fortress bunker, was also shocked. When he found that the British and French allied forces' tents were on fire, he hurriedly ordered to stop the shelling.

If the fire spreads deep into the dense forest and ignites the pre-buried flammable materials, the fire will burn so fiercely that even gods will be unable to put out the fire.

Now is not the right time to launch the attack.

In the Anglo-French camp

Several officers didn't know that they had just escaped a disaster. Major General Courbet's face was as black as the bottom of a pot. He had embarrassed himself in front of everyone, and no amount of explanation seemed pale and powerless.

The fierce counterattack of this round of artillery fire from the Chu army made these senior officers of the coalition forces look humiliated and they no longer had the arrogant attitude they had before.

If I hadn't run fast, I would probably have died.

Looking at the ruined camp and the wailing of wounded soldiers, Major General Courbet asked with shame and anger, "What's going on? What kind of artillery do the Orientals have? So sharp?"

"Reporting to the commander, we have now discovered that these Oriental troops are equipped with American 40-pound Parrot rifled field guns, numbering over . This is one of the world's top field artillery pieces, and the artillery skills are very sophisticated."

"Damn it, how come we didn't notice the exploratory attack yesterday?"

"Reporting to the commander, these Oriental troops are very cunning. Yesterday's bombardment only used three 12-pound Napoleon cannons and did not reveal their true strength."

"What are the casualties?"

"Reporting to the commander, a field artillery battalion is basically destroyed. 37 guns were destroyed, 141 casualties, 26 carriages and 42 tents were lost."

Major General Courbet was so overwhelmed by what he heard that he waved his hand to let the officer leave and turned around to say;
"It seems we have underestimated these opponents. They are like a pack of wild wolves hiding in the jungle. Under the offensive pressure of the coalition forces, they will reveal more of their cards.

The loss of a field artillery battalion is not a terrible thing, we have plenty of artillery.

The most urgent thing now is not to mobilize more artillery, but that our field camp is not safe and we need to open up another camp in the rear.

General Boggs, what do you think?"

"I think so. This artillery battle has given us a new understanding of the Chu army. They are indeed a formidable opponent." Major General Cameron Boggs's expression also became much more serious. After a moment of thought, he said;
"We can gather the Malay laborers, some to repair this camp, and others to build new camps in the woods. But the offensive cannot stop.

My British Indian Corps can join the battle sequence.

Immediately mobilize artillery reinforcements from the rear to open a path for the infantry to reinforce them."

"I agree. In addition to the necessary troops staying at the landing site, other forces can be transferred to serve as reserve forces." Major General Courbet put away his usual arrogant attitude and put forward new suggestions.

"Okay, let's do it." Major General Cameron Boggs, commander of the British Indian Corps, nodded in agreement.

Now that the two highest commanders of the army have reached an agreement, the order is to implement it quickly.

The artillery from the rear was quickly delivered, the new artillery positions were hidden in the jungle, the anti-artillery walls and other facilities were more comprehensive, and reinforcements also arrived one after another.

At noon
The total number of officers and soldiers who arrived at the front line of the Anglo-French Allied Forces exceeded 8,000. The Allied Forces deployed two field artillery battalions, which, together with the previous artillery, totaled more than 100 field artillery pieces and launched a fierce artillery bombardment on the Chu State's defensive positions.

The Chu artillery was not willing to be outdone and immediately retaliated, and a more intense artillery battle began.

The rumbling sound of cannons echoed through the valley, lasting for a long time...

On the sea near the Strait of Johor
At around 2 p.m., a large number of troop transports arrived on the sea. They were the second batch of British and French soldiers from Kuala Lumpur, totaling about 1.6 people.

After the transport fleet arrived, it sailed directly into the vicinity of the Johor Strait. The more than 60 small boats became busy again, continuously transporting soldiers to the shore.

It takes more than 20 minutes to go back and forth, and in an hour, six or seven thousand people are transported.

Around 5 p.m.
Basically, all the landing troops of more than 1.6 people landed on the island. The beach was crowded with people. After forming into teams one after another, they entered the jungle road under the leadership of their commanders.

It takes about an hour and a half to trek through the tropical jungle from the landing site to the front line where the two armies are in a stalemate.

Before reaching the front line, we could hear fierce gunfire and shouts in the distance, and the strong smell of blood wrapped in gunpowder smoke was so choking that it made us want to vomit.

A large number of Malayan laborers were setting up a forest camp in the dense forest in the rear. This forest camp was about 1.6 kilometers away from the front battlefield and about 2.8 kilometers away from the valley fortress where the Chu army was entrenched, beyond the limit of the enemy's artillery range.

As the large trees were felled, their branches cut off and dragged aside, the bushes and low vines were cleared away with sickles, revealing large areas of bare open space.

As they worked, the Malay workers discovered something was wrong.

There are often some raised things in the woods that are more than ten meters long and covered with a lot of firewood.

When they dug it open, they saw a lot of sulfur rocks and black powder mixed together. Some places were wet, and it seemed that they were poured with kerosene.

Sulfur rocks are very abundant in the archipelago. There are not only many extinct volcanoes, but also many active volcanoes. They erupt irregularly every few years, and over the years, a large amount of sulfur ore is produced.

These bumps covering the ground layer by layer do not look like naturally grown things.

One or two would have been fine, but as the clearing in the forest became larger and larger, several more were discovered one after another. This made many Malay workers lose their composure and they started shouting and yelling.

They were familiar with black powder, and kerosene was not a rare thing. In addition, hay and sulfur were deliberately piled together, which was creepy to think about.

Several Malay laborers even discovered these things tied to the trees with straw ropes, as well as wet oilcloth strips and black gunpowder tied to the tree trunks.

When I pulled it with my hands, it fell down and I screamed in fear.

This chaos attracted the angry shouts of the white officers, who came over with whips in hand...

"We can't hide it anymore. Brother Dali, what do you think we should do... Should we launch it in advance?"

"Damn it, we've been hiding for three days and now we've failed. Now we can only follow the emergency instructions from our superiors and launch the attack early. Shizhuzi, light the fire, Erlang, prepare the rockets, and light the fireworks."

"Alright, let's do a big job this time and drag these foreigners along with us."

A voice came from the branches of a large tree at the top of the dense forest, and then a fire lit up, illuminating the big tree with lush branches and leaves, where three people were hiding.

The area was surrounded by mosquito nets and camouflaged with many tree leaves. If you didn't look carefully, you wouldn't be able to find it.

The white officer who was cursing came closer and saw this scene. He could not hide the shock on his face and was completely speechless.

He couldn't imagine when these three people hid in the tree?

The three men took out bows and arrows, lit them on the fire and shot them everywhere. As soon as the arrows hit the nearby big trees, the trees would burst into flames violently.

The rocket hit the ground nearby, and the ground suddenly burst into flames, quickly spreading over a dozen meters. The fierce fire suddenly rose, wrapping all the nearby vines and bushes in the burning fireball, making a crackling sound.

Then, one after another, the lit signal cannons screamed and shot straight into the air, exploding high in the air with a wisp of green smoke and making a "bang" sound.

Just two or three minutes

Five or six fireworks were fired in succession, and then one after another fireworks were fired from the distant jungle, exploding in the sky above the lush tropical jungle.

The flames visible to the naked eye suddenly grew stronger and stronger, and the violently rolling fire snakes spread out. What flammable material was suddenly encountered in the jungle?

The flames spread violently in all directions, spreading extremely quickly...

Just a few minutes
The flames all around had spread violently, and the thick smoke ignited by the wet bushes, mixed with the smell of yellow sulfur, began to spread wildly everywhere.

When the white officer recovered from his shock, flames were already billowing all around him. Three strong Chinese men jumped down from the trees one after another, holding bows and arrows in their hands, shooting at the distance as they walked, not taking him seriously at all.

The white officer shouted in despair, "Oh my God, why are you doing this? You can't escape." Although he couldn't understand what the white officer was shouting, it was nothing more than "life or death". One of the strong Chinese men turned around, glared at him with contempt, and cursed.
"Damn it, we didn't plan on returning alive after doing this. It's worth it to drag you damned foreigners along with us..."

After saying that, he strode into the depths of the dense forest and was soon engulfed by the raging flames.

"Operation Wujiang" has been brought forward...

Standing high on the fortress bunker, Major General He Ruolin's eyes were caught by a cluster of burning flames. He calmly took out his Swiss gold watch and checked the time.

It is now 5:22 pm. Operation Wujiang has encountered an emergency and is forced to be implemented ahead of schedule.

On this point

Major General He Ruolin had also anticipated this. Standing on the high point of the bunker, he could sense the loud noise coming from the huge trees that were being cut down in the dense forest collapsing.

Through the telescope, you can see a blank area in the dense forest, which obviously means something has changed.

In this case, it is only a matter of time before the British and French forces discover the pre-buried incendiary devices, and they will definitely not be able to wait until the time for the plan to be launched.

Fortunately, the latest military information came from the observation post

This afternoon, the second wave of reinforcements from the Anglo-French forces arrived, totaling approximately 15000 to 16000 people. They have probably all landed and are now in the sea of ​​fire.

Adding to the above...

Major General He Ruolin looked at the corpses scattered in front of the position. These were the casualties caused by the British and French forces launching seven consecutive attacks and being hit by continuous artillery and volley guns.

What about quantity?
There were about seven or eight hundred people, all of them Indian soldiers from the British Indian Corps, and there was not a single white soldier from the French Foreign Legion.

When it comes to sending people to their deaths, the senior officers of the British and French Expeditionary Forces had a tacit understanding that they would not use the white soldiers of the Foreign Legion as cannon fodder.

As for why it is clear that these are Indian soldiers?

That's too easy. You can smell the strong smell of curry in the ranks of these soldiers from a distance. That's a characteristic that no one else can imitate.

If you don't have body odor, you will be very sensitive to the smell of body odor.

The same reason

Major General He Ruolin was very confident that he could smell the curry on these Indian soldiers from across several hills, and there was no doubt about it.

He looked up at the lush green jungle in the distance, his eyes full of satisfaction.

In the endless green jungle before our eyes, large balls of flames were rising from the treetops several meters high. The orange-red flames mixed with thick smoke and quickly spread in the jungle.

Just ten minutes later

You can see that a clear fire line has appeared in the forest. As it spreads, it suddenly expands and the flames become more intense.

Not long

More than a dozen long lines of fire have formed, and the scorching flames have burned through the uppermost layer of the forest, then formed a wall of fire dancing in the wind, engulfing more green forest in flames.

Dozens of large black smoke billowed out of the green forest before my eyes. The thick black smoke formed large black clouds in the sky, and countless gray ashes were scattered and drifted over the jungle like smog.

The wind fueled the fire, and the fire spread even more violently. These walls of fire would suddenly erupt violently as they expanded, again and again.

The attack of the British and French forces did not stop. Everyone was shouting and screaming in panic, and thousands of people were running frantically towards the Chu army fortress, trying to avoid being engulfed by the forest flames.

On the fortress
All the officers and soldiers of the 1st and 3rd Regiments climbed onto the fortress, stood densely in two rows, raised their rifles and aimed at the bottom of the fortress, and fired a deadly volley.

"Pah, pah, pah, pah, pah, pah..."

"Pah, pah, pah, pah, pah, pah..."

"Pah, pah, pah, pah, pah, pah..."

Deadly rain of bullets poured down, knocking down large groups of British and French soldiers who were rushing towards the fortress. Amidst the spurting blood, a large number of soldiers still rushed forward frantically.

They were caught in the barbed wire and then shot down by deadly bullets, stacked up layer by layer.

The fleeing soldiers behind them stepped on the corpses, as if they had lost their minds and gone mad. Then they were caught in a second wire mesh, like a bird caught in a spider web, struggling helplessly, and then died...

The rifles on the fortress unleashed a frenzied fire, firing dozens of volleys in just a few dozen minutes, causing heavy casualties to the British and French forces.

The shallow ditch in front of the defensive wall, three barbed wire fences and two deep trenches were filled with piles of corpses, and some injured coalition soldiers were howling in pain.

This tragic scene is like hell.

The forest fire gradually spread to the forward camp of the British and French forces, igniting a large amount of stored gunpowder, which then caused a huge and earth-shattering explosion.

The Chu soldiers standing on the fortress could all feel the obvious vibration, as if a dragon was turning over, and they could not even stand steadily.

The shock wave generated by the huge explosion instantly extinguished all the approaching flames in the surrounding area.

The explosion engulfed the surrounding carriages, artillery pieces, and a large amount of dust, forming a huge mushroom cloud that slowly rose to a height of more than 100 meters in the air.

The British and French fleets in the Strait of Johor also saw this mushroom cloud, and then they all fell silent.

Everything they saw before their eyes was a catastrophic scene.

Major General He Ruolin was a ruthless man. His "Wujiang Plan" deployed six groups of 18 assassins, three of which were located along the coast, where flammable materials were buried.

When the fireworks and cannons rose into the air, the six groups of assassins took action almost at the same time and began to ignite the inflammable and explosive materials that had been buried long ago, thus causing a forest fire.

Unlike the flammable and explosive materials buried more than ten meters deep in the jungle, the flammable and explosive materials buried near the coast are often more than a hundred meters away, and there are more of them, so they burn more fiercely.

What’s particularly terrible is that a lot of sulfur ore is added here.

Because of this, the British and French fleets saw a hellish scene, with large tracts of forest along the coast being the first to be set on fire.

The blazing flames would fly for hundreds of meters at a time. After the fierce burning spread, new explosions would soon occur, again and again, and large areas of the coast were covered by the blazing flames.

The flames spread so quickly that the landing soldiers were put in a desperate situation in a short time.

The landing soldiers gathered on the beach were forced to jump into the sea in panic, and then the yellow and black smoke produced by the burning flames covered a large area of ​​the coastline.

Those soldiers who jumped into the sea suddenly inhaled the poisonous smoke during strenuous exercise. They sank to the bottom of the sea before struggling for long and died very quickly.

The soldiers who fled deep into the jungle along the road were soon surrounded by flames and filled with poisonous smoke, and they could not hold out for long.

When this catastrophic scenario occurs
The small boats on the other side of the Johor Strait were shocked. Many soldiers rowed over recklessly, wanting to rescue their brothers trapped by the fire, and resolutely plunged into the smoke.

Then there is no more then.

Anyone who dared to row into the thick smoke would have no chance of coming back alive.

The British naval fleet wandering in the Strait of Johor soon discovered this. The sailors who smelled the smoke coughed violently and could not stop. Soon they fell to the ground with weak hands and feet.

Seeing this, the fleet immediately issued an emergency retreat order.

The sailing fleet quickly withdrew from the Johor Strait and watched the narrow strait shrouded in thick smoke. Everyone was shocked and speechless for a long time.

"Oh my God, these Orientals are a bunch of devils, they all deserve to die, all of them deserve to die!" Vice Admiral Calvin Phillips was already mad at this moment, his cheeks were flushed with anger, blood red and scary.

Because of his own little thoughts, he destroyed the main force of the British Indian Army.

The supreme honor of liberating Singapore should undoubtedly belong to the British Indian Corps and should not be taken away by the damned French mercenary group.

In that case, the British Army would lose face.

It is based on this careful thinking

He hurriedly ordered the second wave of reinforcements to depart from Kuala Lumpur. The more than 1.6 people on board were all British Indian Corps, and none of the remaining -plus French mercenary soldiers were loaded.

The reason is that there is no space left and we can only wait for the next wave.

Although Vice Admiral Calvin Phillips suffered a loss in the Singapore Strait early yesterday morning, he obviously did not learn his lesson. British pride has been ingrained in his bones.

In his opinion
By transporting more than 2.6 troops to land in Singapore, breaking through the ridiculous defense line of the Chu army is just around the corner and is not difficult at all.

Just a few years ago, the entire northern continent could not withstand the attack of 6000 British and French forces. How much trouble can these Eastern armies make?

As for the Chu army's bloody massacre of Saigon, it was just that the hateful thief took the opportunity when the tiger was napping and stole the victory.

It was not just him who thought so. Senior generals of the British and French forces generally held the same view, and ended up suffering a great defeat.

Looking at the flames rising from Singapore Island, Vice Admiral Calvin Phillips felt heartbroken, with two lines of tears silently flowing down his wrinkled cheeks.

At this moment, he cried like a child.

"Devils, devils! They are a group of devils that crawled out of hell. They only bring death and endless terror. God, please give me your guidance!"

(End of this chapter)