1848 Great Qing Charcoal Burners

Chapter 207 A crushing defeat

After half a day of shelling and reconnaissance.

Peng Gang had already realized that although the Qing army was numerous, it numbered nearly ten thousand soldiers.

However, the Qing army had several obvious weaknesses.

One reason is the low morale of the Qing army.

Even Chu Yong's morale was far lower than it had been six months ago. Unlike the Left Army, whose morale was high and whose soldiers were almost all willing to fight to the death, eager to defeat the enemy and achieve merit.

Secondly, the various units of the Qing army acted independently, appearing united but actually divided.

Li Xingyuan clearly intended to use Jiang Zhongyuan's Chu soldiers as human shields and cannon fodder. The left army's heavy artillery bombarded the Chu soldiers on Lion Ridge for half a day before the Qing army in the rear sent troops up the ridge to support them.

Thirdly, the Qing army consisted mostly of infantry, with very few cavalry, only about a hundred of whom were used for reconnaissance.

Defeating this Qing army, which was similar in number to the Left Army, was not difficult; the difficulty lay in how to rout the Qing army with minimal losses.

A methodical, forceful assault on Lion Ridge would clearly not achieve this.

Jiang Zhongyuan's Chu Yong had been managing Shiziling for nearly a month, and their defensive preparations were quite thorough.

Just now, Peng Gang also clearly saw through the telescope that there were rolling logs and rocks, spike traps, and iron caltrops set up on the mountainside of Lion Ridge.

Compared to his predecessors, Chu Yong was far inferior, but compared to the Qing army brought by Li Xingyuan, he was the most elite Qing army force.

A strong attack on Lion Ridge could capture it, but the casualties would certainly be greater.

Furthermore, Peng Gang's primary target in this attack on Shuitang Bay was not Jiang Zhongyuan's Chu troops, but the main force of the Hunan Qing army brought by Li Xingyuan.

This was intended to clear obstacles for the subsequent attack on Lingling, the capital of Yongzhou Prefecture.

Once the Qing army under Li Xingyuan in Taipingpu and Chetianli is defeated, Peng Gang does not believe that Jiang Zhongyuan will remain indifferent and continue to hold out at Shiziling.

"The First Battalion, the Ninth Provisional Battalion, the Tenth Provisional Battalion, and the Eleventh Provisional Battalion will bypass Lion Ridge and attack Taipingpu from the left flank."

Order Chen Ajiu to send his two battalions to attack the Qing troops in the Chentianli area on the east bank of the Xiang River. They must be routed! After defeating the Qing troops in Chentianli, they may pursue them.

Peng Gang tugged on the reins to calm the somewhat restless white warhorse beneath him and gave the order.

The Chu troops, who had been stationed at Shiziling for nearly a month, were well-prepared, while the Qing troops under Li Xingyuan, who had just entered Taipingpu and Chentianli, were basically unprepared.

Although they outnumbered Chu Yong, fighting them was much easier for them.

Upon receiving the order, each battalion began to carry out Peng Gang's command.

Chen Ajiu had already led two battalions in a feigned attack on the 3,000 Qing troops under Sun Yingzhao, who had just entered Chentian yesterday.

Sun Yingzhao's Qing army was twice the size of Chen Ajiu's.

Even so, the three thousand Qing soldiers and local militia were on the verge of collapse under the feint attack of Chen Ajiu's two battalions.

If Peng Gang hadn't given Chen Ajiu a feint attack and Chen Ajiu hadn't held back, he would have already routed Sun Yingzhao's three thousand Qing troops.

Upon receiving Peng Gang's order, Chen Ajiu gathered his troops and launched a full-scale attack on Sun Yingzhao's Qing army.

Although Sun Yingzhao had a large number of Qing troops, only one thousand were Green Standard Army soldiers from Yongzhou Town who had participated in low-intensity battles such as bandit suppression. The remaining two thousand Qing troops were new recruits from Yongzhou Prefecture who were going to the battlefield for the first time.

These two thousand new soldiers from Yongzhou Prefecture are completely unreliable; their only purpose is to boost morale.

Being able to stand in the middle of the formation and not collapse is already an extraordinary performance.

On the surface, Sun Yingzhao led 3,000 soldiers and local militia to fight against 1,500 Zuo Jun soldiers. In reality, Sun Yingzhao only had 1,000 Yongzhou Town Green Standard Army soldiers, with a core of more than 100 personal guards, against 1,500 Zuo Jun soldiers.

Faced with Chen Ajiu's feigned attack, Sun Yingzhao was only leading his personal guards to patch up the leaks and barely hold on, so as not to fail Li Xingyuan's kindness in recognizing and promoting him.

Sun Yingzhao was completely unable to withstand the all-out attack from the two battalions on the left.

Before the Qing army's arquebusiers could fire a second volley, the scattered and loosely organized troops quickly scattered in fear as the left-wing officers rushed towards them.

The Qing soldiers instinctively ran towards the riverbank, scrambling to board the boats moored on the river.

The Qing soldiers and local militia, fleeing for their lives, no longer cared which boats belonged to the Chu army and which belonged to the Green Standard Army from Yongzhou Town.

They would squeeze onto whichever ship was closest to them and whichever ship had available seats.

The Qing soldiers who had squeezed onto the boats first, seeing the Left Army soldiers closing in on the shore, decisively cut the mooring lines and rowed away before their comrades who hadn't yet boarded, in order to shake off the Left Army's pursuit. This infuriated the Qing soldiers and local militia who hadn't yet boarded, who cursed under their breath.

Shuitang Bay is located in the upper reaches of the Xiangjiang River. The nearby section of the Xiangjiang River is not only shallow but also narrow, with the river surface only a little over 100 meters wide.

The Qing troops camped at Taipingpu, across the river from Chentianli, could clearly see the rout of their friendly forces in the Chentianli camp.

Some Qing soldiers who failed to seize a boat even swam across the river and stole a boat from the west bank of the Xiang River to escape.

The friendly forces were routed and scrambled to seize boats. They also heard that the Taiping army had bypassed Lion Ridge and was coming to attack Taipingpu.

How could the Qing troops at Taipingpu remain seated?

Before the battle even began, the Qing troops in the Taipingpu area rushed to the riverbank, scrambling for boats and rafts, fearing that if they were a step too late, they would have no boats to catch.

Even when Li Xingyuan, the imperial envoy, personally led the Qing troops out of his command tent to suppress the rebellion, they could not achieve their goal.

Upon arriving at Lion Ridge, Liu Changqing saw that the Qing troops in Chetianli and Taipingpu had all fled. He had no intention of assisting Chu Yong in defending Lion Ridge and immediately withdrew from the ridge to join the fleeing troops.

Of the troops defending Lion Ridge, only Jiang Zhongyuan's Chu soldiers remained.

When Chu Yong saw that Li Xingyuan's Qing troops had all fled, his army's morale also wavered, and his will to fight was completely lost.

"The tide has turned!"

Looking at the Qing army that was collapsing like a house of cards, Jiang Zhongyuan stamped his foot and said.

Instead of attacking Lion Ridge, the Left Army attacked Taipingpu, rendering the Qing troops in Chetian useless.

If the Left Army attacks Lion Ridge, Jiang Zhongyuan can still lead the Chu troops, relying on their knowledge of the terrain of Lion Ridge, to set up traps and prepare rolling logs and rocks in advance, resisting the Left Army step by step and buying some time.

However, Zuo Jun did not play by the rules. He bypassed Lion Ridge, did not engage with Chu Yong, and went straight to attack the Qing army under Li Xingyuan.

Jiang Zhongyuan had considered that he might not be able to stop the rising tide of the Left Army, but he did not expect that with roughly equal numbers and the Qing army in a well-rested defensive position, they could not even last a day.

Jiang Zhongyuan now faces two paths.

One option is to defend Lion Ridge to the death and resist to the very end.

One option is to take advantage of the fact that the Left Army has not yet encircled Lion Ridge, break out with Chu Yong, protect Chu Yong, and ensure that as long as there is life, there will always be hope.

This multiple-choice question is not difficult.

To send two thousand Chu soldiers alone against the Left Army, which outnumbered them several times over, was tantamount to throwing an egg against a rock.

"Brother, let's retreat."

Even Jiang Zhongji, the fiercest general of Chu, who was always warlike, advocated withdrawing from Lion Ridge in the face of an irreversible situation.

It wasn't that Chu Yong was cowardly, but rather that the Left Army was too strong, and Chu Yong's allies were too incompetent.

Li Xingyuan's soldiers, let alone compared to Zhang Bilu, if they had even seven or eight tenths of the ability of Xiang Rong's Chu army, would not have been so easily defeated by the short-haired cult bandits.

"Retreat! But Chu Yong will not retreat with Li Gong and the others."

Jiang Zhongyuan raised his binoculars and observed the river surface near Shuitang Bay. He could clearly see that even Chu Yong's boats had been almost completely looted. Now that they had retreated from Shiziling to the riverbank, Chu Yong had no boats to take and could only walk along the river.

"Why not retreat with Li Gong and the others?" Jiang Zhongji asked, puzzled. Jiang Zhongji was relatively simple-minded and felt that it would be safer and more secure to retreat with the main force.

“When the short-haired rebels don’t fight, they’re fine, but when they do fight, they’re always aiming to annihilate the government troops. Do you think they’ll just give up and watch Li Gong calmly sail back to Yongzhou Prefecture?” Jiang Zhongyuan asked rhetorically.

Even if Chu Yong's ships had been seized by Li Xingyuan's troops, Jiang Zhongyuan would not have fled with Li Xingyuan even if Li Xingyuan's troops hadn't seized Jiang Zhongyuan's ships.

The short-haired cult leader was clearly after Li Xingyuan. Why would he take Chu Yong and run away with Li Xingyuan? Did he want to die even faster?
"Does Brother mean that Shorty has set up an ambush on the way Li Gong and his men retreated back to Yongzhou Prefecture?" Jiang Zhongji thought for a moment and soon realized what was going on.

“That’s for sure.” Jiang Zhongyuan tightened his belt and said, “Take all the brothers and, while the short-haired men are focused on Li Gong and the others, break through to the west and head to the bridgehead to meet up with Yin Qu. If we can’t protect Hunan, then let’s settle for protecting our hometown, Xinning.”

Jiang Zhongyuan decided not to follow Li Xingyuan by water to Lingling, the capital of Yongzhou Prefecture, but instead chose to break through by land westward toward his hometown of Xinning County.

Xinning is mountainous, with very few flat areas. The route from Shiziling to Xinning is mostly along mountain paths.

Once they entered the mountains, the paths would be difficult to discern, and Duanmao wouldn't dare to pursue them too deeply. Chu Yong and Duanmao were both locals from Xinning, so once they entered the mountains, they would be safe.

(End of this chapter)