Late Ming Dynasty: Oops, I am surrounded by the Donglin Party

Outside the city of Nanjing, Gao Jie and Liu Zeqing were busy mobilizing troops.

Unlike later film and television dramas, it is difficult to carry out a raid when tens of thousands of troops are dispatched from the city.

In order to prevent Huang Degong from cheating, Xu Hongji refused to open more city gates and only opened the gate opposite to where Huang Degong's main force was located, which was the East Gate.

It took the 60,000-strong army nearly half an hour just to leave the city and assemble into formation.

By the time Gao Jie and Liu Zeqing had finally reorganized their formation and were ready to launch an attack, Huang Degong, Zhou Yuji, Sun Yingyuan and other generals of the Yongwei Camp, as well as Sun Dasheng and Wang Jingduo from the Jing Camp had already been waiting for a long time.

As early as the time of dividing the troops, Zhang Shikang handed over the command of this army, including the Beijing camp troops, to Huang Degong.

Huang Degong, Zhou Yuji and others had already discussed countermeasures for possible attacks.

Considering that the soldiers of the Beijing Camp are mainly equipped with firearms and have unique tactics against firearms phalanxes, after communicating with Wang Jingduo, it was decided that the core of this defense should be the 5,000 musketeers of the Beijing Camp plus the 3,000 musketeers of the Yongwei Camp.

As for why we have to defend, it is because the enemy is taking the initiative to attack. If we can fight a defensive counterattack, who will fight an offensive war?

You can line up your troops for defense, but it is not so easy for the attacker.

In terms of tactical arrangements, the 5,000 musketeers of the Beijing Camp were arranged in fan-shaped formations in units of 500.

The musketeers of the Yongwei Camp were divided into three teams, stationed on both sides of the musketeers of the Jing Camp. In front and on both sides of the musketeers were a group of shield soldiers and two teams of spearmen.

There were gaps of several meters between the fan-shaped arrays of musketeers. To prevent any unexpected events, several teams of borers were stationed in the gaps.

On the left and right wings of the entire battle formation, the front side was composed of 1,000 archers from the Brave Guard Battalion, and the back side was composed of 1,500 cavalry from the Brave Guard Battalion.

In the entire battle formation, there was no sign of Sun Dasheng, the lieutenant general of the Beijing Camp Cavalry, and his 5,000 cavalry.

After Gao Jie and Liu Zeqing had arranged the troops, without any trash talk before the battle, Gao Jie immediately ordered the drums to be beaten and the troops to march forward.

Tens of thousands of troops attacked in an overwhelming manner. Due to the large number of soldiers, the entire front line was pressed forward like dumplings. This formation alone was enough to scare many people.

However, neither the Yongwei Battalion nor the Jing Battalion belongs to Xiamen University.

This was especially true of the soldiers in the Beijing camp. Even the most timid Wang Jingduo was not afraid at all, for they had all experienced the iron hooves charge of the Tartars.

The enemy's infantry moved neither hurriedly nor slowly, and suddenly stopped when they were 300 steps away from the opposite side. The cavalry drew a circle on both sides of the infantry and then began to accelerate their charge towards the Beijing camp soldiers.

This time, Gao Jie directly sent all 8,000 cavalrymen from the two units forward. The collective charge of 8,000 cavalrymen was still very scary.

But the formation is still not even close to that of the Tartar heavy cavalry, Wang Jingduo thought.

As he thought this, he estimated the distance between the enemy cavalry and the phalanx.

When the cavalry approached to within 120 steps, as the iron whistle sounded between the arrays, the phalanx musketeers automatically switched formations, changed into squatting or standing postures, raised their guns and began to aim.

Then another whistle was sounded, and thick smoke began to billow between the square formations.

But then there were bang sounds, black smoke billowed from the square formation, and the sound was like thunder as the three rows of ten Beijing camp square formations fired at the same time.

Under such intensive firepower, the cavalry at the front were immediately thrown to the ground.

The biggest advantage of the Beijing Camp's firearms phalanx is its shooting density. If the enemy is charging with infantry, they will use the typical three-stage attack. When the cavalry is charging, in order to increase the shooting density, they will use the nine-stage attack.

After the cavalry in the front row fell to the ground, the cavalry in the rear who were too close had no time to dodge, and many of them fell off their horses.

At this time, the musketeers of the Yongwei Camp also began to fire their muskets, but the musketeers of the Yongwei Camp were still old-style muskets, and their shooting accuracy and range were not as good as the Rumi muskets of the Jing Camp.

The firearms workshop of the Ming Dynasty's Ministry of Industry has been working overtime to produce the Rumi gun. However, whether it is the Tianxiong Army, the Qin Army, or the newly recruited firearms soldiers of the Beijing Camp, they are all waiting to be replaced with the latest Rumi gun.

Zhang Shikang established a new group of workshops in the Xishan Camp. In addition to developing new firearms, he also wanted to speed up the production of firearms.

Wang Jingduo calmly commanded the square formation. The three teams of soldiers who had fired automatically retreated, and the last three rows followed in turn...

Zhou Yuji looked at the Rumi gun of the Beijing Camp with some envy. He certainly knew this tactic, but the accuracy, range and loading speed of the old-style musket were not enough to support this tactic. Using this tactic would affect the shooting efficiency.

The most intensive shooting naturally caused the greatest damage. Before the cavalry rushed to the front of the formation, they had already been hit by three volleys of fire from muskets.

At least 800 cavalrymen died on the way to the charge, and Gao Jie and Liu Zeqing were very distressed about this.

At this time, Ma Jun is an absolute treasure no matter where he is.

But there is no other way. If you want to provide the infantry with as many opportunities as possible, you can only use the cavalry to charge the enemy's formation. Only by disrupting and destroying the enemy's shooting formation can the infantry play a higher role.

After experiencing three rounds of volleys from muskets and arrows from two thousand archers, the cavalry quickly formed a battle formation and raised their ten-foot-long spears at an angle.

The enemy's cavalry generals decisively turned around and retreated from both sides of the phalanx.

The cavalry general was terrified because he saw that the enemy's muskets were preparing to fire again. Not only was the shooting density very high, but the shooting efficiency was also very high.

He saw archers, shieldmen, and spearmen mixed in with the enemy's phalanx. He even saw spearmen among the enemy's phalanx. If he rushed in, he would be badly injured if not killed.

It would be better to just leave it to the infantry at the rear.

Upon seeing this, Gao Jie exchanged a glance with Liu Zeqing, feeling both shocked and angry. He was shocked by the strength of the Beijing Camp's musketeers, and angry that the cavalry really disappointed him.

But the opportunity on the battlefield was fleeting, and he had to immediately order his infantry to attack.

Tens of thousands of infantrymen holding iron spears began to accelerate, and among them there were also thousands of archers and, of course, shieldmen.

However, their formation became chaotic as soon as they started running, and the shieldmen were left behind.

Fortunately, the infantry brigade was covered by the retreating cavalry, and was not sniped by the musketeers until it was only eighty steps away from the enemy.

Bang, bang, bang—bang, bang, bang—

Because the shield bearers were left behind, casualties increased rapidly.

After being attacked by another round of arrows, the infantry, despite the scolding from the supervising team, still charged forward.

Their archers finally shot the first wave of arrows. Needless to say, they were very evenly distributed, with many of them landing sparsely in front of the formation.

Shock! Their archers couldn't even shoot from 60 steps away!

This is almost the same level as the peasant army that has not received any training.

Wang Jingduo even cursed inwardly, because he had worried for nothing. After all, the volley of thousands of archers was still very terrifying.

When the enemy infantry suffered another round of three-stage attacks and paid a huge price, their formation became extremely scattered, and they finally engaged in close combat with the enemy phalanx.

Gao Jie and Liu Zeqing were suddenly secretly delighted because they found that the enemy's formation had not changed.

As we all know, the musketeers at this time were almost in the same position as the crossbowmen, both of them were only suitable for long-range combat and not good at close combat.

Generally, before close combat begins, troops must retreat to a safe distance and other arms will take over the battlefield.

But Huang Degong didn't do that.

But when their infantry really came into close combat with the musketeers of the Beijing Camp, the two men immediately stopped laughing.

Because the musketeers of the Beijing Camp suddenly transformed themselves into melee soldiers wielding swords.

And... their infantry couldn't win.

……