bookcurios Chapter 452 Siege Battle
Chapter 452 Siege Battle
This time the Xiongnu army was led by Yelu Qing from the west, who was the closest and most trusted general of Chanyu Dun.
In this expedition, 50,000 mortars and tiger barrel cannons were all equipped in his army, and the heavy responsibility of attacking Shizhou City naturally fell on his shoulders.
The army led by Yelu Qing totaled 200,000 people, of which the vanguard army had 100,000 led by Gulizar.
Gaddafi was the general leading 50,000 troops in the vanguard of the Western Route Army. His troops were equipped with 5,000 mortars. As the first team to attack Shizhou City, this number of mortars seemed sufficient.
The mortars produced by the Wang family of Mayi have a range of up to 800 steps. Compared with heavy siege equipment, their lightness and flexibility are particularly prominent.
In order to enable the soldiers to become proficient in using these weapons as quickly as possible, Yu Wenhua and Tuoba Youyou's teams specially selected a group of outstanding gunners and gave them professional training.
In this era, people's concept of weapon use was relatively simple. They thought that as long as they could learn to aim and successfully fire the shells, it would be fine.
After only one month of training, the Xiongnu army had the confidence to attack the city.
Gaddafi led the vanguard troops with weapons. At his command, the first team's 2,000 mortars launched a fierce attack towards the north gate of Shizhou.
Qin Zichuan was in charge of defending the city wall. Seeing the enemy approaching, he immediately ordered the use of large-caliber artillery produced in Bingzhou to fight back.
The large-caliber artillery used to defend the city has now been changed from solid bullets to explosive bullets, with a range of one thousand steps, which is two hundred steps longer than the Huns' mortars.
"Watch them all, and blow them up!"
Qin Zichuan was giving loud orders on the city wall, with many rolling logs piled behind him to prevent him from counterattacking when the enemy approached.
Bingzhou's large-caliber cannon was improved under the inspiration of mortars. The shape of the shell is similar to that of a mortar shell, with one end being round and the other end being an ellipse without a tail fin. There is a jet nozzle at the rear end and a fuse connected to it.
The shells fell into the enemy group, and the dust raised by the explosion instantly terrified the Hun soldiers.
A row of artillery shells were fired, causing the Hun army to panic and retreat briefly.
However, this panic was only temporary, and they soon reorganized and launched a new round of attacks.
From a distance, you can see them advancing steadily with mortars.
The cannons on the city walls still use the traditional front-end loading method to replace ammunition.
After all, Shizhou wasn't a direct descendant of the Wang family, and the cannons they used were mostly discarded from Jinyang or other city walls. The fact that they could be equipped with explosive shells was already a special favor from Wang Danwang.
In Bingzhou, the weapons of the border troops were previously supplied by the imperial court. However, Shizhou, as a city governed by aristocratic families, was an inner city in Bingzhou, and the weapons had to be purchased by the garrison themselves.
Strictly speaking, Shizhou has the right to decide independently where to purchase weapons.
At this moment, the Xiongnu cavalry had quietly approached to within more than 200 steps. Under the city wall, mortars were quietly set up like vicious wolves, ready to fire.
On the city wall, cannons were sparsely placed, with one every ten steps, like lonely warriors on watch.
The gunners were frantically loading shells, each shot carrying a heavy load of hope, but they could only pray for the favor of the god of fate. It was hard to predict whether they could accurately hit the rampaging enemy.
At the same time, the mortars in the Hun formation were not to be outdone. The roars came one after another, and the shells whistled through the sky with sharp sounds, heading straight for the city wall.
Fortunately, most of these messengers of death bloomed in front of and behind the city walls, leaving only smoke and tremors. The cannons on the city walls were spared and continued to hold their positions.
This is a battle of hot weapons. Every minute and every second is thrilling, and life and death are just a matter of moments.
"Captain Qin, the house behind us where we store supplies has been blown up and is on fire!"
Sun Yue, the head of the group, hurried over to report to Qin Zichuan.
"Are you bored? We have to deal with the enemies outside the city. If there's a fire, the soldiers below will handle it!"
Qin Zichuan said unhappily.
"No, there's some gunpowder stored where the fire started. If it continues to burn, or if it's put out with water, all the gunpowder will be wasted!"
Sun Yue explained anxiously.
This made Qin Zichuan even more angry, and he cursed: "You bastard, now that you know, why don't you send someone to rescue the gunpowder?"
After being scolded, Sun Yue didn't bother to retort. He turned around and ran towards the burning pile of supplies alone.
When he arrived, he saw soldiers carrying water and preparing to put out the fire.
"Stop, let me get my things out first!"
Sun Yue shouted at the top of his lungs.
The soldier who was preparing to put out the fire heard someone shouting to stop from behind. He turned around and saw a man running towards him in a hurry. He quickly lifted the wooden board that was pressing on him and rushed out with a wooden barrel in one hand.
In fact, the fire was not big, and the burning area did not directly affect the place where the gunpowder was stored. Otherwise, if it exploded, everyone who came to put out the fire would be doomed.
One of the soldiers fighting the fire asked curiously, "Sir, what are you holding in your hand?"
Sun Yue replied nonchalantly, "Two barrels of gunpowder, luckily they didn't explode, otherwise we would all die here. Now it's okay, you can put out the fire."
When the soldiers who were putting out the fire heard this, they were stunned and felt a chill on their backs. They secretly thanked their luck.
Some people couldn't help but sigh that Sun Yue was really brave. He actually rushed over to grab two barrels of gunpowder. If it exploded, I'm afraid even his body would not be found.
The gunpowder barrels were not too heavy, weighing about fifty kilograms each, and Sun Yue ran out carrying them.
The Huns' artillery reloaded very quickly, and after the first round of explosion points were inaccurate, they quickly made calibrations.
Shells landed on the city walls, sending bricks and stones flying and injuring many soldiers. Fortunately, most of the cannons were still in place.
Two thousand mortars lay beneath the city walls, creating a considerable density of firepower. If the Xiongnu soldiers hadn't been unfamiliar with these weapons, the city walls would have been blown to smithereens.
After the cannons on the city wall launched the third round of bombardment, the Huns below the city began to suffer casualties, and large pits were blown out at the locations of some mortars.
Perhaps it was a coincidence, but this scene greatly boosted the morale of the soldiers on the city wall. They continued to load gunpowder and cannonballs, vowing to annihilate all the enemies below the city.
Unfortunately, ideals are beautiful, but reality is cruel.
Under the intensive mortar attacks of the Huns, the city walls began to partially collapse and several cannons were unfortunately destroyed.
The cannons on the left and right sides of the destroyed city wall could still be supplied, but even though the cannons on the middle wall still had their barrels intact, their shells had quickly run out.
"Quickly send someone to set up a ladder and get the shells up there!"
Qin Zichuan was extremely anxious when he saw this, and quickly ordered his soldiers to support the damaged middle city wall. There were still cannons there, but they could not continue firing because there was no gunpowder and shells.
The Huns' mortars continued to rain down shells on the north gate. The shells continued to explode on the city walls and surrounding areas, bringing unprecedented heavy damage to the soldiers of Shizhou.
The wooden hanging tower on the city wall also caught fire. The soldiers were only concerned with protecting the gunpowder and shells, but had no time to pay attention to the increasingly fierce fire...