Chapter 45: Fortresses and Gunboats

  While the Tongmenghui was busy in Tokyo wiping Zhao's butt, the mastermind behind the Jiujiang Anti-British Telegram was inspecting the fortifications at Jinjipao.

  "Boom! Boom!"

  Two dull booms of the cannon, the air suddenly shook, two 210mm shells were thrown into the air, drew a beautiful curve and fell down, hitting the Yangtze River, splashing waves as high as six feet.

  "Not bad, if it's a blooming bullet, I suppose the power would be even stronger." Zhao Bei put down his binoculars and sincerely praised.

  "It's a pity that it's an old-fashioned turret gun, the firing speed is too slow, and there are only six large guns, the rest are small ones." Wu Zhenhan said.

  "Be content with what you have, it's still better than being cannon fodder."

  Zhao Bei and his staff walked into the artillery position, came to a Krupp fortress cannon, stretched out his hand to touch the hot barrel, and glanced at the inscription on it.

  "In 1888, roughly our age," Zhao Bei said to his staff.

  Everyone looked at each other and smiled, surrounding the big gun to point fingers and draw feet. Most of them had never seen a caliber as large as this giant cannon. It was relying on these giant cannons that Jinji Slope Fortress could become the throat of the middle reaches of the Yangtze River, together with the downstream Ma'an Fortress and Jiangyin Fortress, known as the "Yangtze River Lock".

  "Has he ever participated in the First Sino-Japanese War?" As he stroked the barrel of the cannon, Zhao Bei's eyes gazed into the distance.

  "Report! The six large cannons have been repositioned, awaiting orders to continue firing from the Commander-in-Chief!" An officer ran over and stood at attention.

  "You must be the bandmaster of the Artillery Battalion." Zhao Bei couldn't recall this person's name for a moment.

  "Colonel Shen Shanglian! Currently the commander of the Jinjipao fortress!" The officer said loudly, also reminding Zhao Bei that he had also been promoted.

  "You led the uprising, I'm delighted. I heard from Wu Zhenhan that you graduated from the Japanese Military Academy?" Zhao Bei nodded. This Shen Shanglian was originally the commander of the Qing army's fortress artillery battalion, and soon after Wu Zhenhan's first brigade launched an attack, he led his troops in a mutiny, attacking the artillery fort, turning the cannons around to bombard the Qing army barracks in Jiujiang, otherwise, the city of Jiujiang would not have surrendered so quickly.

  "Reporting to the Commander-in-Chief! My department is the second batch of Japanese-study officers, and I studied artillery." Shen Shangrui said.

  "Oh? You're also from the second batch? So that means you and Lan Tianwei are classmates?" Zhao Bei exclaimed in surprise.

  "Yes!"

  "Are you with the Triad?"

  "No."

  "Not? Don't worry, as long as you participate in the revolution, you are a comrade of the revolution." Zhao Bei said with a smile, walking to a shell and pointing at it asked: "How heavy is this shell?"

  Shen Shangyuan said: "Each cluster bomb weighs 280 pounds, the propellant package weighs 90 pounds, and the solid bullet weighs..."

  The words were hardly out of his mouth when a soldier shouted: "Here they come again! Here they come again! The Tartar's gunboats are coming again!"

  Several people rushed out of the gun position, raised their binoculars and looked downstream at the Yangtze River. They saw a few strands of black smoke coming from afar, with yellow dragon flags fluttering in the wind, which were two small gunboats of the Qing army.

  Since the surrender of Jiujiang, Qing naval ships have been coming from downstream to harass us. If it weren't for the fortifications at Jinji Slope, I'm afraid the Qing naval ships' shells would have already fallen into Jiujiang City. Although there are only six large-caliber guns with a long range in the fortifications, they are not something that the small Qing naval ships can contend with. Often after being bombarded by several rounds of artillery fire, they would be scared away.

  Zhao Bei raised his right hand, which was wearing a sheepskin glove, and pointed at the two gunboats. "Concentrate your firepower," he said, "use solid shot for a salvo, let's take down their arrogance."

  "Yes!" Shen Shanglian hastily ran off to shout the command.

  The fortress artillery quickly loaded the shells, adjusted their position and angle, and with a whistle, the six Krupp giant cannons roared to life, shaking the earth. The six shells flew over, sandwiching the two small gunboats in a massive splash, scaring them into hastily turning around and fleeing downstream.

  As those few wisps of black smoke gradually disappeared into the distance, the staff officers all breathed a sigh of relief, and the artillerymen even cheered.

  Zhou Bei furrowed his brow and said to Wu Zhenhan, "The Qing army can divide its troops to harass Jiucheng City, it seems that the pressure on Anqing has eased. I wonder how General Xiong and the others are doing?"

  "Anqing has no fortifications; if the Qing army uses warships to attack, it won't be able to hold out for a few days." Wu Zhenhan shared similar sentiments.

  "I hope General Xiong can respond flexibly and not be stuck in a lonely city. If all else fails, he should attack northward, occupy Luzhou, or go to the mountains." Zhao looked back at the artillery position. "Fortunately, the Qing army's warship cannons don't have a longer range than ours, otherwise we wouldn't be able to hold Jiujiang either."

  "It's now the dry season, and the Qing naval ships can't come in. The cannons on the smaller vessels are too small, their range is no match for the fort's cannons." said Wu Zhenhan.

  "We can't be too optimistic, these six fort cannons are firing too slowly. If the enemy ships rush up in a swarm, they won't be able to withstand it. If Anqing falls, the Qing army will concentrate its forces to attack Jiujiang, which is still a threat to our western expedition." As he spoke, Zhao Bei looked up at the Yangtze River.

  "The Yangtze River's dry season won't end until the spring, and before that, we have at least one or two months to attack Wuhan. We now have thousands of large and small sailboats in our hands, which can guarantee the transportation of troops and supplies. Baishan, how is the repair of that captured gunboat going?"

  The gunboat was originally the Qing army's "Chu Guan" number, which was originally ordered to depart from Wuhan to Anqing to reinforce the Qing army. On the night of the recovery of Jiujiang, this gunboat arrived at the dock in Jiujiang and stopped to refuel. It happened that the rebel troops who took over the dock encountered it, so they captured the ship and its crew as spoils of war. At the time, the captain of the gunboat tried to escape with his ship, but just after cutting off the anchor chain, the rebels' cannons hit the stern of the ship, damaging the rudder machine, which prevented them from escaping. For the past two days, this gunboat has been docked at the pier for repairs. Through interrogation of the sailors and officers on board, the rebel army also clarified the strength of the Qing naval forces upstream.

  "Chu Kuan" is the last large inland gunboat on the upper reaches of the Yangtze River. If they advance to Hubei now, the revolutionary army will not be blocked by the fleet from upstream, and the only thing that needs to be guarded against are those downstream gunboats attacking Anqing.

  Apart from the regular gunboat, the insurgent troops also captured a ferry, which was a small paddle steamer with a wooden hull and a horizontal steam engine. It had originally been the touring boat of the Daoist master, and it still had a troupe of Beijing Opera performers on board. The insurgent troops incorporated the performers into their propaganda team and mounted field artillery on the ferry, converting it into a small gunboat which they named "The Republic". In this way, the insurgent army now possessed two gunboats, although they were somewhat inferior, they were still better than sailing ships.

  Wu Zhenhan said: "It's almost repaired, but there are fewer people driving the boat, and we need to supplement some water soldiers." The ship was captured, but not all the Qing army water soldiers on the ship were willing to join the revolution. On the one hand, they had concerns, and on the other hand, the military pay for water soldiers had always been generous, so it seemed unnecessary to risk their lives for that little bit of restoration pay. Of the 80 officers and men on the entire ship, only more than 40 were willing to join the revolution, and the remaining "Manchu running dogs" were also sent to the labor camp.

  Zhao Bei thought for a moment, then turned to the guard captain Tian Jin standing behind him and said: "Yiren, you select a reliable subordinate from one of your platoons, form a marine guard team, board the ship as sailors, and ensure that we have complete control over the 'Chu Guan'. Do you understand what I mean?"

  "Understood! Just keep an eye on that gunboat, so the sailors on board won't turn against us." Tian Jinfu said.

  "It's fine if you understand." Zhao Bei patted the shoulder of this guard captain and said in a low voice, "However, next time remember not to be so loud."

  The Chief of Staff Blue Sky rushed over with a few people, still holding a letter in his hand.

  "Commander-in-Chief, someone has been sent from Anqing to contact us! This is a letter from General Xiong." Lantian handed the letter to Zhao Bei and pointed to the people behind him. "They are messengers sent by General Xiong, they came on a foreign ship."