Chapter 298
Chapter 298.
Fort Biddle was eventually lost, and the lords inside took advantage of the late night to falsely set up torches and banners on the walls and quietly withdraw through the underground tunnels.
After dawn, the Duke’s army began to prepare for the new day’s attack, and Jaaius sat in command with his reddened eyes open.
Last night he only slept for a few hours, late at night, the troops on guard at the west side of the castle ran over to report that there had been a looming fire further to the west, the officer in charge of the patrol didn’t dare to be careless, and personally ran quickly to the camp to report.
Jaaius endured the nameless fire of being woken up and inquired carefully, “Are we sure it’s enemy reinforcements?”
“Can’t be sure, it’s too far away and disappeared right away, but I think it’s better to be careful.”
“You’ve done well, inform all battalions to be on alert!”
Jaaius had to be on his guard, what sane person would travel in the middle of the night, it would be bad if his side was unprepared for a sneak attack by the enemy.
Most of the civilian soldiers can’t see well at night, and when they are awakened, they can only take their weapons and slash indiscriminately, and the loss of the attack for several days makes the troops physically and mentally exhausted, and one of them will blow up the camp if they don’t get it right.
So the whole army spent the night in nervousness.
After dawn, in order to restore morale, Jaaius ordered to reward wine and meat, the soldiers open stomach full meal, to start a new day of attack.
However, they found that the thunder hammer, which was usually a fearsome sound, had stopped ringing.
The attacking soldiers approached the castle slowly, pushing their heavy shield carts, a defense that was quite effective against incoming shells at long range, and deadly loose bullets at close range – provided they didn’t get smashed in the middle. They were trembling with fear and trepidation, but they didn’t hear the roar of the thunder hammers along the way, accustomed to advancing next to the cannons every time, the feeling of this pressure suddenly disappearing instead caused them greater uneasiness, the people inside the castle wouldn’t be ready for a more damaging trick.
The foremost troops finally approached the gate, and there were no grenades falling down to welcome them, and finally discovered the end – the figures on the top of the castle wall seemed to be all made of straw.
“Did the people inside run away?”
With such thoughts in mind, some bold soldiers climbed up the wall.
Sure enough, besides them, there was no one inside.
“The enemy has retreated! I can take down Fort Biddle!”
……
Hearing the news of his “victory”, Jaaius cried and laughed. It took more than a month, more than 3,000 casualties, and this is what he got in return?
In terms of the result, he was indeed victorious, but no matter how you look at it, it was a victory that the enemy handed over to him.
There is no kneeling and begging for mercy of the captive routed soldiers, there is no hanging head of the defeated generals, this kind of victory makes a person so ungrateful.
One has troops stationed on all sides of the castle, how did they take advantage of the night to run away? There must be a hidden secret inside this castle.
Jaaius ordered his army to closely search every place in the castle, and finally found a tunnel leading underground in a warehouse.
He sent his men into the tunnel to search for them, and they only came back after an hour, so it was obvious how long it was inside, and the soldiers who came back said that the path was blocked as they walked. There must be an exit to the west of the castle, the Duke’s son was furious, and they must have used this tunnel to transport a lot of supplies in the meantime.
“Brett Shawn, you bastard!”
The angry roar of the Duke’s son could seemingly be heard throughout the castle.
The tunnels were long and had perfect reinforcements, and this amount of work showed that it couldn’t have been dug in haste. It must have been dug and repaired for generations by the Sean family in response to an emergency.
……
On the other end of the spectrum, Paul was also depressed at the news that Fort Biddle had been abandoned; he had thought his allies could hold out a little longer.
“In vain I sent them so many armaments and supplies, as well as eight rapid-fire cannons before and after, and we haven’t even equipped ourselves with a few of them.”
But it was useless for him to be anxious about this, he could only remind the two battalions stationed in Emden to pay close attention to the enemy’s movements.
Another thing that made him more alert was a secret letter written to him by Schroeder, which mentioned that in the battle that took place on the border of the Duke’s territory, the enemy quietly touched the artillery position through flanking detours and occupied it, although the Alda army immediately counterattacked and took the position back, and there was not a single artillery piece missing, but the enemy, after all, had been in close contact with the artillery, and there was a possibility that it might come into contact with the residual gunpowder.
The enemy may be able to speculate about the gunpowder of one or two points of information, but Paul is not worried that they can immediately reverse out of the real black powder to, even if you know that the black gunpowder has nitrate sulfur and charcoal, but also can not immediately test the best ratio. To know the last life, as the inventor of gunpowder, because of the lack of rigorous chemical knowledge, China even to the end of the Qing Dynasty did not figure out a variety of gunpowder optimal ratio, can only rely on the experience of the artisans to create a varying quality of gunpowder. To make good quality gunpowder, you need to go through a series of complex processes such as crushing, mixing, pressing, drying, polishing, etc. Since Paul made gunpowder, the Ordnance Factory has been relentlessly researching and experimenting on how to improve the purity of nitrate and sulphur, how to grind the gunpowder and other technologies safely, and so on, and developed dozens of processes before and after, and according to the different uses of the raw materials of the proportion of the subtle adjustments.
Although the Northwest Bay is not a lack of saltpeter ore, but the method of refining saltpeter is still the original method of boiling, as the saying goes, “boiling nitrate for a thousand days, but not against the general a gun”, how to expand the production of saltpeter has been a headache for Paul, in order to obtain saltpeter, he also sent people to go from door to door to scrape the toilets, which is the reason that he strictly prohibit public urination and defecation! One of the reasons why he strictly prohibited public urination and defecation, the toilet is the fighting force ah, although the amount is not much, but the mosquito is also meat.
Paul did know the principle of using nitrifying bacteria and rice fields to build nitrate fields to produce saltpeter on a large scale, but the principle is the principle, and it takes time to figure out a feasible set of operations.
Alda’s demand for saltpeter is so great that it must be impossible to hide it from people who are interested in it, so instead of trying to conserve the gunpowder formula, it is better to spread some misleading information.
Paul approached Old Ford, the chief administrator of the Council of State, and Cecil of the Intelligence Department to discuss his plans to build a couple of ice factories, as the weather had been getting hotter lately.
Old Ford was shocked, “My lord, although life is not as tight as it was in the previous two years, there aren’t too many rich people in Lakewood to buy our ice, it’s definitely a losing proposition.”
“Uh, whether it’s profitable or not is secondary, I mainly want to use it as a cover ……”
Paul stated his intentions to them.
Chief Ford nodded, “That sounds like it might work a bit, but it’s going to cost a ton of money again, we can’t let people see it’s a shell factory at a glance.”
Seeing that the Chief Administrator of the Council of State agreed, Paul instructed Cecil again, “You’re going to put out some disinformation to mess up the recipe for gunpowder as much as possible, as well as to think in terms of the source, such as refining it from seawater or something like that.”
“Leave it to me, Lord Count, spreading rumors couldn’t be easier.”
Cecil took on the task with a beat of his chest.
(End of chapter)