Chapter 408: Volley Fire

Just as the Ming artillery fire disrupted the Qing army's formation, the five hundred sword-and-shield soldiers standing in formation on the left flank had already received orders to move rapidly toward the arquebus square, preparing to use their shields as cover to prevent Qing heavy arrows from killing the gunners.

Seeing that the Qing formation had shifted from dense to dispersed, which would greatly reduce the lethality of the shot, the Ming artillery camp's Company Commander reacted with great speed and immediately ordered the cannon muzzles adjusted, making the Qing shield carts the primary target of the next volley.

Because the grapeshot was too light and had an effective range of only about a hundred paces, the ten Folangji cannons on the front could not use grapeshot to strike the Qing troops nearly two hundred paces away.

This was not a major oversight in Zhou Yuji's troop deployment—mainly because the Ming army's four thousand gunners also needed a relatively large area to spread out their formation.

Because the arquebuses of this era were quite cumbersome in length, weight, loading, and many other procedures, each row of gunners had to maintain a certain distance between one another, while the distance between front and rear rows was even greater. Add to that the need to reserve space for retreat and buffer zones, which meant the gunners had to be at least a hundred paces away from the artillery positions. Thus, combining infantry and artillery could only rely primarily on solid shot.

Unless the gunner square collapsed and the Qing troops charged within a hundred paces—that would be the moment when grapeshot unleashed a storm of blood and carnage.

But if it truly came to that point, the Folangji cannons could only serve to cut off the advance of Qing pursuers and cover the gunners' retreat, for the cannons were far too heavy to provide sustained firepower while moving freely.

The battle-hardened Qing troops seized the gap while the Ming cannons fell silent, forming groups of dozens to a hundred men, rising to shoot at the Ming gunners forty to fifty paces away.

Since the sword-and-shield soldiers had not yet arrived to raise their shields before the gunner formation, and because the thick layered screens of the shield carts blocked any threat, the arquebuses could not menace the Qing troops at all. The front-row Battalion Commander in charge therefore did not issue the order to fire. The gunners could only follow their usual drill procedures—lowering their heads and necks, using their wide conical iron helmets to protect their vital facial areas, and enduring the killing power of Qing heavy arrows.

In the common understanding of most later generations, people believe that the Manchu Qing of this era relied primarily on mounted archery as their main means of attack.

In fact, this is a tremendous misconception.

The Jianzhou Jurchens were a fishing-and-hunting people, not a nomadic one. It is true that the Jurchens were skilled archers, but they were not adept at fighting on horseback.

Those skilled at mounted archery were the Mongol Eight Banners who had surrendered to the Jurchens.

The Eight Banners' primary method of fighting the Ming army was first to use strong bows and heavy arrows to disrupt the Ming formation, then to send selected heavily armored soldiers to charge the lines, using wolf-teeth maces, flails, tiger-tooth spears, chopping sabers, great axes, and other heavy weapons to break in and slaughter—quickly routing the Ming troops.

The killing power of the Qing heavy arrows was astonishing. The sharp wolf-tooth arrowheads bore barbed hooks; once they pierced armor and entered the body, pulling them out would tear away a large chunk of flesh. If left in place, the wound would bleed continuously until the victim bled to death. This was one of the reasons the Ming troops beyond the pass feared the Eight Banners so greatly.

Before the Ming sword-and-shield soldiers could arrive, nearly a thousand Qing archers had each loosed two heavy arrows—over a thousand arrows arcing down caused nearly three hundred Ming casualties.

This was even with the Qing troops holding back from forming arrow volley formations out of concern for the threat of Ming cannons.

Had these nearly a thousand archers formed two squares and concentrated their fire, Ming casualties would have multiplied severalfold.

Just as the Qing's third volley of heavy arrows fell, killing and wounding nearly two hundred more Ming soldiers, the five hundred sword-and-shield soldiers arrived at the front of the gunner formation in time.

As one massive shield after another was raised in succession, the casualties inflicted by the Qing's fourth wave of arrows dropped dramatically—only a dozen or so men were struck, and none of the hits were in vital areas.

Just as the Qing troops were preparing to loose their fifth volley of heavy arrows, the Ming's ten Folangji cannons fired in succession. Ten shot balls came smashing down from the sky, and every single one struck the densely arrayed shield carts.

When the shot balls smashed through the shield carts' layered screens and frames, fragments and wood splinters flew in every direction. These sharp splinters, traveling at tremendous initial velocity, inflicted damage no less than that of sharp arrows.

For a moment, screams rose one after another.

Besides the Qing troops killed and wounded by the ricocheting shot, the flying splinters of wood easily pierced the cotton armor of the Qing archers and drove deep into their bodies. The pain these sharp objects caused was unbearable even for the Eight Banner soldiers, renowned for their ferocity.

The Folangji cannons roared on without pause, one-pound shot balls falling without interruption, smashing the Qing shield carts arrayed in the front ranks into scattered wreckage. The Qing archers in front, dodging and seeking cover in every direction, could only retreat rearward, leaving the ground littered with their dead and wounded.

After several rounds of firing, the Folangji cannon barrels had grown scorching hot to the touch. Fearing that another discharge might trigger a chain detonation, the artillery camp's Company Commander issued the order to cease fire.

The ground fifty-odd paces before the Ming formation was a scene of utter devastation. Besides nearly three hundred Qing soldiers lying dead or wounded in pools of blood, of the hundred-odd shield carts, only twenty-odd remained intact—the rest had all been destroyed by cannon fire.

In the rear formation, Abatai gave a single command, and several hundred booi bondservants, under the cursing shouts of the supervising Qing soldiers, hurried forward in trepidation—either carrying away the Qing dead and wounded or clearing away the wreckage of the shield carts. Soon the chaotic battlefield had been roughly cleared.

On the Ming side as well, some sword-and-shield soldiers were detailed to carry the severely wounded and the fallen to the rear, while the lightly wounded gritted their teeth and made their own way back. The formation that had been disrupted was restored to its original order.

Abatai naturally knew that the cannons would need a considerable time to cool. He had to seize this moment to launch a fierce assault—otherwise, once the cannons had cooled, the Qing army would have to pay an even greater price in blood.

"Gerleng! Send a thousand cavalry to charge at once!"

Gazing at the wide expanse of open ground before him, Abatai issued the order swiftly.

The horn blower beside Gerleng sounded the horn. A thousand Mongol Eight Banner cavalrymen began riding forward slowly from over two li away, advancing at a trot in a wedge formation. When they reached roughly one li from the Ming lines, the warhorses began to accelerate.

In an instant, the thunder of hooves filled the air and the earth trembled faintly. The momentum of the massed warhorses charging was like great waves rolling in with the rising tide, bearing down upon the Ming gunners with a heart-shaking spectacle.

"BOOM!"

The thunderous roar from the walls of Ningyuan shook the heavens.

Four red barbarian cannons bellowed in a synchronized volley.

The Ming sword-and-shield soldiers had already shifted to both flanks when the Qing warhorses began their charge. The first Ming arquebus square assumed the three-rank firing stance, calmly awaiting the arrival of the Qing cavalry, while the pike squares on both flanks closed in toward the gunners, ready at any moment to provide cover and support.

Four five-pound shot balls carved four bloody paths through the charging Qing cavalry. Dozens of warhorses collapsed with mournful whinnies, and the riders atop them were trampled into pulp by the horses behind that could not stop in time.

"Raise muskets!"

The moment the arquebus battalion commander's command fell, a sharp and short trumpet blast suddenly sounded. One thousand eight hundred gunners blew their match cords bright, swung their muskets down in unison, and a dense forest of muzzles pointed at the Qing cavalry thundering toward them at full speed.

The muffled thunder of thousands of hooves pounding the earth shook men's hearts. Many of the Ming gunners' faces turned deathly pale, while the resolve and desperation visible in their eyes reflected the conflicted feelings of the moment.

"Fire!"

The short trumpet blast sounded once more.

Amid the dense crackling like beans popping in a pan, the first rank of kneeling gunners fired first. Great billows of white gunpowder smoke rose into the air, and over a hundred Qing cavalrymen who had charged within forty paces tumbled to the ground amid the screams of men and horses.

The crackling gunfire like popping beans resounded through the sky once more as the second rank of gunners fired in quick succession.

The first two ranks of gunners did not pause to look at the scene before them. As the third rank's volley rang out, they bent low and moved rapidly to both sides, preparing to circle to the rear to reload and reform for another volley.

At the same time, the second square ten paces behind had also completed its preparations to fire, and the last rank of shooters in the first square also crouched low and withdrew to the flanks.

By now, the ground thirty to forty paces before the Ming formation had become a veritable hell.

Of the one thousand eight hundred arquebuses, aside from a few dozen that misfired, all the rest discharged successfully.

Over three hundred riders at the front of the Qing cavalry were shot down. The warhorses and Qing corpses strewn across the ground severely slowed the speed of the cavalry behind, forcing the rear riders to rein in their mounts, leaping and dodging as they reduced their pace.

The gunners of the first square, having moved quickly, had already circled behind the second square and begun cleaning and reloading their weapons.

"Fire!"

Another urgent trumpet blast sounded.

Taking advantage of the clear line of sight opened by the first square's gunners, the one thousand eight hundred muskets of the second square discharged in continuous succession. Nearly two thousand lead balls pierced through the smoke-filled air, howling as they slammed into the Qing troops whose charging momentum had been shattered.