Chapter 984 Mine
Although the British New Mediterranean Fleet encountered an ambush at this time, its combat power was still crushingly powerful.
A few blown-up small ships actually had little impact on the combat effectiveness of this huge fleet.
But in the panic, Edward Hobart Seymour Sr. issued what he thought was the safest and most prudent order.
If it were just those few forts, there would be no need to retreat, but the mines brought too much uncertainty.
Although mines were not common in naval operations at this time, they could achieve amazing results every time.
Whether it was the American War of Independence, the Greek War of Independence, or the Russo-Turkish War, mines played an important role.
At this time, the main types of mines were floating mines. As the name suggests, the so-called floating mines mainly rely on "waves". These mines will explode when they collide with ships, bridges, rocks and the like.
The combat effectiveness of this kind of mine is usually very short, only a few days or even a few hours, but it is powerful enough.
A single mine can destroy a light frigate of hundreds of tons, and even large battleships cannot withstand multiple explosions of mines.
However, its shortcomings are also extremely obvious. Because there is no modern automatic locking device, floating mines and destroying ships mainly rely on luck and quantity.
Of course, if it is in the open sea, thousands of floating mines may not be able to blow up enemy ships.
It is easy for an experienced captain to avoid these floating mines without automatic navigation and temporary driving devices.
However, at this time, the small bay was filled with a huge number of ships, and it was difficult for those floating mines to blow up anything.
What's even more frightening is the uncertainty it brings. Those warships that were sunk by stray mines were like rocks in such a narrow bay.
They may cause more warships to run aground at any time, causing a series of more chaotic chain reactions.
The Austrian artillerymen, who had been hiding near the fort for a long time, rushed to the fort almost immediately and fired their loaded artillery pieces.
The latest ship killer (high-explosive bomb) flew out of the gun barrel and landed on the British warship. With huge explosions, sawdust flew everywhere, and large pieces of deck debris even nailed people to the wall.
However, the British navy was not blocked. Their gun doors had already been opened, and the gunners also aimed at the fort.
The close-range shooting of more than a dozen battleships destroyed the forts on both sides in an instant, but the chaos of the British army did not stop.
Seymour's fleet was too large, especially the huge sailing battleships, and it was not easy to turn around.
It was relatively easy for those paddle-wheel battleships to turn around, but because they were not in sync with other battleships, it made the whole scene even more chaotic.
What's even more frightening is that the fleet at the rear is not aware of the situation, and some small boats keep turning around and frantically escaping for their lives. As a result, accidents occur frequently at the mouth of the bay, and the entire bay looks like a large car accident scene.
The Austrian army on the other side of the pier was frantically dropping drift mines into the sea, and barrels filled with gunpowder were compressing the space of the British fleet.
But the British navy is not easy to mess with. Every salvo fired by the dozen or so battleships in the bay can destroy large areas of buildings.
The warehouse near the dock where the mines were stored and the carriage carrying the mines were successively covered by artillery fire, followed by a series of huge explosions.
The pier was filled with smoke and the fire spread quickly. The Austrian troops on the shore were also in chaos. Their continuous shelling and fire interrupted their command.
Some people want to put out fires, some are rescuing supplies, some are dropping floating mines into the sea, some are looking for hidden artillery to prepare for counterattack, and some are scared out of their wits and running around on the dock screaming.
But British Fleet Commander Seymour still frowned. He thought that with his powerful troops and firepower, any conspiracy and conspiracy would be nothing more than a ridiculous struggle.
Those forts did not pose a threat to his powerful fleet at all. Even if there were hidden firepower points, the fleet would only need to pay a very small price to win.
However, he was defeated by those small wooden barrels and could only let the easy victory slip away from him.
Compared with the approaching wooden barrels, the chaos at the mouth of the bay was more deadly at this time. Several small warships had been hit and sunk.
These sunken small warships made the already narrow mouth of the bay even narrower. At this time, Commander Seymour regretted letting the main fleet enter the fjord.
If we just send some light ships to take the lead, it will be easy to retreat at this time.
But it is impossible for light ships to beat the forts on both sides to pieces and turn the dock into a sea of flames. But no matter whether he used light ships to take the lead or the main force, he could not capture the port.
Ultimately Seymour did not expect the Austrians to use mines, and in such large numbers.
The demining methods of this era were still very hard-core. From the east to the west, whether facing underwater dragon king cannons or beer barrels, the only way to clear them was to directly hit them with ships.
However, the Austrian side seemed not to want to give Seymour any chance. There were at least a thousand floating mines on the sea at this time.
Although the price of gunpowder has dropped again and again through industrialized production after the Industrial Revolution, using thousands of floating mines at one time still seems very arrogant.
There are usually fifty to one hundred kilograms of black powder in a drift mine. At this time, the price of a barrel of black powder is about 40 pounds.
A barrel of black powder is about 286.2 kilograms, and the price of one hundred kilograms of black powder is about 13.97 pounds.
At this time, the price of an old-fashioned flintlock gun was only 1-2 pounds, and the price of a new front-loading smoothbore gun was only 8-10 pounds (the price of a rifled gun was about 1.5-2 times the price of a smoothbore gun).
In other words, as soon as they met, the Austrian side destroyed the equipment of thousands of people.
Of course, the results were also very impressive. The British army lost ships worth at least tens of thousands of troops at this time.
Edward Hobart Seymour Sr. figured that if the Austrians tried this trick at every port, he would be in big trouble.
But if you think about it carefully, it’s impossible, because this time you were careless. If you had not entered the bay rashly, but had chosen to fight steadily, no matter how many floating mines the Austrians dropped into the sea, you would not have any consequences as long as you left. question.
When the floating mines drift away with the ocean currents, the Austrians on the island will be lambs to be slaughtered.
Just as he was calculating how many more ships he would need to lose to pass through the bay, the warship traveling in the center of the channel suddenly exploded.
There was no time to think about it, and explosions came one after another. At least three small and medium-sized warships were seriously injured and were about to sink. One battleship was also seriously injured, but it barely made it out of the bay.
"How is this going?"
Edward Hobart Seymour Sr. roared angrily because he had not found a stray mine at sea, but it was impossible for his ship to explode for no reason.
The British sailors who fell into the water soon gave the answer, a British captain who fell into the water shouted.
"Underwater! These floating mines come from the water!"
Only then did Edward Hobart Seymour Sr. notice that there were several strange boats at the mouth of the bay, and there were also some people dressed as fishermen on the shore who were hacking at cables with knives and axes.
"Damn it! Kill them!"
As soon as the British warship approached, the people dressed as fishermen immediately ran away.
The loss statistics have been released. Counting the three frigates that were just sunk, the British army has lost 12 light gunboats, five transport ships, four frigates, and two cruisers in this battle. In addition, a third-level battleship was seriously injured.