Make France Great Again

Chapter 473 Bombardment of Odessa

After several hours of non-stop sailing, the British and French fleets finally arrived near Odessa around 5 p.m.

At this time, the fiery red sun has slowly fallen from the top to the sea level. The large white clouds in the blue sky show a fiery red under the sunlight, and the white sails blown by the sea wind are also dyed orange-red.

Under the setting sun, Odessa, the southern pearl of the Russian Empire, revealed an indescribable French beauty, which made Vice Admiral General Dunstar, who used a telescope to observe the scene of Odessa, couldn't help but sigh: "Alas! It is so beautiful! How wonderful it would be if the city was not founded by the Russian Empire!"

"General Dundas, the founder of this city was Duke Richelieu. He was appointed by Catherine to be the first governor of Odessa! It is precisely because of his efforts that Odessa became It turned into what it is today!" Rear Admiral Edmund Lyons, standing aside, whispered to his superior, Dundascorp.

"I asked why Odessa's architectural style is really French! After a long dispute, it turned out that it was built by our French friends! Our French friends are really helpful!" Dundas said sarcastically.

After hearing Lieutenant General Dundas's complaints, Edmund Lyons immediately gave up Lieutenant General Dundas's idea of ​​continuing to popularize science, and turned to discuss the attack sequence with Lieutenant General Dundas.

"No rush! We'll wait until our reconnaissance fleet comes back from the port of Odessa!" Lieutenant General Dundas raised his hand to stop him.

After a while, the steam gunboats (two British gunboats and one French gunboat) responsible for surveying the enemy situation in Odessa Port returned to the vicinity of the main fleet. The semaphore on the ship reported the situation to the main fleet through the flag.

The naval fleet stationed in the port of Odessa consists of three main sailing battleships, two double-decker ships, and three outdated steam gunboats.

This scale is simply vulnerable compared to the British and French combined fleets. What needs to be noted is the forts deployed in the area around the port of Odessa. The artillery of each fort can fire twenty-four or forty-eight pound artillery shells. These forts are originally from Nepal. The weapons prepared by King Gula I in order to prevent the British and French forces from attacking the port of Odessa one day, but most of these weapons were produced more than ten years ago. The threat to the current British and French combined fleets is far from fatal. The British and French joint forces The ships of the fleet are equipped with artillery of larger caliber and longer range than those on the Odessa fort, which is enough to pose a fatal threat to the Odessa fort.

Of course, if you fight against Turkey, these forts are enough, and then the Turkish fleet will have a drink.

Dundas, who received the basic information about the Odessa port, calmly analyzed the current situation.

Although the British and French combined fleets are well aware of the deployment on the sea of ​​Odessa, there is still a fog in the port of Odessa. Dundas believes that it is not the time to launch a general attack.

Just as Dundas was carefully thinking about the response strategy, a small boat was launched from the French command ship on the left side of the fleet he was riding on. The small boat swam around Dundas's ship, and the sailors on Dundas's ship Welcome guests on board the ship.

After the guests arrived on the deck, the sailors reported the arrival of General Bruat to Lieutenant General Dundas.

Lieutenant General Dundas and Major General Emond rushed to greet General Bruat. The two shook hands again under the sunset, and then quickly got down to business.

General Bruat asked Lieutenant General Dundas for his opinion on Odessa. Lieutenant General Dundas responded cautiously to Bruat: "I hope the fleet can postpone the attack because we have not yet understood whether there are troops inside the Odessa port! "

"What do you want to do?" General Brua asked Lieutenant General Dundas.

"It's best to catch a tongue and learn the news about the port of Odessa from his mouth!" Lieutenant General Dundas responded to General Bruat.

"This is not easy to handle!" General Brua said with a frown.

"Actually..." Major General Edmund whispered: "This is not that difficult!"

"Huh?" General Bruat dragged his chin and looked at General Edmund with interest: "What can you do?"

"According to my recent observations of Odessa and Sevastopol Fortress, a small number of ships return to Odessa from Sevastopol Fortress every day. Most of these ships are merchant ships. I think they are probably responsible for the The Russian army at Sevastopol Fortress sent supplies to civilian ships! If we can capture them, we will definitely know the situation at the Odessa port!" Major General Edmund put forward his own opinion.

"This is a good idea!" General Bruat nodded and looked at Lieutenant General Dundas and said, "What do you think?"

"You can try it!" Lieutenant General Dundas nodded.

Later, Major General Edmund took out the small notebook he carried with him, looked through the contents of the record, and then explained to Dundas and Brua the time when the mall would return to the port of Odessa.

"The closest time to us is around 6 o'clock!" Major General Edmund said to Lieutenant General Dundas, then he took out a pocket watch and glanced at the time. It was now around 5:45: "The closest time to us is around 5:45." There’s less than 15 minutes left!”

"Order the reconnaissance fleet to conduct investigations along the route from Odessa to Sevastopol, and be sure to seize the merchant ships!" Lieutenant General Dundas responded firmly.

Gu Fen/span "Yes!" Rear Admiral Edmund responded, and then gave the order to the flag carrier, who waved the flag to convey Vice Admiral Dundas's order to the reconnaissance fleet.

The reconnaissance fleet that received the order was like a wild horse running wild, frantically searching for traces of passing ships along the route from Odessa to Sevastopol.

Time passed quickly, and after nearly 20 minutes, the reconnaissance fleet once again returned to the main fleet. The semaphore on the ship conveyed the order to complete the mission to the main fleet.

After seeing the order coming from the reconnaissance ship, Edmund immediately entered the cabin and reported the news of the completion of the mission to Lieutenant General Dundas and General Bruat.

"Bring the people over here!" Lieutenant General Dundas ordered again.

Edmund quickly returned to the deck and conveyed the news to the reconnaissance fleet about escorting the merchant ship members to the main fleet, and the reconnaissance fleet turned and left.

After a while, a boarding ship passed through layers of siege and arrived in front of the command ship. The person in charge of uploading followed the two sailors and boarded the ship heading to the command fleet, and then boarded the British command ship.

Looking at the Russian Empire businessman with a Tatar appearance in front of him, Dundas asked him in broken Russian whether he could speak English.

"Dear Sir! (The businessman doesn't know whether Dundas is a noble or not, so he can only try to address Dundas as Sir), I don't speak English, I only learned a little French!" The businessman spoke fluent Russian. to Lieutenant General Dundas.

Lieutenant General Dundas turned his attention to General Bruard who was standing aside. General Bruard stepped forward and had a simple communication with the Tatar-looking businessman.

From this businessman, I learned that since the British and French allied forces declared war on the Russian Empire, Tsar Nicholas I of the Russian Empire has been strengthening military power in the Odessa area. Now Odessa has gathered 50,000 to 60,000 Russians. The army can be said to be heavily defended.

"A team of 50,000 to 60,000 people? Where did the Tsar find such a huge army!" Lieutenant General Dundas was somewhat unwilling to believe what the Tatar businessman said, so he immediately asked.

General Bruat translated Dundas's words into French and told them to the Tatar merchants.

"Dear Sir, I am just an ordinary businessman. I don't know where the Tsar mobilized these troops from, but they are indeed staying in the port of Odessa!" the Tatar businessman said one word after another. .

After listening to what the Tatar businessman said, General Bruat and Lieutenant General Dundas remained silent. Major General Edmund immediately asked his men to take the Tatar businessman down.

"What do you think?" Lieutenant General Dundas, who pondered for a moment, asked General Bruat.

"This possibility cannot be ruled out! After all, the port of Odessa is too important to the Tsar! No matter how careful you are, you can't be too careful!" General Brua replied with his chin in his hand, and then said with relief: " But we don’t have to pay too much attention to the number of people. I personally don’t think there are 60,000 people in the Odessa port! At best, there are only about 30,000 to 40,000 people!”

"Even if they only have 30,000 to 40,000 people, it will be difficult for our army to gain an advantage!" Dundas' army responded.

The total number of British and French forces staying on the ship was only about 8,000, and they did not have any advantage in terms of numbers. In addition, in the early landing operations, a large number of soldiers were bound to be lost, which was really not worth the gain.

"Then we can only choose to destroy Odessa's effective force!" General Bruat set the next strategic goal of the British and French combined fleets.

"Then that's all!" Dundas nodded and responded.

Under the joint orders of General Bruat and General Dundas, the British and French combined fleets began to change their attack formation and move towards the port of Ossade.

The small and nimble gunboat walked at the front of the team, followed closely by the huge steam sail battleship.

When the British and French combined fleet reached the maximum firing range from the ships and forts in the port of Odessa, the port forts and the Russian Imperial fleet remaining on the ships also discovered the appearance of the British and French combined fleets.

Reflected by the stars hanging in the sky, the figures in the Odessa port fort began to move back and forth, and all this was seen by General Dundas and General Bruat who commanded the ship.

"Counterattack? Do you have the ability?"

General Dundas, who vaguely saw the movement of the fort through the lookout glass, put down the lookout glass and looked at it with disdain, and then ordered the fleet to execute the next order step by step.

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