1855 United States Tycoon

The following is a relaxed and pleasant episode. Annie's father invested in the Johannesburg Gold Mine, and the income was considerable. The family even had plans to send Anna's Big Brother Jack to study in Europe. However, the shadow soon fell. Through Anna’s eyes, the audience saw that the atmosphere at home became weird. Anna’s father and some Uncle uncles often gathered together and excitedly talked about something. Sometimes Annie heard it occasionally. Words like "invasion" and "war". One day at noon, Annie, who was taking a nap, was awakened by a sound. The sound seemed to be coming from the room downstairs. Annie followed the sound, down the stairs, and walked to the door of the small living room. The door was just concealed. Annie looked through the crack of the door and saw that her father and Big Brother were arguing about something there.

"The President has issued a mobilization order, and I meet the conditions!" The Big Brother directly collided with his father, rarely seen.

"It's enough to have me in our house! You can go to Europe to study obediently for me!" Father also widened his eyes and shouted loudly.

"I'm not going! Go at this time. Do you want everyone to know that Jack from the Braun family is a coward? Do you want everyone to say that your son is a coward who evades responsibility?" Big Brother stood up. His voice is higher than his father's.

The camera turned from the inside of the room to behind the door again, and Annie was looking in from the crack of the door suspiciously, when suddenly a hand fell on her shoulder. Annie looked up and saw her mother's smiling face.

"Mom, Dad and Big Brother..." Annie whispered.

"Are you awake?" Mom said, "They are discussing some men's things. Just eavesdropping on other people's words is not a lady's job. Let's go over there."

"Yeah." Annie nodded obediently, took her mother's hand, and followed her mother to the yard in front of the door. At this time, the yard was full of flowers of various colors.

"Will there really be war?" Annie asked.

Mother grinned reluctantly. Just about to answer, she saw a man running over on a horse. This man controlled the horse and stopped in front of Annie's door. However, he did not dismount, but controlled the excited horse. , While raising the hat on his head with his right hand, greeted Mrs. Braun.

"What happened?" Mom asked.

"Mrs. Braun, war, war has broken out!" the man replied loudly, "President Kruger has declared war on the British!"

At this time, the window in the living room was suddenly opened. Anne's father, Mr. Braun stretched out his head and shouted: "Durban, what are you talking about? The war broke out?"

...

The lighthearted plot just flashed past. At this time, the voice-over sounded again. This is a paragraph from Annie's diary:

"Big Brother has been away for more than two months. The last letter he sent us was a month ago. The letter said that they had won many battles and were about to attack Cape Town. As long as Cape Town was defeated, The war was victorious. However, after that, we never received his letter again. The situation on the front line does not seem to be very good. The hospitals in the city are said to be crowded with wounded people who were sent back from the front line. The broadcast said that there is a shortage of beds and nursing staff in the hospital. Therefore, some lightly wounded people are going to be sent to the homes of those who are willing to accept the wounded in the countryside. Dad said that this is the responsibility of every Boer because they are in Fighting for us. It's just that my father joined the railway defense team and patrols along the railway every day, so the care of the wounded depends on my mother and me. My mother is also very supportive of this matter, she said, maybe. Maybe Big Brother also needs help from others. I don’t understand what Dad said, but I think what Mom said is very reasonable..."

The Annie's house on the screen began to change. There were many wounded soldiers living in the room and even in the aisle. Mom and Annie walked through the wounded soldiers in nurse uniforms, and the wounded soldiers greeted them one after another.

At this time the voice-over sounded again:

"The situation of the war is getting worse and worse, even I feel this. Because there are more and more wounded in our family, I heard that every day at the railway station, there are whole trains of wounded people being pulled back... …"

"Mrs. Braun!" Suddenly someone knocked on the door, and my mother went up to open the door and saw that it was an officer.

"Lieutenant Walter, what's the matter?" Mom asked.

"The British are coming soon. I was ordered to bring the wounded into the city." Lieutenant Walter replied.

"Will the British come to us?" Mom asked.

"It's hard to tell, maybe it will or maybe not." Lieutenant Walter replied, "but I think this place is generally safer than the city, because Johannesburg is about to become a battlefield..."

In these words, Lieutenant Walter's face gradually faded out, and then the camera turned around, and there were British troops everywhere in Annie's farm. The small building where Annie and the others lived was requisitioned by the British army and became a barracks. And Annie's family was also driven to the original tool room. The small garden surrounded by the white fence became the British horse farm. Those Anne's favorite flowers were also plucked out and trampled in a mess.

The Sagu Field, not far from the house, was even used as an artillery position by the British. The British set up artillery there. At first they kept the artillery against the Boer’s fortress area. Later, it was not obvious that the effect of the artillery was good. , It was simply changed to firing at urban residential areas.

"Lieutenant Walter advised us not to enter the city. At first the manor was occupied by the British and our family was driven into the tool room. I really complained about him. I want to live in the city’s aunt’s house, whatever How better than watching these British guys here. Although they will still occupy our house and make a mess of my garden. But soon I knew that Lieutenant Walter was right because they started bombarding the city... …"

In the voiceover, the huge muzzle of the "Macdonald Hammer" began to slowly rise. Because I couldn't find the same products from the British Army, I could only use United States products instead in the movie. In fact, this approach is also quite common in future generations of war films, which is some so-called "epic" big productions. For example, in the "Battle of Moscow" filmed by the Soviets in later generations, dozens of German tanks were needed to launch an assault scene, and there were not so many German tanks that could be driven at a time, except for the front. Except for a few tanks, all T-62 tanks that were in service by the Soviet army in the 1960s were all in the water. If Hitler saw it, he would sigh: "It's meowing. If I had a T-62 back then, how could I lose this battle?"

Of course, the people of United States are not much better. The United States people filmed "Tank Battle", because they couldn't find enough tiger kings, they simply used the M-60 tanks equipped by the U.S. military at the time to apply iron crosses to pretend to be the tiger kings. Even because they couldn't find enough Mauser rifles for the Germans in the movie, they simply let them have an M-14 rifle. As a result, the movie became a battle between the American army (German army) in the 1960s and the American army in the 1940s.

As the muzzle of the 8-inch gun was raised to the highest point, a ball of flame spurted from the muzzle. At the same time, the sound of huge cannons rang, and even the floor of the theater trembled.

"Damn!" Heidi who was sitting in the front row yelled, and she hugged Katie who was sitting next to her tightly. So that Tom, who was sitting on the other side of her, felt very depressed: "Obviously I am here, why didn't she rush into my arms?"

Tom’s depression did not last long, because the scene on the screen began to change again. As soon as the camera turned, it became a residential area in Johannesburg. One after another, the shells fell, and the original gorgeous houses were just in the explosion of the shells. It was torn to pieces like a piece of paper. People in the street ran around in a panic, and then they were blown up by shells, or even broken into several sections.The audience panicked and got up from their seats one after another, trying to run out. The order of the entire theater suddenly became chaotic. Fortunately, the theater had a plan. They immediately suspended the film, turned on the lights, and used loudspeakers to appease the audience.

In the panic "escape" just now, Heidi lost her hat, and she didn't know who stepped on her foot. But now, with the lights on and the comfort on the radio, she quickly understood that this was just a false alarm. After understanding this, Heidi suddenly felt that this was really interesting, so she couldn't help laughing. Many other people also looked at each other first, and then all laughed.

So everyone laughed and went back to their own seats, looking around, looking for what they had just accidentally lost.

"Heidi, this is your hat." Tom's eyes were sharp and he saw the hat that fell on the ground. He picked it up, patted it, and handed it to Heidi.

"Thank you Tom." Heidi said with a smile, and then she lowered her head, looked at her hat again, frowned slightly, and said, "I didn't expect audio movies to be so realistic. I was really scared just now. There is absolutely no such effect on stage play. It's...really..."

Heidi thought for a long time, but still didn't think of a suitable adjective, but at this time everyone was seated again, the lights dimmed again, and the movie started again.

...

The film continues. The British finally used poison gas. The Boer defenders suffered heavy casualties. The British asked the nearby Boers to help clean up the remains of the dead. Mr. Braun, Mrs. Braun, and Anne, who was thirteen years old. They were all taken there, and they were responsible for pushing the body of the deceased to the stacking site with a trolley. Mr. Braun pushed a trolley alone, while Mrs. Braun and Annie pushed a trolley together.

The two Boers who were also recruited gently lifted a corpse from the cart of Mrs. Braun and Anne, and then gently stacked it on top of the other corpse. Annie suddenly found that the corpse underneath was very familiar. The eyes of the deceased were wide open, and all his throat was scratched by his own hands. Annie recognized him, he was Lieutenant Walter who advised them not to enter the city.

"Mom," Annie said with a choked voice. The camera zoomed in, and big tears could be seen rolling down from the corners of her eyes, "It's Walter Uncle. Mom, will we be like this in the future?"

Mom stretched out her hand and stroked Annie's head. She sighed and said nothing. At this time, the camera gradually retreated and pulled up, revealing a panoramic view of the entire stacking place, one after another cube-shaped corpses piled up in this area...

"God!" Heidi couldn't help groaning in a low voice, and her tears flowed out unknowingly, soaking a large area of ​​her new clothes.

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