I Am the Crown Prince in France

Chapter 447: Encircle and attack the reinforcements

Drissen was riding his horse forward with the winding marching team, turning his head from time to time to talk to the staff officer, when he suddenly heard the roar of cannons faintly coming from the side and front.

The entire Prussian army queue stopped immediately, and the soldiers looked around in panic.

Drissen's face also became gloomy. He was very cautious along the way. Even though he was marching on Prussian territory, he still sent out a large number of cavalry for reconnaissance.

Before, all the hussars reported that they did not find anything unusual in front, so what was the matter with the cannon sound?

He hurriedly ordered the troops to gather around him and line up for defense.

Then, he looked at the staff officer beside him and shouted: "Leon, send someone to find out what happened!"

"Yes, General!"

Before his order was passed down, two messengers came rushing over. After seeing him, they immediately reported anxiously: "General, our front team was attacked, and General Brecht's two regiments have been defeated..."

"How is this possible?" Drissen frowned, "Who is attacking us?"

"It seems to be the French."

"Damn, where did they come from!" Drissen was puzzled. Logically, the artillery must be set up to ambush on the road ahead, but why didn't his hussars find it.

Of course he didn't know that it was the cavalry artillery of the Guards Corps, which had been hiding 6 kilometers away. After discovering his troops, they quickly approached and fired at their flanks and fronts.

"How many enemy troops are there?"

"It's not clear yet. The artillery attack came too suddenly..."

Drissen was an experienced commander after all. He quickly calmed down and made a quick judgment.

The enemy has artillery, so it may be a large army, so the first thing to do is to delay the enemy's attack.

He immediately ordered the Fein Corps to set up a defense line on the spot to block the enemy. The other troops gathered near the woods in the north.

Most of the Fein Corps were elite Prussian guards, and they moved very quickly. After just over half an hour, they began to gather on the south side of the main force. The winding marching column of the Prussian army slowly moved north.

However, the French army that ambushed them obviously did not intend to give them a chance.

Soon, a hussar reported to Driesen that he had found tens of thousands of French infantrymen on the southwest side and were rushing towards this side.

Driesen's forehead was covered with cold sweat. His main army was at least three or four kilometers apart. It would take at least three hours to gather and complete the formation.

He immediately commanded the two grenadier regiments around him to join Fein and build a temporary defense line together. He ordered Krokov to lead all 12 hussar squadrons to delay the French army at all costs to buy time for himself.

On the high ground beside the Bull River, Joseph saw nearly two thousand Prussian cavalrymen in the telescope, rushing towards the infantry line of the Guards Corps.

He was not nervous at all. After two years of military study, he could see that the Prussian cavalry was not prepared at all, the formation was scattered, and the front and back were out of touch, so they launched an attack in a hurry.

This is basically suicide.

Don't think that the cavalry can crush the infantry with good equipment, fast speed and strong impact. In fact, cavalry is not used for head-on decisive battles. Their advantage is to use mobility to quickly raid the enemy's weak links and then drift away. But if you fight with infantry, especially rushing into neat infantry lines, you really can't beat them unless the number of people is equal.

Sure enough, when the Prussian cavalry rushed to the front of the French infantry line, they were immediately hit by a volley of fire. More than 20 war horses in the front cried and fell, and many cavalrymen behind them were tripped.

Then, the soldiers who finished shooting inserted their bayoneted guns diagonally into the ground and squatted down at the same time. The soldiers in the back row raised their guns and fired, then raised their percussion guns horizontally and pointed their bayonets forward.

Then the third row fired volleys...

When the Prussian cavalry rushed to the front, they were faced with three rows of dense bayonets in front and behind. They had to pull the reins and turn to separate to both sides.

It is meaningless for the cavalry in movies and TV dramas to fearlessly step on the bayonets - even if you can overwhelm two or three infantrymen, someone will immediately fill the gap. And your body and the body of the horse will become a stumbling block for the teammates behind, slowing down the speed of the entire team. And the cavalry who stopped running are the targets of the infantry.

The infantry line of the Guards Corps was very long, and it was impossible for the Prussian Hussars to complete the task of bypassing the two wings and encircling them. Moreover, the cavalry of the Guards Corps was on standby to provide cover behind the infantry.

The Prussian cavalry had to make a circle and assemble in the distance. Just this unsystematic attack just now caused them to lose at least one squadron, that is, more than 150 people.

But Driesen's order to Krokov was to delay the French army at all costs, so he had to raise his sword and shout to his men again to charge the Guards Corps.

After the third such attack, the Prussian cavalry was timid due to the huge casualties, and hesitated and was reluctant to move forward.

In fact, these Junker noble cavalry were already very good. If it were a unit with slightly worse morale, they would have begun to flee as early as the second charge.

Berthier once again suggested that the cavalry of the Guards Corps go to meet them. Joseph looked at the shaky Prussian cavalry through the telescope and finally nodded in agreement.

Cavalry was the most lacking branch of the Guards. Only the cavalry obtained from the Paris Guards had strong combat effectiveness, and most of the cavalry trained later could only serve as rangers. Therefore, Joseph was very careful when using them, and a little casualty would make him feel distressed for a long time.

However, after several rounds of consumption, the Prussian cavalry at this time had difficulty even gathering the team.

When 700 Guards Hussars suddenly appeared on their left, even though Krokov personally led his attendants to greet them, almost no one followed him.

Then, the Prussian cavalry was split into two from the middle, most of them fled north, and the others were shot by the French infantry who caught up, and soon abandoned their horses and surrendered.

The infantry line on Driesen's side was still in a mess, and then some Hussars were seen fleeing back.

He had a small group of defeated soldiers brought to him, and heard several people panicking:

"General, the enemy is only eight or nine hundred steps away from here."

"General Krokov? We don't know where he is."

"The enemy's defense is dense, and the firepower is very strong..."

Drissen's heart sank. He had tried his best to remedy the situation, but he couldn't even delay for an hour... It seems that the enemy has at least 30,000 or 40,000 people.

Damn, such a large army has entered Oberon for at least two days, and no one has discovered it!