Chapter 367 Battle of Brussels
The Marquis of Wellesley sat down on the chair opposite and recalled the news he had just heard in parliament:
“According to Fox, nearly two months ago, Messault I dispatched 6,000 troops to attack Cannanore. The defending East India Company soldiers only resisted for three days and were completely defeated."
Kannanur is an important stronghold of the East India Company in the southwest of the Indian peninsula. If it is lost, trade in southwest India will be greatly affected.
Although the East India Company is a company, it is actually the British administrative agency in India - almost everyone in the UK, from the government to parliamentarians, from officials to businessmen, has bought shares in the East India Company. It can be said that the interests of this company have been damaged, and the impact in the UK is even greater than the government's financial loss of a large sum of money.
Little Pete frowned: "You mean, those Indian natives only invested 5,000 people..."
Although the East India Company's garrison at Kannanur has less than 600 people, they are basically all people with regular army service experience, and their combat effectiveness absolutely crushes the Indian natives. Moreover, there are thousands of servant troops recruited from the local area. According to past experience, they can at least withstand the onslaught of tens of thousands of Mysore troops for one or two months.
But this time it only lasted three days before it was captured.
The Marquis of Wellesley said solemnly: "Yes. It is said that this Mysore army is extremely powerful in combat. They are all equipped with European-made flintlock muskets and more than ten sophisticated artillery pieces. East India Company The bastions were breached by their cannons."
These sophisticated weapons were naturally brought to Mysore by Lafayette.
Moreover, Princess Amira of Tunisia has arrived in Mysore and held a secret engagement ceremony with Tipu Sultan's son Nawaz. Although the marriage has not been officially completed, her dowry has been shipped to India in advance.
It was a complete set of artillery production equipment, 30 cannon casting technicians, and enough raw materials to produce 50 cannons. This meant that Tipu Sultan would have a constant supply of cannons.
Although the British navy controlled Indian Ocean shipping, it had little to do with smuggling ships. The gunsmiths could safely land aboard French merchant ships. The French also had a small colony in Pondicherry, India, which maintained negligible trade.
The most important thing is that Mysore has Lafayette, a general who is good at commanding rookies to fight.
For a country like India, which is still in the middle stage of feudal society, only a small part of the factors that restrict the combat effectiveness of the army come from weapons and equipment, and more are various backward systems and the quality of the soldiers.
Lafayette, as the protector of Princess Amira and with the rank of Umuda, led the military reforms in Mysore. He made strict regulations from the payment of military pay to the appointment and dismissal of officers, from military discipline to how to coordinate between soldiers of different faiths, and even down to the details of how to arrange the tents when setting up camp, and how many rounds to walk in which direction during patrols.
After nearly three months of rigorous training with whips and sticks, this Indian army, which originally had a certain foundation in European drills, was almost completely transformed. Although the combat effectiveness is far less than that of the British army, at least they will not be easily beaten ten by one like before.
Of course, with Lafayette's energy and only sleeping 5 hours a day, he could only train 4,000 Mysore new troops. The rest could only be left to the Tunisian officers he brought for training.
In this raid on Cannanore, he personally led 3,000 new troops, plus 3,000 ordinary Indian soldiers as miscellaneous soldiers, and easily conquered the East India Company's camp.
However, there are also factors that the British did not expect. At that time, only half of the soldiers, about 300 people, were on duty in the bastion, while the others were doing business or having fun in nearby cities. The servant army was not formally summoned.
After Lafayette launched the attack, the British servants who had no loyalty at all saw that the Mysore people seemed to be extremely ferocious - Tipu's name as the Tiger of Mysore also played a big role - So they all turned against each other. These men were very familiar with Cannanore's defenses, further accelerating the collapse of the British garrison.
Marquis Wellesley continued:
"The last news coming back from India is that more than 10,000 Mysore troops have approached North Kannada."
Little Pete's face was as dark as water. North Kannada was an important stronghold of the East India Company in western India. Malabar Port is right there. If this place was again occupied by Mysore, the British would not have a single trading post available on the entire west coast of India.
As India is far away from the UK, this news was at least a month and a half ago. He looked at the Marquis of Wellesley thoughtfully:
"It seems that the Royal Navy should give India its full support."
"And an expeditionary force of thousands of people is needed." Marquis Wellesley nodded, and suddenly remembered something, and added, "Your Excellency, Prime Minister, Governor Cornwallis of India once mentioned that there was a group of French people in Mysore recently. Activities.
"There was a wave of hatred against the British in Mysore a while ago, and it was probably the French behind it. And the weapons in the hands of the Indians were probably provided by them."
Little Peter was greatly surprised - France's financial situation should have been very serious, but it could still squeeze out funds to assist the Indians!
Little did he know that France actually only produced a Lafayette and a Tunisian princess. The other investments had long been made up for by Tipu Sultan's betrothal gift, and he even made a small profit.
Little Pete sighed silently. He had invested a lot of money in North Africa before, but the French have not withdrawn from Tunisia. Later, Hanover's army suffered another disastrous defeat in the Southern Netherlands. And now India needs huge investments.
In addition, British textile exports to Europe have recently declined, and the French are using cheap fabrics to impact the British market in Germany and Spain. If the unfavorable situation cannot be reversed everywhere, the Whigs will definitely take the opportunity to attack, and His Majesty the King may also have doubts about his own abilities.
He calculated the cost of aiding India and the complicated situation of the war with Mysore, and finally said tiredly to the Marquis of Wellesley: "Please go to Paris as soon as possible. We cannot have a problem in India. A bigger loss.”
…
Southern Netherlands.
Brussels.
Karl II looked at the officers in front of him angrily and yelled: "What on earth are you doing? The French only have 3,000 people in the town of Rully! You used nearly three times the force and you didn't capture it. !”
Several Hanoverian officers bowed their heads and remained silent, but they were complaining in their hearts.
Those French troops were really terrifying. Before their troops got close to the town of Luli, the French troops with inferior strength actually took the initiative to attack and cut their queue into two.
If they hadn't reacted quickly and retreated in time, they might not have lost 300 soldiers.
In fact, it was Joseph who strictly ordered not to annihilate the enemy troops on a large scale, otherwise how could they escape from the hands of the Guards?
The front line south of Brussels has been facing off for more than a month. Karl II recruited more than 7,000 troops from Hanover, but they were unable to shake the French army at all. Instead, he suffered losses one after another.
(End of chapter)