Through mobile operations in Shonan, the Taiping Army added another 50,000 men. Within the Taiping Army, Xiao Chaogui, the King of the West, was evaluated as "brave and strong, the first to charge", and he learned through espionage that Changsha was still empty and unprepared, so he asked Yang Xiuqing, the Eastern King, who was in charge of military affairs, for orders to raid Changsha.
Yang Xiuqing believed that after the Battle of Ziyidu, the opportunity for a surprise attack had been lost, and did not agree, and Hong Xiuquan also held the same opinion. Xiao Chaogui stubbornly came up, took only a thousand troops, and drove straight in with his own care and launched a surprise attack on Changsha.
On September 12, 1852, Xiao Bu arrived directly under changsha. Since the rest of the Taiping army was still in Shonan and there was no sign of attacking Changsha, Xiao Chaogui's onslaught could be said to be completely unexpected. The inhabitants of the city did not even know that a great war was coming, until the Taiping Army attacked the city, the cannon hit the city, the street pulp vendor was about to take the bowl to drink, and the fragments of the cannon just smashed the bowl, and the people panicked.
When Xiao Chaogui attacked Changsha, the officers and troops actually adopted the strategy of dividing defense and blocking from afar, most of the troops were still deployed elsewhere, and the number of defenders in the city was limited. However, the information xiao chaogui received was also not accurate, at this time, three months had passed since the battle of Yidu, and all kinds of strict measures taken by the government had been implemented, and it was difficult for Xiao Chaogui to attack it in a short period of time.
Prior to this, Jiang Zhongyuan, in accordance with Liu Changyou's suggestion, selected five hundred people from Chu Yong to form a death squad to prepare for emergency at a critical moment. If you add the general soldiers and Chun and other other reinforcements, the number of Qing troops in Changsha is already several times that of Xiao Bu, but similar to the situation when besieging Yong'an, most of the officers and troops are useless, and the only people who can really fight are still Jiang Zhongyuan and his Chu Yong, so if you want to defeat the Taiping Army in one fell swoop, it is also equivalent to a fantasy.
Xiao Chaogui's troops were too small to encircle Changsha, so he concentrated his forces outside the south gate and made a posture to prepare for a protracted war. Jiang Zhongyuan inspected the situation and found that the Cai Gong cemetery outside the southern city was high, and if it was occupied by the Taiping Army, it would pose a great threat to the city gate, so he launched a rapid attack and took it down.
Xiao Chaogui was strangled to the point, unable to exert his strength, and could only rely on brute force to desperately attack the city. He was wearing a yellow official robe, supervising the battle on the front line every day, the target was extremely conspicuous, the defenders in the city suspected that he was the King of the West, a cannon shot came, Xiao Chaogui was shot, and then he was seriously wounded and killed.
Xiao Chaogui's death did not fundamentally relieve the crisis facing the provincial city. Hong Xiuquan was shocked and angry, and immediately led the whole army north to Changsha. Jiang Zhongyuan led Chu Yong to intercept it, the troops won first and then lost, in fact, they were caught in the Taiping Army's trick of enticing the troops, and they were ambushed, and Jiang Zhongyuan himself was stabbed by a spear, fell into the Malay, and almost died.
You gave me a stick in the coat, and I'll pay you some interest now! The Taiping army was eager to take revenge, and soon arrived in Changsha, forming a heavy siege of the city.
Jiang Zhongyuan (6) serialized, the end of the play.