Naval Battle (1)

As they turned, the distance between the two sides closed to about four thousand meters, and the Britain finally began to return fire. However, the result of the Britain France was the same as that of the France —the shells flew off to who knows where, and none of them hit their targets. The closest shell landed a hundred or two meters away from the target.

This is actually quite normal, because naval guns of that era did not have stabilizers and were greatly affected by the ship's rolling motion. The North Atlantic Ocean is also notoriously rough and stormy. So at this distance, missing the target is quite normal.

The distance between the two sides continued to close. The France had more warships and also had the advantage in speed.

In fact, there wasn't much difference between Britain and France in terms of steam engine technology. If there was any difference, it was that steel was cheaper in France, so they were less concerned about the quality of steel used, which might have resulted in slightly better performance stability.

However, due to differences in ship design and propeller manufacturing, even with comparable steam engine performance, France ships were generally faster than Britain ships. Because of this difference, in the civilian steamship market today, Britain ships, except for those in their home country and colonies, are virtually unable to compete with France ships.

In addition, the Britain "Queen Elizabeth" was damaged and needed to control its speed, so the speed of the entire formation was reduced significantly.

Fortunately, the Britain noticed early on that the France had an unshakeable advantage in speed, so when designing and building these ships, they simply abandoned the excessive pursuit of speed and placed more emphasis on the stability and maneuverability of the ships.

More stable ships allow for improved accuracy in artillery fire, while more agile maneuvering makes it harder for the enemy to gain control of the ship's hull. In addition, sacrificing some speed requirements makes it easier to increase armor. As a result, Britain warships of this era are quite similar in style to warships of a certain country in another timeline—both are heavily armored, cannon-wielding, and iron-clad behemoths.

Of course, this is only a last resort. While this approach might not be disadvantageous in a specific battle where the forces are evenly matched or even slightly weaker, it comes at a strategic cost: the loss of initiative on the battlefield. In other words, it relinquishes the power to decide whether to engage in battle and whether to end the fight.

For a country like Britain, with colonies all over the world, this choice was actually quite disadvantageous. If possible, the Britain, or rather, Royal Navy admirals like Nelson, would rather have an egg that could swing a hammer and bounce around than a bunch of iron turtles.

However, they had no choice. The strategic situation didn't allow them to choose either. If they were just a bunch of eggs jumping around wielding big hammers, they would be in trouble when the France came in with a bunch of turtles wielding big hammers to land on the beach. Moreover, if everyone was an egg, the France eggs might roll even faster.

The Britain believed that with their thick armor and large-caliber guns, they could outmaneuver the France, whose ships were fast but had thinner armor, especially their smaller-caliber guns. While this put them at a strategic disadvantage, they thought they had a tactical advantage. However, once the battle began, the Britain discovered that one of their initial assumptions had a major problem.

The Britain categorized the performance of warships into six aspects: speed, maneuverability, and maintainability (related to navigation), firepower, protection, and damage control (related to combat performance).

The Britain believed that France warships were superior to Britain warships in speed and maintainability, while Britain warships had a clear advantage in mobility, protection, and maneuverability. As for damage control, they thought the differences were probably minor. Therefore, the Britain believed that although the choice of whether to fight or not was in the hands of the France, in a decisive fleet battle, if the two sides were evenly matched, the Britain should have a slight advantage.

However, judging from the initial probing shelling, the Britain had certainly misjudged the France warships in many ways. For example, in terms of firepower, although the Britain battleships' guns appeared to be much larger in caliber than the France ones, Nelson felt that the Britain probably did not have any firepower advantage, given the astonishing rate of fire of the France guns.

As for defense, theoretically, Britain warships had thicker armor. However, considering the level of metallurgy, it's hard to say whether the defenses of Britain warships were truly better than those of the France.

Even more critically, the numbers on both sides were not evenly matched on the battlefield. General Nelson's squadron consisted of only one new battleship, three so-called supercruisers (smaller than their France counterparts, possessing comparable speed but only the defensive capabilities of Britain France armored cruiser; naturally, Britain were also cheaper to build), and six armored cruisers.

However, the France did not need to worry about the British Army landing on their coast, so they could naturally deploy far more warships for this operation, giving French Army a clear numerical advantage. Grand Admiral Treville's fleet now consisted of two battleships, two supercruisers, and as many as fifteen armored cruisers. Excluding the battleships and supercruisers, the number of armored cruisers was more than double that of the British Army.

To effectively utilize their numerical superiority, Field Admiral Treville divided his fleet into two squadrons. The first squadron consisted of the battleships Imperator and Caesar, along with six armored cruisers. Their mission was to suppress the British Army battleship Queen Elizabeth and three other supercruisers. The second squadron consisted of the supercruisers Prosperity for All and Lasting Peace, along with nine other cruisers. Their mission was to first attack and destroy the Britain cruisers, and then concentrate fire on the Britain capital ships.

Upon seeing the France fleet's formation, General Nelson knew that this battle was unlikely to end well. The enemy's advantage was simply too obvious. Nelson felt that if he were the commander of the France fleet, most of the Britain ships would be doomed.

So, while both sides were still slowly finding their target with cannon fire, Nelson gave the order to break out of the fleet to the best-condition supercruiser in the fleet Yorkshire.

This order had two considerations. First, it was to ensure that the homeland was quickly informed of the major battle taking place here. The prospects for this battle were quite bleak, and if the homeland remained unaware of the situation, it would lead to even greater danger. Therefore, it was imperative that some ships break through the encirclement and bring news of the battle back home.

Secondly, among the French Army, only their supercruiser could match France Britain supercruiser, giving them an advantage in both firepower and defense. However, their speeds were actually quite similar. After all, the Britain couldn't afford to sacrifice protection and firepower for nothing. Moreover, supercruisers are inherently fragile. The armor of the France supercruisers was designed to withstand the guns of ordinary armored cruisers, so while their armor was slightly better, it still couldn't withstand the guns of the Britain France. Of course, to achieve sufficient firepower to penetrate the France supercruisers' armor, the Britain had to reduce the number of guns. Therefore, the France supercruisers' firepower advantage referred to having more guns, not necessarily greater firepower.

Therefore, in the current situation, if the France send a single supercruiser to pursue the Britain supercruiser, France might gain a certain advantage in the battle, but victory is not guaranteed. They could easily be overwhelmed by the Britain. However, if they send two supercruisers, the pressure on that side will be significantly reduced.

After issuing the order to break out, Nelson ordered the Z flag to be hoisted on the mast of the Queen Elizabeth, and simultaneously sent a signal to the rest of the fleet. "The United Kingdom demands that all men and women perform their duties."

One or two ships might be able to escape, but the entire fleet had no chance of escaping. Therefore, their only option was to continue fighting and try to inflict greater damage on the enemy.

"Even if we are all sunk by the France, we must at least render the France fleet incapable of continuing operations for a short period of time, so as to buy more time for the United Kingdom."

The France completely ignored the York, which had broken away from the fleet, and continued to use the first detachment to force the Britain fleet to turn, while the second detachment began to circle around to the rear of the Britain fleet.

Nelson noticed his opponent's move to split the fleet in two. He understood their intention: first, use two battleships to tie down his main force, then use the other ships to sweep away his armored cruisers first, using their numerical advantage to quickly destroy those armored cruisers, and then concentrate firepower on the "Queen Elizabeth".

Nelson knew that due to the vast disparity in troop strength, he was practically unable to counter his opponent's tactic. If Nelson were to further divide his already limited fleet, he would be playing right into the France hands. Therefore, Nelson decided to disregard the France's strategy of attacking from both sides and instead unleash all his forces on the France first detachment.

Nelson knew that this move was, in fact, within the France's expectations. He even knew that in the France plan, the first squadron, with its two "Inberlar-class" battleships, was like an anvil, while the second squadron, faster and with more ships, was the hammer. If his fleet were caught in a pincer attack by these two squadrons, it would be extremely dangerous.

However, Nelson still chose to charge headlong into the enemy. Because the hammer and anvil needed time to coordinate their movements, Nelson knew that due to the overwhelming disparity in strength, he had no chance of winning this battle. Therefore, his goal was not to win, but to inflict the greatest possible damage on France, ideally rendering their fleet incapable of fighting for a certain period. So he decided to take a risk, to gamble on whether he could inflict sufficient damage on the France anvil before the hammer struck his back.

The France first detachment continued to force the British Army fleet to turn and circle. After a few more turns, the second detachment could use its T-shaped advantage to cut in and unleash a fierce barrage of fire on the Britain. If the Britain fleet did not turn with the first detachment, they would face the T-shaped barrage from the first detachment.

But at this moment, the "Cambridgeshire," which was at the forefront of the British Army and seemed to be turning counterclockwise, suddenly veered sharply to the right and charged straight at the first detachment.

This was tantamount to placing themselves at the head of the enemy's T-shaped formation. However, since the two sides were already quite close beforehand, if they could just grit their teeth and endure one or two rounds of shelling, the Britain fleet would have the opportunity to directly penetrate the formation of the France First Squadron, changing the positions of both sides from T to X.

Of course, during this process, the supercruiser Cambridgeshire, as the first major ship to bear the brunt of the attack, would inevitably be subjected to concentrated fire from the French Army. However, her actions could provide cover for HMS Queen Elizabeth behind her. By the time Cambridgeshire was sunk, Queen Elizabeth would be very close to the enemy. Her defenses were quite strong, and although her guns had a low rate of fire, their power was astonishing. Even a single effective hit or two would be enough to inflict significant damage on the France warships. Even if not enough to sink them, it would force them to remain in the shipyard for a period of time.

Of course, if the Queen Elizabeth charged forward at such close range and was bombarded by the First Squadron, she would only suffer more damage. Her entire hull would likely be reduced to rubble by the France. However, this damage wouldn't render the Queen Elizabeth incapable of fighting; her engines could still roar, and her cannons could still howl. It was just that her cannons' rate of fire was far too slow, much slower than the France.

"Main guns, prepare to fire. Do not fire without our order." Nelson issued this order again. Since it was difficult to hit targets at long range, it would be better to rush to bayonet-like distance and fire the main guns through the enemy's armor.

Britain warships were far more agile than France ships, so when the Britain suddenly swerved and rammed into them, the France had no time to maneuver and avoid them. However, Grand Admiral Treville felt he didn't need to evade at all. He fully understood the meaning behind Nelson's action. If he were in Nelson's position, he would have done the same, as it was the most likely way to inflict more damage on the France in the current situation.

But Nelson's actions meant that the HMS Elizabeth would be under heavy fire from the bow. Grand Admiral Treville felt it was worth a fight.