Although the journey from Tongzhou to Beijing was short, the journey was complicated, with bushes everywhere, so it was easy to get lost. The same was true for withdrawing from Tongzhou to the Northern Canal to Tianjin. Therefore, the retreating coalition forces marched slowly and encountered quite a lot of difficulties.

The French army decided to stop in a village where famous glazed tiles were fired, where there were about 10 brick kilns to supply bricks and tiles for building houses in the capital. It is said that these brick factories belonged to the palace. General Montauban ordered the remains of soldiers who were snatched from the French generals to be cremated in a centralized manner, preparing to bring their ashes back to their homeland for burial, which was an explanation for their families, and more French corpses were abandoned on the battlefield in Majuqiao Town and had no time to restrain themselves.

From the height of the brick kiln, you can also look at the capital city from afar. This is an endless plain, so you can vaguely see the destination they wanted to reach during this expedition. Everyone rushed to watch it, maybe it was just {m that can only be viewed, and that mysterious country is so out of reach!

Montauban and Grant climbed to the top of the tallest brick kiln along the spiral ladder, and were fascinated by the Beijing city tower and the unique hip roof of China. No one spoke for a long time, but in the end, Montauban broke the tranquility.

"James, what do you mean we are here for? We were left behind by Ronglu's rebels and lost the opportunity to enter the capital to control the political situation in northern China. We started a war with our former best friend in the Far East. What did we get through this war?" Grant's full name is James Hope Grant Montauban called him James in private.

Grant also looked worried. After Ronglu and Mianyu's rebels left behind some old, weak, sick and disabled people to deceive the coalition. They led the remaining more than 30,000 troops not to retreat to Tianjin in the southeast, but to Jizhou in the northeast. The cunning Ronglu might have understood that the Taiping Army had to completely eliminate this British and French coalition. There would be no other end except to be annihilated when they were with the British and French coalition. Therefore, this cunning Easterner parted ways with the coalition early and did not give the coalition any chance to take advantage of them.

"I don't know that the combat effectiveness of the Taiping Army is not inferior to our coalition forces. They sneaked into Tianjin and Hexi Wu Town, with the purpose of annihilation of all the troops we landed in, so that the Western King of the Taiping Army can have bargaining chips to negotiate with the British and French governments." Grant sighed and said, "Maybe we joined the Chinese civil war at the wrong time, the wrong place, and the wrong opportunity. We failed to get any benefits from it, but it will affect our expansion strategy in the Far East."

At this time, Sir Erkin also came here, and he crawled out of breath and looked very depressed, "Generals, your remarks have completely lost our last hope. The most pessimistic remarks I heard actually came from our generals."

Grant looked at the politician with some disgust. One of the biggest mistakes of the coalition forces was that they were busy using political means to solve the problem before the military purpose was achieved. This could be seen from the wasted time in Tongzhou. And if Erjin had not repeatedly rejected the peace agreements of Prince Gong of the Qing Dynasty and refused to give up Ronglu's despicable rebel army, the coalition forces might not have been as passive as they are now.

Montubang said without hesitation: "Sir Erkin, according to the current situation, we are likely to be completely annihilated, which represents a complete mistake in our policy towards China. Before the expedition, we failed to thoroughly evaluate the strength of the Taiping Army. This was a very fatal mistake."

Sir Erkin wiped his glasses and said, "It's too late to say anything now. The Congress and the Prime Minister do not want to see a powerful and unified country appear in the Far East, so it is necessary to intervene. It's a pity that the power we sent to the Far East is too weak." He paused and continued, "Generals, do we have no chance at all?"

Grant smiled bitterly and finally said, "Maybe we should wait for the news from Major General Miqier. If we really cannot break through Hexiwu Town and cannot occupy Tianjin again, then we can only break through and try our best to break to the seaside. Our powerful navy will try our best to withdraw the soldiers on the land, and then we go south to threaten the Taiping Army's Jiangnan hinterland. Only by relying on the navy can we regain the passive situation."

As soon as he finished speaking, gunfire sounded not far away, and an officer shouted loudly under the brick tower: "The guards and the Taiping Army have exchanged fire, and the enemy has caught up."

Grant tidied up his outfit and said in a deep voice: "Gentlemen, it's time for us to leave. Let's talk about something else first."

The coalition continued to march towards Wu Town in Hexi. The soldiers were in a low morale. They came lightly. They had to give up the spoils that might slow down their journey overnight and retreated in a hurry with only ammunition and grain. The South China Sea and Indian coolies they brought began to flee on a large scale. Many coolies surrendered to the Taiping Army, while some were killed by angry local civilians on the spot. These people were even more cruel than the soldiers during the usual robbery, so they were regarded as enemies by the people of the Jintang area. The lonely coolies were basically not left behind. Without the support of the foreign master, they could only end up like this.

It was almost twenty miles from Tongzhou to Hexiwu Town. After 5 hours of march, the coalition forces barely arrived here. Major General Michele and General Colino, who were greeting them, also looked very depressed. Grant and Montubon hurriedly held a military meeting to inquire about the current situation of Hexiwu.

Major General Miqier roughly introduced the current situation. Since yesterday, Major General Miqier's 8,000 coalition forces have been constantly attacking the outer positions of Hexi Wu Town, but the Taiping Army has been very strict in defense. The barbed wire, trenches and dense rifle artillery defense system has become a nightmare for the coalition's attack. On the Taiping Army's positions, the two sides fought repeatedly, but the enemy was very tenacious, and one group of casualties was replaced with another group. The coalition forces attacked more than ten times, and several times occupied most of the positions, but they were soon sent by the Taiping Army to take the position back. The two sides had no less than 3,000 corpses on the small outer positions of Hexi Wu Town. In the end, the coalition forces had to suspend the attack due to huge losses.

The water battle on the canal was also very fierce. Although the four gunboats that the coalition forces rushed back from Tongzhou sank the gunboats captured by the Taiping Army in one fell swoop, the four gunboats of the coalition were also seriously injured. Then, due to the stranding, they were completely sunk by the Taiping Army from underwater installation last night. This means that the coalition forces lost the possibility of retreating from the canal waterway. According to the investigation, the Taiping Army began to sink the coalition's grain transport ships in the canal water section near Tianjin to block the river, and prevent the coalition navy, which was still at Tanggukou, from sending ships into the inland river to rescue the coalition.

Due to the ambush of the Taiping Army and the cavalry searching for the coalition forces everywhere, Major General Miqier had not received any news from the Tanggukou Navy, but Major General Miqier firmly believed that the intelligence navy that fell in Tianjin must have known it and was organizing the dispatch of reinforcements to respond.

After listening to Major General Michiel's introduction, Grant and Montauban discussed for a moment, Grant said in a deep voice: "Gentlemen, our current situation is very dangerous. We still have more than 15,000 soldiers on land. I hope to take them back to the south to continue fighting the Taiping Army. So we must be prepared to retreat. We cannot return to Tianjin from Hexiwu Town and then retreat from Tianjin to sea, because there are layers of fortifications made by the enemy there, and we need to consider the retreat route. Do you have any opinions, gentlemen?"

Major General Michiel said: "But Your Excellency, we are starting to lack ammunition now. If we encounter the enemy on the way to retreat and fight one or two battles, our soldiers will face a lack of ammunition, and there is also a problem of food. The dry food we carry with us will only be worth five days..."

Grant interrupted him and said, "As long as we can return to the ship, nothing will be a problem. If we continue to stay and attack the target that cannot be captured in a short period of time, that is to kill the troops."

General Corino said: "Since Tianjin is not open, there are two roads to consider. One is to continue to go southeastward and bypass Tianjin from Jinghai to return to the Tanggu area we control. This road is a little closer, but there are many Taiping troops here, so it is difficult to break through. The other road is to take the Taiping Army's origin, from Yutian, Qian'an, Luanzhou to Shanhaiguan. The disadvantage of this road is that it is far away, almost 140 kilometers away, and may be pursued by the Taiping Army on the way. Moreover, when we retreat to Shanhaiguan, we must send people to the Tanggu navy to know that they can prepare to pick us up at Shanhaiguan in advance."

Grant and Montauban looked at the map for a long time. The large sludge wetlands south of Tanggu were not suitable for large troops to board the ship to retreat. Otherwise, the coalition would not have attacked Tanggu several times at that time. The route on Shanhaiguan was indeed too far. Unless the Taiping Army did not expect the coalition to retreat far away, otherwise the plain terrain of a flat horse would cause heavy losses to the coalition forces during the retreat.

After a moment of silence, Grant and Montauban looked at each other, and both decided. Grant said, "We retreat to Shanhaiguan, but we need an army to act as a feint attack force to break through to Jinghai, attract the attention of the enemy, and protect the large force to retreat from Shanhaiguan safely." Finally, Grant said painfully: "I need volunteers..."

For a moment, the tent of the coalition commander quieted down. Finally, Major General Michele stood up bravely and said loudly: "I am willing to lead the troops to break south and make a feint attack."

Major General Michele is a very simple soldier. He is brave in fighting. Grant is a little reluctant to let him go, but at this time he doesn't care about so much. Finally, Glen nodded and said, "Go down and select volunteers. The heavy artillery that the coalition forces are difficult to transfer will also be given to you." Montauban seemed unwilling to be a martyr alone. He said, "You can also choose the volunteers from the French army. The Navy will still wait for you in Tanggu. If it is really difficult to break through, after completing the mission, you will surrender to the Taiping Army..." (To be continued...)

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Chapter completed!