Chapter 1280: Bloody Battle for Ore Mountains Fortress
Close-range firing allowed the cannons to achieve extreme accuracy. The very first shell struck a gun emplacement on the fortress's inner wall. A large section of the stone wall in front of the cannon instantly crumbled, and over a dozen surrounding Austrians were covered in blood from flying debris, screaming and writhing on the ground.
The Polish soldiers directly below the fortress immediately let out a cheer, then spread out to get a better angle, firing a volley upwards. Another dozen or so lit grenades and tossed them in.
Once the enemy's fire was somewhat suppressed, engineers quickly moved forward, using the wooden frames they carried and the earth mounds previously built by the infantry as a base to construct a climbing ramp.
On the other side, Woronowicz and his men began piling up crescent-shaped earth walls with shovels in front of the valuable Twelve-Pounder Cannon, intending to turn the position into a semi-permanent firing point.
But just then, the Austrian cannons suddenly regained their firing rate, capable of firing at least two shells per minute, clearly indicating that someone had brought cooling water.
Several blood mists immediately erupted around the Polish Twelve-Pounder Cannon. The soldiers digging were pinned down by the fierce artillery fire, huddled beneath the mere 50-centimeter-high mounds, unable to even lift their heads.
The young major dodged a hail of bullets and finally reached the base of the fortress wall, only to hear the enemy's cannon fire suddenly intensify. He turned to see their lone cannon, like a leaf adrift in colossal waves, on the verge of being overturned at any moment.
'We need to find a way!' He gazed at the slope not far away, still roughly a person's height short of the wall's top, and was immediately filled with anxiety. On the front lines, where building materials were scarce, making up that small height difference would take at least half a day.
Grzegorz Janik gritted his teeth and declared loudly to the surrounding Polish soldiers, "I am Grzegorz Janik, commander of the King's Own Ninth Infantry Regiment! I need men to climb this damned wall with me and suppress the enemy's fire!"
"Why did you personally charge up here?"
"You're the bravest officer I've ever seen!"
Janik gestured into the distance. "All the officers of the Royal Twelfth and Sixteenth Infantry Regiments have also joined this assault, including their own commanders.
"So, who wants to charge up with me?"
Two or three hundred men immediately gathered around. "Me, I'll go!"
"If you're not afraid to die, what do we have to fear? Let's go!"
"That's right, count me in too!"
"I've never fought alongside a Major before..."
Over ten minutes later, Janik's aide-de-camp, accompanied by a few men, was the first to step onto the unfinished slope.
They luckily dodged the bullets flying from all directions, running all the way to the end of the slope. Then, half the men crouched down, while the other half stepped on their shoulders, leaping upwards forcefully to grab the edge of the wall.
But a flurry of bayonets immediately appeared above their heads.
Janik waved and bellowed, "Covering fire! Quickly!"
Over a hundred Polish soldiers, enduring the wildly flying bullets, fell back to gain an angle and raised their rifles to fire at the massing enemy troops.
Meanwhile, the Austrians fiercely returned fire from the wall.
At a distance of merely ten meters, both sides had extremely high hit rates. Every second, someone was struck and fell. Gunshots and wails instantly merged into a cacophony, transforming the area into a living hell.
But soon, the Austrian forces were defeated in this desperate exchange of fire, beginning to retreat in terror to either side.
"Let's go!" Janik signaled to Grochowska, then charged up the slope in a few strides, covering over ten meters. With the help of a sergeant, he reached up, grabbed the wall, and powerfully vaulted over.
Without time to assess his surroundings, he rolled a few times on the spot, then swiftly drew the pistol from his waist and fired a shot to the side.
The closest Austrians were visibly startled, retreating in a flurry and reloading in a frantic rush.
Grochowska and a few soldiers followed, climbing up and immediately forming a simple line shoulder-to-shoulder. "Aim—"
"Fire—"
A cloud of gunpowder smoke billowed up. The Austrian soldiers retreated even faster, continuously shouting, "Reinforcements, we need reinforcements here!"
Grochowska reached down to pull up the soldiers below. In just a few minutes, forty or fifty men had already gathered on that section of the wall.
Janik vigorously waved his hand. "Expand the area of control! Keep low, and only reload on command!"
On the inner walls of the redoubt, Austrian officers also noticed the anomaly on the outer wall and hastily ordered nearby cannons to load grapeshot and turn to fire in that direction.
On the distant hillside, Woronowicz quickly noticed the enemy's artillery fire had significantly weakened. He immediately grabbed his shovel, stood up, and shouted, "Quick! Keep digging!"
On the outer wall, a spray of black iron balls swept through where Janik and his men stood. At least a dozen individuals were instantly torn into scattered flesh and blood.
The dirt from Woronowicz's shovel fell onto the earth wall, which was now over a meter high. At this point, the Twelve-Pounder Cannon behind it was completely safe from bullets and small-caliber artillery.
He then signaled to his comrades, "Don't stop! Zlatopol, you and Bujak thicken the breastwork.
"The rest of you, continue widening it on both sides with me!"
"Grochowska, tell everyone to keep their heads down..." Janik turned and called out, but found that the staff officer was no longer there.
A sergeant relayed his orders to the soldiers.
With reddened eyes, Janik caught sight of the earth wall taking shape on the hillside. He smiled at where Grochowska had stood. 'See, we're doing well, old friend...'
Half an hour later, two more Twelve-Pounder Cannons were brought behind the makeshift breastwork piled up by Woronowicz and his men. By then, this crude barrier was over ten meters wide and about a meter thick.
On the wall in front of them, nearly a hundred Polish soldiers' bodies lay strewn about, yet more men continued to climb up from behind.
Janik's left hand was a bloody mess, but he seemed oblivious, still encouraging the soldiers beside him with a hoarse voice, "Hold on, everyone! The enemy is starting to falter, we will eventually seize this place!"
From the direction of the hillside came three consecutive cannon shots. The shells whistled over his head, slamming violently into the inner wall and gouging out two clearly visible craters.
The Polish soldiers on the wall immediately cheered and unleashed a hail of bullets upon the enemies to their sides.
Finally, the fortress's overall commander, Lieutenant Colonel Steinocher, noticed that the Polish forces on the southwest side had gained artillery cover and were attacking with increasing ferocity. He hurriedly ordered the officers beside him to lead six companies to reinforce the position.
On the north side of the fortress, a messenger handed the latest hot air balloon report to Lannes. "General, the high-altitude reconnaissance battalion has detected that the enemy is redeploying a large number of soldiers."
Lannes listened to the fierce cannon fire from the other side of the ridge, narrowing his eyes. "It seems our Polish friends are doing well.
"Order the artillery to advance 600 meters. The Fourth Skirmisher Brigade will commence its attack."
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