CHAPTER X
WARSHIPS OF THE TWENTIETH CENTURY
Two classes of vessels stand forward prominently as the products of the twentieth century. One is the Dreadnought, or all-big-gun one-calibre type of battleship, the other is the submarine. The fact that both are the result of the slow developments of centuries does not render them the less the products of the last few years. Both are untried in battle, and they are regarded as preparing the way for the introduction respectively of surface and under-water warships, the power of which is conjecturable only. Associated with both is the torpedo. The dream of a submarine which shall travel faster than a surface vessel of the same size is never likely to be realised, provided that the surface vessel is built for speed also, for the simple reason that the vessel travelling on the surface has only about a third of its surface in connection with the water, whereas the submarine has its whole surface submerged, and has three times as much friction against the water to overcome. Hence, a lightly armed, very fast vessel is regarded as likely to play an important role in the navy of the not distant future, and finds its representative in the destroyer of to-day.
The submarine and the destroyer owe their existence to the battleship’s greatest enemy, the torpedo. All three vessels carry that weapon, and any two of them may combine against the third. The spar-torpedo was such an unsatisfactory weapon at best that it had either to be abandoned, save under most unusual circumstances, or improved out of all recognition. The possibilities of the torpedo itself were so great as to compel its retention, and the startling proposition was made that torpedoes should be fired by under-water guns at a distant ship. The blowing up of the Albemarle in the American Civil War showed what could be accomplished by a small fast steam launch. If this could be done with a spar-torpedo, how much more destructive would a torpedo be which could be directed against a hostile vessel from a small fast launch which could approach to within an effective range, and then turn and make a rush for safety from the gun-fire which might be brought to bear in her direction. Several torpedoes of one kind and another have been designed, but they have all had to give way to the Whitehead torpedo. The inventor is stated to have derived his idea in 1864 from a fire-boat designed by an Austrian officer, who thought of loading a small boat with explosives, to be fired by a pistol connected with protruding spars which should strike the vessel attacked, while the fire-boat itself was to be propelled by a screw driven by clockwork. Whitehead improved on this by making his boat of iron, and able to travel under water for a short distance at a speed of six knots. Its explosive was a few pounds of dynamite. By 1870 he had improved this to a torpedo having a speed of eight knots, a range of 400 yards, and a charge of 76 lb. of gun-cotton. The modern Whitehead torpedo is a wonderful piece of mechanism, so wonderful that to the ordinary spectator it seems almost endowed with intelligence. To see it lying in its cradle ashore it is simply a beautifully polished smooth steel cylinder. The fore end is blunt and with an innocent-looking steel spike projecting from the centre of its rounded front, but it is this spike which strikes the object aimed at and causes the ignition of the explosive an inch or two behind it in the head of the cylinder. The torpedo has a fine run aft for about a third of its length, and at the after end are two vertical and two horizontal rudders, and two screws revolving in opposite directions. It is some time since compressed air was adopted as the motive power. The efficacy of the compressed cold air has been increased to an extraordinary degree by the introduction of an apparatus for heating the air. A torpedo fitted with a heater can travel over double the distance at a given speed and the same expenditure of air that a torpedo without a heater can. “If a torpedo be run for the same distance with a heater as a similar torpedo without a heater, a 100 per cent. gain of power would be realised by increasing the speed, and at a range of 2,000 yards this increase is from 26 knots to 33.5 knots, the highest which has ever been realised with a torpedo over a range of 2,000 yards.”[56] The newest form of torpedo is that in which hot air instead of cold air is used.
A TORPEDO. DISCHARGED FROM A DESTROYER, TRAVELLING BY ITS OWN ENGINES TOWARDS AN ARMOURED BATTLESHIP.
In the case of the latest pattern 18-inch Whitehead torpedo, a speed of 28 knots for 2,000 yards, or 34½ knots for 1,000 yards when using the ordinary cold air, has been obtained. For longer distances, such as 3,000 and 4,000 yards, the speed is proportionately less, falling to about 20 knots for the 4,000 yards range. When using the heater, “the same torpedo maintains a speed of over 40 knots for 1,000 yards, 37 knots for 2,000 yards, 30 knots for 3,000 yards, and 27 knots for 4,000 yards. The speeds are quite extraordinary, as they represent exactly 100 per cent. more power from the engines, and it is further pointed out that the heater is extremely small, simple, and burns any ordinary lamp oil, and is capable of being fitted to practically any existing type of torpedo. The Admiralty has never been slow to adopt improvements in the torpedo armament of the fleet, and for years Great Britain has led in the matter of submarine tubes for firing torpedoes.”[57]
The explosive carried, usually gun-cotton, weighs 200 lb. An ingenious arrangement of gyroscope, valve and pendulum causes the torpedo to remain at the required depth, and to return to it if it should be diverted from it.
There have been several attempts to solve the problem of directing torpedoes by means of wireless telegraphy. The great drawback, however, has been that the receiving apparatus which the torpedo had to carry was outside it and must appear above the surface of the water, and was, therefore, liable to be sighted and shot away. The same objection has been raised to the equipment of submersible torpedo boats with “wireless.” Of recent years a torpedo has been contrived which the inventors claim can be directed by wireless telegraphy, and as there seems no reason why the principle applied cannot be improved and extended to submarines and submersibles, the utility of these under-water craft may be augmented to an inconceivable degree. The “Actinaut” is the name of the torpedo, and the jet of salt water which it ejects serves not only to indicate the position of the torpedo, but is an “indestructible receiver for the electric waves.”[58]
SUBMARINES
Submarine warfare and exploration are no new ideas, but in the past as in the present, the great difficulties have been to ensure the provision of sufficient power for rapid propulsion, and to keep the air pure enough for the crew to breathe for a long journey under water.
Efforts at submarine warfare seemed to have been made many centuries ago, but none of the contrivances then used had any fighting value, and were more interesting as freaks than in any other capacity. It is unnecessary to attempt even to summarise all the schemes which early and late inventors evolved to render possible under-water attacks upon an enemy’s fleet. The problem was as fascinating seven or eight hundred years ago as at the present time. Most of the alleged mediæval inventions probably never got beyond the imaginative or paper stage, and however wonderful the inventors’ theories or written descriptions may have been, even when embellished with weird illustrations showing the contrivance at the bottom of the sea, it is not recorded that any of the submarines achieved any actual success whatever. One of the earliest submarine descents which is supposed to have been made was that of Alexander the Great, who is mendaciously represented to have been lowered to the bottom of the sea in a glass barrel, too small for him to stand up in, with a smoky oil lamp or two, and an animal which might have been a dog or a cat (it is difficult to say which the artist intended) for company, the circumstances being such that he could not have failed to be asphyxiated in a very short space of time. It appears, too, that he wore a crown and his royal robes on that occasion, so that he evidently visited Neptune in state.
As early as the year 1190 a man is said to have constructed a diving boat of leather. Numerous suggestions were made to enable men to go under water in order to bore holes through the sides of an enemy’s ships, which, considering the thickness of the planks, must have been a somewhat laborious undertaking. The Barbary corsairs are stated to have used some sort of submarine explosive against the ships of their opponents, but this explosive or combustible was most likely Greek fire.
William Bourne, who served in Queen Elizabeth’s navy, is said to have had a submarine boat which could have been made useful, but there are no records in existence to show that the experiment ever took place. An interesting feature of the suggestion was that he proposed to sink or raise the vessel by admitting and expelling water. About the middle of the seventeenth century, a Dutchman is said to have invented a boat which travelled under water from Westminster to Greenwich, and it is even asserted that it carried passengers, in addition to twelve men at the oars, and that the air in the interior of this vessel was purified by a “chymicall liquor.” A Royal Warrant, dated June 29th, 1626, ordered the delivery of “360 fforged iron cases with fireworkes, 50 water mynes, 290 water petards, and two boats to conduct them under water, for H.M. special service to goe with the fleete.”
Two worthy friars of the Order of Minims turned from their spiritual contemplations to devise a submarine, and they appear to have been the first to suggest that it should be built with both ends alike, and pointed so that it could move either end foremost; it was to be given wheels to move along the sea floor, and to be propelled by oars. It was even to carry guns, to be fired through holes in the side. Another inventor in the seventeenth century waxed so enthusiastic over his submarine, that, besides pointing out its advantages in all manner of possible and impossible circumstances in time of war, he represented that it should be used for submarine hunting parties, who might have great sport shooting the fish as the boat went along. A Frenchman named De Son, built in 1663, at Rotterdam, a vessel about 72 feet in length, circular, and running to a cone at each end, by which he promised, but did not perform, great things. A few years later a boat was designed by the Abbé Borelli to travel under water, his idea being that the boat should rise or sink according to the amount of water admitted through holes in the hull to skins provided for the purpose. Bushnell, an American inventor, had a vessel he called the Turtle, which seems to have been shaped more like an egg. It floated at the surface of the water with the pointed end downward, and had a small screw propeller, jutting out at one side. On the opposite side of the body of the vessel was a magazine containing about 150 lb. of powder. This magazine was detachable from the inside of the ship, and was fastened by a rope to a powerful screw which the inventor intended to drive into the hold of the opposing warship, and then make the best of his way to safety, leaving the magazine attached to the screw. He was more anxious to find someone to make the attack on the British ships than to do it himself.
THE “HOLLAND” SUBMARINE.
THE “GOUBET” SUBMARINE.
Probably the first really successfully designed submarine was that of Robert Fulton, the American, who submitted his plans of the Nautilus to the French Directory in 1797. His first boat was tried experimentally on the Seine in 1800. His next boat had iron ribs, and was copper-sheathed, and was shaped like a very long egg; it was fitted with a small hinged mast and a bat-wing sail, so that it could be used for surface navigation if necessary. He made a few descents in the Seine with success, but at no time stayed under water more than twenty minutes. Still, the experiment was held to be sufficiently promising for the boat to be tried at Brest, where he failed in his attempts to do any damage to the English ships of war. A preliminary experiment, before that against the English, was successful. On the British side, a so-called catamaran was contrived, by which it was intended to blow up the French ships at Boulogne. The catamaran consisted of a framework in which one man should sit immersed up to his arm-pits, and should paddle himself along under cover of darkness, and tow a floating box of powder to be exploded by clockwork in so many minutes, this affording him time to paddle away in safety. This floating mine or torpedo was to be fastened under the counter of the wooden man-of-war. Fulton is supposed to have had a hand in this, but the attack when it was made ended in an absolute failure, the catamarans making the attack being mostly blown up, while those vessels against which it was directed suffered no harm whatever. Upon his return to America, Fulton constructed a submersible called the Mute, which was to fire “Colombiads,” or under-water guns. Her inventor died during the course of her trials, which, however, did not reveal anything to show that the boat would have been other than an absolute failure as a warship. Though the British and the French naval authorities were strongly opposed to submarine warfare for a variety of reasons, American inventors continued their experiments. A diving boat passed under the British 74-gun ship Ramilies three times, and at last got close under the vessel, and tried to fasten a clockwork mine to it by means of a screw after the plan Bushnell adopted, but the screw broke. Other attempts were made, and as there were then no means of discovering when a submarine attack was intended, the British officer in command placed a number of American prisoners on board his ships and notified the American Government that if any of the ships were blown up, the American prisoners as well as the crew would go with it. What was known as an American torpedo-pilot was really a large boat covered from end to end with a curved iron deck, above which was a small pilot-house or look-out chamber, which also served as a ventilator; the boat was propelled by paddle-wheels, and travelled so low in the water as to be practically awash, and towed a mine behind her. Some of these mines or torpedoes contained as much as six barrels of gunpowder. An Englishman named Johnson designed a submarine or diving boat in which he was to have rescued the ex-Emperor Napoleon from Saint Helena, but Napoleon’s death intervened.
Various inventions were tried at one time and another, and the misfortune is that in many cases the first experiment proved to be the last, for the contrivances were the inventors’ coffins. Some of these fatalities were unquestionably due to the submarines being made to descend too low, when they gave way under the enormous pressure of the water.
The first effective submarine designed for war purposes was a cigar-shaped boat constructed by an American shoemaker named Phillips. The boat was built of iron and carried a colombiad, which could be fired through a port in the iron plating, and also a couple of torpedoes or mines. Numerous experiments with this boat were successful, but Phillips descended once too often.
A German named Bauer invented a diving boat, which scared the Danes badly in the war between Denmark and Prussia in 1848-50. At its second voyage it descended too far, but Bauer and his two companions escaped through the scuttle. Thirty-six years later the boat was fished up, and is now in the Naval Museum at Berlin. Failing to get any more money in Germany, and being suddenly dropped in Austria after the Court and Government had given him much encouragement, he came to England, where the Prince Consort became his patron. He designed a submarine, but his plans were altered by some of the leading engineers, ship-builders, and statesmen, who, whatever their skill in surface navigation and diplomacy may have been, knew next to nothing of submarine navigation. The consequence was that his boat as altered to suit their views was a failure, and the discredit was cast upon Bauer. Still believing that he was right, he betook himself to the United States, but the American Government, probably finding that the local supply of inventors and submarines was a long way in excess of the demand, turned a deaf ear to all his suggestions. He went back to Europe, and the Russian authorities authorised him to construct his Sea Devil which, after numerous experiments, was sunk under circumstances never fully explained. He managed, however, in one of his trips with her, to enter Sebastopol harbour, to the great dismay of a Russian sentry who, seeing him gliding by night in a standing position along the surface of the water, took him for a ghost, dropped his rifle, and ran. The loss of his boat has been attributed to an order of the Russian Government that it should be deliberately sunk to get it out of the way.
The French boat Plongeur, launched at Rochefort in 1863, was cigar-shaped with the upper side flattened, and was driven by an engine deriving its power from compressed air. She was too long for her width to be of much use, and had no stability.
The first Confederate David has already been alluded to, and the Southerners were so pleased with the success that they ordered another. In five experiments the second boat sank five times, and drowned altogether thirty-five men. Before she went down the next time it was determined that she should attack one of the Federal warships. She was directed against the Housatonic, then one of the fleet blockading Charleston. The David was being navigated along the surface of the water instead of beneath, and her scuttles were open. The little vessel’s spar-torpedo struck the warship in line with the magazine. Nothing was ever seen of the David afterwards, nor of her crew. The Housatonic went down, but nearly all on board were saved.
Though the Davids proved as destructive to themselves as to the enemy, they demonstrated as nothing else could have done that a small boat approaching noiselessly under cover of darkness could destroy by means of mines or torpedoes a hostile ship.
The most inappropriately named submarine was the Resurgam, invented by an English clergyman named Garrett, for during an experiment off the Welsh coast, in 1879, it never returned to the surface after diving.
The first submarine as a locomotive engine of warfare was invented by John P. Holland, and it is to his boat, known as the Holland the First, that all the modern submarines and submersibles owe their parentage. It was a one-man affair, just big enough to allow him to sit down in it and work with his feet the paddle arrangement that turned the propeller shaft. It carried five small torpedoes, which could be placed outside through a chamber in the dome or conning tower, and were discharged by electricity. This marked the introduction of one of the means which made modern submarine vessels possible, for until it was discovered how to use electricity in this way, a clockwork arrangement was the only reliable method by which a torpedo could be exploded. The application of electricity rendered it possible to eject the torpedo a considerable distance from the ship, comparatively speaking, and by means of connecting wires discharge it when thought advisable. This vessel was only 16 feet in length. The second Holland, built in 1877, was only 10 feet long. A small gas or oil engine was introduced to drive the screw propeller of a third submarine built by Holland two years later. This boat was 31 feet long, 6 feet in diameter, and cigar-shaped. The experiments he conducted with it showed that it was impossible to depend on ordinary vision when travelling in any depth of water on account of the darkness. She carried a pneumatic gun discharging a 9-inch projectile, the range of the weapon being 130 feet. It was not until 1884 that Holland’s fourth boat appeared. In the following year he tried again with a rather larger vessel, 40 feet long and 7 feet in diameter, often called the Zalinski, because it was fitted with pneumatic guns of the type invented by an American army lieutenant of that name. Again there was a long silence in regard to Holland, until he submitted the designs of his seventh boat—the sixth was planned but never built—to the American Government, which had decided to adopt the under-water torpedo boat as a definite part of the navy. The Holland the Seventh, as designed and launched, was to be 85 feet long, of 100 tons displacement, and to carry three torpedo tubes and two steel armoured gun turrets. The Holland Company had meanwhile designed a vessel they considered much superior, and the Government consented to adopt it in place of No. 7. She was something like a porpoise, and above a semi-cylindrical hull carried a flat-sided superstructure, which has been one of the distinguishing features of the Holland type of submarines from that day to this. Her aerial torpedo was to carry 100 lb. of gun-cotton. After discharging it she was to dive, approach the vessel she sought to destroy, and fire her Whitehead torpedo. If this missed, she was to go under the vessel and discharge her after submarine gun immediately after passing underneath. The Holland was altered and improved, and when the French announced that they had become possessed of types of submarines and submersibles upon which dependence could be placed in time of war for destroying an enemy’s vessels, the British Admiralty abandoned the attitude of scepticism and watchfulness combined it had maintained for so long, and ordered five boats from the Holland Company for experimental purposes. The experiments which were made with these boats resulted in the Government becoming possessors of what were known as the A class of submarine.
BRITISH SUBMARINE A13.
Photograph by E. Sankey, Barrow.
BRITISH SUBMARINE C22.
Photograph by E. Sankey, Barrow.
Very little has been revealed of the details of modern submarines, for if there is one subject more than another upon which the admiralties of the world are agreed, it is that they should not let one another know the secrets of the mechanism of these under-water craft. That, at least, is the theory, but it is very questionable if all the governments are not quite well informed as to the constructional details of each other’s submarines, and probably know almost as much about them as they do about their own. The experiments at Barrow and elsewhere with the Holland boats and their successors have been responsible for the introduction of several classes of submarines, every one of which embodies improvements upon its predecessor. The five boats built for Great Britain at Barrow, in 1902, were 63 feet 4 inches in length by 11 feet 9 inches breadth, by 12 feet 1 inch depth, and had a surface speed of ten knots and a submerged speed of seven knots. The A class, which appeared in 1902, began with a vessel of 180 tons displacement, and 100 feet in length by 12 feet 8 inches beam. Larger vessels of this class were built from 1904 to 1907 of 204 tons displacement, but varying considerably in dimensions. The B class of 313 tons submerged displacement was introduced in 1903-4. These vessels were 135 feet by 13 feet 6 inches, and had a cruising speed of fourteen knots and a submerged speed of nine knots. The C class, which resembled the B class in many particulars, appeared in 1906-7, as did also the D class, but the latter were of 500 tons submerged displacement and of fifteen knots cruising speed. The five boats built on the Holland designs were each propelled by a 4-cylinder 190 h.p. petrol engine besides an electrical engine of 70 h.p. The armament was an 18-inch torpedo tube in the bow, and each carried five torpedoes. These vessels were divided into seven compartments. The deck was 31 feet 4 inches by 4 feet 5 inches. There were two diving rudders at the stern, and the conning tower, of 32 inches diameter, was formed of 4-inch armour. The A type, the first of which sank in March, 1904, off Spithead, had a 12-cylinder 600 h.p. gasolene engine. The B type had engines of 850 h.p., and could carry 15 tons of fuel structurally, and were provided with a forward superstructure. The D type have heavy oil engines, and can carry 15 tons of fuel. Yet another and more advanced type of submarine is stated to be under consideration and possibly under construction. It is to be larger, according to report, than any existing submarine, and is to carry a gun, which it will come to the surface to discharge. Is this to be the forerunner of a new cruiser, to be equally at home and equally dreaded, whether it be operating at the surface or beneath the waves, advancing stealthily upon its foe?
The Japanese, when they decided upon importing some submarines from this country, had two specially built at Barrow. It was not thought advisable to send them under their own power, or in tow of tugs, to the Far East, so a special vessel was built for their accommodation. For two-thirds of her length her main deck could be removed and her bottom was constructed to permit of the two submarines lying side by side. In order to get them on board, this steamer, which was called the Transporter, was sunk in dock at Liverpool, the submarines were floated into place and the water was pumped from the dock, and, of course, from the steamer also. As it subsided, the submarines were carefully adjusted in their cradles, and when this work had been completed, the Transporter with her strange cargo returned to Barrow in order to be prepared for the voyage to Japan.
SUBMARINE D1, WITH WIRELESS TELEGRAPH MAST.
Photograph by Stephen Cribb, Southsea.
LAUNCH OF U.S. SUBMARINE “NARWHAL.”
Photograph supplied by the Fore River Shipbuilding Co.
FRENCH SUBMARINE “X.”
Photograph by Stephen Cribb, Southsea.
It is necessary, however, to consider what other nations have done in connection with the submarine, long before the Holland was adopted by the British Admiralty. A Swedish inventor, Dr. Nordenfeldt, who had given a great deal of attention to the subject, was attracted by Mr. Garrett’s method of what was called “bottling up” the steam engine, so as to permit of the vessel diving under water. The first Nordenfeldt was cigar-shaped and 64 feet long, and was remarkable in one respect, for she was the first to carry a tube for discharging Whitehead torpedoes. She underwent in the presence of Royalty a fairly successful trial on the first day, and was ultimately purchased by the Greek Government. In 1887 Dr. Nordenfeldt and Mr. Garrett designed boats with screws placed on top, for regulating the ascent and descent, and the torpedo tube of each was carried at the outside of the bow instead of inside. One of these boats was taken by Mr. Garrett to Constantinople, where she was put through numerous evolutions in the presence of the Sultan himself and the greater part of the population of that city. The engineer and Mr. Garrett understood their work perfectly, but the same could not be said for the Turkish crew who were told off to be drilled in its manipulation. They knew nothing of submarines and did not want to learn, and maintained their obstinacy to the utmost. The trials took place in June, 1887. The Turkish boatmen simply would not keep out of her way, until one of them navigated his empty barge too close to the Nordenfeldt, whose revolving propeller knocked such a large hole in the barge’s bottom that it was as much as the boatman could do to get it to the shore to save it foundering. After that the Nordenfeldt was allowed more room. The first time, so far as navigation was concerned, she was tried she was a success, but directly her stability was altered by the discharge of her Whitehead torpedo from the bows, her trim was changed very materially, and it was even thought possible that she might go down stern first. However, the Turks bought her and added her to the collection of naval purchases of which they could make little use. A later submarine was built by Nordenfeldt, but proved no more stable, horizontally, than the other. It was purchased by the Russian Government, and was lost on the way to the Baltic.
The French have seemed to find an extraordinary fascination in submarine navigation. It was very great before Jules Verne published his fascinating romance, “Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea,” and became even more enthusiastic than ever. Of the early French experiments it is not necessary to say much. One of the first of the reliable French submarines was the Goubet, 10 feet in length, 6 feet high and 3 feet wide. This vessel was succeeded in the estimation of the French naval authorities by the Gymnote, which proved as remarkable a forerunner of a type as the Dreadnought did of the new type of battleships, and, like the Dreadnought, she has been steadily superseded by improvements upon her design. The Gymnote was designed by M. Gustave Zédé, although the credit of suggesting her in the first instance is sometimes ascribed to M. Dupuy de Lôme. She was launched in September, 1888, and was cigar-shaped. She displaced about 50 tons with dimensions of 59 feet in length, 6 feet in depth, and 5 feet 7 inches in breadth, and her electrical motor was supplied with the necessary power from a large installation of accumulators. Her conning tower was telescopic, and she had a periscope to enable her commander to take observations without coming to the surface; she was one of the first vessels, if not the first, to be fitted with a periscope or optical tube, the principle of which is that a mirror placed at a certain angle above the tube has its reflection reproduced by another mirror placed entirely parallel to it at the bottom of the tube. She carried two Whitehead torpedoes. M. Zédé planned another submarine which was launched in June, 1893, and its electrical installation nearly poisoned its crew owing to the fumes given off. Another Goubet followed, but was so slow that the Government rejected her. Since then, especially in the last few years, the French Government has gone in for a singular variety of these vessels. Some of them have undergone marvellous tests with conspicuous success. But none have attempted such a feat as two British submarines have accomplished, viz., from England to Hong Kong. They were towed part of the way, and escorted all of it, but their own power was not allowed to be idle.
THE “TRANSPORTER.”
Photograph supplied by Messrs. Vickers, Ltd.
U.S. GUNBOAT “PADUCAH.”
Photograph supplied by the Gas Engine and Power Co.
It is now attempted to propel French submarines by Diesel engines for surface work, and by electric motors for underwater work; the result of the experiment is not known at the time of writing.
The Russian Government is said to favour submarines of the Lake pattern, so named after its American inventor, of which a great deal is thought; and America is said to have adopted both Holland and Lake submarines. One Lake boat was provided with wheels, and went on a submarine motor tour along the New England coasts, and Mr. Lake finally offered to demonstrate the usefulness of his vessel by finding and cutting the cables of the mines protecting one of the American ports. This was more than the American Government could allow, so he had a cable laid across a harbour mouth, and having found it, severed it.
The Italian authorities have modified the Holland and French plans to suit their own ideas, and though their boats are said to have given excellent results, singularly little is known about them.
All makes of submarines and submersibles have to return to the surface at fairly frequent intervals to renew the supply of fresh air, and have to approach it at even more frequent intervals in order that the navigating officer may see what are his surroundings at the surface, and, in time of war, whether it would be safe for him to bring his vessel up. The difficulty of finding his way about without revealing his whereabouts by exposing the periscope to view is one of the greatest the commander of a submarine has to meet, but it would be futile to say that the ingenuity of scientific inventors will not overcome even this difficulty.
TORPEDO BOATS AND DESTROYERS
When the Iris was given a speed of 18½ knots, many declared that the limit in speed, with a due regard to safety, had been attained. Much the same was said when Mr. Thornycroft brought out the Lightning in 1876, the first real torpedo boat ever built for the British Navy, which had a speed of 18½ knots. Now, however, the speed has been more than doubled, and the sea-going qualities of the vessels are so much better that there is scarcely room for comparison. In 1873 the same firm built for the Norwegian Government a small steamboat intended to be employed in torpedo work only. The Lightning was 87 feet over all, with a displacement on her trials of 28½ tons; now torpedo boats are a hundred feet or so longer.
THE EARLIEST EUROPEAN TORPEDO BOAT. BUILT FOR THE NORWEGIAN
GOVERNMENT IN 1873. SPEED 18 KNOTS.
Photograph supplied by Messrs. J. Thornycroft & Co., Ltd.
FIRST BRITISH TORPEDO BOAT, “LIGHTNING.” SPEED 18 KNOTS.
BUILT IN 1876.
Photograph supplied by Messrs. J. Thornycroft & Co., Ltd.
H.M. TORPEDO BOAT NO. 79, BUILT IN 1886.
Photograph by Stephen Cribb, Southsea.
H.M.S. “VULCAN.”
Photograph by E. Sankey, Barrow.
A small torpedo boat built for the Russian Government by Messrs. Yarrow, in 1879, was considered to be the most formidable vessel of her class afloat. Her speed was 22 knots, and on 10 tons of coal it was estimated that she would be able to steam 800 miles at a speed of 10 to 12 knots. Her stem was formed to be a sharp ram, and from the conning tower to the stem she had a hood over her deck to throw off the water she might take over her bows. The two launching tubes for her Whitehead torpedoes were on either side of the bows. The theory was that the first torpedo should break through the nets or other guards, and that the second torpedo, discharged a few seconds later, should pass through the gap thus made in the ship’s defence and attack the hull itself. A comparatively recent invention is a contrivance to be carried on the nose of the torpedo to cut through the net.
Torpedo boats had to have their “parent ship,” or ship to which they could go for any repairs to be made when at sea. The parent ship was necessarily a floating torpedo boat factory, and, if the torpedo boat were not too large, could hoist her on board and repair her as effectually as if she were in dry dock or on the slips ashore, and lower her again to the water when the work was finished. The Vulcan, of 6,620 tons displacement, was launched in 1889 to undertake these duties, and also act as a laboratory in connection with the mining service. She had two powerful hydraulic cranes for hoisting in and out torpedo boats, of which she carried six on her deck for the assistance of the fleet she might accompany, and also had two counterbalancing barges and steam pinnaces. In order that she might be able to protect herself she was equipped with twenty quick-firing guns. Several “parents” or floating repair ships have been added to the Navy of recent years, and every one of them is as modern as science and money can make her.
Having a large fleet of cruisers and battleships, it has been the British policy of late years to arm them with a powerful secondary battery, especially designed to meet torpedo attack. It is not touching upon international or diplomatic questions to state that the very preponderance of the British fleet has rendered the risk of invasion of these islands exceedingly small, and the resources of this country have been, and are, so vast, that the much-debated two-power standard—in spite of the numerous and contradictory estimates of comparative naval strength based upon it—has, on the whole, been maintained.
If the theoretical British frontier be the coast-line of a possible opponent, it is evident that vessels which can steam to an enemy’s coasts and destroy his torpedo boats there are of greater use than the torpedo boats which can only operate along the coast-line, or venture to cross the seas in fine weather. This has been set forth as one reason why the British Admiralty of recent years has preferred destroyers to the smaller vessels.
The introduction of rapid-firing guns of great power and range is claimed by some naval authorities to have reduced very materially the effectiveness of the torpedo boat. Its speed has been doubled in a few years, but it is contended that with the improvement in guns this has been more than neutralised by the greater size it has been necessary to give the torpedo boats in order to provide sufficient space for the machinery and retain the vessel’s sea-going qualities, as the increased size renders the vessel easier to hit. It must be remembered, moreover, that the anti-torpedo boat armament of a modern warship can fire as many as a hundred shots a minute, or several times as many as when torpedo boats were added to the world’s fleets.
HIGH-SPEED SEA-GOING TORPEDO BOAT OR GUNBOAT, PROPELLED BY
INTERNAL COMBUSTION ENGINES. SPEED 23 KNOTS.
Photograph supplied by Messrs. Yarrow & Co., Ltd.
U.S. DESTROYER “LAWRENCE.”
Photograph supplied by the Fore River Shipbuilding Co.
Some of the Continental powers have been quick to appreciate the value of the torpedo boat as propelled by internal combustion engines, among the most noteworthy examples being those built and engined by Yarrow for the Austrian Government. The “E,” for instance, is 60 feet in length by 9-feet beam, and has a draught of 2 feet 8 inches. She has three screws, and her five sets of these engines give her a speed of 22¼ knots, in spite of her diminutive size, and her radius of action at 11 knots is three times what would be obtainable with vessels of the same size propelled by steam. Another, of the same length, has attained a speed, when light, of 25½ knots, and of 24 knots with a load of 3 tons, and her radius of action at full speed is 250 miles. A somewhat larger vessel from the same makers is 100 feet in length, with a beam of 13 feet 6 inches, and her internal combustion engines give her a speed of 23½ knots. The advantages, and they are very great, claimed for all boats propelled by powerful engines of this type over those propelled by steam engines, are that as the vessels have no funnels there can be no flaming from funnels, with its risk of betrayal of the vessel’s whereabouts; that only half the engine-room staff is required, and that the range of action is three times what it would be under steam.
The development of the torpedo boat as a means of offence soon made it necessary for a means to be devised of defeating them. The torpedo gunboat was accordingly designed, the idea being that it should be able not only to act as a small cruiser, scout or gunboat, but by reason of its superior size, armament, and sea-going qualities should hold the torpedo boats in check. One of the earliest of these was the French Bombe launched in 1885. She was of 395 tons displacement, and was intended to have a speed of 18 knots, but being lightly constructed, proved a slow boat whenever there was the suspicion of a sea on. England followed suit with the Rattlesnake and others, of 550 tons, but they also failed to maintain their designed speed of 19½ knots. Improved gunboats followed, which, however, were not considered to be equal to the duties required of them, especially as by 1902 torpedo boats were built to travel at a speed which would leave the gunboats far behind.
This left the way open for the appearance of the torpedo boat destroyer, which has been described as the result of the failure of the gunboat to perform its second purpose satisfactorily.
The destroyer was designed to be able to overtake torpedo boats by superior speed, to be of larger dimensions, and therefore able to maintain her speed in rougher weather than the torpedo boat could, and to be sufficiently powerfully armed to sink a torpedo boat or hostile destroyer by gun-fire. The destroyer was also to carry torpedoes, it being desired to take advantage of the great speed to deliver torpedo attacks upon cruisers and other large ships as occasion offered. The earliest British destroyers were the Daring of 237 tons, in 1893 the Hornet of 240 tons, and the Ferret of 250 tons, built respectively by Thornycroft, Yarrow and Laird, all three boats having a speed of 27½ knots; and about two years later the Palmer firm built at Jarrow the Janus, Lightning, and Porcupine of equal speed. With Thornycroft’s Boxer, in 1894, the speed was brought up to 29 knots; and in the same year the Desperate, 280 tons, and the Quail, 305 tons—two odd names to be associated—were the pioneers of the destroyers of the 30-knot type, many of which attained to 32 knots. These were turbine boats, but the Albatross by Thornycroft, with reciprocating engines, also attained 32 knots in 1899. The last 30-knot destroyer had her engines fitted with forced lubrication on a special system, which overcame the difficulty of oiling the engines satisfactorily for running at the high speed necessary and was the first destroyer in the British Navy to be thus equipped.
STERN VIEW OF H.M.S. “SYLVIA.” 30-KNOT DESTROYER, WITH
COAL-BURNING WATER-TUBE BOILERS.
Photograph supplied by Wm. Doxford & Son, Ltd., Sunderland.
No further advance of a sensational character was announced until the Star was launched from Palmer’s yards, and she was surpassed very shortly afterwards by the performance of the little steamer Turbinia. This vessel was only 100 feet in length, and of 44½ tons displacement. The engines of the Parsons type of turbines, with which it was fitted experimentally, received the cold shoulder, which seems to be the fate of all innovations that do not come into the world through official channels. But the owners of this vessel and the proprietors and inventors of the engines adopted a method of compelling recognition as daring as it was successful. The occasion chosen was the naval review held in honour of the diamond jubilee of the late Queen Victoria, and shortly before the Royal Yacht arrived to pass between the rows of warships, this turbine steamer shot into the fairway and went at her utmost speed from one end to the other of the lines of steamships and the finest assemblage of warships the world had ever seen, and there was not in the whole British Navy one destroyer or torpedo boat present that she could not outdistance. Thousands of spectators witnessed the exploit, and the success of the turbine engine was assured from that moment.
The remarkable development in steamship propulsion this vessel heralded was represented in less than ten years by the fastest and largest steamships in the world, and the largest and fastest and most powerful battleships afloat. The builders’ estimate of the power of her rotary engines was that for every ton of the machinery 72 h.p. should be developed, and though this seems to have been accomplished in the Turbinia, equally satisfactory results have not been attained in the large seagoing destroyers fitted with turbine engines, but the results were in advance of those obtainable with reciprocating engines.
It was not, however, until 1900 that the first turbine-driven war vessel was added to the fighting force of the Navy. The Admiralty had not been idle, and as the result of numerous tests and inquiries made the great experiment which brought about the revolution in the propulsion of the world’s fighting ships. The mercantile marine led the way, the Allan line being the first to have Atlantic liners equipped with turbines. The Government watched the experiment carefully, and in spite of opposition from some influential quarters decided to try how turbines would act in a destroyer. This was the Viper, of 390 tons displacement. The hull and boilers were by Hawthorn, Leslie and Co., and the engines were by the Parsons Turbine Company. She astonished everyone by attaining a speed of 36.6 knots when running light, and from that time onward the development of turbines for warships has been one long series of progress.
The destroyers of the River class, begun in 1903 and completed in 1906, had displacements varying from 540 to 590 tons, but the speed of all of them was about 25½ knots. These were followed by the coastal destroyers, designed, as their name indicates, to operate as destroyers along the coast against any hostile torpedo boats, but now classed as torpedo boats. In the latter capacity their guaranteed speed of 26 to 27 knots would stand them in good stead, but as destroyers they were soon outclassed. Some of them were provided with turbines.
H.M. TORPEDO BOAT DESTROYER “SWIFT.” OIL FUEL.
Photograph by Stephen Cribb, Southsea.
H.M.S. “WEAR.”
Photograph supplied by Palmer Shipbuilding Co., Ltd.
The announcement that the Admiralty favoured a speed of 33 knots evoked a chorus of disapproval. The Admiralty was supposed to have become obsessed by a craze for speed, to which everything must be sacrificed. All the old objections which had done duty at every increase of speed for years, and had been proved to be ill-founded, were revived, brought up to date, and launched against the Admiralty proposals. Again it was contended that a vessel travelling at that speed must inevitably founder if she should unfortunately bury her nose in a wave, and that the violent alternation of stresses as she travelled in a rough sea must cause her to break her back or buckle her decks without more ado. But the Mohawk, in 1907, came and conquered, much to the delight of everyone except those whose prophecies, as usual, were upset, and not only attained a speed of 34½ knots, but accomplished it in fairly rough weather in the wintry month of November of that year, and proved her soundness of construction and the possession of excellent sea-going qualities. An objection, which at first was supposed to be serious, was that to attain such a high speed her consumption of fuel would be so great that her radius of action would be greatly restricted. The contract under which the Mohawk was built by White, at Cowes, contained the stipulation that she should maintain a speed of 33 knots for six hours; at her trials, however, she averaged 34½ knots. Her consumption of oil fuel on this occasion was 64¼ tons, and as she is fitted to carry 148 tons, her radius of action at this enormous speed is 435 knots, and at 14 knots, which is known now as the cruising speed, she is estimated to cover 1,500 miles. Though 270 feet in length she is only 25 feet beam. She is constructed entirely of high tensile steel, the tensile strength ranging from 37 to 40 tons per square inch. Her three screw propellers are driven by turbine engines, and it has been found that with oil fuel she can attain her full speed in less time than would be possible were her furnaces fed with coal. Her armament consists of three 12-pounder rifled quick-firing breech-loading guns, two of which are forward and one aft, and two revolving tubes on deck for firing 18-inch torpedoes. Another of the class, Thornycroft’s Tartar, made 35.678 knots on the measured course, an almost equal speed on the six-hours’ run, while the highest speed she showed was 37.037 knots, thereby establishing a world’s record.
The same year saw the launch of the Swift, at Birkenhead. She has a displacement of 1,800 tons, and is the largest and fastest destroyer yet constructed. She is of a special type, a class by herself; her turbine engines of 30,000 indicated h.p. give her a speed of 36 knots, and for armament she carries four 4-inch guns and two torpedo tubes. Not far behind her in dimensions and speed is the Japanese Kaifu, but a Russian destroyer building at the Putilov yard in Russia is to be of 1,300 tons, but with engines as powerful as those of the Swift, is expected to prove fully as fast, if not faster.
The ocean-going destroyers, built in 1909, have displacements varying from 880 to 1,000 tons, and a speed of from 33 to 34 knots, a typical example being the Maori, built by Denny at Dumbarton. The new naval force for the Australian Commonwealth includes some very fine destroyers, among which may be mentioned the Yarra.
A tendency has been manifest in some of the later destroyers to provide better all-round fighting and sea-going qualities than were possible in vessels like the Swift, in which speed was all-important. The Beagle and Acorn are considered to be good representatives of the compromise.
The bunker capacity of destroyers being very limited, and their consumption of fuel large, it is evident that the scope of their operations must be considerably restricted. At no time is it possible for them to be more than fourteen days away from their coal base. In case of necessity they might coal at sea, if coal storeships accompany the fleet to which they are attached. The adoption of oil fuel, which can be stored in the double bottom, may increase the range at which these vessels can operate, and if, as is expected in the near future, destroyers driven by internal combustion engines are adopted, their range of action will prove more extensive still.
H.M. TORPEDO BOAT DESTROYER “TARTAR.” TURBINE DRIVEN, SPEED
35 KNOTS.
Photograph supplied by Messrs. J. Thornycroft & Co., Ltd.
H.M. TORPEDO BOAT DESTROYER “MAORI.”
Photograph supplied by W. Denny & Brothers, Dumbarton.
German and British rivalry in the production of faster destroyers and torpedo boats has resulted in the production of two types, each peculiarly suitable to the country to which it belongs; the British vessels have been designed rather for the offensive, on the principle perhaps that the truest defence is the swiftest attack, while the German boats have become torpedo boats rather than destroyers, and though capable of performing the duties of both roles, are considered by British experts to be less destroyers than the British boats, which are admittedly destroyers first and torpedo boats afterwards. By 1909 the tonnage of the British destroyers had reached 950 tons, the speed being 27 knots. In that year, too, the Admiralty standardised its vessels instead of leaving the contractors to design their own craft. Oil fuel was tried in the small boats of these classes in the British Navy in 1904 and for three years subsequently, but was dropped, only to be taken up again in 1909, in which year Germany also experimented in this direction. The armament of the British and German ships shows that the destroyers of the latter are meant to be torpedo boat destroyers, though it is contended that they could be more heavily and effectively armed still than they are without interfering with their sea-going qualities and speed. The British boats have probably the greater gun power, while the German torpedo boats have the better torpedo power.
The scouts were a class introduced early in the present century, intended to combine the advantages of a fast gunboat with the speed of a small cruiser and the activity of a commerce destroyer. One of the best examples is the Adventure, launched in 1904, of 2,940 tons, whose engines of close upon 16,000 h.p. under forced draught give her a speed of 25.4 knots. She is, moreover, powerfully armed for a vessel of her lightness and speed, as she has ten 12-pounders and eight 3-pounders. The Americans in 1907 brought out the remarkable scout cruiser Salem, built by the Fore River Company. She was a 24-knot vessel, and though only of 4,640 tons displacement fully loaded, was given a freeboard of 34 feet at the stem, 19 feet 8¼ inches amidships, and 21 feet 6 inches at the stern, or higher than that of any vessel then in the American navy, in order to give her excellent seagoing qualities in all weathers, and a wide range of stability. She was built of steel throughout, carried two torpedo tubes, and is heavily armed.
The crushing defeat of the Russians by the Japanese in both the naval engagements of the war was brought about by the superior long-range firing of the Japanese, whose big guns played havoc with the Russian vessels.
The Battle of Tsushima resulted in the “all-big-gun one-calibre battleship of high speed.” How this came about has been admirably demonstrated by Lieut.-Commander Simms, of the United States Navy, and chief of the American naval artillery department, in a remarkable report on the battle and its influence on shipbuilding.
“Experiments have shown,” he wrote, “that it is exceedingly difficult to hit an enemy at long range when the range is changing rapidly. This is, of course, not true at short range, but at long ranges half the danger spaces—those at which the gun sights must be set in order to hit—are so small, say 50 yards. The bearing of these facts on naval tactics is very important, since it means that, generally speaking, you cannot make many hits at long range while you are manœuvring. Conversely, you will not receive many hits at such a time, because, when at short ranges, the most dangerous position in which a ship can place itself is end-on to the enemy. It is usually assumed that this is equally true at all ranges; but this is not the case, provided the rate of change in fire is rapid.... From the point of view of the theory of gun-fire alone it would be unwise to think of building a man-of-war of any type having more than one calibre of gun in her main battery. In other words, it may be said that the abandonment of the mixed battery ships in favour of the all-big-gun one-calibre ship was directly caused by the recognition of certain fundamental principles of naval marksmanship developed by gunnery officers.”
U.S. SCOUT “SALEM.”
Photograph supplied by the Fore River Shipbuilding Co.
U.S. CRUISER “MAINE.”
Photograph supplied by the W. Cramp & Sons, Ship and Engine Building Co., Philadelphia.
There was no great heralding by trumpet-blast the arrival of the Dreadnought. The true significance of this vessel only became understood by degrees. The Admiralty kept its secret well: indeed, it may be doubted if an Admiralty secret has ever been so well kept before. A short paragraph in the papers was all that was vouchsafed for the edification of the public or the naval experts of other nations. It was known that a warship to bear the historic name of Dreadnought was to be launched, but the public took it for granted that it was an addition to some “programme” or other, and regarding modern battleships as too wonderful and too full of mechanism to be comprehended by ordinary mortals, was content to accept that much, and leave the rest to the experts. But the naval experts of the other powers were astounded when they learnt the march that Great Britain had stolen upon them. They appreciated to the full the importance of the new era in warship building which had been inaugurated, for they saw that England had a lead which they could not overtake, and that with her splendid resources she would be able to accept any challenge for rivalry for first position which any power might offer. The Dreadnought meant that any other warship afloat was already rendered out of date. Her gun-fire, as much by its weight as by the range of her guns, would enable her to pick and choose where and when and how she would fight, and her speed would enable her to prevent any ship, however powerful, from shrinking from a combat if the Dreadnought thought fit to insist upon one. It was even recognised that she was a match for two or three of the most powerful ships that could be brought against her, for her big guns would be equal to theirs in hitting power, and their smaller guns would be ineffective at the range at which she could fight. Again, by concentrating a portion of her fire upon one of her antagonists she would be able to crush it, and then turn her attention to the other two with the odds as represented by gun-fire distinctly in her favour. Some enthusiastic adherents of the Dreadnought even went so far as to assert that she was equal to half a dozen Lord Nelsons, but the more extreme views of this nature were rather severely criticised. It was not only in the number of big guns that the Dreadnought exceeded all previous ships, but in their penetrative quality also. Compared with those of the Majestic they are of about fifty per cent. greater power.
Lieut.-Commander Simms, however, was by no means the only one or the first to hold the views explained in his report. They were entertained by many authorities in other countries, and especially in England, and the recognition by this country of the importance of the theory led to the secrecy with which everything connected with the Dreadnought was invested.
One notable change introduced with the Dreadnought was that she had no intermediate or secondary armament. She carried ten 12-inch guns as her main battery, and some smaller guns to repel torpedo attack, but whereas the Lord Nelson had twenty-nine anti-torpedo boat guns the Dreadnought had but five, depending rather upon her smaller armament of twenty-four 3-inch quick-firers (12-pounders), and in addition she had five under-water torpedo tubes.
H.M.S. “DREADNOUGHT.”
Photograph by Stephen Cribb, Southsea.
A Parliamentary Paper issued at the time described the arrangement of her guns as follows:—
“In arranging for a uniform armament of 12-inch guns it became at once apparent that a limitation to the number of guns that could be usefully carried was imposed by considerations of the blast effect of the guns on the crews of those guns adjacent to them. It is obviously uneconomical to place the guns in such relative positions that the blast of any single gun on any permissible training should very seriously hamper the use of one or more of the remaining guns. While it is recognised that broadside fire is held to be the most important in a battleship, all-round fire is also considered of great importance, since it lies in the power of an enemy to force an opponent who is anxious to engage to fight an end-on action. In the arrangement of armament adopted six of the guns are mounted in pairs on the centre line of the ship; the remaining four guns are mounted in pairs on the broadside. These eight 12-inch guns—80 per cent. of the main armament—can be fired on either broadside, and four or possibly six 12-inch guns—or 60 per cent. of the main armament—can be fired simultaneously ahead or astern.
“In view of the mobility of modern torpedo craft, and considering the special chances of torpedo attack toward the end of the action, it was considered necessary to separate the anti-torpedo boat guns as widely as possible from one another, so that the whole of them should not be disabled by one or two heavy shells. This consideration led the committee to recommend the numerous and yet widely distributed armament of 12-pounder quick-firing guns of a new design and greater power than those hitherto carried for use against torpedo craft. In order to give the ship sea-going qualities and to increase the command of her forward guns a forecastle is provided giving the ship a freeboard forward of 28 feet, a higher freeboard than has been given to any modern battleship. The main armoured belt has a maximum thickness of 11 inches, tapering to 6 inches at the forward and 4 inches at the after extremity of the vessel; the redoubt armour varies in thickness from 11 inches to 8 inches; the turrets and fore conning tower are 11 inches thick, and the after conning tower is 8 inches thick. The protective deck varies from 1¾ inches to 2¾ inches in thickness. Special attention has been given to safeguarding the ship from destruction by under-water explosion. All the main transverse bulkheads below the main deck—which will be 9 feet above the water-line—are unpierced except for the purpose of leading pipes or wires conveying power. Lifts and other special arrangements are provided and give access to various compartments. Mobility of force is of prime necessity in war. The greater the mobility the greater the chance of obtaining a strategic advantage. This mobility is represented by speed and fuel endurance. Superior speed also gives the power of choosing the range. To gain this advantage the speed designed for the Dreadnought is twenty-one knots.”
Turbines were decided upon because it was held that their adoption conferred certain advantages which more than counterbalanced their disadvantages. Compared with reciprocating engines, they were said to be lighter, to have a less number of working parts, to work more smoothly and be more easily manipulated, and to be less liable to breakdown. They were claimed also to show a saving in coal consumption at high powers, and to require less boiler-room space and a smaller number of engineers to look after them. Another important consideration was that turbines could be placed lower in the ship. The point which chiefly occupied the committee was the question of providing sufficient stopping and turning power for quick and easy manœuvring. A series of experiments with pairs of sister ships, fitted respectively with reciprocating and turbine engines, and also at the Admiralty experimental works at Haslar, influenced the Admiralty in their decision in favour of turbines. The Dreadnought’s bunker capacity is 2,700 tons, with which she could steam 5,800 sea miles at economical speed, or 3,500 sea miles at 18½ knots, due allowance being made for extra consumption in bad weather, and for a small quantity being left in the bunkers. Oil fuel was not taken into account in estimating the ship’s radius of action, but a considerable quantity was arranged for and would, of course, greatly increase her effectiveness in this respect.
Another innovation in this remarkable ship was in the rearrangement of the principal officers’ quarters. Hitherto they had been accommodated as far as possible from the conning tower, where their most important duties were performed, but in this ship the admiral’s and captain’s quarters are placed on the main deck forward, near the conning tower. The officers’ quarters also are placed forward, both on the main deck and on the upper deck. Ample accommodation for the remainder of the crew is available on the main and lower decks aft.
Space does not permit—and to attempt it would be out of place in a book of this character, which does not profess to do more than indicate the general lines upon which the world’s warships have developed—of a detailed account of all the ships which have followed the Dreadnought. Some idea of the wonderful progress that has been made may be obtained from a comparison of the Dreadnought herself and one of her latest successors, the battleship Orion, in the matter of armament. The Dreadnought could fire on the broadside eight guns of 12-inch calibre, throwing projectiles of 850 lb. weight, her weight of broadside being 6,800 lb. The Orion has ten guns on the broadside having a calibre of 13½ inches, and throwing projectiles of 1,250 lb. in weight, the weight of broadside being 12,500 lb. Now, if we take the ships intended to be able to take their place in the line of battle since 1906, we find the evidence of development to be equally startling. The dimensions of the Lord Nelson and Agamemnon have already been referred to, and are of exceptional interest in this connection as showing the type of vessel the Dreadnought superseded. This vessel herself was exceeded slightly in displacement by the Bellerophon, Temeraire, and Superb, which had sixteen anti-torpedo boat 4-inch guns, as against the twenty-seven 12-pounders of the Dreadnought. The St. Vincent, completed in 1909, and her sisters the Vanguard and Collingwood, completed in 1910, are 500 feet in length by 84 feet beam, and have a displacement of 19,250 tons, and engines of 25,400 h.p.; their armoured belt is 9¾ inches thick amidships, tapering fore and aft to 6½ inches, while the armour of the barbettes is 11 inches in thickness, and the protective deck is 2¾ inches. They have the same number of big guns and torpedo tubes, but the number of the 4-inch anti-torpedo guns was increased to twenty, and they also had six Maxims. In 1911 the Colossus, Hercules and Neptune were launched, and showed a very great advance on those immediately before them. Their length was increased to 510 feet, and they were 86 feet in the beam and of 20,250 tons displacement, and their engines developed 25,000 h.p. Their armour was more powerful, as their water-line belt amidships was 10 inches thick, tapering to 8 inches forward and 7 inches aft; their armament was the same. These three ships were given conning towers with 11-inch armour. There were also launched in 1911 the Orion, Thunderer, Monarch, and Conqueror, built respectively at Portsmouth, Blackwall, Elswick and Dalmuir. These four vessels are so much larger and heavier than preceding ships of the all-big-gun type that they have been claimed as inaugurating another class. They carry ten 13.5 inch guns, which include the famous “12-inch A,” in five barbettes, all of which are on the centre line of the ship. These four vessels are each 545 feet in length between perpendiculars, and 584 feet over all, and have a beam of 88 feet 6 inches. The weight of the Orion at launching was about 8,000 tons, and her estimated load displacement is 22,500 tons. Her engines, developing 27,000 shaft h.p., are Parsons turbines, driving four shafts and screws, each having a turbine for ahead and astern, the ship having a nominal speed of 21 knots, which is expected to be exceeded. She has eighteen water-tube boilers, and can carry, besides 2,700 tons of coal, 1,000 tons of oil in her double bottom tanks. Her armour varies from 12 inches to 4 inches. Under ordinary circumstances the arrangement adopted for the guns would restrict their direct ahead and astern fire very materially, and in order to overcome this difficulty and double the gun-fire ahead or astern, the second and fourth pairs of guns are raised to fire above the others. Besides increasing the effectiveness of the end-on fire, it will also add materially to the weight of the broadside fire, as, the guns being on a different level, there will be less of what is known as the interference of one pair of guns with another, and the air will become clear the sooner so that the gunners will be able to take a more accurate aim than would otherwise be possible. There are also sixteen anti-torpedo 4-inch guns.
H.M.S. “NEPTUNE.”
Photograph by Stephen Cribb, Southsea.
H.M. SUPER-DREADNOUGHT “COLOSSUS.”
Photograph by Stephen Cribb, Southsea.
The Orion has about 2,000 tons more displacement than the Neptune, and this has enabled her to carry the heavier guns. She has one elevated tripod mast which is provided with wireless telegraphy apparatus. Her two funnels are of more than usual height, and steam is generated in a series of water-tube boilers. To summarise, by way of contrast, the armament arrangement of these ships, it may be said that the Dreadnought, the three Bellerophons, and the three St. Vincents have six 12-inch guns in three turrets on the middle line of the ship, and two in a turret on either wing. The Neptune, Colossus, and Hercules have their wing turrets en echelon, so that ten guns can be trained on either side. The Orions have all their guns on the centre line of the ship. Which of these systems is the best has been keenly debated. Experiments in gun-fire are being carried out to ascertain it, but the true test can only be warfare, and even then much will depend on the circumstances of the battle and on the men behind the guns.
The Hercules was the first of her class to be given only one mast. Of the centre-line turrets, one is forward and the other two are aft, and of these two the foremost can fire over that aft of it. This arrangement of the turrets makes it possible for ten of these immense guns to be fired on either broadside. There are also twenty 4-inch quick-firers and three submerged 21-inch torpedo tubes. Her maximum coal capacity is 2,700 tons and she can also carry oil fuel in her double bottom. She is a sister vessel to the Neptune and Colossus. These three vessels are protected against attack by aerial warships.
Like all the rest of the Dreadnoughts, the Neptune was constructed in unusually quick time, only two years elapsing from the laying of the keel until she was ready for being commissioned. She has been described as a 30 per cent. improvement on the Dreadnought, but the rapidity of her construction made her a cheaper vessel than the other, her cost per ton of displacement working out at £86.85, as against £101.29 for the Dreadnought.
The Monarch took the water with a launching weight of about 11,500 tons, a record for a warship, after having been just a year on the stocks. This weight included the main structure, the boilers, funnels, funnel uptakes, casings, and a large quantity of auxiliary machinery and armour. Her eighteen boilers weighed 23 tons each, and her two funnels, which are 53 feet high above the upper deck, weigh 18 tons apiece. The deck-houses and bridges were also in place, and she was in other respects in a forward condition. The whole of the work was carried out in 220 working days. This shows what can be done in the private ship-building yards of this country. Builders of warships now find it more economical to put as much work as possible into the hull before launching it, modern dockyard methods rendering this comparatively easy. A great boiler is raised bodily and lifted into position without trouble, and even items weighing 20 to 30 tons or more are lifted and deposited where wanted with no more trouble than if they weighed so many hundredweights.
Mention has been made in earlier pages of such splendid vessels as the Hood, Trafalgar, Nile and Royal Sovereign, all of which in their day, not so long past, were considered to be unsurpassed, and by some to be unsurpassable. Their fighting efficiency is as great as the day they were launched, yet these and many others, equally good vessels, have been removed from the list of the Navy as obsolete and ere long will retire ingloriously to the scrap-heap. All these vessels have been launched since 1890, and however much one may deplore that such fine ships should be discarded, there is no denying that they are hopelessly outclassed by the Dreadnoughts, and that a dozen of them would not be a match for one of the latest Orions. Yet more than one of them was hailed as the last word in battleships, and there were some who asserted that they would prove to be the last big armoured ships to be built, as torpedo craft and protected cruisers would constitute the navies of the future. But that prophecy was made before the Battle of Tsushima was fought, and the lessons it taught were learnt.
Protests by naval men against the relegation of these ships to the lists of the useless have been frequent, and it has been contended that some of these fine old battleships could have been sent to the Colonies to act as harbour-defence vessels. But the Colonies have shown no disposition to be satisfied with anything under the best that money can buy, and they have contended that if a ship be out of date it is no use to them, especially as any hostile power sending a ship out against them would probably send one of the best and newest and most powerful.
The compound armour produced in 1879 enabled the thickness of armour carried to be reduced to 18 inches, and proved equal to the attacks of the 80-ton gun of the period, but was ultimately beaten by heavier guns and improved projectiles. All-steel armour was introduced in 1890, and was followed in 1892 by the super-carburising and subsequent chilling of the face of plates made of nickel steel. Five years later steel plates were made yet harder, until the 9-inch plate of the modern battleship was equal to a 13-inch plate of the early hardened type; or a 20-inch compound plate of the ’eighties, or a 26-inch wrought-iron plate of the ’sixties.[59]
The modern 12-inch gun, it has been pointed out, with a muzzle velocity of 2,859 feet per second, can penetrate the thickest armour on any of the ships of the Majestic class at a range of 12,700 yards; the ships of the Duncan class would suffer at about the same range; that of the Ocean class would be penetrated at 13,350 yards; and that of the Formidables at over 11,000 yards. The broadside water-line belt of any of these ships could be perforated by the same gun at any range up to the limit of observation. On the other hand, the primary guns of the ships of the classes named could only perforate the water-line belt of the Dreadnoughts at from 7,000 to 9,000 yards range, the former being the range of the Oceans for this purpose. The modern ship could smash the others without receiving a hit in return. Even if they did succeed in getting close enough to use their heavier guns and the 6-inch guns as well, they would be exposed to the risk of a much severer blow in return. This is not the only consideration. Rapidity of gun-fire has to be taken into account. The Majestic’s four 12-inch guns can only fire six rounds each in ten minutes or twenty-four rounds in all in that time, and the other three classes named could fire forty rounds per ship in a ten minutes’ action. The Dreadnoughts of 1906-7 could reply with 120 rounds, and the latest type of Dreadnought with 150 rounds, using the 12-inch guns, and of course the disparity would be even greater with the newest guns.[60]
BRAZILIAN BATTLESHIP “MINAS GERAES,” SHOWING DECK AND
SUPERIMPOSED TURRETS.
Photograph supplied by Sir W. G. Armstrong, Whitworth & Co., Ltd.
The rapidity of fire of the large guns has been greatly increased of late years, and compared with the destructive effects inflicted by some of the guns they have superseded, notwithstanding that the changes were not brought about without encountering some opposition, the new guns are held to have justified their selection to the fullest. The experiments made in firing on old battleships have shown what the guns then considered sufficient could accomplish, and as the muzzle velocity and muzzle energy and the other scientific data could all be calculated to a nicety, and the effects on certain constructions of armour when struck by projectiles of certain shapes and weights could be estimated approximately and verified by actual experiment, it became really a question for the gun-makers whether they could produce a weapon which, at the range at which modern actions at sea are likely to be fought in the future, would be able to penetrate the heaviest armour which could be placed on a battleship of known displacement. This problem has exercised the artillerists of all nations with naval aspirations, particularly those of Great Britain, Germany, Italy and the United States, and of recent years Japan. Austria has usually been content to follow the lead of Germany in this respect, and the other powers, such as the South American States, China, and the smaller European States, have had to content themselves with the advice of the experts in the gun-manufacturing countries, except when political necessities and diplomatic pressure have regulated their choice for them, to the financial advantage of the vendors. Some of the most powerful warships afloat have been designed by private firms, notably those built at Barrow, or on the Tyne, or at Liverpool, for the South American States, the Minas Geraes and her two sisters being conspicuous examples. These vessels have each twelve 12-inch guns, twenty-two 4.7 quick-firers, and eight 3-pounder quick-firers, and four torpedo tubes. Their displacement is 19,250 tons, their horse-power indicated 24,500, and their speed 21 knots.
The other nations made up their minds that they must follow the lead that England had set, and have Dreadnought ships as good as hers or better. The naval architects of the powers have since been engaged in a struggle to surpass each other and England in particular. The name-ship has been so much improved upon in recent designs that she is as inferior to the last of the super-Dreadnought battleships as the displaced pre-Dreadnoughts were to her.
One American legislator, unaware of the historical significance of the name of the Dreadnought, suggested at Washington that the United States should “go one better” by building the “United States warship Skeered-o’-Nothing,” with thirty or forty guns—a few big guns more or less apparently did not matter to this naval humorist—and let England see that there was a flag called “Old Glory” which could also brave the battle and the breeze. The suggestion was a sample of that peculiar humour, now, happily, almost moribund, in the Great Republic, and usually estimated at its proper value; it was taken seriously, however, in some quarters, and it was shown to be impossible to build a vessel which should carry forty guns larger than those of the Dreadnought, and be faster.
U.S.S. “NORTH DAKOTA.”
From a Photograph by permission of the Fore River Shipbuilding Co., U.S.A.
Modern American battleships have attracted more than ordinary attention by the daring character of the innovations the naval architects of that country have not hesitated to introduce. The armament of the Kearsarge and Kentucky was extremely powerful, and its arrangement was unique. There were two turrets with walls 13 inches thick, each containing two 13-inch guns; and above each of these turrets was a smaller turret with 9-inch walls, in which were two 8-inch guns. This gave two two-storeyed turrets with four guns to each; either pair of guns could be fired independently of the other pair, but they could not be aimed independently, and when it was necessary to turn the turret all four guns had to go with it. This experiment, though apparently excellent in theory, did not prove satisfactory in practice, and the designs for subsequent vessels which were to have had similar turrets were altered. Other nations have not taken kindly to the idea, and have not adopted it, and too many objections have been raised to the proposal that the upper and lower turrets should be constructed so as to revolve independently of each other for this plan to be given serious trial. Some of the American vessels have been fitted with what are known as lattice masts, or miniature Eiffel towers. It is claimed for them that they are of great strength for their weight, and that they are less likely than the military mast or the tripod mast to be utterly destroyed by gun-fire. The naval authorities of the other powers are interested but not converted.
When the Dreadnought was launched, the Americans replied with the ships of the Delaware class, of 20,000 tons and carrying ten 12-inch guns. The French had done very little for some time in the building of big ships, seeming to prefer smaller ships in greater number, but they too fell into line and built the Danton and others. The Danton was built in four years, which contrasts favourably with the seven years spent on some French ships.
Germany, in constructing her modern fleet, had to bear in mind that the waters round her coasts are rather shallow, but she has produced some splendid ships of great fighting power and high speed. She has some ships under construction more powerful than any at present in her navy, and one of these—the cruiser Moltke—is expected to be quite as good as anything England or America can show.
So great has been the demand for Dreadnoughts, that at the beginning of this year, for Great Britain alone, there were built or building no fewer than twenty-two, and arrangements had been made for laying down five more; while for foreign powers there have been constructed, or were still in the builders’ hands, up to January last, the enormous total of sixty. The average cost of these vessels has not been much short of a couple of millions sterling, and some have cost fully £2,300,000. The Dreadnought type has admittedly not reached its maximum development yet, and it may well be asked, where is it to stop? At present battleships of a somewhat smaller type are being advocated.
What will be the type of the battleship of the future? Revolutionary as have been the developments in the nineteenth century, great as have been the changes in the last twenty-five years, marvellous as has been the adaptation of scientific discoveries and appliances to the means for conducting naval warfare, it would be an idle boast for anyone to say that he can see finality. The dream to render war impossible by the introduction of some dread weapon has been entertained by many inventors, but never a one of them has seen its fulfilment. When steam-driven armoured warships were proposed, there were not wanting those who declared that henceforth fleets of wooden walls were doomed, and that naval war would become an impossibility. Yet the wooden walls have passed away, the nations unanimously adopted the newer methods, and the contingency of naval war must ever be provided for. The heavily armoured iron ship, carrying few guns of enormous power, came; and when at last it was found that were the armour made much thicker the ship would sink under the weight of her own protection and armament, and that guns could be constructed to smash that armour, again the hope was entertained that the limit had been reached, that naval warfare had become an impossibility, and that the world’s highways on the vast and beautiful ocean should be devoted solely to the purposes of commerce and peace. But science had already come to the rescue and dispelled the illusion before it was half-formed. Steel, at first gradually and then wholly, took the place of iron in the building of ships, the production of guns, and the manufacture of projectiles. Steel itself has been improved since it was made possible by the Bessemer process, and Harveyised steel, Krupp steel, and steel toughened with nickel or chrome or tungsten, or by what is known as the Simpson process, have all been tried and have all proved their value. The science of ballistics has made equal progress, and the development of the resources of marine engineering are little short of the miraculous. And the end is not yet!
There are guns in existence which at their maximum elevation will hurl a projectile weighing not far short of three-quarters of a ton a distance of 25 miles, and the projectile itself contains an explosive charge more powerful and destructive than the heaviest charge which could be placed in the heaviest gun which was fought in the Battle of Trafalgar. The whole fleet which bombarded Alexandria would be no match for the latest Orion, and the Orion herself at no very distant date will be removed from the list of effective ships as obsolete, or as having only a doubtful fighting value. Scientific development cannot be arrested, and the only hope is that some day the inventions for war purposes will have become so terrible that the dream of inventors that they have made war impossible will be realised. In the meantime, science is seeking to surpass all its present achievements. The marine steam engine, of whatever type, will give way to the internal combustion engine of a type which will surpass all the existing machinery as surely as the best turbines are ahead of the old compound engines. The battleship of the future will have an armament surpassing in effective range and penetrative power anything at present afloat, and an armour as far in advance of the present steel armour as that is ahead of the compound armour it but lately supplanted. The adoption of the internal combustion engine will mean the removal from the ship’s deck of the obstructions which now find a place there. With no furnaces, there will be no funnels. An armoured citadel, flush decked from end to end, has been prophesied as a coming type in the early future, with one mast for signalling purposes and to convey the wireless telegraphy apparatus, the necessary ventilators, and the conning towers as the only breaks in the smoothness of the deck. Submarine signalling, already in extensive use in warships and the mercantile marine, is being improved beyond all comparison with what it was a few years ago, and if the wireless apparatus be shot away it will still be possible for a ship to signal by the other method over a distance of some miles. Moreover, submarine signalling will enable an admiral to judge how an enemy’s fire may be affecting a distant ship of his own squadron. Size will be another feature of the coming battleship, for in size lies one of the chief protections from the attack of the most insidious and most to be feared naval weapons of the present, as well as the future. The submarine ship will launch its torpedo at a greater range as the propelling machinery of the torpedo is strengthened, and, granted that the aim is true, the only hope the great warship will have of surviving the explosion of the under-water weapon will lie in the number of compartments into which her dimensions will permit of her hull being subdivided or her double bottom to accommodate, thereby restricting the area of the damage and limiting the inrush of water.
The torpedo itself is destined to play a part more important than has yet fallen to its lot in war. Not only will it be launched from the tubes of the battleship or cruiser or destroyer at the distant foe, but it will be dirigible, controlled and steered by wireless telegraphy, and extra speed, or counter explosion, or gun-fire, or the disablement of the vessel sending it forth will alone be the means of rendering it ineffective. Torpedo nets may be of value when ships are at anchor or travelling slowly, but not at any other time.
The submarine will not be the only danger to be guarded against from an unexpected quarter. The aeroplane and airship will play their parts in the next naval war. Experiments have already been tried in starting a flight of an aeroplane from a platform at the bows of an American warship, and this being accomplished, it is not too much to anticipate that aeroplanes for purposes of observation or attack may become part of the equipment of every battleship or large cruiser. The flying machine will drop its bomb on the deck of the attacked vessel, if the aviator has the good fortune to aim sufficiently straight, but whether the dropped explosive will do much harm will depend on whether the deck is comparatively flat as at present, or is curved like the modern protective deck, or has a bomb-proof turtle back covering it entirely. Will the battleship of the future, then, be an immense cylindrical-backed hull, with one mast or none, innocent of funnels, leaving no trace of smoke behind her, and rushing at a speed of a railway train as she belches forth with almost unerring precision terrible explosives at a similar enemy so far distant as to be barely discernible on the horizon? Are we to see cruisers as much faster than the battleship, as the present cruiser is than the present Dreadnought? If, as is asserted to be possible, the battleship of twenty years hence will attain a speed of 30 knots under internal combustion engines, armed with weapons showing a corresponding advance in power and range and penetration, will the cruiser of that time cover its 40 or 45 knots, and the destroyer hurl itself forward at even greater speed to explode its torpedo, also correspondingly more destructive and deadly than now, at its foes? Will the aeroplane enable the whereabouts of the submarine to be more easily detected than now? It sounds like a confusion of ideas that such a thing should be suggested, but it is a well-established fact that it is possible to see further into the open sea from a height above it than when close to the surface. If the cruising aeroplane can detect and reveal the submarine to the battleship, the submarine will be robbed of half its terrors, and if the aeroplane can drop an explosive sufficiently near to the submarine it is not improbable that the career of the latter will be terminated instantly. The same fate may await the submarine as the result of the aeroplane signalling its whereabouts, for recent experiments have shown that it is possible for a warship to sink a submarine by gun-fire, even when the latter is several feet under the surface, the victim in this case being the ill-fated A1. Thus, it is not at all improbable that the under-water craft may find the swift aeroplane its greatest and most to be dreaded enemy. The aeroplane will be attacked by other aeroplanes, and aerial navies may yet be seen “grappling in the central blue,” fighting their battles on their own account and so high among the clouds as to be almost out of reach of the guns which might be directed against them. Are these ideas but visions and day dreams? It is impossible to say. Yet they have one and all been enunciated by naval experts and strategists. Whether these are the lines upon which the navy of the not distant future will operate, time alone will show. Events point in their direction. But one thing is assured, and that is that, marvellous as have been the developments in the last twenty-five years, it will indeed be strange if the developments of the next twenty-five years do not surpass them.