Under the Ensign of the Rising Sun

by Collingwood Harry

THE FLOATING MINE.

It is a true saying, that “the pitcher which goes too often to the well gets broken at last;” and thus it came about with me, or rather with the Kasanumi.

As the days passed, we became aware of greatly increased activity on the part of the garrison of Port Arthur. Cruising in the offing during the daytime, well beyond the range of the Russian’s biggest guns, yet near enough at hand to make sure that our blockade of the port was effective, the sound of violent explosions came floating off to us all day long, telling us in unmistakable language that strenuous efforts were being made to clear the channel of the sunken steamers wherewith we had blocked it, at such heavy cost to ourselves. There could be but one reason for such tremendous activity: it was doubtless that the enemy had it in contemplation to send his fleet to sea, probably with the object of finding a more secure shelter in the port of Vladivostock, a surmise which was confirmed by our spies in Port Arthur.

If still further confirmation of this intention were needed, it was to be found in the increased efforts which the Russians put forth to hamper our mine-laying operations in the roadstead; for about this time it became the practice of the enemy to send out a ship, sometimes two, or even three, to lie at anchor in the roads all night. The ship, or ships, always anchored well under the cover of the heaviest guns of the fortress, yet so far out that her, or their, own heavy guns completely commanded the waters of the roadstead, thus tremendously increasing the difficulty of sowing those waters with mines.

Naturally, the presence of these ships in the roadstead offered an almost irresistible temptation to our destroyers to essay the task of sinking them, or at least putting them out of action; and this desire on our part was smiled upon by Togo, to put the case mildly, for information was now continually reaching us to the effect that the formidable Baltic fleet was being rapidly prepared for sea, and that its departure on its long voyage to the Far East was imminent; while Togo was naturally anxious that the Port Arthur fleet—and the Vladivostock fleet also, if possible—should be effectually disposed of before the arrival of so powerful a reinforcement in Japanese waters. Therefore, great as was the risk attending the attack of a powerfully armed ship at anchor under the cover of several formidable forts, and careful as our Admiral was, both of his ships and of his men, no attempt was made to discourage us of the torpedo flotilla when our desire to attack was made known; on the contrary, the desire was smiled upon, as I have said, and nothing more than a word of caution was given against the incurring of unnecessary risks.

Perhaps I ought to explain precisely what I mean by saying that the desire of the commander of the torpedo flotilla to attack these ships was “smiled upon” by the Admiral. He had not only “smiled upon” but had given imperative orders that the torpedo fleet was to be employed upon every possible occasion for the harassing and discomfiture of the enemy; but hitherto the tactics employed had been for the destroyers and torpedo-boats to attack in numbers, a division or even two or three divisions being sent in at a time. It was due to my initiative that these tactics were now to be altered, and that attacks were now to be permitted by as few as two boats only. Up to now it had been our regular practice for a large number of craft to creep in toward the roadstead at a low speed until discovered by the enemy’s searchlights, and then dash in upon the foe at our utmost speed, through a hail of shells, discharge our torpedoes as we circled round our quarry, and then dash out again, trusting to our speed to carry us back into the zone of safety. Of course this plan had its advantages, inasmuch as that the more there were of us, the greater—in theory—the chance that some of us would score a hit. But against this there was the fact that during the final rush of the torpedo craft upon the enemy, the necessity to maintain our highest speed throughout the entire period of the attack involved forced draught, and consequently flaming funnels, which latter of course immediately attracted the attention of the enemy and nullified all our efforts to take him by surprise.

Now, I had by this time gained a considerable amount of experience of torpedo warfare, and I had not failed to observe that in the majority of cases where our attacks had failed, the failure had been due to the above cause, combined with the fact that ten or a dozen craft ran a much greater risk of being picked up by the enemy’s searchlights than would one or two. It had therefore seemed to me that, taking everything into consideration, the prospects of successful attack by two craft—one to support and assist the other in case of need—were as good as those of a dozen craft, while the risk would be very much less, provided that the attack were made coolly and circumspectly in accordance with a plan which I had worked out. This plan was, in brief, to run for the harbour at normal speed until we were practically within effective range, and then, instead of dashing in at full speed, to stop our engines—the throb of which was loud enough to be heard at a considerable distance on a quiet night—and head directly for our quarry, discharging our torpedoes when the momentum or “way” of the boat had carried her as far as she would go, trusting to the subsequent confusion to enable us to escape unscathed. I had fully explained this view of mine to the Admiral, and had obtained his sanction to put my plan to the test. Accordingly, on a certain night toward the middle of June, after the Russians had been let severely alone for some forty-eight hours, the Kasanumi, accompanied by the Akaisuki, my friend Ito’s ship, left the rest of the blockaders, with the object of putting my theory into practice.

It was a splendid night for our purpose; there was a breathless calm, the water was smooth as oil, and although there was certainly a moon, she was in her last quarter, and did not rise until close upon one o’clock in the morning. Moreover, the sky was overcast by a great sheet of dappled cloud through which only a solitary star here and there peeped faintly; it was consequently dark enough to afford us a reasonable chance of getting within striking distance of our quarry undetected.

When the Russians sent their ships out of harbour to lie all night in the roadstead, as they did pretty frequently now, it was their custom to get them out early in the afternoon, after their destroyers had carefully swept the anchorage in search of mines; and it was my hope that—we having left them alone for the preceding two days—they would by this time be getting suspicious of such unwonted inactivity on our part, and consequently would send out one, or perhaps even two ships, to guard against a possible coup on our part.

Our mine-laying craft very rarely got to work before one or two o’clock in the morning, that being the hour when human vigilance is popularly supposed to be least active; I therefore planned to arrive in the roadstead about midnight, hoping that I should then catch the enemy off his guard, snatching a rest in preparation for the moment when our activities usually began.