The Imperial Japanese Navy

by Fred T. Jane

Chinese Fleet’s Damages.

The Chinese flagship was an ironclad of 7000 tons displacement, the Ting Yuen. The first thing that hit her was a big ricochet which flew up and knocked the mast, carried it over the side, and killed all the men in the fighting-top. She was peppered all over by the Japanese, and hit something like 300 times, the result of the 300 hits being 14 men killed and 25 wounded. She was set on fire practically continuously all through the action. As soon as one fire was put out she was set on fire again in another place; but the Chinese managed to get these fires out without any bother, and no harm was done to her that way.

The second principal Chinese ship was the Chen Yuen. She was hit 400 times. The photograph of her in dock is how she appeared shortly after the battle. The funnel was peppered over everywhere. All the men in the fighting-tops were killed. The fore 6-in. turret was hit; it is only about an inch thick, and this shell went through and killed or wounded the gun’s crew, but did not hurt the gun. The only gun that was disabled at all in the battle was one of the 12-in., and it appears to have been disabled by something very big—probably one of the Japanese 12.6-in. shell hit the barbette of the ship, and the concussion upset the training gear of the guns in some way. Nothing could be done with them for about ten minutes. After that they were got in working order and fired again: This ship was also set on fire all over the place, but was perfectly able to fight when the battle was over.

The Chen Yuen had on board her the famous Captain McGiffin, who wrote a great deal about his adventures in the fight. He was an American, who was usually described as commander of the ship and as having fought the battle. He was photographed against the hits in a desperately wounded condition, but afterwards it was surmised that he was not blind to dramatic effect. His narratives can hardly be accepted as historical evidence, save in a general way.

The next ship of interest at the battle of Yalu was the Elswick cruiser, Chih Yuen. She is described in most accounts of the Yalu as having very gallantly charged the entire Japanese fleet, attempting to ram; a tremendous fire was poured into her till she went down, and there was an end of her. According to Japanese officers, what really happened was that at an early stage in the action her steering-gear got disabled; she was simply wandering about unable to do anything. She was simply a cloud of white smoke drifting along. The Takachiho, one of the Japanese cruisers, had a 10-in. gun. She waited until the Chih Yuen was within something like 400 yards, when they could not miss, then let drive with this 10-in. They did not attempt to pick out any particular part of the Chih Yuen; they simply fired “into the brown.” They hit her somewhere rather high up near the funnel; there was a tremendous cloud of white smoke, which became red, and when that cloud went the ship was gone. There is no idea that any magazine was hit, or that there was any ammunition on deck to account for it, and the favourite theory of the Japanese officers is that this particular hit upset her stability in some way and did the finishing touch, and thus caused her to capsize.

[Sketch by a Japanese Officer.

SINKING OF THE KING YUEN ([p. 139]).

Opposite is a sketch by a Japanese officer of the sinking of the King Yuen, which was a small Chinese ironclad. There is a great deal of mystery in all the histories as to how that ship really did go down. The Japanese account of it is that “she was on fire, and apparently the fire could not be put out; she began to roll very much indeed—first very heavily over one way and then very heavily over the other way; she continued rolling like that, and one time she rolled and did not come back.”