So far shell fire had developed on land. In sea warfare the solid cannon ball remained the orthodox missile; the use of explosive or incendiary shells was deemed so dangerous a practice as to forbid its acceptance by the great maritime powers, save in exceptional cases, until the nineteenth century. Toward the end of the eighteenth century serious consideration was given, by France especially, to the possibilities of shell fire. Frenchmen felt restless and dissatisfied with the conditions in which they were waging war with England. Sea ordnance, which in the past had wrought so much by the destruction of personnel, was becoming increasingly impotent, not only against personnel but against ships themselves. Trafalgar came as a proof of this, when not a single ship was sunk by gunfire. Sea fighting was again resolving itself into a straightforward physical struggle between the guns’ crews of the opposing fleets, in which struggle the victory went by attrition to the side which plied its guns with the greatest rapidity and perseverance. Élan, enthusiasm, science, the mental alertness of the individual, were bound to be overborne in such a case by superior endurance, physique, coolness, and sound workmanship. Both sides had a profound belief in the superiority of their personnel in hand-to-hand conflict. Where fighting was, as in the earliest days of the rival navies, “man to man, lance to lance, arrow to arrow, stone to stone,” success depended entirely upon courage and physical strength; and in such cases, says Nicolas, the English were almost always victorious. If, stated a French writer, sea actions could be decided by hand-to-hand combat the arms of France would triumph. But sea fights were in fact almost solely a matter of artillery. If only the conditions of battle could be altered; if only the forces of incendiarism or explosion could be summoned to put the enemy ships-of-the-line in jeopardy, a short cut to victory might be found or, at any rate, the superiority of England in material might be seriously depreciated.
Some time was to elapse, however, before France was to see even the partial consummation of this fervent desire.
While the use of grenades, bombs, carcasses and other explosive and incendiary missiles had been recognized on land for centuries, an event occurred in the year 1788 which, coming to the ears of Europe, should have had considerable effect in turning the thoughts of artillerists to the possibilities of their use at sea. In that year, some sixty-five years before the action off Sinope, a Deptford shipwright who had risen to high service under the Russian government fitted out for his employers a flotilla of long-boats for an attack upon a Turkish squadron. These long-boats Sir Samuel Bentham—he was the ex-shipwright—armed with brass ordnance mounted on his favourite non-recoil system, and for them he requisitioned a large supply of shells, carcasses and solid shot. At the mouth of the Liman river in the Sea of Azov the Russians, with these insignificant war vessels, attacked a very superior force of Turkish ships, and gained a complete victory. The effect of the shells, fired at close range into the Turkish ships, was startling and impressive. Great holes were torn in the sides of the vessels, and fires were started which, in a favouring medium of dry timber and paint and pitch, rapidly spread and caused the squadron’s destruction.
No evidence can be quoted, it must be admitted, to show that contemporary opinion realized how portentous was this sea action; no stress is laid on the event in histories relating to that time. Nor does another event which occurred at this period appear to have caused the notice it deserved: the firing, at the suggestion of a Captain Mercier, 35th Regiment, of mortar shells from the British long 24-pounders, from Gibraltar into the Spanish lines.[100] Nor was Lieutenant Shrapnel’s contemporaneous invention,[101] of a shell containing case shot explodable by a small bursting charge, developed or the possible adaptation of its use for sea warfare fully appreciated. Or, if authority did discern the eventual effect of these innovations, a wholesome dread of their extension and development in naval warfare appears to have dictated a policy of calculated conservatism in respect of them, a suppression of all ideas and experiments which had in view any intensifying or improvement of our artillery methods. “So long as foreign powers did not innovate by improving their guns, by extending the use of carronades and, above all, by projecting shells horizontally from shipping; so long it was our interest not to set the example of any improvement in naval ordnance—the value of our immense material might otherwise be depreciated. Many of the defects which were known to exist, so long as they were common to all navies, operated to the advantage of Great Britain.”[102]
Apart from this consideration, however, it is remarkable how small a value was set by English opinion, even at a late date, upon explosive as compared with solid projectiles. The obvious disadvantages of hollow spherical shell—their smaller range, more devious flight and less penetrative power—were emphasized; their admittedly greater destructive effect (even taking into account the small bursting charges deemed suitable for use with them) was rated at a surprisingly low figure.
The French, on the other hand, showed great eagerness to explore the possibilities of shell fire in fighting ships. Addicted to science, they searched unceasingly throughout the revolutionary wars for some development of naval material which would neutralize the obvious and ever-increasing superiority of the British navy under existing conditions, even if it might not actually incline the balance of power in their favour. To this end they courted the use of incendiary projectiles. Our own authorities, partly from a lively apprehension of the danger believed to be inherent in their carriage and use in wooden ships and partly from a feeling of moral revulsion against the employment of what they genuinely believed to be an unfair and unchivalrous agency, limited the use of fuzed shells, carcasses and other fireworks as much as possible to small bomb vessels of special construction—and inferior morals. But in ships-of-the-line the use of such missiles was strongly deprecated by naval opinion, and even the use of hand-grenades in the tops was forbidden by some captains. Time justified this cautious attitude. The French suffered for the precipitancy with which they adopted inflammatory agents; fires and explosions were frequent in their fleets; the history of their navy in these wars—“la longue et funeste guerre de la Révolution”—is lit up from time to time with the conflagrations of their finest ships, prey to the improperly controlled chemical forces of their own adoption. One example alone need be cited: the Orient at the battle of the Nile. Even if the French flagship was not set on fire by their direct agency, small doubt exists that the spread of the fire which broke out in her was accelerated by the presence of the combustibles which, in common with most of the French ships, she carried. Throughout the wars fuzed shells, carcasses, stinkpots, port-fires, proved far more terrible to friend than foe. And the foe doubtless felt confirmed and fortified in his opinions that such substances were quite unsuitable for carriage in warships. As to the ethics of explosives even the French themselves seem to have been doubtful. For, shortly after the battle in Aboukir Bay, some of their officers accused an English captain of having been so “unfair” as to use shells: an audacious manœuvre on their part, for, on some of the shells in question being produced and the gunner questioned as to whence they came, “to the confusion of the accusers, he related that they were found on board the Spartiate, one of the ships captured on the first of August!”[103]
Continuous trials were carried out in France with shells fired from guns. In 1798, following a series of successful experiments, trials were prosecuted at Meudon by a special commission, who caused 24-and 36-pound shells to be fired at a target representing a ship-of-the-line, at ranges of 400 and 600 yards. The results were impressive, and the report rendered to Bonaparte such as to confirm his personal conviction in the value of shell fire. Less than a year later, we may note in passing, the Consul was himself the target of shell fire: being subjected, at the siege of Acre, to the unpleasant attentions of a 68-pounder carronade from the English fleet. In 1804, with the avowed object of keeping our cruisers at a distance, he had long howitzers cast and placed for the defence of Toulon and other ports. And hardly a year passed but some trial was made of horizontal fire of shells from guns and mortars.
Of the two great maritime powers, Britain had contributed more, perhaps, towards the building up by actual practice of the system of artillery which was shortly to come into vogue. Shell fire from mortars had been used with far more effect by her forces than by those of her great enemy. The invention of the carronade was in itself almost a solution; and, though it did not lead directly to the shell gun, yet it undoubtedly induced the weapon which most strongly resembled it: the medium ship-gun, as designed by Congreve and Blomefield, which was something between the carronade and the long gun, and which for a time was mounted in our two-decked ships for the purpose of preserving unity of calibre.
But the French, free from the bias against change of method and material which operated in this country, seized on the possibilities of existing elements, and combined them in such a way as to form a complete solution of the shell-fire problem. To General Paixhans, the eminent officer of artillery, the credit for this solution is undoubtedly due.