Nor were the Japanese behindhand in accepting the challenge. With what appeared to be almost lightning speed, the Japanese admiral, Nozu, changed his formation from column in line abreast to column of divisions steaming in echelon, the starboard division being led to starboard by the cruiser Yoshino, of nine thousand tons, and the division to port being led by the Fuji, of about the same measurement, these two being the most powerful ships possessed by the Japanese. This particular formation enabled the Japanese to direct the whole of their fire against the Chinese ships, since the two divisions of their fleet were to pass on the inside of the Chinese double column, while the double Chinese column would prevent their ships in the port line from firing to port, and those in the starboard line from firing to starboard. Likewise the inner line of each of the Japanese divisions sheltered the outer line from the fire of the Chinese port and starboard columns respectively. This amounted, in plain language, to giving the Japanese four times the volume of gunfire that the Chinese could bring to bear, and was a masterly stroke of genius on the part of Nozu which Admiral Ting did not comprehend until it was too late to remedy matters, and he found himself hopelessly enveloped in the net.
As yet, however, the action had only commenced. Through the observation slits in the walls of the Chih’ Yuen’s conning-tower Frobisher saw, as the Japanese fleet completed its evolution, several dazzling flashes of flame dart out from the turrets of the Yoshino and the Fuji, and simultaneously it appeared as though the entire Japanese fleet had fired at the same moment, so fierce and so continuous were the flashes of the discharges. He felt his ship reel and stagger as no less than five heavy shell,
fortunately not armour-piercers, struck her almost simultaneously, and he heard the shrieks and cries of men in mortal agony as the deadly flying fragments scattered like shrapnel about the decks.
This would never do, said Frobisher to himself; if this kind of thing continued, his ship would be put out of action
before she had an opportunity of giving back as good as she received. So, without waiting for the admiral’s signal for “General action”, he pressed one of the electric buttons close to his hand in the wall of the conning-tower, and the two 9.4’s in the Chih’ Yuen’s forward barbette roared out their hoarse defiance, dropping their shells full upon the Yoshino’s after turret, where they burst with an explosion like that of a small powder-magazine, but without doing much damage. Had they fallen under the muzzles of the guns, neither of the weapons would have been heard from again.
But although the turret itself appeared uninjured, Frobisher would have been quite satisfied with the execution wrought if he could but have looked inside. The guns’ crews within, while in the act of serving their weapons, had, some of them, become aware that the after end of the turret had suddenly glowed red-hot for a moment; after that, none of them knew what had happened, for they had all been killed as by a lightning stroke, by the terrific concussion of the two shells striking together; and had a man been foolish enough to place his hand on that spot even five minutes afterward, he would have left the skin behind, so intense was the heat generated by the impact.
Frobisher, however, could not know this, and he sent word to the lieutenant in charge of the barbette to plant his shells, if possible, on or near the guns of the enemy which were already in action, leaving the after guns until later. And presently he had the satisfaction of seeing one shell after another crash down on the very spot where the Hakodate’s single gun protruded from her turret. When the flash of the explosion and the yellow fumes of the bursting charge had cleared away, there became visible a black, ragged hole where the gun-port had been, and the gun itself, blown from its mountings, was pointing its muzzle upward to the sky, useless for the rest of the action.
Both fleets had now broken their formation to a large extent, and the fight had resolved itself more or less into a series of individual actions between ship and ship. The Chinese flagship was close alongside the Fuji, giving her a most unmerciful hammering with her eighty-ton monster guns, which sent their high-explosive shells crashing through her sides as through match-boarding, these subsequently bursting inside, between decks, carrying death and horrible mutilation in their train. The plucky Chen Yuen and her gallant British captain, who, with Frobisher, most distinguished himself that day, had been laid in between the already severely punished Yoshino and the celebrated Matsushima, which, so far, had not received a single injury, although she had entirely disabled and very nearly sunk the little Chinese unarmoured Hai-yen. The latter, with only one boiler available, and a very low pressure of steam in that, most of her guns disabled, her captain killed, and all her officers wounded, could do no more; and when the Chen Yuen came up and drew the Matsushima’s fire upon herself, a quartermaster, one of the few surviving petty officers, steered her slowly and painfully, like a crippled-animal, out of the press, when, unpursued—being too small fry to trouble about—she turned her bows in the direction of Wei-hai-wei, and hobbled into port some twenty hours later, the dismal forerunner of the shattered and broken remnant that was so soon to follow her.