An American correspondent, Mr. Gordon Brace, who sailed in a mine-trawler to learn its work, concluded an article in the New York Tribune in these words:—
I looked at those men who go out day after day; who wear their lifebelts continuously; who take their tea on the decks while they peer over the rims of their cups for the death that lurks in those sombre waters. I thought how fine was their devotion to their duty; how great a part they are playing in the war—out there alone, where their deeds are attended with no sounding of trumpets, where they give to their work the same quality of bravery as is required of the man in the trenches. And as I glanced at the inscription over the cabin, which read “England expects every man to do his duty,” I knew that England would not be disappointed.
The practical methods by which the Navy and its brave mine-trawlers conduct their operations are of great interest, but description cannot go too far. The enemy is certainly well acquainted with all British methods previous to the war; but mine-sweeping systems do not stand still, but develop with the progress of armaments generally. Mine-trawling is developed from the system of trawling for fish, which before the war had reached a high degree of technical efficiency, and in the application of that system to their work in the war the men have attained great proficiency and become extraordinarily successful. The trawl-net varies in size with the dimensions of the vessel using it. An average size would be about 100 feet in length, with a spread of from 80 to 90 feet. The principal features in fishing trawlers are fore and after frameworks, with fairleaders, a towing-block, a powerful steam-winch, and towing-warps. A trawler would pay out hundreds of fathoms of heavy wire warp, the handling of which called for great skill and dexterity. It was not a very difficult thing to adapt this method of trawling to the sweeping for mines. The fishing trawler goes unaided, but in mine-sweeping the trawlers work in pairs, and the towing-warp is replaced by the sweeping-wire. Two trawlers, steaming abreast at a certain interval, drag a weighted steel hawser which, upon striking the mooring of a mine, brings the deadly catch to the surface, where it is exploded by gunfire from a destroyer or by rifle fire from an armed trawler or motor boat. The mine-sweepers have encountered perils and hardships which have never been recorded, and fishing trawlers pursuing their peaceful occupations have often incurred the same risks.
Next after the destruction of the enemy’s fighting vessels comes the destruction of his death-dealing mines, and the mine-trawlers, confronted with an unparalleled task, attended with extreme peril, have rendered magnificent service to England and her Allies.
CHAPTER VII
The Navy and Army Transport
What of the mark?
Ah! seek it not in England;
A bold mark, an old mark
Is waiting over-sea;
Where the string harps in chorus,
And the lion flag is o’er us,
It is there our work shall be.
Sir A. Conan Doyle.
The stupendous and scarcely calculable operation of transporting by sea the enormous armies which are employed in many theatres of the hostilities is the index and measure of the greatest of all the triumphs of naval power in the war, namely, that of establishing and maintaining essential command of the sea. Against this bulwark the enemy’s naval forces have battled in vain. The submarine may, in some degree and in some circumstances, affect command of the sea, but it cannot exercise it.
It is difficult to realise all that the transport of millions of men, organised as armies and provided with all that armies require, has meant to the Allies, or to bring home to ourselves a full sense of what the responsibilities of the Navy have been in safeguarding them. The armies of Frederick and Napoleon were pygmies compared with the vast hosts which are set in the field to-day. When Frederick invaded Silesia he had with him not more than 30,000 men. The motley army with which Napoleon invaded Russia—the greatest that had ever been brought under a single command—did not greatly exceed 600,000 on a liberal computation. Wellington in the Peninsula never commanded 50,000 men. But in March, 1916, Mr. Balfour, then First Lord of the Admiralty, said that 4,000,000 combatants had already been transported under the guardianship of the British Fleet, with 1,000,000 horses and other animals, 2,500,000 tons of stores, and 22,000,000 gallons of oil, for British use and the use of the Allies. In January, 1917, Admiral Sir John Jellicoe, First Sea Lord, said that over 7,000,000 men had been transported, together with all the guns, munitions, and stores they required. Six months later, when the United States troops began to arrive, the figure may be estimated to have reached 10,000,000.