Early in 1915 arrangements were made, with the assistance of Sir Percy Scott and the warm support of Lord Fisher, then First Sea Lord, by which the battleships and battle-cruisers were supplied with this system, without being put out of action or sent to a dockyard for the purpose. The necessary instruments were manufactured at various contractors’ shops, and the very laborious task of fitting them, and the heavy electric cables, on board the ships was carried out by electricians sent to the various bases. The complicated work naturally took a considerable time, and many vexatious delays occurred; but gradually all ships were fitted, Sir Percy Scott rendering invaluable assistance at headquarters.
As a first step, the system was fitted to the heavy guns mounted in turrets, and by the date of the Battle of Jutland there were few ships that were not supplied with the system, although six of those last fitted had not had much experience with it.
The conditions under which that action was fought converted any waverers at once to a firm belief in the Director System, and there was never afterwards any doubt expressed as to its great value.
Further efforts were made later to accelerate the work, and the system was extended to smaller vessels. This had been the intention even before the action, but there were then still many who were unconvinced. However, during the remainder of 1916 and 1917 the work was pressed forward, and the system became universal for all guns and in all classes of ships.
The improvement in what may be termed the application of existing methods of fire control may now be mentioned. Throughout the War we had gradually, as the result of practice, increased greatly the effective range at which ships could engage, and stress had been laid on the necessity for bringing the fire rapidly on to the target in order to obtain early hits. Improvement was perhaps most rapid in the five or six months following the Jutland action. In this action the Fire Control Instruments, as adopted in the Service, which were the outcome of the work of naval officers, were found to meet the gunnery requirements most successfully. The only important improvement that was made was the provision of additional means for keeping the observation of Fire Instruments trained on the correct enemy ship. Various committees were formed immediately after the battle in order that full advantage might be taken at once of our experience. The result was the introduction of new rules for correcting gunfire; these, in addition to greatly increasing the volume of fire from a ship, also rendered it difficult for the enemy vessels to evade punishment by dodging tactics.
SMOKE SCREEN MADE BY DESTROYERS
A DUMMY BATTLESHIP, MARCH, 1915
In order to cope more successfully with the latter development, more experiments were ordered, having as their object the determination of the inclination of the enemy vessel to the line of bearing from us, and various methods of obtaining this inclination were recommended to the Fleet. The most promising at the time that I relinquished command of the Fleet was that proposed by Lieutenant J. W. Rivett-Carnac, R.N., the range-finding expert of the Grand Fleet, who had investigated this inclination problem for some years. A great increase in the rapidity with which the fall of shot were “spotted on” to a target resulted from all this work. It is not too much to say that the interval between opening fire and the moment at which the salvoes began to “straddle” the target was certainly halved, and the rapidity of fire when the enemy was “straddled” was very greatly increased. The new firing rules, by standardising the system of correcting fire, produced a marked increase in the efficiency of the methods by which the fire of two ships was concentrated on to one target and generally paved the way for the solution of many gunnery problems which the Fleet had previously been unable to solve completely.