The introduction of rapid-firing guns of great power and range is claimed by some naval authorities to have reduced very materially the effectiveness of the torpedo boat. Its speed has been doubled in a few years, but it is contended that with the improvement in guns this has been more than neutralised by the greater size it has been necessary to give the torpedo boats in order to provide sufficient space for the machinery and retain the vessel’s sea-going qualities, as the increased size renders the vessel easier to hit. It must be remembered, moreover, that the anti-torpedo boat armament of a modern warship can fire as many as a hundred shots a minute, or several times as many as when torpedo boats were added to the world’s fleets.
HIGH-SPEED SEA-GOING TORPEDO BOAT OR GUNBOAT, PROPELLED BY
INTERNAL COMBUSTION ENGINES. SPEED 23 KNOTS.
Photograph supplied by Messrs. Yarrow & Co., Ltd.
U.S. DESTROYER “LAWRENCE.”
Photograph supplied by the Fore River Shipbuilding Co.
Some of the Continental powers have been quick to appreciate the value of the torpedo boat as propelled by internal combustion engines, among the most noteworthy examples being those built and engined by Yarrow for the Austrian Government. The “E,” for instance, is 60 feet in length by 9-feet beam, and has a draught of 2 feet 8 inches. She has three screws, and her five sets of these engines give her a speed of 22¼ knots, in spite of her diminutive size, and her radius of action at 11 knots is three times what would be obtainable with vessels of the same size propelled by steam. Another, of the same length, has attained a speed, when light, of 25½ knots, and of 24 knots with a load of 3 tons, and her radius of action at full speed is 250 miles. A somewhat larger vessel from the same makers is 100 feet in length, with a beam of 13 feet 6 inches, and her internal combustion engines give her a speed of 23½ knots. The advantages, and they are very great, claimed for all boats propelled by powerful engines of this type over those propelled by steam engines, are that as the vessels have no funnels there can be no flaming from funnels, with its risk of betrayal of the vessel’s whereabouts; that only half the engine-room staff is required, and that the range of action is three times what it would be under steam.
The development of the torpedo boat as a means of offence soon made it necessary for a means to be devised of defeating them. The torpedo gunboat was accordingly designed, the idea being that it should be able not only to act as a small cruiser, scout or gunboat, but by reason of its superior size, armament, and sea-going qualities should hold the torpedo boats in check. One of the earliest of these was the French Bombe launched in 1885. She was of 395 tons displacement, and was intended to have a speed of 18 knots, but being lightly constructed, proved a slow boat whenever there was the suspicion of a sea on. England followed suit with the Rattlesnake and others, of 550 tons, but they also failed to maintain their designed speed of 19½ knots. Improved gunboats followed, which, however, were not considered to be equal to the duties required of them, especially as by 1902 torpedo boats were built to travel at a speed which would leave the gunboats far behind.
This left the way open for the appearance of the torpedo boat destroyer, which has been described as the result of the failure of the gunboat to perform its second purpose satisfactorily.