“For resistance to rams and torpedoes, and for the limitation of the injuries to be effected by them, as much cellular subdivision as possible should be supplied; but, as against shot and shell, subdivision by their sheet-steel is no guarantee whatever of safety in any ship, least of all in line-of-battle ships, which must be prepared for fighting at close quarters.
“I must now ask for space to remark upon a few minor points in Mr. White’s letter. He seems to consider that the scant armor of the Admiral class is somehow associated with the placing of the large, partly protected guns of these ships in separate positions, ‘in order to reduce the risks of complete disablement of the principal armament by one or two lucky shots, which may happen when the heavy guns are concentrated on a single citadel or battery.’ Suffice it to reply that in the proposed new designs of the Admiralty ships now before Parliament, which have almost equally scant partial belts of armor, the guns are nevertheless concentrated in a single battery.
“Again, Mr. White says the Admiralty have declined to adopt my advice to protect the Admiral class in certain unarmored parts with 3-inch plating, and declares that such plating would practically be no better defence against rapid-fire guns than existing thin sides; but has he forgotten the fact that my suggestion has been adopted in the new designs for the protection of the battery of 6-inch guns, although it is perversely withheld from those parts of the ship in which it might assist in some degree in prolonging the ship’s ability to float and to resist capsizing forces?
“Mr. White makes one very singular statement. He takes exception to my claiming for the Inflexible type of ship, on account of their armored citadel, a much better chance of retaining stability in battle than the Admiral type possesses, because, he says, ‘in both classes the armored portions require the assistance of the unarmored to secure such a range and amount of stability as shall effectually guarantee their security when damaged in action.’ The fair inference to be drawn from this would be that where the principle long ago laid down by me, and supported by Mr. Barnaby in the words previously quoted, is once departed from, the danger must in all cases be so great as to exclude all distinctions of more or less risk. Mr. White can hardly mean this; but if he does not, then on what grounds are we told that a ship which has no armor at all left above water at an inclination say of six or eight degrees is no worse off than a ship which at those angles and at still greater ones has a water-tight citadel over one hundred feet long to help hold her up?
“I am not at all disposed to enter into a discussion as to the relative stabilities of the English and French ships under various conditions. The French ships have armored belts two and a half to three feet above water from end to end. That fact, other things being presumed equal, gives them an immense advantage over our ships, which in battle trim have belts scarcely more than a foot wide above water, and for less than half their length. It is quite possible that the French constructors may have given their ships less initial stability than ours; from such information as I possess I believe they have; but in so far as the ship below the armor-deck, and the action of shot and shell upon that part of her, are concerned, whatever stability they start with in battle they will retain until their armor is pierced; whereas our ships may have a large proportion of theirs taken from them without their armor being pierced, and their armored decks are then less than half the height of those of the French ships above water.
“I will add that I doubt if the French ships are dealt fairly by at Whitehall. I lately heard a good deal of the extreme taper of their armor-belts at the bow, and the Amiral Duperré was always quoted in instance of this. It is true that this ship’s armor does taper from fifty-five centimetres amidships to twenty-five centimetres at the stem, but she stands almost alone among recent important ships in this respect, as the following figures will show:
| Name of Ship. | Thickness of Armor Amidship. | Thickness of Armor at Bows. |
|---|---|---|
| Centimetres. | Centimetres. | |
| Amiral Baudin | 55 | 40 |
| Formidable | 55 | 40 |
| Hoche | 45 | 40 |
| Magenta | 45 | 40 |
| Marceau | 45 | 40 |
| Caiman | 50 | 35 |
| Fulminant | 33 | 25 |
| Furieuse | 50 | 32 |
| Indomptable | 50 | 37 |
| Requin | 50 | 40 |
| Terrible | 50 | 37 |