Warships and their story

WARSHIPS OF THE TWENTIETH CENTURY

Two classes of vessels stand forward prominently as the products of the twentieth century. One is the Dreadnought, or all-big-gun one-calibre type of battleship, the other is the submarine. The fact that both are the result of the slow developments of centuries does not render them the less the products of the last few years. Both are untried in battle, and they are regarded as preparing the way for the introduction respectively of surface and under-water warships, the power of which is conjecturable only. Associated with both is the torpedo. The dream of a submarine which shall travel faster than a surface vessel of the same size is never likely to be realised, provided that the surface vessel is built for speed also, for the simple reason that the vessel travelling on the surface has only about a third of its surface in connection with the water, whereas the submarine has its whole surface submerged, and has three times as much friction against the water to overcome. Hence, a lightly armed, very fast vessel is regarded as likely to play an important role in the navy of the not distant future, and finds its representative in the destroyer of to-day.

The submarine and the destroyer owe their existence to the battleship’s greatest enemy, the torpedo. All three vessels carry that weapon, and any two of them may combine against the third. The spar-torpedo was such an unsatisfactory weapon at best that it had either to be abandoned, save under most unusual circumstances, or improved out of all recognition. The possibilities of the torpedo itself were so great as to compel its retention, and the startling proposition was made that torpedoes should be fired by under-water guns at a distant ship. The blowing up of the Albemarle in the American Civil War showed what could be accomplished by a small fast steam launch. If this could be done with a spar-torpedo, how much more destructive would a torpedo be which could be directed against a hostile vessel from a small fast launch which could approach to within an effective range, and then turn and make a rush for safety from the gun-fire which might be brought to bear in her direction. Several torpedoes of one kind and another have been designed, but they have all had to give way to the Whitehead torpedo. The inventor is stated to have derived his idea in 1864 from a fire-boat designed by an Austrian officer, who thought of loading a small boat with explosives, to be fired by a pistol connected with protruding spars which should strike the vessel attacked, while the fire-boat itself was to be propelled by a screw driven by clockwork. Whitehead improved on this by making his boat of iron, and able to travel under water for a short distance at a speed of six knots. Its explosive was a few pounds of dynamite. By 1870 he had improved this to a torpedo having a speed of eight knots, a range of 400 yards, and a charge of 76 lb. of gun-cotton. The modern Whitehead torpedo is a wonderful piece of mechanism, so wonderful that to the ordinary spectator it seems almost endowed with intelligence. To see it lying in its cradle ashore it is simply a beautifully polished smooth steel cylinder. The fore end is blunt and with an innocent-looking steel spike projecting from the centre of its rounded front, but it is this spike which strikes the object aimed at and causes the ignition of the explosive an inch or two behind it in the head of the cylinder. The torpedo has a fine run aft for about a third of its length, and at the after end are two vertical and two horizontal rudders, and two screws revolving in opposite directions. It is some time since compressed air was adopted as the motive power. The efficacy of the compressed cold air has been increased to an extraordinary degree by the introduction of an apparatus for heating the air. A torpedo fitted with a heater can travel over double the distance at a given speed and the same expenditure of air that a torpedo without a heater can. “If a torpedo be run for the same distance with a heater as a similar torpedo without a heater, a 100 per cent. gain of power would be realised by increasing the speed, and at a range of 2,000 yards this increase is from 26 knots to 33.5 knots, the highest which has ever been realised with a torpedo over a range of 2,000 yards.”[56] The newest form of torpedo is that in which hot air instead of cold air is used.

In the case of the latest pattern 18-inch Whitehead torpedo, a speed of 28 knots for 2,000 yards, or 34½ knots for 1,000 yards when using the ordinary cold air, has been obtained. For longer distances, such as 3,000 and 4,000 yards, the speed is proportionately less, falling to about 20 knots for the 4,000 yards range. When using the heater, “the same torpedo maintains a speed of over 40 knots for 1,000 yards, 37 knots for 2,000 yards, 30 knots for 3,000 yards, and 27 knots for 4,000 yards. The speeds are quite extraordinary, as they represent exactly 100 per cent. more power from the engines, and it is further pointed out that the heater is extremely small, simple, and burns any ordinary lamp oil, and is capable of being fitted to practically any existing type of torpedo. The Admiralty has never been slow to adopt improvements in the torpedo armament of the fleet, and for years Great Britain has led in the matter of submarine tubes for firing torpedoes.”[57]

The explosive carried, usually gun-cotton, weighs 200 lb. An ingenious arrangement of gyroscope, valve and pendulum causes the torpedo to remain at the required depth, and to return to it if it should be diverted from it.

There have been several attempts to solve the problem of directing torpedoes by means of wireless telegraphy. The great drawback, however, has been that the receiving apparatus which the torpedo had to carry was outside it and must appear above the surface of the water, and was, therefore, liable to be sighted and shot away. The same objection has been raised to the equipment of submersible torpedo boats with “wireless.” Of recent years a torpedo has been contrived which the inventors claim can be directed by wireless telegraphy, and as there seems no reason why the principle applied cannot be improved and extended to submarines and submersibles, the utility of these under-water craft may be augmented to an inconceivable degree. The “Actinaut” is the name of the torpedo, and the jet of salt water which it ejects serves not only to indicate the position of the torpedo, but is an “indestructible receiver for the electric waves.”[58]

SUBMARINES

Submarine warfare and exploration are no new ideas, but in the past as in the present, the great difficulties have been to ensure the provision of sufficient power for rapid propulsion, and to keep the air pure enough for the crew to breathe for a long journey under water.

Efforts at submarine warfare seemed to have been made many centuries ago, but none of the contrivances then used had any fighting value, and were more interesting as freaks than in any other capacity. It is unnecessary to attempt even to summarise all the schemes which early and late inventors evolved to render possible under-water attacks upon an enemy’s fleet. The problem was as fascinating seven or eight hundred years ago as at the present time. Most of the alleged mediæval inventions probably never got beyond the imaginative or paper stage, and however wonderful the inventors’ theories or written descriptions may have been, even when embellished with weird illustrations showing the contrivance at the bottom of the sea, it is not recorded that any of the submarines achieved any actual success whatever. One of the earliest submarine descents which is supposed to have been made was that of Alexander the Great, who is mendaciously represented to have been lowered to the bottom of the sea in a glass barrel, too small for him to stand up in, with a smoky oil lamp or two, and an animal which might have been a dog or a cat (it is difficult to say which the artist intended) for company, the circumstances being such that he could not have failed to be asphyxiated in a very short space of time. It appears, too, that he wore a crown and his royal robes on that occasion, so that he evidently visited Neptune in state.

As early as the year 1190 a man is said to have constructed a diving boat of leather. Numerous suggestions were made to enable men to go under water in order to bore holes through the sides of an enemy’s ships, which, considering the thickness of the planks, must have been a somewhat laborious undertaking. The Barbary corsairs are stated to have used some sort of submarine explosive against the ships of their opponents, but this explosive or combustible was most likely Greek fire.

William Bourne, who served in Queen Elizabeth’s navy, is said to have had a submarine boat which could have been made useful, but there are no records in existence to show that the experiment ever took place. An interesting feature of the suggestion was that he proposed to sink or raise the vessel by admitting and expelling water. About the middle of the seventeenth century, a Dutchman is said to have invented a boat which travelled under water from Westminster to Greenwich, and it is even asserted that it carried passengers, in addition to twelve men at the oars, and that the air in the interior of this vessel was purified by a “chymicall liquor.” A Royal Warrant, dated June 29th, 1626, ordered the delivery of “360 fforged iron cases with fireworkes, 50 water mynes, 290 water petards, and two boats to conduct them under water, for H.M. special service to goe with the fleete.”

Two worthy friars of the Order of Minims turned from their spiritual contemplations to devise a submarine, and they appear to have been the first to suggest that it should be built with both ends alike, and pointed so that it could move either end foremost; it was to be given wheels to move along the sea floor, and to be propelled by oars. It was even to carry guns, to be fired through holes in the side. Another inventor in the seventeenth century waxed so enthusiastic over his submarine, that, besides pointing out its advantages in all manner of possible and impossible circumstances in time of war, he represented that it should be used for submarine hunting parties, who might have great sport shooting the fish as the boat went along. A Frenchman named De Son, built in 1663, at Rotterdam, a vessel about 72 feet in length, circular, and running to a cone at each end, by which he promised, but did not perform, great things. A few years later a boat was designed by the Abbé Borelli to travel under water, his idea being that the boat should rise or sink according to the amount of water admitted through holes in the hull to skins provided for the purpose. Bushnell, an American inventor, had a vessel he called the Turtle, which seems to have been shaped more like an egg. It floated at the surface of the water with the pointed end downward, and had a small screw propeller, jutting out at one side. On the opposite side of the body of the vessel was a magazine containing about 150 lb. of powder. This magazine was detachable from the inside of the ship, and was fastened by a rope to a powerful screw which the inventor intended to drive into the hold of the opposing warship, and then make the best of his way to safety, leaving the magazine attached to the screw. He was more anxious to find someone to make the attack on the British ships than to do it himself.

Probably the first really successfully designed submarine was that of Robert Fulton, the American, who submitted his plans of the Nautilus to the French Directory in 1797. His first boat was tried experimentally on the Seine in 1800. His next boat had iron ribs, and was copper-sheathed, and was shaped like a very long egg; it was fitted with a small hinged mast and a bat-wing sail, so that it could be used for surface navigation if necessary. He made a few descents in the Seine with success, but at no time stayed under water more than twenty minutes. Still, the experiment was held to be sufficiently promising for the boat to be tried at Brest, where he failed in his attempts to do any damage to the English ships of war. A preliminary experiment, before that against the English, was successful. On the British side, a so-called catamaran was contrived, by which it was intended to blow up the French ships at Boulogne. The catamaran consisted of a framework in which one man should sit immersed up to his arm-pits, and should paddle himself along under cover of darkness, and tow a floating box of powder to be exploded by clockwork in so many minutes, this affording him time to paddle away in safety. This floating mine or torpedo was to be fastened under the counter of the wooden man-of-war. Fulton is supposed to have had a hand in this, but the attack when it was made ended in an absolute failure, the catamarans making the attack being mostly blown up, while those vessels against which it was directed suffered no harm whatever. Upon his return to America, Fulton constructed a submersible called the Mute, which was to fire “Colombiads,” or under-water guns. Her inventor died during the course of her trials, which, however, did not reveal anything to show that the boat would have been other than an absolute failure as a warship. Though the British and the French naval authorities were strongly opposed to submarine warfare for a variety of reasons, American inventors continued their experiments. A diving boat passed under the British 74-gun ship Ramilies three times, and at last got close under the vessel, and tried to fasten a clockwork mine to it by means of a screw after the plan Bushnell adopted, but the screw broke. Other attempts were made, and as there were then no means of discovering when a submarine attack was intended, the British officer in command placed a number of American prisoners on board his ships and notified the American Government that if any of the ships were blown up, the American prisoners as well as the crew would go with it. What was known as an American torpedo-pilot was really a large boat covered from end to end with a curved iron deck, above which was a small pilot-house or look-out chamber, which also served as a ventilator; the boat was propelled by paddle-wheels, and travelled so low in the water as to be practically awash, and towed a mine behind her. Some of these mines or torpedoes contained as much as six barrels of gunpowder. An Englishman named Johnson designed a submarine or diving boat in which he was to have rescued the ex-Emperor Napoleon from Saint Helena, but Napoleon’s death intervened.

Various inventions were tried at one time and another, and the misfortune is that in many cases the first experiment proved to be the last, for the contrivances were the inventors’ coffins. Some of these fatalities were unquestionably due to the submarines being made to descend too low, when they gave way under the enormous pressure of the water.

The first effective submarine designed for war purposes was a cigar-shaped boat constructed by an American shoemaker named Phillips. The boat was built of iron and carried a colombiad, which could be fired through a port in the iron plating, and also a couple of torpedoes or mines. Numerous experiments with this boat were successful, but Phillips descended once too often.

A German named Bauer invented a diving boat, which scared the Danes badly in the war between Denmark and Prussia in 1848-50. At its second voyage it descended too far, but Bauer and his two companions escaped through the scuttle. Thirty-six years later the boat was fished up, and is now in the Naval Museum at Berlin. Failing to get any more money in Germany, and being suddenly dropped in Austria after the Court and Government had given him much encouragement, he came to England, where the Prince Consort became his patron. He designed a submarine, but his plans were altered by some of the leading engineers, ship-builders, and statesmen, who, whatever their skill in surface navigation and diplomacy may have been, knew next to nothing of submarine navigation. The consequence was that his boat as altered to suit their views was a failure, and the discredit was cast upon Bauer. Still believing that he was right, he betook himself to the United States, but the American Government, probably finding that the local supply of inventors and submarines was a long way in excess of the demand, turned a deaf ear to all his suggestions. He went back to Europe, and the Russian authorities authorised him to construct his Sea Devil which, after numerous experiments, was sunk under circumstances never fully explained. He managed, however, in one of his trips with her, to enter Sebastopol harbour, to the great dismay of a Russian sentry who, seeing him gliding by night in a standing position along the surface of the water, took him for a ghost, dropped his rifle, and ran. The loss of his boat has been attributed to an order of the Russian Government that it should be deliberately sunk to get it out of the way.

The French boat Plongeur, launched at Rochefort in 1863, was cigar-shaped with the upper side flattened, and was driven by an engine deriving its power from compressed air. She was too long for her width to be of much use, and had no stability.

The first Confederate David has already been alluded to, and the Southerners were so pleased with the success that they ordered another. In five experiments the second boat sank five times, and drowned altogether thirty-five men. Before she went down the next time it was determined that she should attack one of the Federal warships. She was directed against the Housatonic, then one of the fleet blockading Charleston. The David was being navigated along the surface of the water instead of beneath, and her scuttles were open. The little vessel’s spar-torpedo struck the warship in line with the magazine. Nothing was ever seen of the David afterwards, nor of her crew. The Housatonic went down, but nearly all on board were saved.

Though the Davids proved as destructive to themselves as to the enemy, they demonstrated as nothing else could have done that a small boat approaching noiselessly under cover of darkness could destroy by means of mines or torpedoes a hostile ship.

The most inappropriately named submarine was the Resurgam, invented by an English clergyman named Garrett, for during an experiment off the Welsh coast, in 1879, it never returned to the surface after diving.

The first submarine as a locomotive engine of warfare was invented by John P. Holland, and it is to his boat, known as the Holland the First, that all the modern submarines and submersibles owe their parentage. It was a one-man affair, just big enough to allow him to sit down in it and work with his feet the paddle arrangement that turned the propeller shaft. It carried five small torpedoes, which could be placed outside through a chamber in the dome or conning tower, and were discharged by electricity. This marked the introduction of one of the means which made modern submarine vessels possible, for until it was discovered how to use electricity in this way, a clockwork arrangement was the only reliable method by which a torpedo could be exploded. The application of electricity rendered it possible to eject the torpedo a considerable distance from the ship, comparatively speaking, and by means of connecting wires discharge it when thought advisable. This vessel was only 16 feet in length. The second Holland, built in 1877, was only 10 feet long. A small gas or oil engine was introduced to drive the screw propeller of a third submarine built by Holland two years later. This boat was 31 feet long, 6 feet in diameter, and cigar-shaped. The experiments he conducted with it showed that it was impossible to depend on ordinary vision when travelling in any depth of water on account of the darkness. She carried a pneumatic gun discharging a 9-inch projectile, the range of the weapon being 130 feet. It was not until 1884 that Holland’s fourth boat appeared. In the following year he tried again with a rather larger vessel, 40 feet long and 7 feet in diameter, often called the Zalinski, because it was fitted with pneumatic guns of the type invented by an American army lieutenant of that name. Again there was a long silence in regard to Holland, until he submitted the designs of his seventh boat—the sixth was planned but never built—to the American Government, which had decided to adopt the under-water torpedo boat as a definite part of the navy. The Holland the Seventh, as designed and launched, was to be 85 feet long, of 100 tons displacement, and to carry three torpedo tubes and two steel armoured gun turrets. The Holland Company had meanwhile designed a vessel they considered much superior, and the Government consented to adopt it in place of No. 7. She was something like a porpoise, and above a semi-cylindrical hull carried a flat-sided superstructure, which has been one of the distinguishing features of the Holland type of submarines from that day to this. Her aerial torpedo was to carry 100 lb. of gun-cotton. After discharging it she was to dive, approach the vessel she sought to destroy, and fire her Whitehead torpedo. If this missed, she was to go under the vessel and discharge her after submarine gun immediately after passing underneath. The Holland was altered and improved, and when the French announced that they had become possessed of types of submarines and submersibles upon which dependence could be placed in time of war for destroying an enemy’s vessels, the British Admiralty abandoned the attitude of scepticism and watchfulness combined it had maintained for so long, and ordered five boats from the Holland Company for experimental purposes. The experiments which were made with these boats resulted in the Government becoming possessors of what were known as the A class of submarine.

Very little has been revealed of the details of modern submarines, for if there is one subject more than another upon which the admiralties of the world are agreed, it is that they should not let one another know the secrets of the mechanism of these under-water craft. That, at least, is the theory, but it is very questionable if all the governments are not quite well informed as to the constructional details of each other’s submarines, and probably know almost as much about them as they do about their own. The experiments at Barrow and elsewhere with the Holland boats and their successors have been responsible for the introduction of several classes of submarines, every one of which embodies improvements upon its predecessor. The five boats built for Great Britain at Barrow, in 1902, were 63 feet 4 inches in length by 11 feet 9 inches breadth, by 12 feet 1 inch depth, and had a surface speed of ten knots and a submerged speed of seven knots. The A class, which appeared in 1902, began with a vessel of 180 tons displacement, and 100 feet in length by 12 feet 8 inches beam. Larger vessels of this class were built from 1904 to 1907 of 204 tons displacement, but varying considerably in dimensions. The B class of 313 tons submerged displacement was introduced in 1903-4. These vessels were 135 feet by 13 feet 6 inches, and had a cruising speed of fourteen knots and a submerged speed of nine knots. The C class, which resembled the B class in many particulars, appeared in 1906-7, as did also the D class, but the latter were of 500 tons submerged displacement and of fifteen knots cruising speed. The five boats built on the Holland designs were each propelled by a 4-cylinder 190 h.p. petrol engine besides an electrical engine of 70 h.p. The armament was an 18-inch torpedo tube in the bow, and each carried five torpedoes. These vessels were divided into seven compartments. The deck was 31 feet 4 inches by 4 feet 5 inches. There were two diving rudders at the stern, and the conning tower, of 32 inches diameter, was formed of 4-inch armour. The A type, the first of which sank in March, 1904, off Spithead, had a 12-cylinder 600 h.p. gasolene engine. The B type had engines of 850 h.p., and could carry 15 tons of fuel structurally, and were provided with a forward superstructure. The D type have heavy oil engines, and can carry 15 tons of fuel. Yet another and more advanced type of submarine is stated to be under consideration and possibly under construction. It is to be larger, according to report, than any existing submarine, and is to carry a gun, which it will come to the surface to discharge. Is this to be the forerunner of a new cruiser, to be equally at home and equally dreaded, whether it be operating at the surface or beneath the waves, advancing stealthily upon its foe?

The Japanese, when they decided upon importing some submarines from this country, had two specially built at Barrow. It was not thought advisable to send them under their own power, or in tow of tugs, to the Far East, so a special vessel was built for their accommodation. For two-thirds of her length her main deck could be removed and her bottom was constructed to permit of the two submarines lying side by side. In order to get them on board, this steamer, which was called the Transporter, was sunk in dock at Liverpool, the submarines were floated into place and the water was pumped from the dock, and, of course, from the steamer also. As it subsided, the submarines were carefully adjusted in their cradles, and when this work had been completed, the Transporter with her strange cargo returned to Barrow in order to be prepared for the voyage to Japan.

It is necessary, however, to consider what other nations have done in connection with the submarine, long before the Holland was adopted by the British Admiralty. A Swedish inventor, Dr. Nordenfeldt, who had given a great deal of attention to the subject, was attracted by Mr. Garrett’s method of what was called “bottling up” the steam engine, so as to permit of the vessel diving under water. The first Nordenfeldt was cigar-shaped and 64 feet long, and was remarkable in one respect, for she was the first to carry a tube for discharging Whitehead torpedoes. She underwent in the presence of Royalty a fairly successful trial on the first day, and was ultimately purchased by the Greek Government. In 1887 Dr. Nordenfeldt and Mr. Garrett designed boats with screws placed on top, for regulating the ascent and descent, and the torpedo tube of each was carried at the outside of the bow instead of inside. One of these boats was taken by Mr. Garrett to Constantinople, where she was put through numerous evolutions in the presence of the Sultan himself and the greater part of the population of that city. The engineer and Mr. Garrett understood their work perfectly, but the same could not be said for the Turkish crew who were told off to be drilled in its manipulation. They knew nothing of submarines and did not want to learn, and maintained their obstinacy to the utmost. The trials took place in June, 1887. The Turkish boatmen simply would not keep out of her way, until one of them navigated his empty barge too close to the Nordenfeldt, whose revolving propeller knocked such a large hole in the barge’s bottom that it was as much as the boatman could do to get it to the shore to save it foundering. After that the Nordenfeldt was allowed more room. The first time, so far as navigation was concerned, she was tried she was a success, but directly her stability was altered by the discharge of her Whitehead torpedo from the bows, her trim was changed very materially, and it was even thought possible that she might go down stern first. However, the Turks bought her and added her to the collection of naval purchases of which they could make little use. A later submarine was built by Nordenfeldt, but proved no more stable, horizontally, than the other. It was purchased by the Russian Government, and was lost on the way to the Baltic.

The French have seemed to find an extraordinary fascination in submarine navigation. It was very great before Jules Verne published his fascinating romance, “Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea,” and became even more enthusiastic than ever. Of the early French experiments it is not necessary to say much. One of the first of the reliable French submarines was the Goubet, 10 feet in length, 6 feet high and 3 feet wide. This vessel was succeeded in the estimation of the French naval authorities by the Gymnote, which proved as remarkable a forerunner of a type as the Dreadnought did of the new type of battleships, and, like the Dreadnought, she has been steadily superseded by improvements upon her design. The Gymnote was designed by M. Gustave Zédé, although the credit of suggesting her in the first instance is sometimes ascribed to M. Dupuy de Lôme. She was launched in September, 1888, and was cigar-shaped. She displaced about 50 tons with dimensions of 59 feet in length, 6 feet in depth, and 5 feet 7 inches in breadth, and her electrical motor was supplied with the necessary power from a large installation of accumulators. Her conning tower was telescopic, and she had a periscope to enable her commander to take observations without coming to the surface; she was one of the first vessels, if not the first, to be fitted with a periscope or optical tube, the principle of which is that a mirror placed at a certain angle above the tube has its reflection reproduced by another mirror placed entirely parallel to it at the bottom of the tube. She carried two Whitehead torpedoes. M. Zédé planned another submarine which was launched in June, 1893, and its electrical installation nearly poisoned its crew owing to the fumes given off. Another Goubet followed, but was so slow that the Government rejected her. Since then, especially in the last few years, the French Government has gone in for a singular variety of these vessels. Some of them have undergone marvellous tests with conspicuous success. But none have attempted such a feat as two British submarines have accomplished, viz., from England to Hong Kong. They were towed part of the way, and escorted all of it, but their own power was not allowed to be idle.

It is now attempted to propel French submarines by Diesel engines for surface work, and by electric motors for underwater work; the result of the experiment is not known at the time of writing.

The Russian Government is said to favour submarines of the Lake pattern, so named after its American inventor, of which a great deal is thought; and America is said to have adopted both Holland and Lake submarines. One Lake boat was provided with wheels, and went on a submarine motor tour along the New England coasts, and Mr. Lake finally offered to demonstrate the usefulness of his vessel by finding and cutting the cables of the mines protecting one of the American ports. This was more than the American Government could allow, so he had a cable laid across a harbour mouth, and having found it, severed it.

The Italian authorities have modified the Holland and French plans to suit their own ideas, and though their boats are said to have given excellent results, singularly little is known about them.

All makes of submarines and submersibles have to return to the surface at fairly frequent intervals to renew the supply of fresh air, and have to approach it at even more frequent intervals in order that the navigating officer may see what are his surroundings at the surface, and, in time of war, whether it would be safe for him to bring his vessel up. The difficulty of finding his way about without revealing his whereabouts by exposing the periscope to view is one of the greatest the commander of a submarine has to meet, but it would be futile to say that the ingenuity of scientific inventors will not overcome even this difficulty.

TORPEDO BOATS AND DESTROYERS

When the Iris was given a speed of 18½ knots, many declared that the limit in speed, with a due regard to safety, had been attained. Much the same was said when Mr. Thornycroft brought out the Lightning in 1876, the first real torpedo boat ever built for the British Navy, which had a speed of 18½ knots. Now, however, the speed has been more than doubled, and the sea-going qualities of the vessels are so much better that there is scarcely room for comparison. In 1873 the same firm built for the Norwegian Government a small steamboat intended to be employed in torpedo work only. The Lightning was 87 feet over all, with a displacement on her trials of 28½ tons; now torpedo boats are a hundred feet or so longer.

A small torpedo boat built for the Russian Government by Messrs. Yarrow, in 1879, was considered to be the most formidable vessel of her class afloat. Her speed was 22 knots, and on 10 tons of coal it was estimated that she would be able to steam 800 miles at a speed of 10 to 12 knots. Her stem was formed to be a sharp ram, and from the conning tower to the stem she had a hood over her deck to throw off the water she might take over her bows. The two launching tubes for her Whitehead torpedoes were on either side of the bows. The theory was that the first torpedo should break through the nets or other guards, and that the second torpedo, discharged a few seconds later, should pass through the gap thus made in the ship’s defence and attack the hull itself. A comparatively recent invention is a contrivance to be carried on the nose of the torpedo to cut through the net.

Torpedo boats had to have their “parent ship,” or ship to which they could go for any repairs to be made when at sea. The parent ship was necessarily a floating torpedo boat factory, and, if the torpedo boat were not too large, could hoist her on board and repair her as effectually as if she were in dry dock or on the slips ashore, and lower her again to the water when the work was finished. The Vulcan, of 6,620 tons displacement, was launched in 1889 to undertake these duties, and also act as a laboratory in connection with the mining service. She had two powerful hydraulic cranes for hoisting in and out torpedo boats, of which she carried six on her deck for the assistance of the fleet she might accompany, and also had two counterbalancing barges and steam pinnaces. In order that she might be able to protect herself she was equipped with twenty quick-firing guns. Several “parents” or floating repair ships have been added to the Navy of recent years, and every one of them is as modern as science and money can make her.

Having a large fleet of cruisers and battleships, it has been the British policy of late years to arm them with a powerful secondary battery, especially designed to meet torpedo attack. It is not touching upon international or diplomatic questions to state that the very preponderance of the British fleet has rendered the risk of invasion of these islands exceedingly small, and the resources of this country have been, and are, so vast, that the much-debated two-power standard—in spite of the numerous and contradictory estimates of comparative naval strength based upon it—has, on the whole, been maintained.

If the theoretical British frontier be the coast-line of a possible opponent, it is evident that vessels which can steam to an enemy’s coasts and destroy his torpedo boats there are of greater use than the torpedo boats which can only operate along the coast-line, or venture to cross the seas in fine weather. This has been set forth as one reason why the British Admiralty of recent years has preferred destroyers to the smaller vessels.

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.

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.

The destroyer was designed to be able to overtake torpedo boats by superior speed, to be of larger dimensions, and therefore able to maintain her speed in rougher weather than the torpedo boat could, and to be sufficiently powerfully armed to sink a torpedo boat or hostile destroyer by gun-fire. The destroyer was also to carry torpedoes, it being desired to take advantage of the great speed to deliver torpedo attacks upon cruisers and other large ships as occasion offered. The earliest British destroyers were the Daring of 237 tons, in 1893 the Hornet of 240 tons, and the Ferret of 250 tons, built respectively by Thornycroft, Yarrow and Laird, all three boats having a speed of 27½ knots; and about two years later the Palmer firm built at Jarrow the Janus, Lightning, and Porcupine of equal speed. With Thornycroft’s Boxer, in 1894, the speed was brought up to 29 knots; and in the same year the Desperate, 280 tons, and the Quail, 305 tons—two odd names to be associated—were the pioneers of the destroyers of the 30-knot type, many of which attained to 32 knots. These were turbine boats, but the Albatross by Thornycroft, with reciprocating engines, also attained 32 knots in 1899. The last 30-knot destroyer had her engines fitted with forced lubrication on a special system, which overcame the difficulty of oiling the engines satisfactorily for running at the high speed necessary and was the first destroyer in the British Navy to be thus equipped.

No further advance of a sensational character was announced until the Star was launched from Palmer’s yards, and she was surpassed very shortly afterwards by the performance of the little steamer Turbinia. This vessel was only 100 feet in length, and of 44½ tons displacement. The engines of the Parsons type of turbines, with which it was fitted experimentally, received the cold shoulder, which seems to be the fate of all innovations that do not come into the world through official channels. But the owners of this vessel and the proprietors and inventors of the engines adopted a method of compelling recognition as daring as it was successful. The occasion chosen was the naval review held in honour of the diamond jubilee of the late Queen Victoria, and shortly before the Royal Yacht arrived to pass between the rows of warships, this turbine steamer shot into the fairway and went at her utmost speed from one end to the other of the lines of steamships and the finest assemblage of warships the world had ever seen, and there was not in the whole British Navy one destroyer or torpedo boat present that she could not outdistance. Thousands of spectators witnessed the exploit, and the success of the turbine engine was assured from that moment.

The remarkable development in steamship propulsion this vessel heralded was represented in less than ten years by the fastest and largest steamships in the world, and the largest and fastest and most powerful battleships afloat. The builders’ estimate of the power of her rotary engines was that for every ton of the machinery 72 h.p. should be developed, and though this seems to have been accomplished in the Turbinia, equally satisfactory results have not been attained in the large seagoing destroyers fitted with turbine engines, but the results were in advance of those obtainable with reciprocating engines.

It was not, however, until 1900 that the first turbine-driven war vessel was added to the fighting force of the Navy. The Admiralty had not been idle, and as the result of numerous tests and inquiries made the great experiment which brought about the revolution in the propulsion of the world’s fighting ships. The mercantile marine led the way, the Allan line being the first to have Atlantic liners equipped with turbines. The Government watched the experiment carefully, and in spite of opposition from some influential quarters decided to try how turbines would act in a destroyer. This was the Viper, of 390 tons displacement. The hull and boilers were by Hawthorn, Leslie and Co., and the engines were by the Parsons Turbine Company. She astonished everyone by attaining a speed of 36.6 knots when running light, and from that time onward the development of turbines for warships has been one long series of progress.

The destroyers of the River class, begun in 1903 and completed in 1906, had displacements varying from 540 to 590 tons, but the speed of all of them was about 25½ knots. These were followed by the coastal destroyers, designed, as their name indicates, to operate as destroyers along the coast against any hostile torpedo boats, but now classed as torpedo boats. In the latter capacity their guaranteed speed of 26 to 27 knots would stand them in good stead, but as destroyers they were soon outclassed. Some of them were provided with turbines.