MODERN SHIPS OF WAR.
During the last thirty years the changes in naval science have been so much greater than in its whole previous history as to be epoch-making. Between the wooden vessel of 1857 and the metal machine of 1887 there exist in common only the essential principles that each is a water-borne structure, armed with guns and propelled by steam. Beyond this everything is changed—model, material, machinery, rig, armament, equipment. In truth, so radical are the differences, and so sudden have been the developments, that authorities are widely separated in opinion, even upon such a primary question as a universally accepted system of classification. But as this is necessary to a proper appreciation of the subject, a generalization may be made in which war-vessels are divided into armored and unarmored types, the former including battle-ships, and the latter those employed in the police of the seas, in commerce protection or destruction, or in the attack of positions which are defenceless.
In the absence of any accepted differentiations of these classes, the new British nomenclature may be adopted with safety, for to a certain degree it explains the terms and includes the types now used so variously in different navies. Under this armored vessels are grouped into (1) battle-ships, (2) cruisers, (3) special types, such as rams and torpedo-boats, and (4) coast-service ships; and unarmored vessels comprise (1) cruisers, (2) sloops, (3) gun-vessels, (4) gun-boats, (5) despatch-vessels, and (6) torpedo-vessels. “As it was impossible to unite all the qualities which are to be desired in a ship-of-war in a single vessel, it became necessary to divide the leading types into subdivisions, each specially adapted to the use of a particular arm, or to perform some special service. For the battle-ships designed for naval operations in European waters great offensive and defensive powers and evolutionary qualities are essential,while the highest sea-going qualities, including habitability, are, in the opinion of some, less essential. For sea-going battle-ships offensive and defensive strength must be partially sacrificed in order to secure unquestionable sea-worthiness. In ocean-going battle-ships canvas is a valuable auxiliary. In battle-ships for European waters, masts and yards involve a useless sacrifice of fighting power.... Heavily armored ships intended for the line of battle must necessarily carry powerful guns. They must be able to traverse great distances, and must therefore have considerable storage for coal. Great speed is required to enable them to meet the inevitable contingencies of an engagement. In a word, the class of ships which may be called battery-ships must be furnished with very considerable offensive and defensive power. Their great size, however, and the enormous weight of their armor and armament, necessitate such displacements as render them unfit for coast defence” (Brassey).
While the antagonistic elements of offence, defence, speed, or endurance have caused the main differences of design in all types, the greatest variances with battle-ships are found in the distribution of armor for protection. A hasty summarization of the policies now adopted by the great maritime nations shows that the French generally adhere to a complete armor-belt at the water-line, that the Italians have in their latest ships totally abandoned side-armor, and that the English favor its partial employment. The popular idea that armor consists only of thick slabs of wrought-iron or steel, or of steel-faced iron, bolted to a ship’s side, is erroneous. “In the earlier broadside ships,” writes the present director of English naval construction, Mr. W. H. White, “this view was practically correct; they had no armor or protected decks, the decks being covered only by thin plates fitted for structural purposes. But in theDevastationclass, and all subsequent ships, considerable and increasing weights of material are worked into the deck armor, and with good reason. Experiments showed conclusively that horizontal protection at the top of the armor-belt, or citadel, was of vital necessity, and even now (1887) it is open to question whether the provision made for horizontal protection in relation to vertical armor is as large as it might advantageously be.”
The factors which have most influenced the problem are the torpedo, ram, and gun. Of these the last is indubitably of the highest importance, for the number and nature, the effective handling, the disposition and command, and the relative protection of the guns are the elements which control most powerfully the principles of ship design. In the first stage of the contest between gun and armor the defence wasvictorious, but so rapidly have the art and science of ordnance developed that to-day the power of the heaviest pieces as compared with the resistance of the heaviest armor is greater than ever before.
The story of the contest can be briefly told. In 1858 the armament of the newest ships was principally a broadside battery of 32-pounders; in this were included a few 56-pound shell-guns and one or two eight-inch 68-pounders, though of the whole number not one had an energy, that is, a force of blow when striking, sufficient to penetrate four and a half inches of wrought-iron at short range. In the earliest iron-clads—the FrenchLa Gloireand the EnglishWarrior—batteries mainly of nine-inch calibre were carried, the latter mounting forty guns of all kinds. TheMinotaur, the first representative of the next English type, had fifty guns, but after this class was launched there appeared that distinctively modern tendency to decrease the number of pieces while increasing the intensity of their fire. The succeeding vessels carried from fourteen to twelve pieces, until, in 1874, the principle of concentration reached its maximum in giving theInflexibleonly four guns. These, like theWarrior’s, were muzzle-loaders, and their relative dimensions and power may be compared as follows:
The term energy, when employed to indicate the work that a gun can perform, is expressed in foot-tons, and signifies that the amount developed is sufficient to raise the given weight in tons to the height of one foot. The piercing power of theInflexible’sprojectile was, under the same conditions of charge and range, sufficient to penetrate twenty-five feet of granite and concrete masonry, or thirty-two feet of the best Portland cement.
When the thickness of armor-plating increased, gun-makers tried to overcome the resistance by giving greater energy to the shot. As this required large charges of powder and very long guns, muzzle-loaders became impracticable on shipboard, and were supplanted by breech-loaders. From this stage guns developed greatly in power until, in 1882, thosedesigned for theBenbowwere to weigh 110 tons, to be 43 feet long and 16¾ inches in calibre, and with 900 pounds of powder and an 1800-pound projectile were to develop 54,000 foot-tons, or an energy sufficient to penetrate thirty-five inches of unbacked wrought-iron at one thousand yards. The guns for the latest English ships, theTrafalgarand theNile, weigh 67 tons, are 36 feet 1 inch in length and 13½ inches in calibre, and with a 520-pound charge and a 1250-pound projectile are expected to develop 29,500 foot-tons, or an energy sufficient to penetrate an iron target twenty-two and a half inches thick at a thousand yards. These results apparently show a retrogression in power, but a comparison of theInflexible’sandTrafalgar’sbatteries proves that the more modern gun of the latter weighs 13 tons less, is 2½ inches smaller in calibre, fires a shot 450 pounds lighter, and yet develops an energy greater by 3000 foot-tons.
This gain is mainly due to the improvements made with powder and projectiles. In 1883 a 403-pound Whitworth steel shell penetrated a wrought-iron target eighteen inches thick backed by thirty-seven inches of well-packed wet sand, one and a half inches of steel, various balks of timber, and sixteen feet more of sand. When the projectile was recovered after this stratified flight it was found to be practically uninjured. On the Continent, where breech-loaders were favored earlier than in England or with ourselves, the heaviest rifles afloat are the 75-ton, 16.54-inch calibre, French, and the 106 tons, 17-inch Italian guns. These are, however, not the largest pieces designed, for there is an 120-ton Krupp gun, and the French have projected one which will weigh 124 tons, be 18.11 inches in calibre, and fire a 2465-pound projectile—over a ton—with a powder charge of 575 pounds. A comparison of the Krupp 120-ton gun with the 110-ton Armstrong shows that the former is more powerful; that its projectile is much heavier, and the initial velocity and pressure are smaller. The results at the recent test were as follows:
From theWarriorto theInflexiblethe evolution of design was based upon a principle that sought the best results for the offence in small, powerful batteries, with all-around fire and armor protection; and for thedefence, in thick armor carried over the vitals of the ship. This was satisfied by larger weights of armor and a smaller ratio of armored part to total surface. Wrought-iron armor was also replaced by compound, with a corresponding gain of twenty per cent. for equal thicknesses, and at present all-steel plates, of which great things may reasonably be expected, are now employed by France and Italy. In 1861 theMinotaurwas belted throughout her 400 feet of length with 1780 tons of armor, or with a weight nearly double that given to theWarriortwo years before. TheInflexiblehas 3280 tons, and theTrafalgar4230 tons, of which 1040 are fitted horizontally. The maximum thickness of theWarrior’swrought-iron armor is 4½ inches, of theDevastation’s, 12 inches, and of theInflexible’s24 inches; the compound (iron steel-faced) armor of theTrafalgaris 18 and 20 inches thick, and theBaudinandFormidablehave 21.7 inches in solid plates of steel. These, of course, are some of the dry-as-dust figures before referred to, and they are cited only to assist a comparison, their mere enumeration having no scientific value, because the disposition and character of the plates are unconsidered.
To meet this development of offence and defence many changes in design have been adopted. Thebroadside systemof the first armored ships was followed in 1863-1867 by abelt and battery type, wherein the principal guns, much reduced in number, were carried in a box battery amidships, and given a fore-and-aft fire by means of recessed ports or outlying batteries. In 1869 the Admiralty adopted thebreastwork monitor, a low free-boarded structure, which was plated from stem to stern in the region of the water-line, and had in its central portion an armored breastwork that carried at each end a revolving turret. In 1870 this type was pronounced unsafe, and after a careful investigation by a special committee on design certain modifications were recommended. These did not affect materially the essential features of Sir Edward Reed’s plan, for the complete water-line belt and the central armored battery were retained; and to-day many of the critics who then denounced it claim that, after all, it is the true type of an ideal battle-ship.
In 1872 the Italian naval authorities accepted the conclusions of the British committee, and laid down the firstcentral-citadelbattle-ships, now known as theDuilioandDandolo; and about the same time Mr. Barnaby, the new Chief Constructor of the British Navy, brought forward a similar design in theInflexible. The engines, boilers, and the bases of two turrets in this vessel are protected by an armored box-shapedcitadel, from the extremities of which a horizontal armored deck extends fore and aft below the water-line; above this deck an armored superstructure completes the free-board, and has its unprotected spaces at the water-line, subdivided into numerous water-tight compartments. This ship met with so much hostile criticism that a committee was appointed to investigate the charges, but in the end the Admiralty plans were officially sustained.
The French, with characteristic ability and independence, have in the mean time made many notable departures from their first types of broadside ships. Believing in the association of heavy guns with light ones—mixed armaments, as they are called—the central armored casemate of wholly protected guns has been rejected in order to give a maximum thickness of plating at the water-line. The largest guns are mounteden barbette—that is, in towers which protect the gun mechanism, and permit the pieces to be fired, not through port-holes, but over the rim of armored parapets. The French constructors reason, and with justice, that no single shot from a heavy gun should be wasted, and that, in addition to an extended range, gun captains must be enabled, by keeping their eyes upon the enemy, to select the best opportunity for firing. With broadside pieces this is impossible, for apart from the limited range, and the obscurity caused by the smoke, the port-holes through which the sighting has necessarily to be done are almost choked by the gun-muzzles. Turrets have their objections also, because the poisonous gases which formerly escaped wholly from the muzzle will, as soon as the breech is opened, rush into the turret and make it almost uninhabitable. Often after one discharge the air becomes stifling, and in theDuilioit deteriorated so quickly as to be unfit for respiration until a part of the turret-roof had been lifted. Then, again, structural difficulties not easily overcome in the turret are simplified in the barbette, as the latter, with equal gun facilities, weighs fifty per cent. less, and at the same time escapes all those chances of disablement which a well-placed shot is almost sure to cause in any revolving system. At sea the chance of hitting the gun is never great, and the main things to protect are the gun machinery and the gunners; the armored wall of the barbette tower does this for the former, and the latter have a fair fighting chance afforded by the gun-shield. Of course war is not deer-stalking, and the patriot who wants to go into battle so fully protected as to be in no danger had better stop playing sailor or soldier, and take to the woods before the fighting begins. In addition to the heavy ordnance, the French mount a number of lighter pieces, and carrypowerful secondary batteries of rapid fire and machine-guns; and sufficient armor defence is given by a belt at the water-line, an armored deck, and a glacis and parapet for the barbette. It is quite probable that these purely military terms may seem odd when applied to ships, but they are the only ones which can exactly explain what is meant, and, after all, they show how much a battle-ship has become a floating, transferable fortress.
The Italians were not altogether satisfied with theDuilio, as she lacked the high speed and coal endurance which they deem essential in any Mediterranean naval policy; so in 1878 they adopted an idea advanced some years before in England, and startled the world with theItaliatype. In this ship protection is given, not by vertical or side armor, but by an armored deck, between which and the deck above there is a very minute subdivision of the water-line space. The system is based upon the theory that the power to float must be obtained, not by keeping our projectiles, but by so localizing their effect as to make any penetration practically harmless. TheItalia’sheavy guns are carried in a central armored redoubt, at a height of thirty-three feet above the water-line, and with their machinery and fittings weigh over two thousand tons. This fact shows the magnitude of the task accepted by her designer, for it means that a load nearly equal to the total weight of a first-class line-of-battle ship of the last century has to be sustained at this great elevation. Besides the main battery of four 106-ton guns, eighteen six-inch breech-loading guns are carried—twelve in broadside on the upper battery deck, four in the superstructure before and abaft the redoubt, and two under cover at the extremities of the spar-deck. The redoubt is protected by seventeen inches of compound iron, inclined twenty-four degrees from the vertical; and the complete armored deck, which is nearly three inches thick, dips forward to strengthen the ram, curves aft to cover the steering gear, and, at the ship’s sides, extends six feet below the water-line.
To cope with this formidable rival, which, whether right or wrong in principle, must, under England’s policy, be surpassed, the ships of theAdmiralclass were designed. In these the main battery is mounted in two barbettes built high out of water, near the extremities of the vessel, while in a central broadside are carried the armor-piercing and rapid-fire guns. The engines, boilers, and barbette communications are protected by a water-line belt of thick armor which covers about forty-five per cent. of the ship’s length; at the upper edge of this there is a protective deck, and at its ends athwartships bulkheads are erected; before andabaft the belt and beneath the water-line there is a protective deck, together with the usual minute subdivision into water-tight compartments. The barbettes and the cylindrical ammunition tubes which extend from the belt-deck to the barbette floors are strongly armored. Owing to the strong protest made against these vessels, more efficient armor protection has been given to the battle-ships lately laid down.
From this very hasty and incomplete review it may be gathered that the first and most lasting influence in the development of battle-ships is due to France and England, though theMonitorhad no little share in the result. It is difficult to say, in the ceaseless struggle for something which, if not good, is new, what may be the outcome of the latest efforts to revolutionize the question, or, curiously enough, to bring it back to the point whence its departure was taken. Whatever may be the courage of one’s opinion, there is not sufficient data—a first-class war can only supply these—upon which to say, Yea, yea! or Nay, nay! and prophecy is certain to be without honor, especially as the discussions given in the appendices demonstrate how the wisest and most experienced have no substantial agreement in views.
An editorial in a late number of theBroad Arrowdeclares that “the days of armored plate protection are, in the opinion of many thinking men, coming to a close. The gun is victorious all along the line, and the increased speed given to the torpedo-boat, taken in conjunction with the destructive efficiency attained by the torpedo, makes it a questionable policy to spend such large sums of money as heretofore upon individual ships.” There is no room here to give the various arguments, though very clever and ingenious they are, by which this position is fortified; it may be added, however, that to a large degree this is the opinion of Admiral Aube, the late French Minister of Marine, and undoubtedly this declaration re-echoes the shibboleth of those other French officers who, in the absolute formula of their chief, Gabriel Charmes, insist that “a squadron attacked at night by torpedo-boats is a squadron lost.”
English authorities, with a few notable exceptions, do not go so far as their more impulsive, or, from the Gallic stand-point, less conservative neighbors. Chief Constructor White believes that at no time in the war between gun and armor has the former, as the principal fighting factor, so many chances of success. He concedes the value of light, quick-firing guns in association with heavy armaments, grants the importance of rams, torpedoes, submarine boats, and torpedo-vessels generally, but denies that the days of heavily armored battle-ships are ended. LordCharles Beresford asserts that the value of large guns at sea is overestimated, advocates from motives of morals and efficiency mixed armaments, agrees to the great, yet subordinate, importance of the usual auxiliaries, and insists that England builds cumbersome and expensive battle-ships only because of their possession by her dangerous rivals.
There are equally rigorous disagreements upon all the other types of armored, unarmored, and auxiliary vessels, as needs must be, so long as the naval policies of no two nations can be alike. England and Russia are at opposite poles, so far as their environments are concerned, and between France and Turkey the differences are as radical as their national instincts and ambitions. But, among all, England is as isolated as her geographical situation. Whatever fleets other nations may assemble, whatever types other countries may deem best for their interests, England, whose existence depends upon her naval strength, must have all; not only the best in quality, but so many of every class that she will be able to defend her integrity against any foe that assails it. England can take no chances.
Upon one point alone, the necessity of high speed, is there substantial agreement. Less than four years ago fifteen or sixteen knots were accepted as a maximum beyond which profitable design could not be urged. Greater speed, it is true, had been attained by our first type of commerce destroyer. In February, 1868, theWampanoagran at the rate of 16.6 knots for thirty-eight hours, and made a maximum of 17.75 knots; but great as was the achievement, there is a general acceptance of the fact that this vessel was a racing-machine, and not in the modern sense a man-of-war.
Fighting-ships, with the power to steam thousands of miles at sea without recoaling, are now being built under contracts which, for every deficiency in speed or horse-power, pay penalties that at our former summit of expectations would have been prohibitive to ship construction; and, what is more startling yet, the bonus which goes to any increase upon this speed proves the co-relation between scientific attainment and popular appreciation of the subject, and shows how readily the impossibilities of yesterday become the axioms of to-morrow.
The development of speed has therefore a special interest. Between 1859 and 1875, that tentative period which led to such wonderful realizations, the highest speed, under the most favorable circumstances, of large war-vessels was fourteen knots; in the smaller classes of unarmored ships it ranged between eight and thirteen, while that attained by fast cruisers was from fifteen to sixteen and a half knots. In 1886 Italianarmored vessels made eighteen knots. Cruisers like the JapaneseNaniwa-Kanand the ItalianAngelo Emoreached nearly nineteen, and theReina Regente, launched in February last, is expected to steam over twenty. Torpedo-vessels beginning in 1873 with fourteen knots are now running twenty-five, and at the same time the type has so much increased in size and importance as to be an essential and not an accessory in naval warfare.
It is impossible to explain the difficulties which have beset this development, because the conditions that surround any attempt at speed-increase are such as can be properly understood only by those who have technical training; and then, too, the great ocean racers have so much accustomed the public to wonderful sea performances that the results are accepted without a knowledge of the credit which is due the mechanical and marine engineers who have achieved them. But with greater experience the higher, surely, will be the appreciation which every one must give; for, in the words of Chief Constructor White, “when it is realized that a vessel weighing ten thousand tons can be propelled over a distance of nine knots in an hour by the combustion of less than one ton of coal—the ten-thousandth part of her own weight—it will be admitted that the result is marvellous,” and that “‘the way of a ship in the midst of the sea’ is beyond full comprehension.”
It is often asked which has the better fleet, France or England. Who can tell? No one definitely. Admiral Sir R. Spencer Robinson, late Comptroller of the British Navy, declares, in theContemporary Reviewof February, 1887, that “the number of armored vessels of the two countries may be stated approximately as fifty-five for England and fifty-one for France. Without going into further details, taking everything into consideration, giving due weight to all the circumstances which affect the comparison, and assuming that the designs of the naval constructors on each side of the Channel will fairly fulfil the intentions of each administration (a matter of interminable dispute, and which nothing but an experiment carried to destruction can settle), the iron-clad force of England is, on the whole, rather superior to that of France. A combination of the navy of that Power with any other would completely reverse the position. I should state as my opinion, leaving others to judge what it may be worth, that in fighting power the unarmored ships of England are decidedly superior to those of our rival’s; but if theraison d’êtreof the French navy is—as has been frequently stated in that country, and by none more powerfully and categorically than by the French Minister of Marine—the wide-spread, thorough destructionof British commerce, and the pitiless and remorseless ransom of every undefended and accessible town in the British dominions, regardless of any sentimentalities or such rubbish as the laws of war and the usages of civilized nations; and if at least one of theraisons d’êtreof the British navy is to defeat those benevolent intentions, and to defend that commerce on which depends our national existence and imperial greatness—then I fear that perhaps they have prepared to realize their purpose of remorseless destruction rather better than we have ours of successful preservation.”
A long sentence this, but it emphasizes the great axiom that war is business, not sentiment, and teaches a lesson which this country will do well to learn. Fortunately, we are at last out of the shallows, if not fairly in the full flooding channel-way, though many things are yet wanting with us. Perhaps this over-long chapter cannot be made to end more usefully than by quoting in proof of this the concluding paragraph of that brilliant article on naval policy which Professor James Russell Soley, United States Navy, contributed to the February (1887) number ofScribner’s Magazine:
“It is the part of wisdom,” he writes, “to study the lessons of the past, and to learn what we may from the successes or the failures of our fathers. The history of the last war is full of these lessons, and at no time since its close has the navy been in a condition so favorable for their application. At least their meaning cannot fail to be understood. They show clearly that if we would have a navy fitted to carry on war, we must give some recognition to officers on the ground of merit, either by the advancement of the best, or, what amounts to nearly the same thing, by the elimination of the least deserving; that we must give them a real training for war in modern ships and with modern weapons; that the direction of the naval establishment, in so far as it has naval direction, must be given unity of purpose, and the purpose to which it must be directed is fighting efficiency; that a naval reserve of men and of vessels must be organized capable of mobilization whenever a call shall be made; and, finally, that a dozen or a score of new ships will not make a navy, but that the process of renewal must go on until the whole fleet is in some degree fitted to stand the trial of modern war. Until this rehabilitation can be accomplished the navy will only serve the purpose of a butt for the press and a foot-ball for political parties and its officers—a body of men whose intelligence and devotion would be equal to any trust will be condemned to fritter away their lives in a senseless parody of their profession.”