PART I

“The submarine craft is a miracle of ingenuity though Nelson and his hearts of oak, fighting only on deck, in God’s free air, and with ‘the meteor flag of England’ fluttering overhead, would have loathed and scorned her burglarious, area-sneak dodges down below.”

In modern under-water warfare two weapons are employed, the Mine and the Torpedo. Both are explosive devices, but whilst mines are stationary, torpedoes are endowed with the power of locomotion in some form or another.

The modern submarine boat is in reality a diving torpedo-boat and like all other torpedo craft of the present day its function is to discharge automobile torpedoes.

The submarine boat is sometimes said to be the child of the torpedo-boat. As a matter of fact the earliest known torpedo vessel was designed to do its workunderwater.

In 1776 an attack was made on the English frigate H.M.S.Eagle, and in 1777 on the English man-of-war H.M.S.Cerberusby a submarine vessel invented by David Bushnell and provided with “torpedoes.”Although no injury was inflicted on these ships, three of the crew of a prize schooner astern of theCerberus, in hauling one of Bushnell’s drifting torpedoes on board, were killed by its explosion.

A few years afterwards Robert Fulton occupied himself with torpedoes, and like Bushnell he came to the conclusion that a submarine boat was the best suited for the discharge of his weapons. In time of peace Fulton showed that his torpedoes could sink ships, but in actual warfare he failed to accomplish the destruction of any craft. For a while torpedo warfare received but scant attention, but on the outbreak of the American Civil War the mine and the torpedo “leapt at one bound from the condition of theory and experiment to become accepted once for all as practical and valuable factors for offence and defence.”

At this period also it is to be noted that the torpedoists considered the under-water vessel the most favourable method of utilising the spar-torpedo, the weapon of the day. Both Federals and Confederates paid much attention to submarine navigation, and success attended the efforts of the latter, for on February 17, 1864, the Federal frigateHousatonicwas sunk off Charleston by a submarine boat manned by the Confederates and armed with a spar-torpedo. This is the sole occasion on which an under-water vessel has ever succeeded in sinking a hostile craft in actual warfare, and even then it was being navigated in the awash condition, and not completely submerged.

The introduction of the automobile or fish torpedo led to the building of above-water torpedo vessels by all the great Powers. The idea of discharging this weapon from a submarine boat occupied the attention of numerous inventors, amongst others of Mr. Nordenfelt, of machine-gun fame.

Greece and Turkey both bought Nordenfelt submarine boats, but although they achieved a certain amount of success and were certainly the best specimens of under-water fighting vessels extant, they failed to receive wider recognition owing to their serious disadvantages.

The possibility of utilising the electric accumulator revived the hopes of the advocates of submarine navigation, and towards the end of the eighties, France added the first under-water torpedo-boat to her navy: since then her interest in the subject has never abated, and although it would be unfair to attribute to all French naval men and officials the ideas as to the superiority of the torpedo vessel to the ironclad put forward by a certain class of writers, it cannot be denied that the question of under-water warfare has attracted more attention in France than in any other country. A few years after the launch of the first French submarine, theGymnote, the U.S. Government purchased theHolland, and in the same year ordered six moreHollandsof an improved type.

When Greece and Turkey purchased Nordenfelt boats there were not wanting those who declaredthat Great Britain should also add under-water vessels to her navy. The official view was however hostile to such craft. In the early part of 1900, Viscount Goschen said that while close attention had been given by the Admiralty to the subject of submarine boats, they considered that even if the practical difficulties attending their use could be overcome, they would seem to be weapons for “maritime Powers on the defensive.” It seemed to him that the reply to this weapon must be looked for in other ways than in building submarine boats ourselves, for it was clear that one submarine boat could not fight another. It would seem from this that the Admiralty had no very high opinion of the submarine as an offensive weapon. However this may be, an order was placed in the autumn of 1900 with Messrs. Vickers Sons and Maxim for five of the newest “Holland” boats, they being the agents in Europe for the Holland Torpedo-boat Company of New York, and this being the only type available. Not till the statement of the First Lord was published on March 1, 1901, was the fact of the ordering of these boats made public; the secret had indeed been well kept.

He would be a bold man who would prophesy how the question of submarine navigation will stand fifty years hence. Some declare that the under-water vessel will go the way of the dynamite gun, the circular battleship, the aerial torpedo and other inventions; others affirm that the warfareof the future will take place neither on land nor on the seas, but in the air and beneath the waves. We shall see what we shall see. At present we would prefer to go no further than the cautious statement of the First Lord. “What the future value of these boats may be in naval warfare can only be a matter of conjecture. The experiments with these boats will assist the Admiralty in assessing their true value. The question of their employment must be studied, and all developments in their mechanism carefully watched by this country.”

CHAPTER IITHE PLACE OF THE SUBMARINE IN WARFARE

“Drake would have understood Trafalgar. Neither Drake nor Nelson could understand a modern naval action.”

“Competent authorities hold that the submersible torpedo-boat is the vessel of the future rather than either the existing type, or the ‘Destroyer’” (Excubitorin theFortnightly Reviewfor August, 1901).

“It is not only the unstable opinions of experts, liable to sudden change, which makes the forecast of future naval war difficult; it is that the progress of invention may be, for all we know, undermining the whole position by disturbing the balance which creates existing warship design” (the late Vice-AdmiralP. H. Colomb).

“Conservatism has thus far delayed the adoption of a most valuable offensive and defensive weapon, not because success was ever proved to be unattainable, but because some vessels built by inexperienced inventors happened to be failures” (Mr.J. P. Holland).

“In the dawn of the twentieth century there has entered into the history of the world’s navies a class of vessel which is probably destined to revolutionise, eventually, the whole system of maritime construction. The problem of submarine navigation, in a limited sense at least, has been solved” (LieutenantG. E. Armstrong).

“Most torpedo destruction has been done with a bag of explosive tied to the end of a pole, and the submarine boat will permit you to get closer to the enemy with a bigger bag of explosive and with less damage to the pole. You have all the advantages of attack with almost absolute safety to the torpedo-boat itself.”

THE FIRST SUBMARINE TO FLY THE WHITE ENSIGN.(By permission of the Admiralty and Messrs. Vickers, Sons, and Maxim.)

At the present time opinion is divided as to the part that the submarine boat is likely to play in the naval warfare of the future. Those who have expressed themselves on the subject may be roughly divided into three classes.

1. Those who have little or no faith in submarines.

2. Those who believe that submarines will revolutionise warfare, ocean locomotion, marine industries, &c., and that an epoch may come in which merchantmen will alone sail the ocean and all the warships will be submarines or submersibles.

3. Those who recognise that the submarine boat of to-day is a great improvement on the boats of twenty years ago; who believe that although at present it suffers from grave defects, its development will continue, and who are of opinion that it will find useful spheres of action in time of war.

Much of the adverse criticism which the “submarine boat” has had to encounter has been due to the popular belief that this type of craft was intended to do its workbelowthe surface of the water. As it is impossible at present to see beneath the waves, many critics have declared the submarine to be a perfectly useless fighting vessel. It cannot be too often asserted, for the sake of overcoming prejudice, that the proper place of the submarine isat the surface, and that she only goes below for short intervals. This is now universally recognised by constructors of such craft, which it might be more correct to term “submersibles”or “diving torpedo-boats.” So far back as 1886 Mr. Nordenfelt remarked, “It is impossible to think of a submarine boat that actually manœuvres and does its work under water. I gave that up from the very commencement.”

By the term “submarine” we mean to imply a vessel capable of manœuvring on the surface like an ordinary torpedo boat, of running awash with her conning tower alone above water to enable her to be steered, and of totally immersing herself for short periods either to escape detection, avoid the fire of the enemy, or fire torpedoes.

The history of the submarine bears a curious resemblance to that of the torpedo and the torpedo vessel in many particulars. All three have been declared to be the weapons of the weaker power and of no possible value to a nation which must maintain the command of the seas. The first Whitehead torpedoes were certainly slow and erratic; now they are capable of running within a few inches of the required depth at a speed of over 37 miles an hour for a range up to 2,000 yards, and hitting the point aimed at with almost the same precision as a gun.

In spite of the sneers of fossilised officials, Great Britain adopted the torpedo-boat, and in the process of time evolved the destroyer, an offensive weapon of no mean value, and a type of craft which some have declared to be the fighting vessel of the future. She will soon be in the possession of nine under-water vessels, and it maybe that the submarines of twenty years hence will bear the same resemblance to those of to-day, as theAlbatrossdoes to theLightningof 1877.

The very first submarine to figure in actual warfare was the boat invented by David Bushnell. His attempt to blow up the British frigateEaglefailed, mainly owing to the incapacity of the operator, Sergeant Ezra Lee. Fulton, although he blew up several old hulks in time of peace, was afforded no opportunity of testing the capabilities of his vessel in actual warfare.

U.S. SUBMARINE “SHARK” ON THE STOCKS.

During the American Civil War there occurred the famous incident of the destruction of theHousatonicby the Confederate diving torpedo-boatDavid—the only occasion on which a submarineboat has succeeded in inflicting injury on a hostile vessel in a naval action. Though many lives were lost in theDavid, this would not have occurred had the most ordinary precautions been taken.

On February 5, 1886, Mr. Nordenfelt read a paper before the Royal United Service Institution on his Submarine Boats; in the discussion that followed many eminent naval authorities took part, and the following are extracts taken from their speeches on this occasion:—

“My opinion is that all torpedo-boats should be submarine boats” (AdmiralArthur).

“With the cupola above water the submarine boat would prove a very formidable means of attack” (Admiral SirAstley Cooper Key).

“Mr. Nordenfelt has done much towards solving a problem which is likely to be of great importance in future naval operations” (Vice-Admiral H.R.H.Duke of Edinburgh).

“I think Mr. Nordenfelt is to be congratulated on having made an enormous step forward, and one which I am sure has a great future before it” (AdmiralSelwyn).

“If you want to economically defend a port it is better to have a boat that does not show at all. The moral effect of this boat would be enormous, and I am perfectly certain that foreign war vessels would not lay off a port to intercept outward- and homeward-bound vessels if they knew that there was a submarine vessel inside that could come out without being seen” (Major-GeneralHardinge Stewart).

“As far as practicability for warfare is concerned this submarine boat (the Nordenfelt) is pretty well accepted by the profession.... Therefore as a craft not altogether wholly submerged, but just a boat awash for coast defence,and also for the attack of ships at sea, and especially in heavy weather, when the fast torpedo boats cannot act, I believe the vessel will be found of great practical and reliable service” (Major-General SirAndrew Clarke).

The Nordenfelt boats, as will be seen in Chapter XV, failed to come up to the high expectations that had been formed of them, and the British Admiralty considered themselves relieved from the necessity of taking up the subject of submarine navigation.

In 1888 France added the first submarine (theGymnote) to her navy, and proceeded to lay down a certain number of under-water craft yearly. In 1900 the United States Government bought theHolland, and in many quarters the opinion was held that the Admiralty should carefully investigate the whole question of submarine warfare.

The official mind thought otherwise, and expressed itself thus: “We know all about submarines: they are the weapons of the weaker power; they are very poor fighting machines, and can be of no possible use to the Mistress of the Seas. We are very grateful to the Governments of France and the United States for expending so much money in experimenting with these craft, and in allowing us to buy experience for nothing; if ever they produce a vessel which we consider satisfactory we shall begin to build, but not till then.” The official mind was inclined to apply to submarine warfare, the words used by Earl St. Vincent in reference to Fulton’s torpedo warfare—“Amode of war which we who command the seas do not want, and which, if successful, would deprive us of it.”

This council of sitting still and watching others experiment did not commend itself to many thinking people who saw that the French and the Americans were every year improving their vessels and converting them little by little from expensive toys into fighting machines with which we should have to reckon sooner or later. Even theEngineer, never enthusiastic about submarine boats, went so far as to remark that “the day for pooh-poohing them is past.”

The anti-submarine party replied that the French and Americans were suffering from hallucinations; that the submarine boat was of no value except for purposes of defence, as its range of action was very limited. The advent of theHollandand theNarval, each capable of making long journeys, proved the fallacy of this view.

Shifting their ground they said that the submarine would be of no use as a weapon of offence, because it was blind; that it would never be able to fire a torpedo at a moving vessel whilst itself in motion; that its speed was so small that big ships could always avoid it; that it would be unable to remain under water for long, as the effect of “potted air” on the crew would be disastrous; and that its lack of longitudinal stability was a fatal drawback to its employment in action.

The behaviour of theGustave Zédé, theNarval,and theHollandin manœuvres, during the course of which they have all fired fish torpedoes whilst moving, which have hit targets, again showed that such arguments could not hold water.

Now whilst it is one thing to say that the submarine boat is a useless weapon to-day, it is quite another to prophecy that it will never be of any value to a navy whose ships are intended to act on the offensive.

The introduction of gunpowder; of steam; of the screw-propeller; of iron-built ships; of high-pressure engines; of rifled ordnance; of explosive shells; of armour plating; of twin-screws; of breech-loading guns; of steel-built ships; of the locomotive torpedo; of electricity on shipboard; of quick-firing and machine guns; of collapsible boats; of wireless telegraphy; of turbine vessels; of devices for coaling ships at sea; of magazine-rifles, &c., &c., have been successively ridiculed by those responsible for the condition of the British Navy.

Officialism is, and always has been, a foe to inventive progress, and the official mind still seems incapable of realising that invention is a plant of slow growth; that improvements or innovations when first mooted do not necessarily represent their final form, and that all the great advances and revolutions in the past in the world of science, invention, and discovery have sprung from small beginnings which have grown gradually and slowly until they forced upon themselves the recognition that was their due.

Faraday, when asked by “practical people” the use of any of his experimental researches, would reply, “What is the use of a baby?” An invention resembles a baby, in that it needs to be carefully watched, tended, and cared for in its initial stages if ever it is to be of any value in the world.

We all remember the gentleman who said that he would eat the first steamboat that crossed the Atlantic; the Quarterly Reviewer who wrote with reference to the proposal to build a line to Woolwich that “he should as soon expect the people of Woolwich to suffer themselves to be fired off by one of Congreve’sricochetrockets as trust themselves to the mercy of a high-pressure steam engine travelling at the awful speed of eighteen to twenty miles an hour”; and the wiseacres who pooh-poohed the electric telegraph and telephone, the electric light, the electric car, the pneumatic-tyred bicycle, and many other inventions which have come into general use.

Granting, as we do, that the submarine is at present in a very inefficient stage of its existence, the necessity for experiment in view of the march of science during the past century is obvious. What should we say of a professor who pleaded that his experiments were a waste of time and money, as he could arrive at his end quite as well by simply reading what other professors in foreign countries were doing?

One cannot too often insist on the fact that it is only by actual experiment that useful facts are arrived at, and that in the investigation of newdevices more can, as a rule, be learnt from an experiment carefully arranged and personally carried out than from the reading of voluminous reports of the work of others.

LAUNCH OF U.S. SUBMARINE “SHARK.”

Rear-Admiral C. C. P. FitzGerald, in an article in theEmpire Reviewfor February, 1901, on “Our Naval Strength,” referring to submarines said:—“It seems a little risky to hold our hand altogether. We are said to be ‘watching,’ and no doubt it will be very convenient if we can allow others to spend their time and money on experiments and then just cut in at the right moment when the submarine boat has established itself as a practicable engine of warfare and build as many as we want with the unrivalledresources which we are so fond of talking about. But it should be remembered that secrets are better kept abroad than they are in England and that a new mechanical industry always takes some time to develop and to train the special workmen essential to its prosecution.”

Mr. Arnold Forster has himself said that an ounce of practice is worth a ton of theory, and it would be well if all officials thought as he does. There is far too little experimental work and practical trial of novel ideas both in the Army and the Navy. If we were never going to use our soldiers or our ships in actual warfare it would be both economical and prudent to wait until other nations had perfected inventions before adopting them ourselves. In this case we should never make any progress at all, for the reason that no improvement is final, and that the fleet of to-day is a totally different thing from the fleet of fifty years ago.

Si vis pacem para bellum.The essence of maritime war is, it has been well said, its suddenness, and a day gained in striking the first blow may make the difference between the fall of an empire and the annihilation of the enemy. To wait to consider to what use we can put submarine vessels and to postpone the question of discovering the most effective method of destroying the boats of the enemy until war breaks out is a suicidal policy, which, however, seemed for many years to appeal to a “Government of Amateurs.”

Had there been more experimental work beforethe outbreak of the Boer War our army would have probably finished its task sooner and with less loss of life. Questions such as the employment of heavy field ordnance, of telescopic sights, of shields for guns and rifles, of motors, of electricity, &c., will have to be considered when the war is over, but they should have received attention before hostilities commenced. If every nation would agree to maintain thestatus quoand to make no effort to keep its navy and its army abreast of the advances of modern scientific progress and invention, then the policy of our Admiralty and War Office would be excellently suited to our needs. As it is, however, Germany, France, the United States, Russia, and Japan are much more ready to improve their services than is Great Britain, whose officials, for the sake of peace and quiet, snub the inventor and smother their consciences by repeating that all is well in our army and navy. Only when great pressure is brought to bear on them will they stir themselves. Admiral Sir E. Fremantle recently suggested that there ought to be a committee on inventions always sitting, and Mr. Laird Clowes has appealed for readier official interest in certain recent inventions.

The experiments with the British submarines must be carefully watched in order that we may arrive at a well-reasoned opinion concerning their future. It may be that it will be decided that for our purposes a means of destroying the submarines of the enemy will be of more value than the boats themselves. On the other hand, the conclusion may be reached thatfor certain purposes this type of craft will be a useful adjunct to our fleet. Whatever the decision may be it is quite certain that the submarine boat will continue to receive improvements at the hands of inventors, and that as practical applications have been found for the Röntgen Rays and wireless telegraphy, so uses will be found for the submarine of the future which may be as great an improvement on the submarine of to-day as theDeutschlandis over theSavannah, the first steam-packet that ever crossed the Atlantic.

Those who discuss submarine navigation as if it were quite a new development are apt to forget that the earliest use of the torpedo was in an under-water vessel. Bushnell and Fulton, no less than the Confederates of a later day, saw that their best chance of success lay in attacking by stealth, and though the modern Whitehead is a very different weapon to the cases of explosive used by Bushnell and Fulton, or the spar-torpedo employed by the Confederates in theirDavids, there are still the same advantages to be gained by a submarine attack.

Whilst the torpedoists of the extreme school claim that torpedo vessels can attack with a very good chance of success in daylight, the more general opinion is that they will he utilised chiefly under cover of darkness, and that the destroyer and the smaller torpedo-boat would stand no chance in broad daylight against the tremendous artillery fire to which they would be subjected by the battleships singled out for attack. Even at night, however,the flare from her funnels might betray the destroyer.

A writer in theUnited Service Gazettea few years ago remarked that the development of quick-firing guns brought about by the increase in the offensive and defensive power of swift torpedo-boats threatened ere long to completely abolish the use of surface torpedo-boats in marine warfare unless the latter could be rendered proof against those terribly destructive weapons, the new rapid-firing guns of large calibre. To secure this invulnerability by the aid of armour would destroy the speed and hardiness of the torpedo-boats, and it had long been the opinion amongst naval officers, more especially on the Continent and in America, that if the torpedo is to be used for successful attack it would have to be discharged from a vessel which was rendered invulnerable by being totally submerged—that is to say, from a submarine torpedo-boat.

The submarine boat of the future will be a diving torpedo-boat capable of manœuvring (1) on the surface, (2) awash with conning tower only above the water, and (3) beneath the waves.

It will have two methods of propulsion, one for the surface, one for beneath the water, and its mode of operation will be to steam on the surface until it is within sighting range; to then take in enough water ballast to bring it to the “awash” condition, thus greatly reducing the chances of being hit; and, having approached within a certain distance of the enemy, to sink entirely beneath thewaves, rising once probably for a second to take final bearings before firing its torpedo.

The nine vessels ordered for our navy are really diving torpedo-boats and are not intended for use under water except for very short intervals of time. The submarine of to-day bears a close resemblance to the torpedo-boat in the early stages of its development and appears to be of more value to a country that is desirous of defending its coasts than to one which must maintain the command of the seas.

There are signs, however, that in the process of its evolution the submarine will go through many of the same stages as did the torpedo vessel, and will develop into an offensive weapon which England will be unable any longer to despise.

That aHolland, aNarval, or aGustave Zédéis as formidable an adversary as anAlbatrossor anExpressfew would claim, but the last word has not yet been said on submarine navigation, and the future may be expected to bring about many changes.

For purposes of coast defence the submarine may be said to have fairly established its value. The knowledge that such craft were “in being” would have a deterrent influence upon an admiral attacking a fort or contemplating a blockade, and in all probability the days of close blockade are over.

As a weapon of offence the utility of the submarine boat is not so clearly established. It istrue that some of the French boats have operated at a considerable distance from their base, but its speed, its seaworthiness, and range of action must be improved before the submarine can be regarded as a useful adjunct to a fleet acting on the offensive. The radius of action at the surface of the newestHollandsis only 400 knots at 8 knots per hour, and submerged the speed is 7 knots for a four hours’ run.

THE “FULTON” RUNNING ON THE SURFACE.

Still even now there are uses to which a submarine boat might be put, such, for instance, as the attack of ships shut up in a blockaded harbour, or of vessels in port; the destruction of a mine field so that ships may enter in safety; the cutting and repairing of cables; the forcing an entrance through a boom, &c.

The late Captain Cairnes, in his book “The Coming Waterloo,” enunciated the theory that even if the British fleet destroyed the French fleet it would still be necessary for us to land an army on French soil in order to bring hostilities to a conclusion. In that case submarine boats would probably be employed, for some of the purposes above enumerated.

It has been suggested that small diving torpedo-boats might be carried on battleships, and it is said that the United States have been experimenting with vessels of this kind. The difficulties of hoisting such vessels in and out of a big ship are, however, considerable, and few naval officers favour this idea. Perhaps a special “submarine depot ship” somewhat similar to theVulcanmight be useful for conveying submarines to foreign waters.

In the opinion of many naval experts most of the naval actions of the future will be virtually decided quite outside the reach of any torpedo yet designed, and at ranges almost beyond the ken of unaided human vision, owing to the fact that with the breech-loading gun of to-day accurate practice can be made at very long range. The battle of Manila was fought and decided at a distance varying from 5,600 to 2,000 yards, and the battle of Santiago from 5,000 to 1,600. A naval battle of the future, according to a distinguished German admiral, if both adversaries are determined and energetic, will resemble a conflict between twostags, which in a moment of fury rush upon one another, entangling their antlers, and, in the end of ends, destroying one another. Or if the enemies are less determined, a naval battle will resemble a contest of athletes, the combatants moving backwards and forwards in serpentine lines; both will keep up fire from a great distance until neither has enough ammunition left to strike a decisive blow.

In the opinion of the late M. Jean de Bloch the warfare of the future will resemble the latter picture, but it will be remembered that this writer in his book, “Is War now Impossible?” laid it down that the bayonet would never be used, as troops would be unable to cross the terrible bullet-swept zone and thus come into personal contact with the enemy. The Boer War has proved on the contrary that the bayonet is still a valuable weapon, and that the bravery of the soldier, combined with artillery fire, will enable him to use it with good effect in spite of the modern rifle.

What the bayonet is in military, that the submarine is in naval warfare. The increasing range of rifle and cannon enable both combatants, if well entrenched, to blaze away at one another and do very little damage, and the necessity therefore arises, if a definite conclusion is to be reached, for some sharp and sudden blow to be delivered at close quarters that shall cause the enemy to evacuate his position and beat a hasty retreat. A bayonet charge is a desperate affair no doubt, butowing to the modern art of entrenchment, recourse must be had to it if the enemy is to be shifted.

In much the same way a submarine attack will be ordered when firing at long ranges has had no effect. There will be great risks, but the chances of a successful attack will be sufficient to warrant its being tried.

In conclusion the following extract from a recent article in theEngineer—a journal which has always regarded the submarine with suspicion—may be quoted: “We must not shut our eyes to the fact that the semi-submarine boat may be a very dangerous foe. Years have passed since we pointed this out. It seems to be admitted that a fast torpedo-boat can get within say a mile of an enemy without certainty of destruction. Indeed, up to that she is fairly safe. If now, that point reached, she descends say five feet below the surface, leaving a conning tower just level with the water, she can be steered, and the chances that she will be sunk by her enemies are very small. The five feet of water above her would deflect all projectiles from machine guns. She would have to get very close up to be hit hard even by heavier metal, and the little conning tower at the water level would be a very difficult matter to strike. A fast vessel operating thusa fleur d’eauwould be no despicable enemy. And it is in this direction we think that submarine attacks will be developed with the best chance of success.”

CHAPTER IIITHE MORALITY OF SUBMARINE WARFARE

“War’s a brain-spattering, wind-pipe slitting art. It is not to be ‘humanised,’ but only abolished one fine day when nations have cut their wisdom teeth.”

“Inter arma silent leges.”

“All’s fair in love and war.”

“The sea fights of the future, with improved ships, guns, and range-finders, may be fought at ranges almost beyond the ken of unaided human vision. It is to be hoped that before that time arrives the progress of civilisation, intellect, and humanity will have consigned all weapons of war to the museum of the antiquary, and that other methods than war may have been discovered for preserving the peace and virility of men and nations.”

In the early years of the nineteenth century the writer of an article in theNaval Chronicle, devoted to a consideration of Fulton’s schemes, stigmatised his torpedoes and submarine boats as “revolting to every noble principle,” their projector as a “crafty murderous ruffian,” and his patrons as “openly stooping from their lofty stations to superintend the construction of such detestable machines, that promised destruction to maritime establishments.” He went on to protest against the policy of encouraginginventions that tended to innovate on the triumphant system of naval warfare in which England excelled, and he concluded thus:

“Guy Fawkes is got afloat, battles in future may be fought under water; our invincible ships of the line may give place to horrible and unknown structures, our projects to catamarans, our pilots to divers, our hardy, dauntless tars tosubmarine assassins; coffers, rockets, catamarans, infernals, water-worms, and fire-devils! How honourable! how fascinating is such an enumeration! How glorious, how fortunate for Britain are discoveries like these! How worthy of being adopted by a people made wanton by naval victories, by a nation whose empire are the seas!”

It is quite evident that even in this “so-called Twentieth Century” there exist many Britons who in their heart of heart agree with this writer, and who cherish the idea, though they may not openly express it, that there is something mean and underhanded, something dishonourable and “un-English” in all methods of under-water warfare. The Englishman prides himself on being a lover of fair play, and so long as the odds are more or less equal, he is ready to enjoy any contest or sport. The average Englishman is neither a hot-headed Jingoist, nor a peace-at-any-price humanitarian; he regards wars as unfortunate necessities of modern civilisation, and he likes to see them waged fairly and squarely, each side observing the rules of the game. As regards warfare on land, it must be confessed that he hashad to correct some of his ideas since the Boer war. He would have preferred the enemy to come out into the open and fight like men. Instead of this, they took every precaution to avoid being seen, and our army found that it had to face an invisible foe. From the Boers we have learnt the lesson of the value of cover and entrenchments, and now officers and men, however much they may dislike it, are forced to seek and utilise cover whenever possible, making it their aim to hit their opponents and to avoid being hit themselves.

“Let us admit it fairly as a business people should,We have had no end of a lesson, it will do us no end of good.”

“Let us admit it fairly as a business people should,

We have had no end of a lesson, it will do us no end of good.”

In naval warfare we have had no opportunity of learning our lesson in the light of actual experience, for we have had no big battle on the seas since Trafalgar, and our naval supremacy has not been seriously threatened since 1805; it is thus possible for men to hold different opinions as to the value of submarine fighting, and we consequently find that there are numerous people who, whilst they would not go so far as to declare mines, torpedoes, and submarine boats unlawful, yet consider them as methods better fitted to the requirements of other nations than to those of the Mistress of the Seas.

Modern submarine warfare was introduced by two Americans, David Bushnell and Robert Fulton, and forced itself into prominence during the American War of Independence. The spar-torpedo originated in America; the Whitehead torpedo was first adoptedby the Austrian Government, and Norway, Sweden, Denmark, France, and Austria all began to build torpedo boats before Great Britain condescended to add them to her Navy.

As to submarine vessels Greece and Turkey purchased Nordenfelt boats in 1887. France built her first boat in 1888, and the United States purchased her first submarine, theHolland, in 1900. Great Britain, then, has followed instead of leading other nations in the matter of mines, torpedoes, and submarine boats, and has only been induced to adopt such methods of warfare because other nations forced her to do so.

Before the advent of the torpedo boat, Great Britain was secure in her position of Mistress of the Seas, so long as she possessed more line-of-battle ships than any other nation. The arrival of the torpedo-boat, the destroyer, and the submarine, all armed with the Whitehead torpedo, has given weaker nations the chance of attacking our ironclads with new weapons, and there are even those who affirm that the battleship is doomed, and must give way to a different type of craft.

The whole trend of modern invention has been to the advantage of weaker nations. Earl St. Vincent described under-water methods as “a mode of war which they, who commanded the seas, did not want, and which, if successful, would deprive them of it.” It is quite true that Great Britain would sooner trust to her guns and her line-of-battle ships than to her torpedoes and torpedo craftin actions on the high seas, but owing to other nations—admittedly weaker—having adopted the torpedo, she has no choice but to adopt it also in order to maintain her naval supremacy. So long as she provides herself not only with methods of submarine attack, but also with means of warding off the under-water attacks of the enemy, other nations are not likely to wrest the command of the seas from her.

It is idle to lament the advancement of Science. Man is an inventive animal, and is ever trying to inaugurate new devices and improve on old ones. For hundreds of years the sailing ship held the field, and guns and cannon underwent but little change. During the “Wonderful Century,” however, changes began in earnest. The wooden sailing ship disappeared, and the steam-driven ironclad took its place, whilst rifled ordnance, high explosive shells, and powerful propellants were introduced.

The fish torpedo made its appearance, and the swift torpedo vessel followed in its wake, and we are now threatened with submarine boats, turbine-driven men-of-war, and aerial machines for the launching of aerial torpedoes both on armies and on fleets.

What the future has in store none can foresee, and until the next great naval battle between first-class Powers comes to pass the value of modern engines of warfare will remain doubtful. All that is certain at present is that Great Britain cannot afford to dispense with mines, torpedoes, and submarine boats.

We may seem to have wandered a long way from the “morality of submarine warfare,” but our purpose has been to show that when certain people argue—as they do seriously in this year of grace—that torpedo warfare should be declared contrary to the laws and customs of war, they are, to a certain extent, influenced by the fact that the torpedo is a weapon which Great Britain could very well do without, provided it was tabooed by other nations.

No one, not even a member of the Peace Society, would urge the suppression of the Lee-Enfield, or the quick-firer, because Great Britain relies on these for the maintenance of her place in the front rank of the nations of the world, and the argument as to the “illegitimacy” of the torpedo depends largely on the fact that other nations gain and Great Britain loses by its adoption.

There have been persons who have argued in favour of giving no quarter to crews of torpedo boats and submarines that might fall into our hands, and have suggested that we could explain such action to the other Powers, to whose advantage it is to use such weapons, by saying that though we had been driven to employ such methods, we were forced to treat the practice with severity. Such a course of action would cut both ways, and we suspect our own torpedoists would be very much averse to it.

Strange engines of warfare and new modes of fighting are received by the bulk of a nation,whose instincts are conservative and whose minds are incapable of imagining a state of things other than that which prevails at the moment, in much the same way as are new inventions. They are first of all scouted as impossible; then, if possible, of no utility; and finally, when they have been universally adopted, they are declared to be no novelties at all. Just as many old ladies have been heard to declare that they will never travel by the Two-penny Tube, so nations have been known to disclaim all intention of using particular weapons. Yet after a time we find the old ladies in the Tube and the nations employing the weapons. Familiarity breeds contempt.

The earliest man—Homo sapiens—fought with his fists, his legs, and his teeth. Gradually he made for himself weapons, deriving his first instruction in their manufacture by observing the ways in which the animal creation fought one another. His earliest weapons were made of wood, bone, and stone, and in due course there was evolved the spear, the waddy, the boomerang, the hatchet, the tomahawk, the bow and arrow, the pike, the lance, the axe, the sword, and other implements.

It is exceedingly probable that the adoption of a new engine of warfare by a tribe would be condemned by another tribe—to whom it had not occurred to use it—as illegitimate, but it is equally probable that while sturdily protesting against the use of one weapon the tribe would be slily endeavouring to procure one more deadly still.

The first great revolution in the art of war was the introduction of gunpowder, both as a propelling agent and also as a charge for shells and bombs. Although the explosive nature of saltpetre when mixed with carbon and charcoal was doubtless known to the Chinese some centuries before the Christian era, our first knowledge of the use of gunpowder as a military agent dates from the seventh century, when it was used by the Byzantine emperors under the name of “Greek fire” in the defence of Constantinople against the Saracens.

“Greek fire,” the invention of which is commonly attributed to Callinichus in 668A.D., consisted probably of pounded resin or bitumen, sulphur, naphtha, and nitre. There were three ways of employing it: it was poured out burning from ladles on besiegers, it was projected out of tubes to a distance, and it was shot frombalistæburning on tow, tied to arrows. Its effect was probably rather moral than material.

Geoffrey de Vinesauf, in an account of a naval battle in the time of Richard I., writes thus of Greek fire: “The fire, with a deadly stench and livid flames, consumes flint and iron; and unquenchable by water, can only be extinguished by sand or vinegar. What more direful than a naval conflict! What more fatal, when so various a fate envolves the combatants, for they are either burnt and writhe in the flames, shipwrecked and swallowed up by the waves, or wounded and perish by arms.”

Despite the lamentations of the humanitarians of the time, Greek fire and serpents (missiles resembling rockets charged with and impelled by the slow explosion of a certain mixture) continued to be used in the navy until the reign of Richard III.

Another favourite method of early naval warfare was the “fire-ship.” Falkiner, an old writer, tells us that fire-ships were used by the Rhodians in 190B.C.They were certainly used by the Greeks; they were employed by ourselves against the Armada, and they first appeared in our Navy List in the year 1675; they were used in the Dutch and French wars at the close of that century, but probably fell into disuse in the eighteenth. It is quite clear that with the French, as well as with ourselves, the crews of fire-ships did not expect quarter. Admiral Gambier deprecated fire-ships as being a “horrible and anti-Christian mode of warfare,” while Lord Cochrane said that if any attempts were made upon the British squadron by fire-ships they would be “boarded by the numerous row-boats on guard, the crews murdered, and the fire-ships turned in a harmless direction.”

Lord Dunsany appeared to think that this apparently cruel rule of no quarter to the crews of fire-ships worked well for humanity in practice, and he seemed to be in favour of its being extended to the crews of torpedo-boats and submarines. His Lordship pointed out, in a lecture at the Royal United Service Institution, that the crews of fire-ships would not stick to their ships to the momentof explosion, but had after firing the fuse to make their escape in boats, which boats, as they passed through the enemy’s lines, would naturally become targets, and if meanwhile some ship clasped in the deadly embrace of the fire-ship had exploded, it was all the more likely that the fugitives would be the objects of unsparing vengeance.

“Probably then the vague but fatal epithet ‘un-English’ came to attach to men who used a deadly weapon, but withdrew themselves (sometimes too quickly) from the fray. I cannot produce evidence of the facts, but I believe that officers serving in fire-ships did not stand high with their brother officers. It is some confirmation of this creed that we do not find the Boscawens, Rodneys, Howes, Jervises, Nelsons serving in fire-ships.”

The first use of gunpowder as a propelling agent was in Spain in the twelfth century, at which period both the Moors and the Christians used artillery. It was first employed in warfare in England in 1327 by Edward III. in his war against the Scotch, the cannon from which the shot was fired being termed “Crakys of war.”

There is abundant evidence that the use of artillery in battle was at first thought to be improper. When cannon was employed at Chiaggia in the fourteenth century all Italy made complaint against this manifest contravention of fair warfare; the ruling classes, seeing their armour, lances, and knightly prowess rendered useless, vigorously opposed the newly-invented arms, declaring that they were calculatedto extinguish personal bravery. Perhaps this sentiment may have had some weight with our navy, for it was not until towards the close of the sixteenth century that artillery finally assumed the position of the dominant arm in the service and that musketry fire altogether displaced the arrow and the bolt.

Shells appear to have been first used by the Sultan of Gujarat in 1480, and they were in general use about the middle of the seventeenth century.

There is no doubt whatever that shells and bombs were considered highly immoral by the side which didnotemploy them. To those accustomed only to fire solid shot there must have been something very terrifying in the hurling of shells fitted with explosives which when they burst slew those round about and set fire to dwellings and ships.

When theBomb Ketch, a ship firing bombs and shells, was introduced into our navy in the seventeenth century, the French were particularly angered by the “inhumanity” of the English in firing “inflammable fire balls and shells.” Again in the eighteenth century we find the Marechal de Conflans issuing an order against the use of hollow shot or incendiary shell because they “were not generally used by polite nations, and the French ought to fight according to the laws of honour.”

At the battle of the Nile in 1798 the French flagshipL’Orienttook fire and blew up, and when the French sailors reproached the English for using incendiary missiles the latter repudiated the charge,and mentioned that they had found such unlawful weapons in one of the prizes they had taken; thus the hollowness of the French regard for humane warfare was neatly demonstrated.

Whilst Great Britain did not scruple to fire lyddite shells at the Boers, their wives, and their children at Paardeberg, she prided herself on her abstention from the use of explosive or expanding bullets, and much abuse was heaped on the Boers for their employment of such. It may, however, be doubted whether a bullet which kills you right off at once, or at any rate which disables you permanently for a long time, is not preferable to one which is of so mild a nature that you can be shot over and over again, alternating your appearances on the battlefield with visits to the hospital.

A lecture on “Explosive Bullets and their Application to Military Purposes” was delivered before the Royal United Service Institution in 1868 by Major G. V. Fosbery, the first officer to use these projectiles in the field, systematically and to any large extent, against some of the mountain tribes of the North-West frontier of India. The lecturer tells us that the natives considered them unfair on two grounds—firstly, because they exploded in an objectionable way; secondly, because there was nothing they could collect of them afterwards, as in the case of ordinary bullets. But more civilised people complained of the use of “rifle shell” on the ground of their Satanic nature, and to these Major Fosbery replies as follows:

“The arguments which condemn a warlike instrument simply on the grounds of its destructiveness to life, provided that it neither adds keen agony to wounds nor new terrors to death itself, are, if logically pursued, simply retrogressive, and even if not recommending by implication a return to the bow and arrow, at all events point to the old times of protracted wars and deaths from fatigue and disease far exceeding in number those caused by the weapons of an enemy. We can therefore afford to set these on one side, or rather we are bound to neglect them altogether and seriously consider any invention which under the conditions above laid down promises us a more certainly destructive fire than that attainablecæteris paribusby the arms at present included in our war material.”

In spite of opinions such as these the humanitarians have won the day, and explosive bullets are now tabooed by Great Britain. The great Duke of Wellington used to say that he should not like to see the bullet reduced in size, because it broke the bone, and the object of war was either to kill your man or else put him in hospital and keep him there. With the Mauser and the Lee-Enfield neither of these results is attained.

The prototypes of the modern submarine torpedo, although they were employed on the surface of the water and not below, were the “machine,” the “infernal,” the “catamaran,” the “powder-vessel,” &c.

“Machines” may be best described as fire-ships specially arranged so as to explode very destructivelywhen alongside one of the enemy’s vessels. They are first found in the British Navy in the seventeenth century, but were soon discontinued, not we are afraid on humanitarian grounds, but because Bushnell and Fulton pointed the way to the more convenient explosive device known as the “torpedo.”

In the year 1650 Prince Rupert made an attempt to blow up the English Vice-admiral in theLeopardby a species of “infernal.” He sent a couple of negroes and one of his seamen in Portuguese dress alongside theLeopardin a shore boat. They carried with them what purported to be a barrel of oil, but the barrel really held an infernal machine to be fired by a pistol attachment, the trigger of which could be pulled by a string passing through the bung. The story goes that one of the crew of the boat, finding the lower deck ports closed, “uttered an exclamation” in English. This betrayed them, but Blake refused to take vengeance on them, though the trick was one he would himself have scorned to play on his adversary.

During the war between Great Britain and the United States in 1812 H.M.S.Ramiliesof seventy-four tons, was so unfortunate as to be the object of attack both by a diving vessel carrying torpedoes and by a powder-ship. TheRamilieswas lying off New London at anchor and maintaining the blockade. As she was known to be short of provisions the Americans fitted out a schooner and filled the hold with powder, covering it over in thehatchways with barrels of flour. By means of an ingenious piece of clockwork attached to a gunlock and a train leading to the powder its explosion was ensured at the intended time. TheRamiliessuspecting nothing, but thanking Heaven for the gift, captured the vessel and the crew escaped to land. By some extraordinary chance (or was it destiny?) the schooner was ordered to anchor near another prize some distance from theRamilies, so that when the clockwork reached the fatal hour, 2.30, the charge exploded and blew up, not theRamilieswith her captain, Sir Thomas Hardy, and crew of six hundred men, but only the prize crew who were in the schooner.

The naval historian James could not trust himself to comment upon “this most atrocious proceeding,” whilst a naval officer wrote: “A quantity of arsenic in the flour would have been so perfectly compatible with the rest of the contrivance that we wonder it was not resorted to. Should actions like this receive the sanction of Governments, the science of war and the laws of nations will degenerate into the barbarity of the Algerians, and pillage will take the place of kindness and humanity to our enemies.”

During the American Civil War a species of weapon known as a “coal torpedo” was employed. This consisted of a hollow lump of iron, fitted with a charge of dynamite. It was rubbed over with coal tar and dust, and exactly resembled a large lump of coal. Lord Dunsany thought that thiscertainly seemed to be on the verge of lawful, if not beyond it.

At the close of the eighteenth century David Bushnell inaugurated the era of submarine warfare by devising cases fitted with explosives, arranged to go off at a set time by clockwork. To enable these cases to be affixed to the sides of vessels, Bushnell invented the first boat capable of diving beneath the waves of which we have any definite details. His attempts to blow up theEaglein 1776 by a case fastened on her bottom, and theCerberusin 1777 by means of a towing torpedo, failed, owing more to the lack of skill on the part of the operator, Sergt. Ezra Lee, than to any defect in the apparatus employed. Nor was Bushnell successful in his effort to destroy vessels in the Delaware by the aid of a number of kegs filled with powder and set adrift.

The introduction of gunpowder, of Greek fire, of fire-ships, of artillery, of shells, of bombs, of machines, of infernals, of catamarans, of powder vessels having, as has been shown, been at one time or another denounced as immoral by certain “humanitarians,” it was but natural that a secret contrivance for bringing about a terrific explosionbeneathan unsuspecting ship’s crew should have been believed to be an invention of the Evil One, and history affords proof that the novel modes of fighting introduced by Bushnell and Fulton were regarded with great disfavour by naval men, who considered the innovators as men “who would discreditthe glorious traditions of our navy, and substitute a set of catamarans for the noble frigates that had carried our flag to victory and were the pride of the nation”; by humanitarians, who regarded the torpedoes as a “dishonest and cowardly system of warfare”; and by the public generally, who denounced the nations who attempted to compass the destruction of British ships of the line by dastardly tricks which England would never stoop to employ.

In a work written by James Kelly, and published in 1818, the author comments with great severity on “some infamous and insidious attempts to destroy British men-of-war upon the coasts of America by torpedoes and other explosive machinery.” This refers to the attacks on H.M.S.Ramiliesby one of Fulton’s boats, attacks which failed, but which caused Sir Thomas Hardy to notify the American Government that he had ordered on board from fifty to one hundred American prisoners of war, “who, in the event of the effort to destroy the ship by torpedoes or other infernal inventions being successful, would share the fate of himself and his crew.” So frightened were the relations and friends of prisoners of war by these threats that public meetings were held, and petitions were presented to the American executive against the further employment of torpedoes in the ordinary course of warfare.

Those who endeavoured to perfect a system of submarine mining for the defence of harbours andcoasts were abused in the same way that Bushnell and Fulton had been. Samuel Colt, the inventor of the pistol which bore his name, and one of the first to experiment with mines fired from shore by means of an electric current, was roundly denounced by John Quincy Adams, who dubbed him “that Guy Fawkes afloat.”

At the time of the Crimean War the popular term “infernal machine” was applied to the submarine mines laid down by the Russians to defend the approaches to Cronstadt. In the seventies Lieut.-Col. Martin endeavoured to establish, on the grounds of humanity, an international anti-torpedo association, while even to-day there are people found to protest against the employment of certain forms of torpedoes, as witness the following letter recently published in theEngineer. The author, Mr. Reginald Bolton, declared that while no one could object to the defensive lay torpedo or the spar torpedo, the same could not be said of the “Whitehead,” “Brennan,” or “Edison.”

“Surely,” he urges, “our forefathers’ code of morality in warfare should not be in advance of our own. All civilised nations have debarred the brutal explosive bullet, and why not the equally mean submarine torpedo? If such a remedy as Commodore Hardy’s were to be applied by any nation, could its opponent complain, and is there anything in the practice of morality to prevent, say, a thousand prisoners’ lives being presented as a bar to the use of an implement which was acknowledged to be a disgrace to its employers not less than eighty years ago?”

The methods of warfare which have most aroused the ire of humanitarians and “blatant platform orators, with their vulgar party cries of eternal peace,” are those which depend for their success on secrecy or deceit. Powder vessels, coal torpedoes,et hoc genus omne, are condemned because they pretend to be what in reality they are not, and torpedoes and submarine boats because they advance in secrecy without giving the enemy any chance of firing at them or of protecting themselves against their insidious attacks beneath the water-line.

The arguments of the humanitarians, who are doubtless well meaning enough, are inconsistent, because, while they raise no protest against certain modes of conducting war, they unreservedly condemn other methods—mainly, it must be observed, because of their novelty. Such a class of person resembles the Quaker who found himself on a vessel engaged in a conflict with another vessel. He resolutely refused to assist in fighting the guns, but at last, when the enemy attempted to board, he collared the leader and pitched him into the sea, saying as he did so, “Friend, thou hast no business here.”

Major Fosbery, in a lecture on explosive bullets, asked whether any of the deaths due to fighting were, strictly speaking, humane, and if they were not, what was this humanity of which so much was made? “Have we not heard that in the dark ages humanity beat out men’s brains with a mace, whilst cruelty used the lance, the sword, and the arrow,and that bishops of the period rode into action with the mace so as to kill without shedding blood? A very nice distinction indeed, as you will admit. In later times, were not Congreve and Shrapnel denounced as monsters for the initiation of inventions in whose perfection we rejoice to-day?”

Inconsistency indeed is the particular failing of Peace propagandists. They not only condemn the use of certain weapons while raising no protest against others equally as destructive of life, but they also pretend to be horrified at deeds committed by the enemy which they themselves would not scruple to do should opportunity offer. Particularly is this the case in savage warfare. Captain Herbert has mentioned a striking instance during the Zulu War. One day the boys were calling in the streets, “Shockingmurderof a whole British regiment” (it was at Isandlewana), and a few weeks afterwards the same boys were shouting, “Greatslaughterof the Zulus.” This is akin to the practice of those orators who refer to the “expansion” of England, but to the “encroachment” of Russia.

As to the “inhumanity” of the submarine vessel, Mr. Nordenfelt, it may be noted, would not admit that there was anything especially cruel or horrible in the idea of a diving torpedo boat. War altogether was cruel and horrible, and caused an enormous amount of pain and suffering, but any invention which tended to shorten a war or to protect common or private property during war would really diminish this suffering on the whole. Humanitarians hadurged that there was something especially cruel in the secrecy of the submarine boat, but the whole tendency of war had, he pointed out, moved in this direction ever since the days of old, when Hector and Achilles advanced in front of their respective followers and spent half an hour in abusing their adversary’s parents and ancestors before they commenced to fight.

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