744
The Torpedo Scare.
[June
armed to the teeth with Nordenfeldt guns – guns en barbette firing grape, shrapnel, &c. I am convinced that we should have destroyed all the torpedo-boats; and this, I believe, would be the fate of any day-attack attempted by them."
"Well, then," said my friend, "I should have followed and attacked you during the night."
"There again," I said, "I think that you would have failed, because if you had been in range of my small guns as well as of shell, say at about 3000 yards, before dark I should have destroyed you. After dark I should have changed my course, and how would you have found me? However, supposing that I had stopped in the night and put down my defences, what could you have done? I don't think that a ship can be seen so as to be fired at a distance of more than 400 yards on a dark night, and a moving ship would be a still more difficult mark. If a torpedo-boat came nearer than 400 yards, she would have been caught by the line of defence, should I have thought it prudent to stop." On this point we had a long and somewhat warm discussion, which ended – at least I flattered myself it did – in the Russian officer remarking that really he thought, after all, that he could have done nothing.
I find that naval men have, as a rule, great confidence in a system of defence against torpedoes by means of nets, and I understand that the ingenuity of the age has invented a plan enabling a ship to steam seven or eight knots without any inconvenience from this modern crinoline. For my part, I do not ignore the utility of this system for want of a better; but I hear rumours of torpedoes which will be able to attack ships at a point that cannot be protected by this plan – namely, under the bottom of the ship, where the protecting net would have no power. But the torpedo, of whatever description, is generally carried in a boat, and if you can manage to catch or destroy the boat, there is an end of the matter.
Now with regard to the power of torpedoes for attacking purposes. I hear it said that during a naval engagement torpedoes can be utilised to a very great extent. In this I am inclined to agree. If torpedoes can accompany squadrons and act independently either against disabled ships or even against ships which might be approached unperceived, there can be no doubt that they would play an important part in a naval engagement. But the difficulty seems to be their remaining constantly at sea in company with a fleet. The French already are drilling their torpedo-boats to accompany a sea-going squadron; but I have a suspicion that, for different reasons, these boats are constantly obliged to return to port. It must be remembered that a torpedo-boat is built of the lightest material, and is of the finest workmanship. Very little would therefore tend to put her out of order. I have seen a torpedo-boat before a gale, in a gale, and after a gale, at sea; and although I should be sorry to discourage those who have put faith in her capacity as a sea-boat, still I must say that in the last state the boat presented a very dilapidated appearance.
Although it is the fashion for ironclads to be fitted so as they can launch their own torpedoes, I do not think that they would be able to do so with efficiency, for several reasons – the first being, that a torpedo is never sure of being fired with accuracy when projected from a height greater than two or three
