The Stourbridge Observer, Cradley Heath, Halesowen & District Chronicle.
Stourbridge, West Midlands, England, 1878-02-16 00:00:00

THE HISTORY OF THE TORPEDO.

In LondorC on Monday, the usual weekly lecture was
given at the London Inititution, by Lieutenant F. Ingram
Palmer, R.N., the suMect being on the history of the tor-
pedo.
-

Although it appears that submarine explosives were
devised by the Chinese as far back as the time of their
invention of gunpowder, it is to America that Europe
owes the torpedo. The first three names connected
with its earlier history are Americans—Bushnell,
Foulton, and Colonel Colt, of revolver fame. In 1777
Bushnell arranged an apparatus for exploding gun-
powder under water, but when it was practically
tried against Lord Howe's ship Lion it proved a
failure.

In 1797 Robert Foulton took the subject up, and
showed to Napeleon in 1801 the first success of which
there is record. In 1804 he brought his invention under
the notice of Pitt, who favoured him with warm sup-
port, until a naval authority gave utterance to the
opinion that "Pitt was the greatest fool that ever
lived to encourage a mode of war which they who
commanded the seas did not need, and, if successful,
would deprive them of it." Foulton received £15,000
with an expression of thanks, and a suggestion that
his services were no further needed. He went back
to America, and by 1810 worked out two torpedo
schemes, both of which depended on the mechanical
ignition of the fuse.
Colonel Colt in 1841 first suggested the employment
of gala aniem to fire a charge of explosives, but nothing
in the way of actual warfare was done till the Russian
war of 1854, when both mechanical and electrical
torpedoes were used in the Black Sea and the Baltic.
Her Majesty's ships Firefly and Merlin were both
damaged, and on June 21, 1855, a torpedo fished up
exploded on the poop of Her Majesty's ship Exmouth.
In the American war torpedoes came to be recog
nized on both sides as instruments of warfare quite as
important as rams, ironclads, and big guns.
In 1866, Captain McEvoy invented a buoyant tor-
pedo so arranged that when struck by a ship the cover,
on being tilted off, fired a chemical fuse and exploded
the charge. In December last he also invented and
patented a torpedo which could be fired either at will
by electricity or could be left to act mechanically.
Gunpowder, gun-cotton, and dynamite are now all
used as explosives. The latest improvement is the
arrangement for steering a torpedo boat by elec-
tricity frown a ship or fort, and exploding it when
desired. The protections against torpedoos are net-
works around a ship to prevent approach, fishing
them up, or counter•mining and exploding them. One
of the latest developments is for the torpedo boats
to carry an apparatus for pumping crude petroleum
on to ships and igniting It by a special rocket. The
mixture of fire and smoke drives the men from the guns,
the torpedo boat can then approach closely without
being fired on, can with one torpedo break away any
surrounding protections there may be, Saud then can
explode a torpedo under the ship. This crude petroleum
or "Greek fire," the lecturer stated he knew on good
authority had been experimentally tried by the
Russians, a4cl he thought it was a matter calling for
serious consideration that 142 powerful torpedo boats,
to cost about £5,000 each, had been just ordered by
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COWS()

The Official Almanack states that the number o,
Medical students entered at the various German schools
during the past year was 0,116. Vienna still stands at the
head of the list with 755 students while Berlin counts only
281, coming sixth on the list, alter Prague, Strasburg has
222 students ; Heidelberg, 84; while Rostock, the lowest on
the Ltd, WAY
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