The Sun.
London, England, 1863-03-30 00:00:00

EXPERIMENTS AT SHOEBURYNESS.

On Friday the members of the Ordnance Select
Committee and the Ironplate Committee, with
several officers of the Artillery end Engineers, made
some novel gunnery experiments at Shoeburyness
both with cannon and forms of projectiles. The
first was made by the Ordnance Committee entirely,
and consisted of trials to ascertain how far a method
now rather in favour among French artillerists,
by which a series of holes, about an inch in
diameter, are bored through the substance of the
cannon near its muzzle, in order, by permitting a
quick escape of gas, to diminish its recoil, affects the
services of the piece as to range and accuracy. The
experiments were made with two brass nine.
pounder ordinary smooth-bore field pieces, which
were loaded with the usual service charges and
spherical shot. Five rounds were fired from each gun
in succession, the recoil of both being carefully mea-
sured after each discharge. They were then shifted,
so that each occupied the platform which had been
used by the other, when again more rounds were
fired. The minute official results of the experi-
ment are not likely to be made out for some days,
but the general merits of the performances of each
gun could be seen at a glance, and were exactly
what were anticipated before a shot was fired. The
recoil of the ordinary gun was, in round numbers,
just twice as great as that which had the holes
bored round the muzzle, while the range and accu-
racy of the latter were scarcely more than half as
good as that of the common piece. The lateral
escape of gas and flame through the side holes of the
French gun, if we may so call it, was very great
indeed, so much so as to prove at once that even if
the gun otherwise possessed the most transcendent
merits it could never be used either on shipboard,
in casemates, or even at embrasures. In the open
air on Friday the trigger had to be pulled by a
laniard nearly 20 yards long. One half of the
force of the explosion evidently escaped through
the sideholes before the force of the powder was ex-
pended on the shot, and virtually therefore the
barrel of the gun is shortened by as much of its
length as is thus perforated. As a general rule, the
recoil of the gun is always in exact proportion to
the force it exerts in propelling the shot, and any-
thing which takes off from this recoil, by allowing
the gas generated by the explosion to escape before
it has done its work, just diminishes by so much the
range, and, therefore, the accuracy of its fire. The
results obtained with this curiously bored gun on
Friday were enough apparently to satisfy the Ord-
nance Committee that it would be a waste of time
to continue the experiments further.
Some experiments were then made with the Arm-
strong 110-pounder service-gun, loaded with steel
shot, against a box target faced with 41-inch plates
and lined inside with teak and an iron skin
like the Warrior. The only interest of this ex-
periment was to test the penetrative power of
the projectiles, one of which was prepared by
the Ordnance Committee, weighing 651 b. and
fired with a 161 b. charge of powder. The immense
superiority of this projectile over the cast and
wrought iron shot, which, as the standards or units
of penetration, were fired at the target before, was
at once apparent. Its indentation was nearly 50 per
cent. deeper than either the wrought or cost iron
missiles. The next shots tried were those of a pecu-
liar kind of steel made by Makin and Sons of Shef-
field. Friday was the third time that steel shots
supplied by this firm have been tried at Shoebury-
ness, and always with the same result—that their
metal, both for toughness and hardness, is superior
to any other kind that has yet been experimented
upon. A conical-beaded shot of this kind, of which
the cone was small and sharp, with a very small
shoulder, weighing 651 b., and propelled by only
141 b. of powder, smashed its cone completely
through the plate, damaging the backing and break-
ing a rib behind—the greatest result that has ever
been obtained with so light a shot and so small a
charge. It was evident that only the very full form
of the shoulder beneath the cone, part of which was
sheared off, prevented the whole going completely
through the target. A second shot of the same kind,
the same weight, and fired with the same charge,
struck the upper plate of the target on an uninjured
part, and about 12in. from its edge. It completely
smashed away a piece about 15in. deep by 18 or 20
wide, splintering and ripping up the backing be-
hind. One piece of the plate, of considerable weight,
was carried far behind the target, where it fell with
the shot itself. An examination of the shot showed
a part of the cone broken off, but otherwise it was
little injured, though the injury to the target was
very great, in spite of the hard, rather than tough,
character of its metal. The trial seemed to show
that to pierce the plates almost as much depends
upon the metal of the projectile as upon either the
gun or charge of powder which fires it. Certainly,
the result seemed quite to upset the notion that a
flat-headed shot is essentially necessary to punch
armour plates, and, on the other hand, to strengthen
the belief that the best form for this purpose may,
after all, and with proper metal, be found to be
the conical form adopted by Sir 'William Armstrovg.

There was only one opinion expressed as to the
quality of the metal supplied by Messrs. Makin
—it was, as we have said, the best that has yet
been tried.

As it seems probable, from the remarks made in
the House of Commons the other night, that some
members intend to honour future experiments with
their presence, we would, as a preliminary step,
earnestly recommend them to take a liberal view of
the Shoeburyness Estimates, in order that some
really stout splinter-proofs may be erected, from
which they may see the trials with something like
safety. Without some such additional safeguard,
even all the care and precautions taken by Colonel
Taylor cannot long avert an accident. On Friday
the officers engaged and all the members of the
committee had very narrow escapes from two large
fragments of steel splinters which came through
the splinter-proof and passed over the heads of those
crowded in it, fortunately without touching any
one. All the splinter-proofs are more or less rough,
temporary erections, made of any strong materials
that are nearest at hand. And, indeed, in all its
appliances for shifting guns, &c., there is an evident
want of proper means to the end, which is not what
one expects to meet in a practice ground of such
national importance as Shoeburyness has now be-
come. This want of a proper plant doubles the
labours of a most zealous staff of officers, who,
without such additional duties, are already almost
overworked.

THE LATE RIOTS.

STALEYBBIDGE, Saturday.

There is reason to believe that the disgraceful
proceedings of the malcontent recipients of relief in
this populous neighbourhood have at length been
finally checked. Further disorders had been appre-
hended, and as early as 9 o'clock this morning a
troop of the 14th Hussars took up a position in front
of the Town-hall, to be ready for any emergency ;
but happily their active services have not been
needed. It will be remembered that on Tuesday
evening the working classes, assembled in public
meeting, passed a resolution to return to their
schools next morning and await the decision of the
Relief Committee, who had promised to reconsider
the minute by which money payments of 3s. 4d.
per week had been substituted by tickets for 3s. only.
Unfortunately the news received on Wednesday
morning of the resolution adopted by the Mansion-
house Committee went far towards the reopening of
the whole question ; and up to this morning it was
doubtful if the discontented would not recede from
the terms of compromise by which they had them-
selves agreed to abide it acceded to by the Relief
Committee. A meeting of the Relief Committee
was fixed for 11 o'clock this morning to receive a
deputation on the subject, and up to the last mo-
ment there was uncertainty as to the result. The
meeting was held at the Town-hall, and there was
a rather full attendance of members. There were
present, in addition to the committee, Sir J. K.
Shuttleworth, Mr. J. W. Maclure, Mr. Commis-
sioner Farnall, and Mr. John Cheetham. The de-
putation consisted of 13 working men, being one
from each school. Upon their admission the chair-
man (Mr. Birks) briefly opened the proceedings by
asking what was to be the nature of the com-
munication they had to make. The leader of the
deputation (Mark Der went) said he was very
glad to have to make a satisfactory report, which
was that they had transmitted to the several
schools the question whether they would accept the
committee's proposal to give the relief half in tickets
and half in money, and they had unanimously
agreed that they would each accept the proposal.
As to the question whether, in consideration of the
relief having been reduced from 3s. 4d. to 3s. per
week, the committee would agree to take off a day's
work per week, they did not propose to press it. It
would be a very acceptable concession, and if made
they would prefer to have Monday, because that
would be the best day on which to seek employment
elsewhere. The chairman inquired how it was, if
they were unanimous, that a message had been re-
ceived yesterday to the effect that the central
school had resolved to have the whole 3s. in cash
and that only on condition of a day's attendance
per week less ? A member of the deputation said
such a proposition had been made, but it had never
received the sanction of the school, and when it was
made it was with a proviso that if the other schools
accepted the compromise they would accept it also.
The chairman said he was very glad to hear the re-
sult of their deliberations. If any cause of discon-
tent in future arose, he hoped they would seek a
solution in a more reasonable way than had been
adopted in this matter, by sending a deputation to
the committee.

Sir J. K. Shuttleworth said, in reference to the
proposed remission of a day's attendance per week
at the schools, it was undesirable to enter upon that
question to-day, inasmuch as the Central Cmmittee
at Manchester had it in contemplation to make
changes in the mode of relief which would be a con-
siderable modification of the present system. Dur-
ing the inclemency of the winter it had been thought
undesirable that the men out of employ should be ex-
posed to outdoor work, and he therefore wrote to the
Poor Law Board on the subject. The result was that
a system of indoor mental employment had been sub-
stituted for outdoor manual labour; but now that the
spring was advancing, and milder weather might
be anticipated, it was under consideration whether
outdoor work would not be better. Probably the
working men themselves would prefer healthy
outdoor employment to the monotony and confine-
ment connected with the school system. In that
case they would probably ba paid by the hour, at
the rate of 3d. per hour, which was half-a-crown
for the day of ten hours, and was the amount
usually paid for out-door labour. It was not in-
tended that such work should go on in inclement
weather, and it would be necessary to make some
difference in the scale of payment according to the
numbers in a family, and to make some departure
from the rule in case of sickness ; but, of course,
these were matters of detail which would require
careful consideration. As to the nature of the work,
that would depend upon the authorities in the
various towns, but probably it would be found in
most of them that there were streets unpaved and
unsewered upon which they might be employed.
He did not mean that they should make permanent
improvements, because local Acts might interfere
with a proposition of that kind very much, but
they might put streets in better temporary repair,
so as to add to the healthiness and salubrity of the
dwellings in those streets of the working men them-
selves. All that would have to be matter of ar-
rangement, and no doubt the committee would be
considerate, and make the tasks as little irksome as
possible, whatever they might be. - In the mean-
time he would advise them not to listen to men who
sought to excite their passions. There were men
who thought the relief ought to be greater, who told
them what a mean pittance it was, and said it as
less thin the criminal in gaol was receiving. These
were appeals to their passions. The cause of their
present sufferings could not be laid upon any class
of the community, and they could not make the
thing otherwise than it was by any action they
might take. Those who were doing most to help
them were suffering as well as they, and they
thought the working men should kindly co-operate
with the committee, and endeavour to make their
duties as light as might be. He had spoken strongly
to them yesterday, because he thought their conduct
in the late acts of violence was disgraceful and
without excuse. The committee were disposed to
consider their welfare in the kindest spirit, but
they would not bend in the slightest degree
to any agitation, and if there was any st
tempt at intimidation, they would probably
have to withdraw their apt,.,.aptions altogether
from the town. Ire was glad to see the tone in
tney had met the committee to-day, and in
such a spirit he should be glad to do anything he