The Sun.
London, England, 1863-07-09 00:00:00

THE FORTIFICATIONS AT SPITHEAD,

Whoever consults the plans of the proposed forti-
fications at Spithead cannot fail to be struck with
the remarkable similarity as to size of works and
position in the Channel which, when complete, these
defences will have to the forts and batteries which
now protect the harbour of Charleston from the
sea. The physical conformation of the two harbours
is almost identical. Forts Moultrie and Sumter
occupy on either side of the channel leading up to
Charleston the same relative positions and distances
apart which the seaforts which it is intended to build
on the Horse Sand and No-man's-land will occupy
in the channel at Spithead leading up to Portsmouth.
If the reader, looking at the map of the English
harbour, can imagine the forts of the inner 'ine
completed on the Sturbridge Sand and Gilkicker
Point, and suppose Charleston built round the site
of the Block House battery and Clarence-yard, he
will have a most perfect idea of the exact position
with regard to its approaches and sea defences in
which the Confederate stronghold stands. Not only
is the similarity perfect as to the outline of the har-
bour and shore, but the resemblance is almost lite-
rally accurate as to distances. Thus the channel
between Moultrie and Sumter is 1,900 yards, and
the channel between the intended forts on the
Horse Sand and No-man's-land is 2,000 yards.
Charleston is distant from Moultrie and Sumter
6,600 yards, and Portsmouth will be distant
from the sea forts we have spoken of 7,500
yards ; in this respect certainly possessing an
advantage of no small importance over its Ameri-
can prototype. But, as the Federals know to their
cost, there is only one side from which Charleston
can be attacked with any hope of success, which is
from the sea, and it is on this side, therefore, that
its great strength and defences lie ; and here the
dissimilarity betwee❑ Portsmouth and Charleston
begins, for Portsmouth is almost undefended from
the sea, while on the land side, the point it is least
likely to be attacked from, it has been made un-
commonly strong, and from Portsdown-hill tii
Southsea-common has been made into what tb.e
Americans call their over armed frigates—a box of
guns. We have, in fact, committed a mistake which
is by no means uncommon in the fortifications of
this and other countries too,—we have double
locked and barred the tack door, but left the front
one open. The fortifications at Spithead and the
Needles propose to remedy this rather important
defect, and if the contemplated works are built the
Solent and Portsmouth harbour will be like Cher.
bourg or Portland—the very last places where an
enemy's fleet, whether s.ron or timber, would ever
think of forcing an entrance. With the forts which
it is intended to build, and supplemented as it is
intended to supplement them, with floating iron-
clad batteries, the Needles and Spithead would be
as invulnerable as Gibraltar itself.

In considering the question of sea defences it
must never be forgotten that neither ships nor
forts are of themselves sufficient, and that, to
make a perfect defence, it is necessary that each
should be there to support the other. With floating
batteries alone the enemy never loses the hope of
being able by a successful stratagem to withdraw
them from the point where he really means to strike
his blow, and we know how terribly successful these
ruses de guerre often are. But forts are not to be
blinded, or cajoled, or threatened from their posi-
tions. There they are, a standing menace, always
ready for action, the strength of each of which to
their last gun and charge of shot must be considered
and provided for in the event of an attack. It may
be said that it is possible to run past them on a
dark, thick night, but, to say nothing of steaming
full speed down a dangerous narrow channel in a
dark, thick night, the auxiliary floating batteries
inside the forts destroy the last chance of success in
this desperate risk. In the attack on Charleston the
Confederate iron-clads moored inside the forts never
fired a shot, the whole work was left to the forts,
and the batteries were only expected to sink or
capture at their ease any crippled cratt that might
run the fiery gauntlet between Moultrie and
Sumter. Defences such as these—that is, forts and
iron batteries—appear to be wanted at Spit-
head, but it is not nearly so open as the'
Needles' passage, which is a kind of backway
into Portsmouth, of which an enemy would not be
slow or unwilling to take advantage. At present
there is at the Needles' passage nothing that could
really stop a welt-found iron-clad frigate bent
on forcing its way. The Victoria battery, a weak,
open, brick casemate work, mounting some 30 guns,
has artillery enough to do it ; but the place in
which the guns stand would, unfortunately, almost
crumble about the heads of its defenders on receiv-
ing a concentrated broadside, while Hurst Castle, on
the opposite shore, would be a mere shambles to
those who tried to fight with such defences as it now
possesses. The defences with which it is proposed to
close this weakest part of our coast-line are a
series of scattered batteries on the Needles' shore
placed at high elevations, at points where the
channel is narrowest, and where, from the turnings,
an enemy's fleet would have to move with slowness
and caution, and to pay as much attention to the
passage she was in as to the batteries which de-
fended it. One of these batteries is to be on the
Needles' Point itself, and to mount eight heavy
guns; another on Hatherwood Point, 1,200 yards
distant, to mount eight more; and a third on the
next point, 10 more—all within such a distance
as would enable them to con7erge or cross their
fires. Cliff-end is to have a casemate work,
to mount 30 of the heaviest ordnance, with earth-
works for 25 guns more above it-55 heavy guns
in all; while the Victoria battery, on Sconce
Point, above, is to have its brick easemates faced
with granite or foes- inch iron. On the opposite
shore the old feudal pile of Hurst Castle is to be
used merely as a magazine, but on the shore-line, both
above and below it, are to be erected a massive
double tier of casemate granite batteries, the
lower tier mounting 50 guns, laid d four d'eau,
like the batteries of the Dardanelles, to hit
vessels on the water-line—the upper tier about
50 feet from the water, and carrying the same
number of guns of the same calibre—that is to say,
the heaviest that our advancing knowledge of artil-
lery will then enable us to construct. Above this,
again, will probably be another line of guns in em-
brasures, so that the entire range of defences on both
sides of the Needles' passage will amount, at the
lowest, to 250 guns, of which at least 100 will be
always able to concentrate their fire on a ship in
whatever part of the channel she may be steaming.
Such a number of guns firing into one vessel would
be, one would think, enough to stop anything that
could float, though it does not come quite up to the
French standard of what the defensive strength
should be to make batteries invulnerable. Batteries
have been built in and round the harbour of Cher-
bourg till that great series of fortifications now
mounts upwards of 1,300 guns, of which 300 can
a itsintri-
cacy be directed on an attacking force, come from
what quarter it may.
The nar r o w
givees s and
woB
of the Needles' passage, however,
a great advantage, as floating batteries could be
moored midway, and between them and the shore
booms laid and nets stretched to stop the way and
foul the screws of enemies' vessels when under the
very guns of our forts.
At Spithead the shore-line on either side is far
too distant to allow batteries erected on the
mainland to interfere with the entrance of ships,
armed or unarmed. But, as if to compensate
for this important deficiency, Nature has
placed two shoals, one on either side, at the very
entrance to the channel—the Horse Shoal
on the right, and No-man's-land Shoal on the
left. The first is a bank of the hardest shingle,
capable, if need be, of supporting a mountain. The
lastnaired is even better adapted to our purposes,
for there, under a slight layer of sand, is a smooth,
level slab of rock of great size. On these two points
it is proposed to build two circular granite forts,
almost precisely similar in height and diameter to
the circular fort that is now being erected at the end
or head of the great breakwater at Portland. Each
of these forts is to be 200 feet in diameter, 70 feet
high above the water, and to mount 90 of the
heaviest guns. The two lower tiers of guns are to
be in casemates, the upper in the embrasures made
of iron, covered in partly from above. As the dis-
tance between these forts is only 2,000 yards, a vcs
eel keeping the mid-channel must pass within 1,000