Morning journal and courier., 1880-11-23
Long Island Sound.
The Nations Harbor and Sea Coast De.
 fences-An Important Report.

ment, and on the power of an enemy to threaten the whole shore spread out before him, and to select his point of attack at pleas ure. A powerful hostile fleet upon the coast of the United States presents some of the features of war where heavy mass is brought to act against detachments which may be cut up in detail, although their combined force might exceed the assailing foe. Our points of exposure are so numerous and distant that it would be impracticable to keep, at each of them, @ force competent to resist the attack of an enemy prepared by his naval ascend ancy and his other arrangements to make sudden and vigorous inroad upon our shores It becomes us, therefore, to inquire how the of this state of things can be avoided.
 In the event of war with 8 maritime nation, if we had no well digested system of fortif- cations ready for use, the cruisers and war vessels of the enemy could run into our har- bors, and without landing could either de- stroy the property along our shores, or else lay our cities under. contribution. We have @ sea coast line of more than 5000 miles in extent on the Atlantic and the Gulf of Mex ico, and 1000 miles on the Pacific not includ- ing Alaska, along both of which lie scat tered all the great cities, all the depots of commerce, all the establishments of naval construction, outfit and repair, and towns, villages and establishments of private enter prise without number. From these lines of sea coast, navigable bays. estuaries and rivers, the shores of which are similarly oc- cupied, penetrate deep into the heart of the country. The accurate detailed charts of our harbors and channels published by the United States Coast Survey are accessible to all na tons and are doubtless in their possession. There are foreign military and naval depots and arsenals in close proximity to our shores, and the arrival of armed vessels will follow in few days or even hours after the declaration of war. Thirty six hours steaming could bring them from Halifax i; hours could bring them from Havana, and 96 hours from Victoria, Vancouver's Island, could bring them in front of San Francisco, the navy yard at Mare Island and the arsenal at Benicia. There might be very little time for preparation to meet the assaults of these fast-runnlng, sea going armored ships, ships clad with from 6 to 24 inches of iron armor, carrying rified guns from 9 inches to r inches bore, which are more powerful than any gun we have in our service. With a fleet or even single vessel of this kind in
 one of our harbors, it would be of no avail to collect troops in the city or town threat ened. Suppose with our railroad facilities we could concentrate loo, GOO men in 24 hours at the point threatened, of what use would they be against the armored ship?
 Suppose that in a night the men concen- trated could throw up temporary earthworks and mount such guns as might be hastily mounted on improvised platforms, B pound CTS, 42 pounders, 100 pounder rifles (even assumed) what injury could all this do to the armored ship? The projecti1es from such batteries would fall harmlessly from the side of the enemy. While lying if need be be- yond the range of our guns, with his 500 or 2,000 pounders he would pierce such tempo rary parapets through and through, dismount the guns and explode any magazine of a tenn porary character.
 But it may be said that we would mount guns as powerful, and even more powerful than those of the enemy. Doubtless this would be done first if we had such guns in our service, and second if we had the time.
 The only modern guns of which we have any number are 8-inch rifles, carrying shot of 19O pounds, fired with 35 pounds of pow der, of which there are on hand no. It is understood that the Ordnance department has recently obtained appropriations and has made contracts for constructing four breech- loading 12-inch rifles on the Krupp plan, which will carry shot of 800 pounds fired with 300 pounds of powder, and that that de- partment will convert the 325 15-inch smooth bores on hand (which at 1,2OO yards are less efficient than the 9-inch ri1e) into 11-inch breech-loading rifles, carrying shot of 800 pounds fired with 90 pounds of powder, as soon as Congress may appropriate money therefor.
 Such is our condition for arming our coasts. European governments are rapidly replacing their old ornaments by ri1ed guns of immense calibers, among which are 12-inch rifles, weighing 3S tons and carry shot of 500 pounds fired with 13O pounds of powder and 16- inch rifles, which weigh 80 tons and carry shot of 1, 700 pounds fired with 370 pounds of powder; and they are now making 17-inch rifles, which weigh 100 tons and carry shot of 1000 pounds fired with 470 pounds of powder.
 These are the kind of guns we must mount in batteries against the armored vessels But their great weight and size require core spending dimensions in the batteries in which they are placed, and in the strength and so- idity of the platforms upon which they are mounted. The parapets and traverses of earth and sand to protect them must be three and even four times as thick and mas- sive as they were formerly built, to resist the armaments of 20 years ago. Where the par apets or earth were but ten feet in thickness, now they must be 40 feet. Guns that were formerly dragged with ease by 15 or 20 men and placed in position over night are now supplanted by armaments of such huge masses that special mechanical appliances are required to move them even slowly, and can- not be lifted upon their supports without the aid of hydraulic power.
 No matter how many men may be at our disposal the time required to place the mod ern armaments in position is vastly greater than for the guns of twenty years ago, and before such works could be improvised in a harbor, the enemy in his armored ships will have accomplished all he desired and have sailed or steamed for some other port to re- peat the injuries of the first. But suppose the harbor in question was on the New Eng land coast, and the season of the year the winter-when the ground is frozen hard then the erection of efficient earthen batter ies will be out of the question.
 . penditures to make the necessary modified tions of our casemated works, and to com plete our barbette and mortar batteries and furnish them with suitable armaments. It would be but an act of prudence to make the beginning without delay. The disasters of the first three months of a war under the present conditions of our defenses might cost the nation tenfold the expenditure that would be needed to thoroughly protect our coast against attack Our great cities, New York Philadelphia, Boston, San Francisco, New Orleans, Baltimore and Washington, should they fall into the hands of an enemy, would suffer ten times more than the cost of all the forts necessary to secure them against such disaster. But such reverses also would be great calamities to the nation, crippling the war power.
 It was estimated that in the great fire in the city of Boston, in 1872, the property de- stroyed within few hours was worth up- ward of $86, GOO. GOO, although the fire was confined to small part of the city, and did not touch the shipping. Is it easy then to estimate the loss that would accrue from the fires that victorious enemy would Hndle by his shells? Or IS it easy to oyerate the trib- ute such city would pay for exemption from that calamity? Can we value too highly the pecuniary losses that the destruction of one of the great navy yards would involve ? and the loss beyond all pecuniary value of stores and accommodations indispensable in a state of war, and which state of war conld hardly replace.
 In what way may powerful enemy wage war upon us He may do so-
 1st By attacking our commerce and navi- sation upon the ocean As, however, no