National Republican., 1886-08-21
BIG GUNS.
The Question of "Our Defenseless
Coast"


The following letter from the president oil
the south Boston Iron Works to the Boston
journal is of general interest in connection
with preat guns for our coast defenses;
After rendlng the article publlshed N y9uiI |
Saturday issue on "Our rDetensoless coast, w wWlth |
hend lines "some Facts Of Interest j begtosug.
gest that other fncts of equal interest should pc
presented to your readers to enable them 10
form balanced Judgment as TO the metiIs on
This important question You state that the
most powerful gun we had In 1860 was cast
iron gun of some 1000 ioot.tons muzzle energy.
You should also state that we now have cast
iron brcech-loading rifle, which has devel-
oped some 10000 foot-tons muz2lo energy, or
nearly ten.fold greater than the gun OF looO
mugzIe Tv energy ranging from 5000 to 5000 and
dO OOO and even 6l,00J foOt-tons muzzle en-
ergy You should also explain that no one OF
these modern steel rifles has passed beyond tne
governmental stage-that is to say, that no one
| of them, either in Germany or EfanGe
| or Italy or England, has ever been hfed ro9nMus rus
HTnnTbHVs" TsbVs weenon for service No steel rifle in
| Europe, of caliber as large as w lnehes nas
| ever been fired 200 rounds. rms statellCu' n
| will seem incredible TO most OF your readeirs,
| but YOU will find 1t TO be true. England; rely
| ing upon her military experts, has bllndly ln-
vested millions in modern hign power guns gur
| $50 called, These guns were designed Dy on
| Cials of the highest scientific attainment ana,
no doubt, after much high power mathemat
cal cacuation-in fact, the emlnence OF the
designer was so satisfactory, and the ma.ne' ,,,ea
mntIcs so deep and searching, that II was
Thought not worth while to delay the work, to
| satisfy any bcggarly doubts as TO the question
| of endurance, II turns out, however, that
these guns now being put In service are D%reak. %
| ing right and left Guupowder seems 10 nave
no respect whatever for all this eminent ex-
pert merit: aud John Bull Is now figuring w
the real value of his gun investment, WIN
. | mutterngs deep aud long. The last numper
| OF The ddnirdliI Gdsgte tells us that on July
| last Il was discovered that two OF the 8stor
, | runs OF the Ajax were disabled
md rendered unfit for further service, theil
iubes having cracked, and on July the whole
, i0ur were found to be disabled. "England,
: ii saws "has not a single gun on which 70 rely
. i'm case of need Those ON board the Colossu
Guns of the latest pattern dare not be u!ed, anC
have been ordered not to be fired. We uarc no
at this moment engage IN war with lorelgi
a | naval power, aud Russia aware Of inc lacl
tears up the treaty Of Berlin as she dld that
| Paris in lSI0' ,-,,,.. so, ,t,
N | to think, but prefer TO follow the bell.Wetnr
| and take their chances. Americans, prop91uoLy
/ inherit this CHARACTERISTIC. Aud so we linu ltel
| Hawley demanding of Congress an ,apprOpliit
tion Of s6,O000 900 to enable the ordnance M n(
partment to contract with some stee, manula
turer for 10000 tons of heavy steel i0rSlng
d Now n little thought would have shown MN W
- propriety of finding some heavy steel gun thi
> had shown satisfactory endurance before con
Is hitting this government to an expenditure
H. | sGOOO,OOO upon type of gun that Is now
=, questionable strength, to say the least; We
IS, ''sS1SSh"B sorTm "B55sroN InoS WORKS, Aug. 0.