Huntsville gazette., 1890-06-21
DYNAMITE PROJECTlLES.
The Great Changes Their Use Would Effect
in Naval Warfare.

The Great Changes Their Use Would Effect
in Naval Warfare.
The cruiser Vesuvius now only lacks
the testing of the horse power of her en-
gines to be accepted and placed in COM
mission, the recent trial of her three dy-
Mantle guns having proved wholly sat
isfactory. Indeed, if any thing were
wanting to show the terribly destructive
power of high explosives in warfare, the
result of the explosion of 5O0-pound
shells during the trial would have sup
piled it. The she'll fired from the Vesu-
vius' battery each passed the mile line
and struck close to the buoy mark, and
by mechanical time fuse were allowed
to sink under the water before exploding.
A few seconds after the sea for a hun
dred yards around was blown bodily into
the air, while one SHE'LL which exploded
on the surface. seemed to open the sea
to its very bottom. Such an explosion
would mean the utter humiliation of a
ship in the vicinity of which it occurred,
and few such shots directed against a
fleet at close range would reduce it to
silence in less time than the Roman
fleet in 1858 silenced the Turkish squad
ron by the use of Paixhan shells. The
only drawback to the utility of the
guns. in fact, is the shortness of their
range, which will prevent their use, un-
supported, against an antagonist armed
with high-powered guns throwing pro-
jectile four or five hundred miles.
The invention of the time fuse used in
the recent trial, however, with the re-
ported tests in England of an applica
tion by which dynamite shells can be
discharged with gun-powder from COM
mon artillery. renders it improba BILE
that. the difficulty in firing the explo-
sive, save from pneumatic guns, will not
be overcome. Even if it is not for har-
Dor and coast defense pneumatic guns
will prove of immense value, and prom
ise to revolutionize the methods of mod
ern warfare as radically as did the in
PRODUCTION of Paixban shells in 1S4S, or
that of ironclads a few years later. When
attack is made by a fleet upon coast de-
fense, the latter nearly always have a
decided advantage in that their location
in harborS or the entrances of rivers
necessitates the close approach of the
fleet to shore. In that event, dynamite
could be used; and while, generally
speaking, vessel though struck by land
batteries can keep afloat, as demon
strated in the bombardment of Alex
andria, a ship struck by dynamite
she'll would be blown out of water.
Land defenses located in harbor where
they could not be successfully shelled
from the sea, would then, be impregna-
Bile, while those constructed on the
banks of the rivers, where the attacking
squadron must come within close range
would bar the progress of any fleet.
What changes the use of dynamite
would effect in naval warfare, should its
discharge from ordinary cannon prove
feasible, it would be difficult to deter
mine, though a heavy armor would be
rendered useless, fleets might be COM
posed only of small unarmered cruisers,
armed with dynamite guns. Numbers
would then be the primo factor in naval
warfare, as bulk is now, though as in
many naval operations large force of
men is needed, it is not easy to predict
what the new conditions would be. That
the use of dynamite on land would put
an end to war by making the slaughter
intolerable, may be questioned, no i'm
provement in the machinery of war hav
ing had the effect to stop hostility be-
tween peoples; but it would probably do
away with the use Of Notifications. The
Franco-Prussian and the RussoTurkish
wars so demonstrated the value Of in
trenchments that Germany and France
have constructed them on large scale
with view to future possibilities, but
they have hardly been completed before
melinite and kindred explosives have
rendered them Ineffective. And fore
casts of the results of the use of dyna-
mite in warfare, however, are liable to
correction, but it may be set down at
once that it will not prevent war, and
that the era of universal peace will not
come through the discovery Of new in
struments of death. th.s-Chicago Journal
A ROYAL BONAPARTE.