Bismarck weekly tribune. [volume] (Bismarck, Dakota [N.D.]) 1884-1943, 1891-08-21
ing large sums of money we aretrying not
to waste any of it.
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ing large sums of money we aretry1ng not
to waste any of it.
"To illustrate the findings Of the fortif-
cation board, take an exposed seaboard,
for example. There 16-inch guns, the
heaviest now contemplated, will be re-
quired. In a bay or roadstead 12-inch
breech loading rifles will suffice. Still far
ther up, where only the vessels of lighter
armor could go, S-inch guns are large
enough. In all this we bear in mind that
one gun ashore is equal to five guns of the
same power afioat. On shore we have the
world to stand u guns upon, while OF
board ship effectiveness is lessened by the
movements of the vessel. The board found
that none of the warships of foreign ma
tions have a deckplate exceeding four and
one-half inches thick, while the deck
plate of a great majority of them is only
three inches thick. Consequently the
board recommended, in habors favor
able to their use, the employment of NOR
tars to drop high-explosive shells upon
the deck of tile enemy. The mortar has
not as accurate fire as a rifle, and we
might throw a good many without hit
tingthe vessel of an enemy, but when these
shells began dropping in his vicinity the
commander, if a prudent man, would
quickly steam away. By these methods
the board reduced the number of guns
and mortars needed for defense of all our
principal harbors. The aggregate number
Is 81 guns and 1900 12-inch mortars.
It will be several years before all these
guns are built and in position, but when
they are ready for use there will be no
further occasion for talk about our de-
fenceless coasts.
"We are building as good guns as there
are in the world. We have had the benefit
of the experience of other governments,
and in the judgment of experts only two
nations are now building guns as good as
ours-France and Germany. The English
guns are inferior. The English stubbornly
stick to weight and great size as indis-
pensable features, in spite of the fact that
the modern science of gun building has
demonstrated that guns can be too
large and too heavy. Only a few days
ago the English tried a new no.
ton Armstrong gun at Woolwich. 1t is
a monster, truly-A feet long, diam
eter at the breech. So feet; caliber, 16N
inches. Its steel shot weighs 1900 pounds,
and is propelled by 960 pounds of pris-
matte powder, each shot fired costing 5000.
On trial the shot of this gun passed through
compressed armor (steel faced irony twenty
inches thick; then through five inches of
iron backing, twenty feet of solid oak, five
feet of mixed stone and eleven feet of hard
granite, finally lodging three feet within a
brick wall. This is an appalling force. A
projectile from this gun would penetrate
any fort in the world, and go very nearly
through any man-of-war afloat, no matter
where it might hit her. But the gun is
not strong enough to sustain its own
weight. At best it can be fired only sew
enty or eighty times before it is ruined;
and if the reports We get of its dropping
out Of shape from its great weight are true
probably it could not be fired adozen times
effectively.
"Great guns are growing longer, are not
so heavy at the breech and are not increas-
ing in caliber. In 1865 we had guns of IS
inch bore, but they had not one tenth the
power of a 15-inch modern breech loading
rifle. 1t is the change in powder which
molds the form of guns. The old powder
was quick burning, very violent and the
gun were necessarily heavy at the breech
and short. Modern powder burns slower,
is not so violent, and therefore the gun
needs length, not breadth of breech nor
extraordinary caliber.
"We are now making the best gun steel
in the world. Our guns are built on the
same general plan followed in Europe-a
steel tube, a jacket shrunk on and a series
of rings, also shrunk on. The cost is about
$1,000 a ton, and this is decreasing all the
time. A 16-inch gun will weigh 1--WE nave
not yet built one) about 125 tons, and by
the time we get ready to build one prob
ably we can turn it out for less than half
a million dollars. Its charge will be 1000
pounds of DOwder. costing 500. and its
and the gun will throw it fifteen miles.
fore 16-inch gun is 4feet 8 inches long, and
for a 12-inch gun, 8 feet 6 inches long. All
projectiles are oblong, of steel, and tho
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