Juniata sentinel and Republican. [volume] (Mifflintown, Juniata County, Pa.) 1873-1955, 1894-10-31
THE NEXT NAVAL BATTLE.
An AFFAIR of q Few Minutes with Eew
Survivors to Tell the Tale.

An AFFAIR of n Few Minutes with FeW
Survivors to Tell the Tale.
There has not been an engagement
between two navies on a large scale
since the replacement of the old
wooden walls by heavily armed bat
tleships: and the ability OF the latter
to Withstand the shock OF onset has
never been put to paractical test A
writer in the United Service Maya
| zine predicts that ironcIads will make
short work of one another. A battle
, will last ten minutes The fleets
will probably approach at the COM
bincd rate of % knots an hour. Tue
two and half or three minutes that
slapse before the fleets meet will be
minutes of the most extreme and
agonisIng tension. The cOmpart-
ments forward in the terrible blast OF
fire that will open the engagement
will be blown away or riddled like
sieves Waite tight doors will be
useless when there are no waiter
tight walls. The whole ship will be
covered with debris, her appearance
will be transformed by the loss OF her
tunnels and the destruction of the
superStructure aud upper works. The
rain Of melinite shells which will be
poured from guns firing smokeless
powder will wreck all parts of the
shi D outside of the heavy q NOR. In
ships where the bar. cites are lnsuf-
fc.ently protected the explosion OF
shells under them may bring them
down with their weight of 700 or $40
tons II once they give way the
armored deck cannot support them.
and they may be expected to go clean
throught the bottom OF the ship, in.
volvIng her destruction in their down.
1all. The destruction Of the tunnels
will destroy the draft, the ship will
ill with smoke and the decks prOba.
bly, lie set on fire.
The big guns will be discharged al
5OO or 600 yards. The detonation OF
their huge shells will probably, like
the explosion of powder magazine,
reduce the already wrecked ship to a
hopeless chaos. destroying all her Or
ganization and the nerve thread that
conveys the captains orders to the
engine room. Even il the armOr re.
sists the blow, the shock to the ship
will be terrific striking the tn. ret
of an ironclad, one Of these project.
Les, would probably, if it did n t
hurl 1T overheard, stun or kill every
man in IL and wreck all its cOmpli-
cateI mechanism. This will consti.
tute the first stage of the encounter.
The ships will now be nearing one
ano her, and the Surv vorS of the ter
rible slaughter will drive the battered
hullS, low in the water, at one an
other. Ships, surviving the ravages
of ordnance, will ram AMI sink one
another, and in twenty minutes from
the opening Of the engagement four
fifths OF the ships will he on their
way to the bottom of the sea
1t Is terrible pict re, but it does
not appear to be overdrawn. Aud
we have not yet nearly reached the
end of inventions in cannon, though
the lin Of armOr bearing by ships
is in sight The dynamite gun now
being tested at sandy Hook throws
a dynamite bomb, large enough To
wreck the largest warShip atOat, a
distance of three miles: and with
such accuracy that nine successive
shots were recently planted in a sp ;ce
not much bigger than battleship
Th Sc guns are meant for coast de-
fense, but it will he but a short time
until they are adapted for use on
ships. When things get to that pass
that two navie three miles apart,
can with single discharge blow one
another into nothingness, "leav ny
not rack behind" the stu endoui
criminality OF war will bring about
its own end. That says the Montreal
Herald, Is the one encouraging feat
ure of the continued progress being
made in the IN enuion Of death deal.
ing instruments CT war.