The Portland daily press., 1898-07-22

~ IL salI UndU all uue Jillo oli0lo "oio
opened and the malefactors taken aboard
the Spanish ships. You can force man
on board ship, but you cont force him to
fight.
Our men had another advantage They
had had gun practice. Most Of the gum
ners were on personally aifectionate
terms with their g. MS, had made bulFs'
eyes with them. and not only aohed to
train them on the enemy, but had such
confidence in their craftsmanship that
rear was out of the question. The crews
simply knew thsy could lick the other
fellows, and their whole interest was in
their own ships, not in those of the
enemy. The Spaniards are not towards,
yet their impulse from the trst was to
dlve out OF their ships. They felt sure OF
defeat.
L value, too, the moral effect on the
men OF large ships. That also gives con-
idence.
The resistance of thick armor was IL
Illustrated in some instances Battle is o
better test than the conditions of the
proving ground. On the Colon's six-inch
armor the nose OF quite a good sized pro-
jectile was found sticking, and large 12-
inch common she'll had exploded on it
without doing any damage. However, on
the Vizcaya large shell had entered
well aft in the cabin, and had passed
right through, tearing off plate on the
uJNcI sue SIG Was uOU dt1uOTeQ. On JDo
Iowa two large shells struck we'll forward
at the water line, but on the unarmored
part Of the ship. The first a six-inch,
did not even pierce the Golfer dam, but,
though it pulverized the cellulose, it is
still in the Golfer dam, the inner side of
which it did not penetrate. Moreover, as
1T did not explode, the rotating band be-
ing recovered entire, though separated
from the shell. it presumably was an
armor- piercing shell. Surely it must
have had little velocity. This is the more
surprising, as the Spanish ships all had
the long, high-power English guns. Still
the blow WAS probably an oblioue one.
The other big shell also struck the water
line, just few feet aft of the first one,
and made a clean hole in the Golfer dam.
Striking batch well amidships, it ex-
ploded, but the pieces seem to have been
carried along, most of them going
through the chain locker, which is right
abreast the hatch. There are seven good
sized holes through it. besides any num-
Der of dents The chain locker happened
to be empty, SO the pieces passed through
into the midship chain locker, where they
were caught by the chain. One OF them
passed through the after side of the chain
locker and struck the base of the turret.
Most of the pieces were picked up around
the deck in the immediate vicinity and
in the chain locker, showing that the force
VI bil6 DufhUlIlH CLuTS6 luu5b udVS U6Su
slight. One of the pieces save the arc of
the base of the she'll, which proved to be
@ l2-inch. The ship was struck by q
number of other smaller shells, once on a
stanchion aft, probably any number of
times on the armor, and scars made by two
small arms bullets were discovered on the
muzzle face t one of the after ~ inch
guns. Everything would tend to empha-s1
size the superiority of armored ships over
unarmored ones. Such q Kidding as
some of the Spanish ships received could
not have been inflicted on any of our
ships that were engaged.
Everything goes to prove the value of
the battle ship; the power they have to
keep off torpedo boa.s and rapid fire fusi-
lade, and the confidence battle ship in
spires in the crew, all go to show the
value of the type.
The import Zee Of having no woodwork
aboard and mailing the most perfect pro-
visions against fire cannot be overesti-
mated. Fire was what destroyed the
S anish fleet, and not only the fire from
our ships, but that aboard their own.
Now, they had little wood aboard any
of the vessels, yet no one of them was
under fire more than few minutes
(about 15) before smoke could be seen
rising from the decks 1t seems even the
cork paint burned. One fire on the Viz
caya was extinguished. but others started
DOUu lOiWt1Fu duU dlU. no
water mains were shot away, and the
fight hadoto be given up. Something must
be done to protect these mains hereafter
in every fighting ship. Fire and smoke
always have the worst possible effect on
the crew, and owing to the great number
of matches and compartments on the ship
flames are the harder to discover and
tight. 1t WAS found simply impossible to
keep fighting both the fro and the ship,
the gun fire slackening up immediately
the alarm was given. SO clear did this
become that whenever the fame and
smoke could be seen from our fleet it was
felt that all was up with that ship, and
the tendency was to direct orr gun fire
on some other ship. Without an excep.
ton every ship that was on fire was soon
headed in for the beach. 1t is fallacy to
think that fire drill is all matter of
form on a steel ship. So quickly and
rapidly does the fire spread that it seems
that even the steel itself must be burn
ing. The Importance, also, of keeping
watch in every compartment for fire was
shown. eb1s
There was the great difficulty during
all the action in getting messages to and
from the different parts of the ship. The
noise and conclusions were too great to
allow of the use CT any kind of voice
tube, and messengers are slow and unre-
liable and in danger of being killed A
serious 6FfUf WIS Ilttu6 ny Inc messenger
on one ship. An order which was in
tended for the secondary battery only was
taken to the turret. The messenger told
the officer in one of the 12-inch turrets to
point on the torpedo boats and "a chance
at the Colon was missed. Unless some
better means of communication is in
vented, officers, shut off as they are
from any direct orders, must be left to
act largely at their own discretion. This
at times would be most unfortunate, as
in the sighting hoods of the turrets es-
pecially the view is SO limited that it is
often difficult to keep even the target in
sight. much less to have the complete
range over the horizon that is SO neces-
sary for proper gun control. Then, too,
in case OF accident some method OF report
ing promptly to the captain is needed.
This fight probably gave severe blow
to the use of coming towers. So far |
can learn of no case where they were used
during the engagement, the captain pre-
ferri n G not to cramp himself and be con-
fined in such narrow quarters, where he
could seeeso little of what is occurring.
Every one has to rely chiefly on his eyes
for knowledge OF how the fight is going,
and in the coming tower the range Of
view is about as limited as in the sight