The Ketchum keystone. [volume] (Ketchum, Idaho) 1885-1899, 1898-05-28
THE sT0KER A HERO.
On Men-of-War There = No Position
More Trying Than His.

1870 eeOo VUA0AV4&
More Trying Than His.
Stripped to the waist. perspiring
in the terrible heat of the furnaces,
the stoker never knows how the
battle is going, whether his ship
will be blown into the air or sent
to the bottom, as he throws the Goa!
into the fiery nav of the furnace.
Among the heroes on a battleship
none have so onerous a position
and none more dangerous than the
men who tend the furnaces and pass
the coal. However the conflict
above him may range, the stoker
hears only its distant murmur and
feels only the shock as the shells
impact themselves against the steel
sides and the great guns recoil from
the thousand pounds of steel and
powder hurled at the enemy. Per-
haps chance shot may pierce the
10 inches of armor that guard the
engines and boilers and the rushing
water may drown him as he vainly
seeks to escape. Perhaps the SO
tons of explosives in the magazines
may be reached by projectile from
the enemy's guns and he may be
blown to pieces in the steel cell
where he is at work.
At any time the crisis may come,
and small chance is there for him
to catch on the floating spar or
wreckage. In such cases the stoke
hole always proves the coffin of the
men who feed the furnaces and lend
the initial assistance towards max
ing the war vessel a thing of life.
The stoke-hole in a battleship is
situated far below the water line at
point almost amidships. A long,
grimy room it is, hemmed in by
steel walls and coal bunkers, with
a score of fiery furnace doors that
send out cleaning rays of light
into the apartment, the only light
that the room ever receives. It has
no windows and no doors. In the
ceiling above great ventilators pierce
the steel. Currents of cool air take
the place of that sucked in by the
furnaces. The room is filled with
a sickening heat that only the ex-
perienced stoker can stand.
In this room the stoker works,
and works hard. The duties are so
severe that he is rarely required to
work a shift of more than four
hours. A line of coal passers con-
stantly moves, each man trundling
a barrow of coal into the stoke hole,
and as it is dumped on the floor
the stoker, armed with long shovel,
jerks the chain that opens the door,
seizes shovelful of fuel and dashes
it into the great bed of glowing,
roaring flame, where it is licked up
almost before the stoker: with half
shielded face, can close the door.
Each stoker has an allotted num-
Der of furnace doors to take care
of, according to the size of the ship
and the capacity of its boilers. He
has scarcelya moments rest during
his shift and when he is not throw
ing coal into the glowing ovens of
flame be Yields rake in the burn.
ing fuel, and nicely of experience
keeps the great furnace at an even
heat. The steam gauge over his
head is watched and every fuctua-
ton noted. The assistant engineer,
who superintends the work of stok-
er, is constantly on the alert. The
life of a battleship may often depend
upon proper handling by the en-
gineer. If one of the furnaces is
disabled by a chance shot, no harm
may result, but if more are disabled
the ship may be at the enemy's
mercy.
In spite of their hard duties the
stokers are healthy, strong and Wig
orous men. The intense heat in
which they work tans their skins a
dark brown. They are fairly we'll
paid and have many liberties. They
are idle more or less when the vessel
Ii. in port and little steam is kept up.
When the battle begins the men
in the stoke-hole are able to tell
only when the ship has gone into
action. They hear the roar of the
batteries as they are fired and feel
the shock of the she'll as it bursts
on the armored sides; but the ter
rible anxiety of a half days conflict
is greater to them than the men
who work the guns or direct the
ships movements.
AS the battle goes on there are
many who win praise for bravery
in action, but to the stoker there is
only to toll on in the furious heat.
each one doing his small share. He
helps to win by keeping his integral
part of the engine of war in work
ing order, at the direction of the
co .nmander.-New York Dispatch.
Educate Your I3owevs WIZ, C....~