Milford chronicle., 1905-06-16
The ART OF WAR.
Use of Star ROclagts and Aerial
Torches at Port Arthur.

Use of Star ROclagts and Aerial
Torches at Port Arthur.
In a vivid description Of a night at
tack at Port Arthur an eye witness,
George Kennan, the OutloOk's repre-
sentative in the far east, thus tells Of
some novel war appliances:
As a means of Illuminating a field of
battle at night the searchlight had one
serious defect and that was its tend
eney to cast black shadows into ra-
vines and depressiOns of the ground.
In order to illuminate such places the
Russians made use of star rockets and
aerial torches, which shed light direct
ly downward into natural or artificial
depressiOns of the ground which the
horizontal rays of the searchlig ght could
not reach. The star rockets consisted
Of tube of quarter inch iron eighteen
inches long and three and a half inches
in diameter. with an explosive head at
the upper end and a long and rather
heavy stick at the lower Around the
stick at the base OF the tube were eight
or ten half inch holes through which, |
l presume, the prOpulsive powder fore
DA ITO way as AitG AOthEL 41tGuutus ]
When it reached its height the burning |
composition inside the tube set IRE to /
the head. The latter then exploded, |
setting free sixty or eighty brilliantly
white stars or spangles, which fell
slowly in a silvery shower, lighting up
an area of at least a square mile un-
derneath very much as it would be
lighted up on a less extensive scale by
the burning magnesium used in flash
light photography. The stars kept
bright for period of from five to eight
seconds, and the illumination of the
ground underneath seemed to me to be
quite as great as that caused by the I
rays of full moon !
In combination with these rockets the
Russians used what l have called "ae- !
rial torches" I never had an OppOr-
tunity to examine them, and 1 do not
know how they We're made but from d
their appearance and behavior l con-
cluded that they were a combination Of
a bomb, a parachute and a large wad 4
Df fax or hemp saturated with some
liquid which burned with a bright
lame. When the bomb was exploded
n midair by means of a time fuse it
iberated a mass of flaming material
attached by wires to a small para
,hute. This parachute descended very
lOwly, and the torch hanging from it
burned for at least a minute, some
lines a minute and a half. 1t made a
lght which was greatly inferior to that
t the star rocket in brilliancy, but it =
ad the cOmpensating advantage OF
lsting longer and carrying the illu.
lination closer to the ground. If the
me fuse were cut short the flaming
'ad would burn until it actually reach.
] the ground, and when there were
lree or four of these torches in the
II at once they made quite light
lough to reveal the movements Of
oops in the trenches or ravines over
hich they were thrown.
1t can readily be imagined that when
star rockets and para
ute torches were all in simultaneous
eratiOn, when bursting shrapnel
ses were making freely flashes in u
dair, when the illuminated slopes Of
e Russian hills were blazing with :
e red fire of artillery and when the
snificance of the illumination was .
lphasized by the booming Of cannon, e
: pom, pom, pom Of quick hrers and
: steady rattle Of perhaps thousand
les the spectacle was one Of thrilling e
absorbing interest