Custer County Republican. (Broken Bow, Neb.) 1882-1921, 1908-01-16
hA7zzZZ7VG LOTT 4 RPOdEC'EIZlE TV ri TTNI-
HVI17 -Z0cGARPEZAz3ZWG GIN O

Now that the American battleship
feet is we'll on its way to the Pacific,
leaving the Atlantic coast practically
without any warships for its protec-
ton, the question naturally arises in
the minds of great many people as
to what would happen if foreign COM
plications should suddenly arise with
some of the European powers? Would
the big cities along the coast-Boston,
New York, Philadelphia, Baltimore,
and other cities-be at the mercy of a
hostile fleet. Only a few years back,
during the Spanish-American war,
when the American fleets were or
dered to Cuban waters in the course
of the Spanish-American war, some
persons were troubled because the
shore resorts of the country were suf
fered to be left to the mercy of what
proved to be the well-nigh harmless
Spanish fleet Apparently they as
sumed that it was essential to the
success of the enemy that it should
she'll summer hotels with a great ex-
penditure of powder. And now once
large proportion of the vessels of
the Atlantic squadrons, has left the
eastern coast of the country for a pc
riod of several months. No war is
now in progress, but the "radioplane,"
swifter than thought in its flight, pos
sessed of the power to lift ships from
their watery ways and transport them
dc Of -
has yet to be invented. What would
happen to New York or Boston or Bal
timore or Washington should war
break out Unexpectedly? Are these
ports amply protected?" asks the man
in the street.
The war department makes little
noise about the condition of the coast
defenses. Such activity as one sees
about the Notifications reveals little
The sun spreads a flood of gold upon
the soft, grassy covering of their
sloping sides, and, somehow, one does
not think of them as impregnable fort
resses. Such guns as one sees look
innocuous enough. They do not seem
as formidable as one imagines they
ought to look. In fact, however, these
fortresses are mailed fists with a vel
vet covering. Army officers assert
that no hostile war vessel could reach
the upper bay of New York harbor if
it could be seen. 1t would be annihi-
lated before it reached the Narrows.
Gunnery has shared in the modern
tendency to specialize and to become
highly scientific in its practice. Gun
ners are now specialists. A battery
is a highly organized mechanism
working almost automatically. In the
old days the men who fired the guns
used to see what they fired at. To-
| day, with guns capable of throwing
thousand-pound shell as far as the
eye can see on clear day, the men
who discharge the guns no longer
necessarily see the object which is to
| be struck by the giant hail they re-
| lease. Until the shot is fired the gun
itself cannot be seen above the para
pet. Hitting the target has become al
| most an exact science. BY mechanical
means the striking of a target has be-
| come so nearly an infalliability that
gets are separated from them by only
600 feet of line. The men upon the
| tugs have no more expectation of be-
ing struck than if they were a mile
behind the gun. They never have
been struck, although the different
batteries have frequent practice. The
song of the shell to the men on the
! tNir iC hn Of hD ni
for death does not follow in its wake.
To be sure like motoring, one has to
become accustomed TO face what
seems like impending death. Faith in
the gunner, as in the chauffeur, and
in the gun as in the motor car, is an
| essential
What is done by the guns in some
of our forts is illustrated by what has
recently been accomplished at two OF
the forts along the Atlantic coast. Al
Boston recently a target four and 6
half miles from the fort and moving
along the horizon at the rate of five
miles an hour was struck by every
shot fired from a ten-inch battery il
less than four minutes, the number o.
shots being six. The following day {
battery of 12inch guns performed the
same feat, punching the shots more
closely than did the ten-inch guns
The shots of both batteries were Sc
close together at the target that they
might have been inclosed in a rec
tangle ten by 90 feet.
Battery Parrot, Capt. Kilborn, a
Fortress Monroe, recently was called
upon TO fire at moving target an un
known distance away. Actually it wa
about three and one-half miles away
Pyramidal in shape, it looked as i
moved across the water about as