The sun., 1908-01-12
FIRST LEG OF FLEETS VOYAGE


| tONtNB4ou BFON HHM rage
pipes Of battleships. Besides. geese do not
give out black or any other smoke.
The painters got out their vocabulary Of
magnificent. awe inspiring. formidable
denons Of war. bulldogs OF tho ssa. peace
compellers and all that string and began
to weave them all together. and It was voted
all right and probably appropriate, bat it
was said that these did not hit the right note
BArrLEsHIP sEAMANsHIP.
That was that this fleet was going out for
business Of different kind from that which
any other American feet had undertaken.
II had nothing 10 do with diplomacy or inter
national things. The business in hand wAs
the moulding OF sixteen battleship units
into ono battle heot unit, not sixteen times
stronger than one unit. but with the strength
increased in something like geOmetrical
ratio.
The problem, therefore. was to make this
feet unit, not like chain. strong only a. its
weakest link. but like a rope. far stronger
| than the multiplied strength OF its various
strands.
Charles n. CTamp. the veteran shipbuilder.
nearly ten years ago pointed out in paper
| read at the annual meeting Of naval men and
marine engineers in New York city that the
greatest training need Of the United States
navy was what be called battIeship seaman
ship. That meant not navigation merely.
but the synohronining Of one battleship to
others, the tuning up. 90 TO speak. the team
work. to use football analogy. in sailing.
manoeuvring. shooting-all pulling together,
Well. OF course the first thing is to get your
battleships. The country now has sixteen
a. anA A..
practice work at Magdelena Bay are ex-
pectSd to produce what Mr.. CrANp termed
battleship seamanship. Il could not be ac-
comphshed according to the naval officers.
in any other way.
Two hours after clearing the Capes Ad-
miral Evans gave the signal for one OF bis
favorite cruising formations. that is in
columns Of fours. The four divisions Of
the feet drew up in parallel lines with an
Admiral At the head Of each line.
The Ave starred white Gag. called the ave
Of clubs, was run up at the fore truck Of the
Connecticut 10 indicate that that ship was
the guide ship. The lines were run At in
tervals Of ! 800 yards. and the chips Of each
division. still in wing and wing fashion,
were at distances Of 600 yards. To be
strictly naval you must call the space be-
tween two lines OF ships interval and the
space between two individual ships in line
distance.
Well, after the ships were spreaH. out
they covered an area OF more than two
square miles, and then one began to realize
what all these ships meant. The circle Of
twelve or fourteen miles that hemmed
them In and that expanded in front and
contracted in the rear seemed practically
filed with them. Distances were kept
fairly well and the ships plodded along in
the smooth sea nodding their approval OF
what was going on.
WORK OF KEEPING DISTANCES
It was this problem Of distance that kept
the officers OF the decks busy. When YOU
think that each Of these ships represented
q weight OF from 1900 to ls 900 tons more
or less. and that you had to move that
ship at the rate Of 10 knots an hour and
keep It within 400 yards Of a ship in front ,
Of you; when you consider how some ships
move a trihe Of an inch faster than another !
ship at the same number Of propeller revo-
buttons; when you think that one Of the |
propellers OF your own ship will do more
work than the other at the same number Of |
revolutions and that this will throw you
out Of your course and make you steer badly |
If you don't correct it; when you think that |
your leader may vary in his speed; when |
you think OF all this. you can begin 10 under |
stand the problem Of those officers on the |
bFidgeto keep the ships in line and at proper /,
distances.
1t took some time for each ship to deter
mine how many revolutions were necessary |
to produce ten knots speed, according to |
the standard Of the flagship. For example, |
the Louisiana's experts figured on sixty |
seven revolutions. Ii was too much, for
after an hour or two IL was found that |
sixty-five would do the work. Some Of
the ships we're between two numbers.
All the time each ship was gaining or
losing q trihe and this had to be corrected |
every minute or two. On each ship a young
midshipman stood on the bridge beside
the oflcer on watch looking through a
little instrument OF bars and glasses and
wheels graduated to a scale Of figures
and called a stadimeter. He reduced the
truckline and the waterline Of the flagship
to some mathematical basis involving
triangulation--what's the use OF trying to
explain il? No one but a mathematician
could understand it--and then he would
say, $50 yards, sir or perhaps the figures
would be S7S or 40. or what not, and the
ofioer Of the deck would have 10 signal
to the engine room to slow down or 60
faster.
II was be watchful every minute OF the
hour. The midshprnan often had to re-
port distances every fifteen or twenty
seconds and the corrections Of speed we're
going on every two or three minutes
Maybe you think it was not a hard Job
to keep that 1900 tons OF steel moving
At the rate Of ten knots an hour almost ex-
Actly within 400 yards Of your leader When
you got more than forty yards out OF the
way you had to fly triangular pennant Of
white with red border and this was set
down against your ship on the flagship,
and that you didn't like, if you were the
officer
And so the first day At sea wore on and
the sun went down with a glow Of gold in
the west that seemed like a benediotion.
Just as il sank below the horizon the pink
rays that were gathering reflected them
selves on the starboard sides Of the white
shF q and gave them a pouch Of color. Lights
on the main truck on the foremast and at
the stern and At the sides appeared in
stantly. and Il was nighttime on the feet.
The black smoke rose straight in the
air other lights began TO twinkle and soon