The Superior times. [volume] (Superior, Wis.) 1870-1912, 1908-01-11
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Now that the American battleship
fleet 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
plcations 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
shell summer hotels with u great ex-
penditure of powder. And now once
again an American fleet, comprising
large proportion Of the vessels of
the Atlantic squadrons, has left the
eastern coast of the country for pc
riod of several months No war is
now in progress, but the "radioplane,
swfter than thought in its flight, pos
sessed of the power to lift ships from
their watery ways and transport them
thousands of miles through the air,
| has yet to be invented. What would
happen to New York or Boston or Bal
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 food 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 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
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come so nearly an infaliabiIity that
the tugs which tow the floating tar
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 mile
behind the gun They never haze
been struck although the different
batteries have frequent practice The
song OF the shell to the men on the
tug is not like the song of the Lorclei,
for death does not follow in its wake.
To be sure. ike motoring, one has TO
become accustomed 20 face what
seems like impending death Faith in
the gunner. as in the chauffeur. aud
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 At
Boston recently a target four and
half miles from the fort and moving
along the horizon at the rate OF five
miles an hour was struck by eve =
sho. fred from teninch battery II