The Birmingham age-herald., 1914-11-08
FINDING THE RANGE . OF WARSH|PS' GUNS
How Crew of Battleship
 Works During Practice
IT IS SEEMING CHAOS
But Every Man Knows What to Do Machinery for Loading and Firing Operated Almost Entirely by
 Hydraulic Pressure

l The gray battleship seems strangely deserted and bare. for her decks are de- ruded of men, while all rails and other outstanding incamhrances have been laid flat on deck, says London Answers.
 The gun turrets, five of them. are trained round, with the long, lean muzzles of their twin weapons pointing out over the sea, and every now and then one Of the guns witches ever so slightly or a tdrret revolves a little. as the gunlavers keep their sights aligned on the dis tant target. The ten 13.5s the ship carries are power ful weapons. Each one of them Is over 5o feet long, and weights close on so tons, while their 12S0- pound shells can be hurled to distance of over l5 miles. The enormous projectiles, too, leave the mug zles at the rate of over 1900 miles an hour, and can penetrate the thickest armor afioat at range of 5000 yards.
 But now, as the ship moves on through the water. with her sharp bow sending rS two little cascades of spray on either side of the stem, she looks like d great mas todon uncontrolled by man. There are no signs of life on board--nothng except the twitching gun turrets and the black smoke rolling from the squat funnels which tells of the men laboring below. But every nan on board is at the station he would occupy in action. and before long the up- roar of the guns will have begun. Quarters Are Cramped l In the coming tower. with it's 12-inch armor, stands the captain. his navigating l officer, a midshipman or two and several | other officers and men. Tho small, cir | To-, sems very eramped for all it has to con- l tain
 l Above the coming tower is another ar mored erection, containing range finder, | and inside this is the gunnery lieutenant, with half dozen more officers and men. | He is surrounded by strange looking in- | struments, while the man at the range 1 finder, with his eyes at it's rubber eye pieces, Is monotonously chanting out the distance of the approaching target | To the naked eye the target itself--a great lattice-work structure, towed by another battleship-looks absolutely small and insignificant at its six-mile range. But the gunlayers in the turrets are provided with teleseopic sights. and these. with their powerful lenses. serve to counteract the difficulty.
 | Inside the turrets themselves the ex- pcctant men are grouped round their guns The great projectiles, and the cor dite charges behind them. have already been pushed home by the hydraulic rammers, and since their weapons are thus fully loaded, the guns crews are idle for the time being.
 But the gunlayers--the men who aim and fire the guns--and the trainers those who keep them pointing in the right direction--are anxiously keepir E
 the sights on the target and every nc W and then. as they move their small n n n hydraulic machinery, and the great brooches rise and fall ever so slightly while the whole armored structure con taining them revolves an inch or so at a time to keep the sights on.
 X minute or two later after an or der has come through from the control position, tho lieutenant in charge of the foremost turret suddenly raps out the order: Bring both guns to the readyl'
 The men standing by the breaches flick over their small levers. Right gun ready, Left gun readyr they re port in rapid succession.
 The range, meanwhile, is decreasing rapidly, and about 10 seconds later there comes the strident rattling of an cleo tric bell
 ,Ft is the signal to open fire. The gun ldyer holds his breath, sees tho cross wires of his telescope cutting the lattice
 work of the target, and then presses all l lllilOttul-looklnS pfdSS luiniDIltte AS he does so there is roar and, with q blaze of strange flame and pail of brown smoke. n projectile weighing more than half ton is sailing through the air on its way toward the target.
 Reloading Quickly Done
 l Outside the turret the concuss lon is ter rible, but Inside it is barely felt, and the | only means the guns crew have of know ing their weapon has gone off is by the i rocking of the turret and the recol of the gun. Back she slides with the water whistling and gurgling through the hy- draulic valves far below. She stops. and then, as the running-out springs exert their strength, is driven back to the firing l position.
 The men, meanwhile. are working like 1 demons. Some one, by moving a smar 1 lever which actuates a hydraulic engine, has opened the breech cloud of acrld cordite smoke fills the turret. but another |