The Grangeville globe. [volume] (Grangeville, Idaho) 1907-1922, 1915-08-19
NAVAL ENGINEERS
Obscure Heroes of the Warships
When Battle RACES.
BOTTLED UP BELOW DECKS.

They Get None of the Glory and the
Fine Thrill Of Combat, but Just q
Little Harder Work Than Usual.
Perils of the Officers and Stokers.
There Is a man In the navy who Is
too often forgotten. even by the au.
thorities, when they are ''dishing out"
rewards and praise for successful op-
erations at sea. and that man Is the
man who makes the wheels go round
inside the ship.
If the wheels stop then the modern
warship lies on the water like an arm
ed tin can. waiting for some one to sail
round 1t, plug 1t full OF holes and
sink 1t.
fighting ship. to put up any sort
Of battle at all. must be able to get on
with 1t at the rate OF knots, as the sail
ors say when they mean at high speed,
and the men who make that possible
are the engineers and the stokers. The
engineer officers are highly skilled
scientists, with no use for the fear of
death.
The stoker, far below the waterline,
shovels coal. and he gathers there is a
battle on, when there is, by the fact
that he has to work twice as hard as
he thought he could, and by the infer
nal racket made by the guns, and by
the projectiles of the enemy, which
have found new home aboard the
ship.
He has none of the glory and the fine
thrill of battle-only an increase in
his ordinary work.
He works by lamplight to keep steam
up, and he knows there has been vic
tory when some one tells him, unless
he happens to be working In his
spare" time at the ammunition hoists
near the roaring guns.
Even now in many ships and once in
all the engineer officers and their men
are shut down In their working place,
and they cannot get out, for 1t Is nee
essary for them TO so be closed up. 1t Is
not, of course, necessary to keep them
there to make them do their work, but
because the ships engines run under
forced draft. and the only way to get
that is to batten down the stokeholds.
They become. In fact, part OF the pipe,
If one can call 1t that, along which the
air Is pumped to the fires to make them
burn more 1iercely, just as one bucks up
the kitchen range with the bellows. II
I.a hn$ ahn, To no dnnEo
were open the air would be pumped
out through them and would not pass
through the white hot furnaces.
If she Is torpedoed and sinks sud
denly down go the engineers and the
stokers without the chance of swim
ming for 1t as the others have when
the order Each man for himself!' Is
given by the executive officer in charge
of the vessel.
In the case of the oil driven war.
ships there is not. 1t need hardly be
said. that added risk for the engine
room staff. There is no need to shut
them down, and in case of sinking
they have 40 further risk than that
entailed by the time taken for the or
a der to get down to them and for then
! to get up on deck. They are, however
the people most likely to go to frag
ments when torpedo comes knocking
on the ships side, or rather, dowI
among her foundations.
'. And there are steam pipes filed witt
scalding and sudden death. flooding tn
engine room in an instant with biting
! binding. soaring fog, somewhere abov
boiling point, for high pressure steam
Is hotter stuff than comes out of tn
.. spout of a kettle. A shell through tn
: main steam pipes. and goodby to thos
who are near the damage.
. The engineer officer knows all thi
, and often has seen some Of the thing
that can happen taking place on
small but significant scale. While tn
gunners get the glory he watches th
!, wheels go round, listens not to tn
scream OF the shells or the hamme
: strokes of projectiles on armor plat
but to the telltale songs of the con
, plex mechanisms over which he pr
= sides with the GOODNESS of naval o
= ficer, the skill of man of science an
= the tenderness of Red Cross nurse.
: Every moment may be the last ID
ment the life In his body has. but
. must not think of that
Down there In the bowels Of II
: fighting ship he must keep his min
= clear to think Of a thousand detail
= and he must do 1t without any OF Il
= exhilaration that comes from watchir
'e the effect of the guns on the enemy
ships.
He never sees shot go home;
never,sees an enemy's flag pulled dow
"a in defeat.
B. He sees only his engines and the ms
u tending them
If all goes well and the enemy rul
he or strikes the engineer command
3 hears all about II at mess. II thin
u go wrong he feels 1t quite unmista
er ably In his person.
u Get one unlucky shot into the engi
l. ~ lAaHF