Evening capital and Maryland gazette., 1915-11-02
DEFENDS CUNNERY
OF u. S. WARSH|PS
Capt. Niblack Attacks Representa-
tive Gardner's Statements As
to the Michigan.
REFUSES TO BE MADE GOAT"
Says If Legislators Had to Go to Firing
Line There Would be Less 0ratory.
PART m.

40 SHOW now easy II is 10 De miSled
by figures, I wish to state that even
had the Michigan made only five hits
out of fifty-six shots. it would not
have necessarily been poor shooting in
any navy, and no cause for worry.
provided there were no wild shots.
This will be explained later.
lin the shooting in question. thin
vertical target. about the size of the
side of a freight or box car, was tow
ed by a battleship on various courses
and speeds, which were prescribed in
a sealed envelope, opened at a given
time, and known only for the guidance
of the towing ship. The firing ship
was required to approach the target
from a distance of at least ten miles at
high speed, and required to turn on a
given bearing at a great distance in
such a way as TO open fire about three
minutes after turning onto a course
which was taken from a sealed envel-
ope by the umpire (from another ship
who announced it to the captain in the
coming tower, who also handed out
from time to time, casualties inter
ruptions and occurrences likely TO
come in battle and all calculated to
make hitting extremely difficult.
Among other things besides the
towing ship altering courses and
speeds, the firing ship was required
to reverse its course at least $50 de
grees. Added to this. the charges Of
powder were reduced charges; the
ship rolled and pitched as did the
small screen target. and any real cas-
ualties as TO failure to fire on signal
or follow minute rules with every
thing recorded to stop watches) were
penalized. To get an idea of what il
means to fire even with everything
perfectly favorable. let us consider
some elementary principles of gun
merry.
IF we take a small canvas screen
target say twenty feet high and aim a
gun at the bulls eye center verti-
cal error of more than ten feet over or
under will make a miss over or under
the screen, and If the screen is forty
feet long a lateral error (error in de-
Election, to the right or left of more
than twenty feet will make miss
to the right or left. All guns (due to
erosion), powder (due to variations in
temperature), proiectiles (due to not
being mathematically seated i'm the
proiectile, chamber) and sights (not
mathematically perfect) have slight
variations, and when fired from the
same ship at the same instant pro-
iectiles will not fall at the same point
but will dispense horizontically aud
laterally on the water. and if they all
hit the screen, will have a certain
amount of unavoidable vertical and
lateral dispersions from the bulls
eye center.
"In elementary target practice is
short range the target screens are the
exact size to allow for the known and
unavoidable dispersion of each type
OF gun, but at day divisional or in
dividual battle practices the screen
is only point of aim. Nevertheless
no shot is counted a hit which does
not pierce the screen :. direct fight,
and richochet hits do .1t count It
might be that every shot fred would
have landed on a target ship. but none
pierce the screen.
"Of the fifty-six shots fired by the
Michigan not one would have thus
failed except the ranging shots fired
TO spot on" Even the nine richochet
which struck in front of the screen
and bounded through would have
struck the side of a battleship. and
even If they had not loosened up arm
or plates they would have deluged the
ship with tons of water, and put his
gun sights out of commission for some
time. Even if we could eliminate the
mechanical errors. the errors in esti-
mating the range (distance) or defiec-
ton (wind, drift, spread of target,etc)
would cause misses.
"Now,as paradoxical as it may seem
it is an axiom in gunnery that GER
tain amount of dispersion is necessa-
ry to get the greatest number of pos
sible hits on the target screen, be-
cause it enables the officers who spot
to get the hitting range by the pro-
cess of straddling the target with
shorts and overs lwhere a number
of guns are fired in salvos at the same
time.) Therefore, accepting the un-
avoidable or mechanical dispersion OF
guns as not at all lamentable. we can
thereby utilize this dispersion to cor
rect the errors due to not knowing
accurately the proper range and de-
flection. The middle point of the dis
persion in the sight bar range. and
that is raised or lowered to bring il
on the target to hit.
AT long range, by firing one OF
more hanging shots, the hitting range
is ascertained, and then you fire sol
vos or half salvos form the target
guns that bear on the target. If they
straddle the target, you get. at the
most, one or two hits in the actual
target screen out of each salvos fired
and you are doing very well and would
be putting battleship out Of business
in a very few salvos, especially if you
get the range first and land on him.
"The Michigan has docking keels on
her to keep her from rolling in a dry
dock. as she is a notorious high roller
but if, on the occasion in question, she
had been firing at the target screen in
perfectly still water with full charges
and at only four miles $4,000 yardsl
| the mathematical chance of piercing
the screen by firing salvos of eight
guns at a time is one hit in eight