Chapter I: Preface

The notes on which these essays are based were collected in the course of two commissions spent under the lee of the Admiralty library, close to the Royal United Service Institution, and in touch with the Reading Room of the British Museum and other public sources of information.

The lack of a book describing in popular language the materialistic side of naval history is, I think, generally admitted. Historians as a rule have devoted small space to consideration of material; in particular, the story of the revolutionary changes in naval material which took place during the nineteenth century has never been placed before the public in convenient form. In the attempt to supply such a description I have taken the liberty, as an engineer, of treating of naval material as a whole; tracing, as well as my technical knowledge permits, the progress of all the three principal elements--ship, gun, engine--and their interdependence. The result, faulty and incomplete as it is, may nevertheless be of considerable service, it is hoped, in clarifying the work of the historians and bridging the gap which divides the classic histories from our modern text-books.

I have considered our modern navy to begin with the “Admiral” class of battleship, about the year 1880.

My respectful thanks are due to the heads of three Admiralty departments: Captain R. H. Crooke, C.B., lately Director of Naval Ordnance; Engineer Vice-Admiral Sir George Goodwin, K.C.B., LL.D., Engineer-in-Chief of the Fleet; and Sir Eustace T. D’Eyncourt, K.C.B., Director of Naval Construction; for their unofficial approval. I wish to acknowledge my indebtedness to the officials of the Admiralty and the R.U.S.I. libraries, for their invariable kindness; to the Directors of the British and S. Kensington Museums, for permission to reproduce pictures in their possession; to Mr. A. W. Johns, C.B.E., Assistant Director of Naval Construction, Engineer Commander E. C. Smith, O.B.E., R.N., Mr. H. W. Dickinson, of the S. Kensington Museum, Mr. Edward Fraser, and Sir George Hadcock, F.R.S., R.A., of Elswick, for various help and criticism; and especially to Mr. L. G. Carr Laughton, of the Admiralty library, of whose advice and knowledge I have often availed myself, and to whose encouragement the completion of the work has been largely due.

It only remains to state that the whole of the book is written and published on my own responsibility, and that it is in no manner or degree an official publication.

F. L. R.

CONTENTS

CHAPTER PAGE
I. THE SAILING SHIP 1

II. THE SMOOTH-BORE GUN 61

III. THE STEAM ENGINE 93

IV. “NEW PRINCIPLES OF GUNNERY” 112

V. THE CARRONADE 125

VI. THE TRUCK CARRIAGE 140

VII. THE SHELL GUN 160

VIII. THE RIFLED GUN 181

IX. PROPELLING MACHINERY 210

X. THE IRONCLAD 246

INDEX 303

PLATES

A Sixty-gun Ship of late Seventeenth Century _Frontispiece_
_To face page_
A Tudor Ship of Period 1540-50 60

Tudor Ships under Sail 124

The _Speaker_, a Second-rate of the Commonwealth 180

The _Comet_ of 1812 224

_Rattler_ versus _Alecto_ 240

The _Warrior_ 260

The _Monarch_ 280

ILLUSTRATIONS IN THE TEXT

_Page_
Diagram illustrating Distortion of Frames under Load 52

Diagram representing a Ship with Trussed Frames 53

Typical Sections of “Symondite” and contemporary Ships 59

Turkish Bronze Cannon 68

French Twenty-four Pounder, with Spherical Chamber 84

Savery’s Engine 101

Newcomen’s Engine 104

Connecting-rod 111

A Carronade 133

A Truck Gun 147

Method of Gun-Exercise in H.M.S. _Shannon_ 155

A Paixhans Gun 173

Bullet Mould 187

Rifleman Presenting 189

“Carabine à Tige” 195

Minié Bullet 195

Whitworth Rifle Bullet 198

Ship and Galley 211

The _Charlotte Dundas_ 219

Pettit Smith’s Propeller 235

THE EVOLUTION OF NAVAL ARMAMENT