The Naval Strategy of the Russo-Japanese War.
(HONORABLE MENTION.)
LIEUTENANT R. E. POPE, U. S. NAVY.—These variations of the author's ideas occur as I read his article: Russia secured an ice-free port and was about to grasp the wealth of Manchuria and Corea. So far her peace strategy had gained for her that which she wished; now she over-reached and underestimated the rival power, though warned by the minister at
Tokio.
The military advisers of the Czar, accustomed to rule with an iron hand, to force from China anything they desired, treated Japan as a second China, considered Port Arthur as impregnable, and the Russian fleet concentrated there able to defeat any war vessels which Japan could bring together. "Did not two Chinese battleships fight a drawn battle with the
Japanese fleet only nine years ago, and have we not always bested the Chinese?"
The efficiency of the Japanese troops with the Pekin Relief Expedition had evidently made little impression upon the government at St. Petersburg. During the negotiations prior to the outbreak of war, it was evidentthat the Russians placed too low an estimate upon the power and determination of the Japanese people. This was their first and greatest error.
I think that Admiral Makaroff knew the importance of the command of the sea, also, most of his officers certainly realized its advantages. Here is what one of them said early in the war: "The issue of the naval campaign was practically determined by the fatal night attack of February 8, with which the Japanese opened the war. When it became known on the morning of February 9 that two of the finest battleships of the fleet, the flagship, the American built Retvican, and the cruiser Pallada had been put out of commission for several months to come by torpedoes, we realized that Japan with her six battleships and eight armored cruisers possessed a numerical and actual superiority in ships of the first line of battle which insured to her, right at the very outset of the war, the invaluable advantage conferred by the possession of the command of the sea." Again he says, speaking of the battle of August 10: "If Admiral Vithoft could reach Vladivostok he could wait in safety the arrival of the Second Pacific Squadron, and, joining forces with Rojestvensky, upon the arrival of the latter, crush the Japanese in one great sea fight and win the command of the sea."
As the author says, "A defensive campaign should have used Vladivostok as a base." But, prior to the first blow, the Russians had not for a moment considered a defensive campaign. Their supposedly superior fleet was stationed on the line between Japan and Manchuria from which point they expected to control the situation. The Russian negotiators were then in Japan with more battleships in Japan's front yard than that state possessed. Possibly this nearness of the fleet added weight to their arguments.
When war broke out the Russians soon realized the advantage Japan had, and did all in their power to transfer their fleet to Vladivostok. Had not Vithoft been killed or had his second in command been able to take responsibility, the course of the contest might have been different from this date.
The point I wish to make is this: At the beginning, the Russian main fleet was properly placed for an offensive war conflict. When forced to take the defensive they again selected the proper base, but lost only because of failure to follow a compass course to Vladivostok.
These three caused the Russians to lose at sea: (1) Underestimation of their enemy; (2) poor gunnery; (3) lack of experience of their officers. All are errors of peace strategy.
One can hardly blame General Kuropatkin for saying "The navy is of little utility." At the close of the war the naval officers might have replied to this criticism with some similar remark concerning the army.
General Kuropatkin may have been nominally in command of the joint land and naval forces. The orders to the admiral in command of the fleet came from St. Petersburg; in other words, the Council of the Empire managed the army and the navy from the seat of government just as we did in 1898.
The author speaks of ours as a "Press-ridden country always clamoring," etc.; also: "Naval officers must not overlook their duty in influencing, as may be in their power, both politics and diplomacy where they affect the preparedness for war of the navy."
The Navy Department is alive to this, but for politic reasons issues no instructions to officers. We go to Congress for extra guns or for more ships—Representative Jones, before voting for four battleships instead of one, considers his constituency in district No. X. Right here we may make sagacious use of the press; though I doubt that we are using all the more simple methods of educating these constituencies: Recruiting parties throughout the country, Navy Department exhibits at all expositions, new regulations added each year to make service in the navy more popular, at the Naval Academy a little book on Strategy by Commander C. B. Brittain, is giving good ideas to 150 young midshipmen each year; most important of all are the 700 or 800 men on each ship—if each naval officer will take the trouble to be a diplomat, the American public including the press which always wants news will think as we do and assist us in our peace strategy.
Duelling in the Old Navy.
(SEE No. 132.)
The following extract from a letter written by Mr. William Gordon McCabe, of Richmond, Va., to the New York Sun, apropos of Mr. Paullin's account of the duel between Passed Midshipman J. P. Jones and Mr. James Hope, throws an interesting light upon the subject:
"The Mr. James Hope, a civilian, was James Barron Hope, at the time of the duel a youngster of 22, who afterward became a conspicuous figure in Virginia as poet, man of letters and editor, and who died universally lamented in 1887. His mother was Jane Barron, daughter of Commodore James Barron, and he was named for his grandfather, whose pistol he used in his duel with Midshipman Jones.
"Though a civilian,' Hope belonged to what used to be known as a navy family,' having many close kinsmen in the old navy (among others Captain Sam Barron of Tripoli fame, and the younger Captain Sam Barron, who resigned in 1861 and did good service in the Confederate Navy), and when he fought this duel he had recently returned from a cruise in the old Cyane, on which ship he had served as secretary to Captain Payne. Captains (afterwards Commodores) Blake and Prendergast, U. S. N., were also his uncles by marriage.
"Hope's antagonist, John Pembroke Jones (always known as Pembroke Jones), who afterward became a distinguished officer in the Confederate Navy, Flag Lieutenant to Commodore Tatnall when the latter assumed command of the Virginia (Merrimac) after Admiral Buchanan had to be relieved because of wounds received in the fight with the Monitor, is still living (now a resident of California), and is the oldest surviving graduate of the Naval Academy.
"The duel caused the most tremendous excitement all through Tidewater Virginia, and especially in the historic little town of Hampton, the native place of many Hopes, Barrons and Joneses. The original quarrel was between Pembroke Jones's brother Booker and Hope and dated back several years, when the last two were students at William and Mary College.
"Hope, on his return from his cruise in the Cyane, heard (of course through what Sir Fretful Plagiary calls some damned good-natured friend') that Booker Jones had been making disparaging remarks about him previous to Booker Jones's departure for California and denounced him in bitter terms. Pembroke Jones, who happened to be at home on leave, heard of Hope's caustic remarks and at once challenged him. Hope graciously replied that he had no quarrel with Midshipman Jones, whom he highly respected,' and suggested that the whole matter be postponed until the arrival of the brother from California, which would be in a few weeks, when he should 'instantly demand a full apology or the satisfaction usual among gentlemen.'
"Jones's second, whom I remember perfectly, in some unaccountable fashion took up the idea that Hope was crawfishing' and without consulting Jones decided to press matters and secure a little glory for his man. He speedily found out that he had made the mistake of his life. Hope read between the lines of his reply to his suggestion what was passing through his mind and sent an answer to that reply that made a hostile meeting inevitable. Jones's second, now recognizing his stupid blunder, made effort after effort to effect an honorable arrangement, but Hope, in his natural indignation, turned a deaf ear to all his overtures. But it is certain that he would never have fired at Jones had he been fully informed of all the circumstances. They fought at ten paces and both fell desperately and it was supposed mortally wounded. Hope, while both lay in agony on the field, sent his second at once to his antagonist with his compliments and trusted that he was not seriously hurt.'
"They became great friends afterward and were both regular attendants of old St. John's' Episcopal Church in Hampton, of which my father was many years rector. I constantly saw both of them in our home, and after I grew to manhood was honored with Hope's intimate friendship until his death. He believed until his dying day absolutely in the code duello, but was one of the gentlest, most genial and most amiable men I have ever known.
"Everybody loved him, for he had the tender heart and open hand, and became a sort of arbiter in 'affairs of honor,' and I feel sure prevented by his tact and authority more hostile encounters than any other man of his time in Virginia.
"The fact is that in the first fifty years of the nineteenth century the young bucks of the Old Navy' fought about anything or nothing. Lieutenant Bushrod Washington Hunter, a great-great-nephew of George Washington, who served under my uncle, William Gordon, as a midshipman, told me that before he reached the rank of lieutenant he had been principal or second in twenty-two duels.
"I come of a navy family myself on my mother's side, nearly every one of my Gordon kinsmen having been officers in the service.
"One of my great-uncles, Captain Alexander Gordon, had the misfortune to kill in his first duel a shipmate whom he greatly loved, but who had forced the fighting, and after that seemed to wish to throw his life away, for he fought six other duels and came to be regarded as a dangerous man. On the other hand, Alexander's brother, another great-uncle, for whom I am named, Captain William Lewis Gordon, U. S. N., to whom Virginia voted a sword of honor for his splendid gallantry as a young officer under Hull in 1812, set his face sternly against duelling, and before he sailed out of Norfolk, Va., on his first and last voyage as captain, called together his wardroom officers, as one of them told me, and said simply:
I'll have no fighting in my ship, young gentlemen. Better leave your duelling pistols ashore, for if there's any fighting among you there'll be no shore leave for you during the three years we shall be gone.' Of course he didn't object to their fighting French or English officers if these last showed any discourtesy to them or the service, and he himself, as a very young lieutenant, fought two duels at Gibraltar with English officers; but he always said in his gentle way that 'there was nothing personal in it; I thought that the honor of the service required it and it made these gentlemen more careful in their remarks.'
"I may add that I have read Commodore Barron's account (in manuscript) of the trouble between Decatur and himself and of the events leading up to that fatal encounter. It is temperately written and amply confirmed by original letters appended to it from officers of high repute. This manuscript, in Barron's own hand-writing, is still in existence and in the keeping of his great-granddaughter, Mrs. Jane Barron Hope Marr, daughter of James Barron Hope, who fought Jones, and wife of Professor Marr, of the Virginia Polytechnic Institute, Blacksburg, Va.
"It differs widely from the commonly accepted versions of the lamentable affair and shows that Barron had suffered the most intolerable provocation before deciding to send his challenge. Captain Pembroke Jones, whom I have not seen for many, many years, a man as lovable as he is modest and resolute, has a son, Pembroke Jones, now living in New York."