A Vanishing Naval Tradition – The Figurehead
(See page 1166, November, 1927, Proceedings)
Brockholst Livingston.—It seems appropriate to welcome Mrs. Constance Lathrop as a contributor to the pages of the Proceedings. We have seen members of her sex entering politics, business and the professions. She now appears as the first to “break into print” on the subject of the Navy. Is it not possible that with the growing interest in all affairs which women are taking we may see a finer side of naval affairs developed? Mrs. Lathrop’s article is a sample of this. She pleads for the cause of the figurehead which for long was held as an ornament of inspirational and traditional value.
The American Navy has been backward in the use of historic material as an inspiration for its younger advocates. It has been the subject of much writing that we do not make the proper use of the mass of available material to instill a better knowledge, even a deeper appreciation, of our past. Mrs. Lathrop has shown the reverence in which the figurehead was often held by the members of the crew of the ship which it adorned. Navy men are still of the nature that is impressed by such things. The army is developing insignia for all its regiments that will portray the history of the unit. Why should not the Navy, whose units are ships, have similar devices, and what better form could they take than the reestablishment of the practice of figureheads?
In discussion of a design for destroyer leaders, submitted by Maurice Prendergast, the present writer advised adopting his suggestion of placing the coat-of-arms on the bow of our ships. The clipper-bow has apparently come to stay in our Navy and is being adopted in foreign ships. Could we not then place the figurehead on many of our future ships? Would not the men of a new Delaware be inspired if, upon her bow, there was placed the “God of 2.5”? Perhaps the Delaware would be too popular with those striving for promotion but then, perhaps, we shall never have another Delaware when we consider the fate of the last of her name.
Emblems of the states are possibly the most adaptable to bows. The figurehead from the old New York is especially so suited but nearly all the states have coats-of- arms similar to New York’s. The states may, in the future, question the suitability of a silver service as compared with the value of a figurehead.
If figureheads were discontinued only because they were of no practical use, let them be replaced with all possible speed. Their value is an invisible asset but a great one, nevertheless. Perhaps there is something in the claim of weight, even of cost, but, if we are to carry the first matter to its extremity, we can rid our ships of much more than they carry at present. The cost is something which, of course, would be questioned by certain individuals who repose in Washington, but even they must have some spirit of the past remaining. Surely it would not be very difficult to persuade them of the benefit which would follow upon the reestablishment of this old-time custom. Mrs. Lathrop concludes her article with the words: “tradition must yield to efficiency in banishing the inspiring and historic figurehead . . . . ” May we, then, expect efficiency to rob us entirely of all those customs and usages upon which the spirit of the sea has been built and which are so much a part of the lives of “those who go down to the sea in ships?” Can it be that the spirit of materialism has so robbed America of her finer feelings? If so, it is to those of Mrs. Lathrop’s sex that we must look for a rebirth of the more spiritual feelings which are so much a part of the grander things of life.
The Last Cruise of the Old Trenton
(See page 948, September, 1927, Proceedings)
Lieutenant Commander John H. Barnard, U.S.N.R.—The line of articles appearing in the September issue of the Proceedings is calculated to bring back to the older readers reminiscences of matters connected with the service hardly to be visualized by those whose entry has been subsequent to the Spanish War.
Note may have been taken of such items in “The Last Cruise of the Old Trenton" as those regarding her having been the first ship in the Navy to have been electrically lighted, and the reference to her equipment with the old spar torpedoes, etc.
In the matter of the first of these two I am more than sure that he is quite right and I think that the writer would have been safe in putting her down as one of the very first of sea-going ships so equipped as, in 1883, even the early “isolated” plants ashore were extremely rare and when I saw her before she left the Brooklyn yard that year, I had only seen incandescent lamps on a single North River ferry-boat and on nothing else afloat.
To her, on her first commission, went a very considerable portion of my class, some to be transferred to ships on the Mediterranean station and others on their way to ships on the China station, and I can well imagine the impression upon junior officers of today to have seen the crowded condition of her steerage, all berths filled, every hammock swing utilized, every foot of her transoms occupied and some even sleeping on the mess table from which they had to be routed very early each day.
It is to the old spar torpedo, however, and to the connection of one of my classmates with one of them on the China station that my thoughts run back.
In most details these torpedoes resembled that with which Cushing attacked the Albemarle.
They consisted of a hollow cast iron flask maybe three or four feet long, maybe 10 inches or 12 inches in diameter, with a neck of slightly less diameter forming a socket into which the end of a spar was inserted.
By my time at the Academy the electric primer had been devised and it is of interest that several years after the Trenton’s first commission one of our largest makers of explosives had to turn to a Navy officer to learn how to contrive such a device. This fuse consisted of a diminutive little “bridge” of platinum wrapped with a wisp of dry gun cotton which detonated the wet gun cotton with which the flask was filled.
For ship work, this torpedo was fitted on the end of the lower studding sail boom, or that which was most usually utilized as the boat boom for a ship at anchor.
The circuit consisted of a single insulated wire running from one pole of a salammoniac battery through a watertight gland in the side of the flask to the platinum igniter and thence was “grounded” on the metal of the flask. The other pole of the battery was “grounded” on the copper sheathing of the hull. Included in this circuit was an ordinary telegraph key on the rail of the bridge.
I cannot recall the ship to which Frank Colvin was eventually transferred but it might have been the old Nipsic, and, at all events, was one of that class with the bridge aft and her engine room hatch rising through the quarter deck almost directly beneath the bridge. Also, on a bulkhead of this hatch was located the battery for the torpedoes.
Now the Naval Academy was about the first college to have a course in electricity and even at that, Colvin came to it as an amateur electrician and telegraph operator and so antedated, in a way, the “hams” of our later days.
In consequence he was marked from the start as “savvy” in electricity and that reputation he carried to his ships and, accordingly, was put in charge of the salammoniac battery and the above described complicated circuit.
It was not in those days a remarkable happening that the skipper knew more about sailoring than he did about these new-fangled contraptions like electricity and was hardly intent on enlarging his acquisitions in that line; or, at least had not given much thought to so doing. It did, however, come about that this particular sloop-of-war was due for her quarterly inspection and was lying off the Tientsin Forts when the admiral arrived and inspection was set for the following day.
Further, as firing the spar torpedo was one of the requirements, one was fitted to one of the boat booms and guyed out a few feet from the ship’s side. Likewise, Colvin was instructed to wash out the cells of the battery, put in new zincs, etc. Toward doing so, he removed the two outgoing wires and hooked their loose ends together rather than let them go adrift.
While so engaged a civilian friend of the executive officer came on board and, in being shown around, the two of them arrived on the bridge where seeing the torpedo key led to a description of the torpedo and the method of firing it. Then, leaning over the bridge rail, the executive officer called down to Colvin who had all the cells down on the grating to ask if the battery was disconnected. Upon being answered that it was, he added to his friend that simply pressing the key would do the trick and, as he pressed it, the trick was surely accomplished.
The discharge not only jarred the ship very considerably but it jarred the old man more. So much so that he would not be satisfied by proof that the battery was actually out of the circuit, and all apart, but demanded that Colvin explain how such things could happen.
Properly doubting his ability to explain electric couples to an irate skipper, he got another igniter, succeeded in persuading the wardroom mess to lend him a bit of their table silverware, begged a grate bar from the fire room, commandeered a deck bucket which he filled from overside and, so sensitive was that little platinum bridge that he made it glow for the captain and thought his troubles over. But not so. The captain thereby became a full-fledged scientist and, not content with his explanation to the admiral, he went on, without consulting Colvin, to brag that he would demonstrate the needlessness of any old battery.
Accordingly, with a new torpedo on the boom which was guyed out its full length, Colvin was instructed to wire it up with the battery omitted from the circuit.
For quarterly practice the torpedo demonstration was scheduled for the last and, all through the exercises, the captain was bragging and the admiral was worse than skeptical. Finally the time for the captain’s triumph was reached, but when he touched the key and nothing happened he got an earful of the admiral’s derision.
Even hammering on the key did not obviate the necessity of hooking in the battery and the admiral was piped over the side adding remarks which had not previously occurred to him.
The scene then shifts to the cabin with the captain visiting on Colvin all the admiral’s thoughts and comments with Colvin thoroughly convinced he could not impress the captain with the details of internal resistances in batteries. Therefore, when the outburst ended, he intimated that had he been consulted he would have advised against attempting the omission of the battery at the end of the ebb tide.
That ran beyond the skipper’s acquaintance with that particular branch of science, so Colvin again provided himself with the former paraphernalia and a fresh bucket of water from the side with which he showed that the igniter would not glow.
To this he added the explanation that when the accident had happened it was the end of the flood with the water much more salty than when the experiment was tried for the Admiral.
In conclusion, I cannot say whether all Colvin’s connections were so carefully made on his second demonstration to the captain as they were during his first because I don’t know.
The Suicide Flotilla
(See page 1002, September, 1927, Proceedings)
Lieutenant Commander H. F. Breckel, U.S.N.R.—The comment on the author’s effort entitled “The Suicide Flotilla” (as published in the June issue of the U. S. Naval Institute Proceedings) which was submitted under “Discussion” in the September issue by Commander G. W. Kenyon, was observed with interest and the statement of error noted.
Primarily, the article in question was one which dealt only with the activity of the yachts working in French waters, and the text thereof was compiled from notes made by the author while cooperating in the writing of The Corsair in the War Zone with the late Ralph D. Paine. This accounts, more than likely, for the alleged error of fact as regards the destroyers which were acting as escort for the convoy in company with the Corsair at the time the great storm of December, 1917, broke in the Bay of Biscay, resulting in severe damage to Allied shipping.
On reading Commander Kenyon’s comment the writer carefully checked the available data and secured verified copies of the ships’ logs for the dates of December 15, 16 and 17, 1917, for the purpose of counterchecking the previous notes compiled. Perusal of these log sheets clearly substantiates the contention of Commander Kenyon to the effect “that the Corsair was obliged to ‘turn around’” by reason of the severity of the storm some hours prior to the Warrington. The logs of the two ships clearly substantiate this fact, while the notes made by the writer and others contending the opposite erred, either due to lapse of time, or other unintentional reasons.
The writer regrets very much that this unintentional error was made, and, as mentioned, the destroyer phase of activity was not stressed more because the article was one primarily concerning the activity of the armed yachts in anti-submarine work and their accomplishments in this direction in spite of their frailness and other drawbacks as to their suitability as “men o’ war.” Certainly the writer wishes to be the last to detract from the wonderful records made by our destroyer forces, transports, and other vessels at sea during the war, for as we know, all worked hard, and the unceasing vigilance and tireless effort displayed by the Navy as a unit in accomplishing the mission of transporting safely overseas our vast war-time army and its equipment, constituted the prime factor in achieving victory for the Allied arms. The credit for the achievement belongs to the Navy as a unit, rather than to the individual vessel or group, even though some were fortunate enough to encounter more activity than others.
The Navy in Hawaii
(See pages xlii and 924, August, 1927, Proceedings)
J. R. Selfridge.—In reading the August issue of the Proceedings the following errors were noted:
(a) Page xlii—The crew of the U.S.S. Philadelphia and not of the U.S.S. Boston hoisted the flag at the time of annexation, August 12, 1898.
(b) Page 924—Article “The American Navy in Hawaii” by Albert Pierce Taylor states, “in the presence of President Dole . . . . and landing forces from the Philadelphia and Mohican, the Hawaiian flag was lowered, etc.” The U.S.S. Philadelphia was the only American naval vessel present at those ceremonies. The U.S.S. Mohican was not there. I was attached to the former ship in the capacity of assistant engineer with the rank of ensign at the time. The entire ship’s company was landed and participated in the annexation ceremonies except the navigator, the late Lieutenant Lansdale, Gunner Jaffe, Surgeon Odell, the writer and hardly more than a half dozen seamen and a small force in the fireroom and auxiliary station. I fired the port three-pounder saluting gun and Dr. Odell the starboard when saluting the hauling down of the Provisional Republic flag and hoisting the U. S. flag.
The Merchant Marine
(See page 1271, December, 1927, Proceedings)
C. A. D. Burk.—I have read the article by C. E. Grunsky “The Merchant Marine”, in the December issue. As the problem is noted in relative costs of U.S. foreign shipping, I suggest that the U. S. importer on through shipments receive a deduction in duty equal to C. I. F. (Cost, Insurance and Freight).
Thus if duty is | $10,000 |
and C. I. F. is | 5,000 Credit |
| 5,000 Cash |
Should this net the government too small a paid duty, simply revise tariff. As there is no hope for subsidy bills in Congress this seems to be the only method to keep U.S. merchantmen in foreign trade.
A Correction to Review of "The Bridge of France”
(See page 1242, November, 1927, Proceedings)
The paragraph referring to the output of the Hog Island Yard should read: “The total output of the country up to November 11, 1918, in wood and concrete ships was ninety of the former and twelve of the latter, but none of them were built at Hog Island.” s