THE ATTACK OF THE "OCTOPUS".
Since the Stone Age, when long-haired men, half brutes, fought with
battle-clubs made by lashing a rudely shaped lump of stone in the cleft
end of a club, and with arrows and javelins tipped with hammered flint,
through all the successive generations of fighters, human ingenuity has
been exercised to its utmost to devise new implements of warfare, and
new defences to protect against them.
A long stride was taken when the first elaborately carved, bell-mouthed
cannon roared at Cressy and Poictiers; another when iron balls were
substituted for stone, and still a third when the idea flashed upon some
belligerent inventor to make his iron shot hollow and transform them
into explosive shells and death-dealing shrapnel.
From shells to torpedoes was an easy transition, and the torpedo-boat
became necessary, duly followed by the torpedo-boat destroyer. At the
same time the armour of the largest fighting ships was increased in
thickness from two or three inches to a foot, over the vital parts of
the battle-ship and cruiser, the primary batteries of which now included
huge rifled guns throwing a steel projectile of well-nigh half a ton's
weight.
The torpedo is a terrible but uncertain weapon. The modern search-light
makes daylight of the darkest night, and renders the approach of a
torpedo-boat within striking distance exceedingly difficult. If
detected, the boat is doomed, for a concentration of fire from the
larger ship beats the necessarily small assailant to death in a moment.
Moreover it is by no means sure that the torpedo will do its work when
launched at the enemy, even if it succeeds in piercing the wire net that
is suspended to entangle it at a safe distance from the hull of the
vessel attacked.
Summing up all the obstacles to successful torpedo attack, it may be
reckoned that _only one in twelve_ reaches its mark, explodes, and
accomplishes its purpose.
It remained for the twentieth century to produce a terrible
fighting-machine--often foretold but never perfected until the
Russo-Japanese war--which should approach the enemy unseen, discharge
its torpedo with careful aim at the most vulnerable part of its huge
adversary, and, while the latter was floating in fancied security on the
open sea, strike a blow which should be instantly fatal. Such is the
marvellous submarine torpedo-boat of this day and generation.
The idea of a boat that shall move under water and discharge its missile
at a hostile ship is by no means a new one. In 1776 a young man named
David Bushnell, of New Haven, Connecticut, constructed a submarine boat
resembling two "turtle-backs" screwed together. She was so small that
only one man could occupy her. Air was supplied to last half an hour.
The "crew," who was expected to work by hand the propelling screw, was
also supposed to be able to pump in and out water ballast to enable her
to descend to the desired depth, to maintain the craft on an even keel
when submerged, and to detach two hundred pounds of ballast weights in
order to rise again to the surface. An explosive mine containing one
hundred and fifty pounds of gunpowder was to be towed alongside until
the bottom of the enemy's ship was reached, when, the mine having been
fastened to the hull, a clock-work arrangement, set by the operator,
would explode the charge. Nothing practical resulted from the young Yale
man's scheme, but it is evident that his boat was the original model for
every submarine torpedo-boat which has since been invented.
In 1800 Robert Fulton, turning his attention from steam engines for a
while, modelled a boat which was a considerable improvement upon
Bushnell's, but, like the latter, failed in practical use.
During our Civil War several essays were made at submarine warfare, the
Confederates taking the initiative. One of these submarines actually
blew up a Union man-of-war, but was itself demolished, with its crew of
nine men. Every great navy in the world now reckons a number of
submarines among its available forces.
One of the most dangerous and powerful of these deadly destroyers at the
time of the breaking out of the Japanese war was the _Octopus_, launched
at night, with great secrecy, near the naval station of Sasebo. Her
length was eighty feet, diameter eleven feet, displacement (when
submerged) one hundred and thirty-nine tons. When she was running light,
or "awash," the twin-screws, operated by triple expansion engines worked
by steam, gave a speed of fifteen knots, with a minimum endurance, at
this speed, of twelve hours.
To drive the craft when submerged a battery of storage cells supplied an
electric current to operate motors sufficient to give a speed of eight
knots for at least six hours. Her armament consisted of five automobile
torpedoes and two expulsion tubes, which opened through her black prow
like the nostrils of some hideous sea-monster. She was able to sink to a
depth of twenty feet below the surface within one minute after the
order to dive was given. When she was submerged three feet the pilot
obtained a view over the water by means of a _camera lucida_ in a tube
that projected above the surface.
When Jules Verne wrote _Twenty Thousand Leagues under the Sea_, in 1873,
his _Nautilus_ was deemed by the reader untaught in naval constructive
history a wild creation of the author's fancy, like his passenger-car
shot to the moon from an enormous cannon. To-day there is not a naval
commander who would not look grave and consider an immediate withdrawal
of his ship when told an enemy's submarine was cruising in his
neighbourhood.
In the face of open danger, visible to eye and ear, no officer of the
navy blenches. The submarine is out of sight. It may be within a hundred
yards of the ship when the report is brought. A man who will stand up
against a wild beast or a band of savages without a tremor will turn
white and shriek with terror if, when he is in the water, the cry of
"Shark!" is raised. The shark betrays its presence by its black dorsal
fin above the surface of the sea. When the fin disappears the danger
increases, becomes terrible; the fear of the swimmer in the vicinity of
that black, unseen peril overmasters him.
The submarine sinks, like the shark, to attack. Its gleaming back,
surmounted by the small, round conning tower, disappears amid a swirl of
foam. A single staff at the stern betrays its presence for a moment;
then that, too, glides beneath the surface. Not a man on the battle-ship
but shudders at the thought of that hidden monster under the waves,
driven by the skill and hatred of the human brain.
Only tried and absolutely reliable men are chosen for the crew of the
submarine. They must be ready to endure extreme discomfort and hardship
and must hold their lives in their hands. A well-aimed shot from a
war-ship, or a defect in the delicate machinery of the boat, and all is
over. A submarine never is wrecked; it sinks, with all on board; it is
obliterated.
The Japanese have been among the first to realise the terrible
effectiveness of this formidable engine of war. No one outside a handful
of men near the Mikado's throne knows how many submarine torpedo-boats
are included in the Japanese navy, nor where they are stationed.
Japanese naval officers and men form an ideal body from which the crews
of these boats are to be chosen. In conflict with the enemy, whether on
land or at sea, they reckon their lives as nothing. They seek eagerly
for a glorious death at the hands of the foe, and when that is denied
them and defeat is inevitable they prefer to die by their own weapons,
or by leaping into the sea, rather than prolong what would be to them a
life of disgrace.
Oto Owari was appointed, on the 11th of April in this eventful year, to
the command of the submarine _Octopus_, then docked, under a concealing
roof, at Sasebo. Three nights later he went on board with a picked crew
at midnight, and the _Octopus_, first gliding out of the dock, and
gathering speed until she reached open water, suddenly stopped her
engines and began to sink, inch by inch. In one minute a dark spot on
the sea, and a patch of foam, indicated the top of her conning tower;
and a moment later she was out of sight. In the act of sinking, her prow
was toward the west.
Early on the morning of April 13th, the Japanese fleet made a
demonstration in the direction of Port Arthur. Always ready to accept a
challenge while there was a shot in the locker, the Russians steamed out
to meet them. There was but a brief exchange of battle courtesies. The
Port Arthur ships were far out-numbered and out-metalled, and Admiral
Makaroff, on the _Petropavlovsk_, signalled for his squadron to retire.
The _Petropavlovsk_ was a first-class battle-ship of about 11,000 tons,
with heavy armament of twelve-inch guns and secondary batteries. She had
on board the admiral, the regular crew of 650 men, the Grand Duke Cyril,
and, as a special guest, the famous painter Verestchagin. Makaroff,
with several officers of high rank, having satisfied themselves that the
ship was in no immediate danger, proceeding as she now was under good
headway, toward her home port, with the Japanese fleet hull down in the
offing, went below to breakfast. The Grand Duke and the great artist
remained on the bridge with the commander of the flagship and its
lieutenant. They scanned through their glasses the far-off pursuers, and
the frowning forts on Golden Hill, and congratulated each other on the
escape of the Russian squadron from the danger of annihilation by an
immensely superior force. Not a man of them guessed the near presence of
a peril, unseen beneath those waves, dimpling in the morning sunlight,
more terrible than the whole array of Japanese battle-ships on the
horizon. Verestchagin, then the greatest living painter of death on the
battle-field, knew not that Death was at that moment gliding toward him;
that he was taking his last look at the drifting clouds, the rippling
sea, the blue hills of Manchuria. The _Petropavlovsk_ sped onward, but
faster, beneath the waves, sped the _Octopus_, guided by the fierce
eyes, the strong hand, the glowing heart and brain of the small brown
man erstwhile cabin steward of the _Osprey_.
Suddenly the great battle-ship quivered from stem to stern, as if she
had struck upon a rock. The sea rose on the starboard side in a
tremendous wave, and a roar like a broadside of a frigate filled the
air, followed by a rattling, crashing discharge from the magazines. A
huge gap appeared in the hull of the ship. A cataract of water poured
in, and slowly turning upon her side, with one great, hissing gasp the
_Petropavlovsk_ sank.
The other ships of the squadron hastened to the spot, and almost before
the fighting-tops of the battle-ship disappeared their boats were
foaming across the water to pick up the survivors from the ill-fated
vessel. The Grand Duke was saved, as were the lieutenant, two other
officers, and about fifty sailors. Every other man went to the bottom.
Never again would the guns of Russia boom out their noisy salute to the
gallant admiral; and Verestchagin had made his last great study of
Death.
[Illustration: THE SINKING OF THE PETROPAVLOVSK.]