Origin of Submarine Navigation.
The history of invention has no chapter more interesting than that of
sailing under the ocean’s waves. The navigation of the air approaches it
in character, but does not present the vital problems of undersea
travel. Both these new fields of navigation have been notably developed
within recent years, largely as a result of the great European war. It
is the story of sailing in the depths beneath the ocean’s surface with
which we here propose to deal. The problem was settled easily enough for
his purpose by Jules Verne, in his “Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the
Sea.” But that was pure fiction without scientific value. It is with
fact, not fiction, that we are here concerned.
[Illustration: A SUBMARINE ABOUT TO SUBMERGE]
The story takes us back three hundred years, to the reign of James I, of
England, when a crude submarine boat was built, to be moved by oars, but
one of no value other than as a curiosity. At a later date a man named
Day built a similar boat, wagering that he would go down one hundred
yards and remain there twenty-four hours. So far as is known, he still
remains there, winning the wager which he has not come up to claim.
Other such boats were constructed at intervals, but the first undersea
boat of any historical importance was the “American Turtle,” built by a
Yankee named David Bushnell during the time that the British held New
York in the Revolutionary War. He sought to blow up the British frigate
“Eagle” with the aid of a torpedo and nearly succeeded in doing so,
seriously scaring the British shippers by the explosion of his torpedo.
The next to become active in this line of discovery was Robert Fulton,
the inventor of the first practical steamboat. He, like Bushnell, was an
American, but his early experiments were in France, where Napoleon
patronized him. With his boat, the “Nautilus,” he made numerous
descents, going down twenty-five feet in the harbor of Brest and
remaining there an hour. He said that he could build a submarine that
could swim under the water and destroy any war vessel afloat. But the
French Admiralty refused to sustain him, one old admiral saying, “Thank
God, France still fights her battles on the surface, not beneath it.”
Fulton finally went to England and there built a boat with which he
attached a torpedo to a condemned brig, set aside for that purpose. The
brig was blown up in the presence of an immense throng, and Fulton
finally sold his invention to the British government for $75,000.
Nothing further came of it.
The submarine next came into practical view during the American Civil
War, when the Confederate government built several such vessels, known
usually as “Davids” from their inventor. Now, for the first time, did
such a craft demonstrate its powers. On the night of February 17, 1864,
one of the “Davids,” the “Hunley,” blew up the steamship “Housatonic” in
Charleston harbor. The wave caused by the explosion swamped the
submarine and it and its crew found a watery grave.
Other submarines were built and experimented with, not only in the
United States but in European countries. One of the later inventors was
an Irish-American named John P. Holland, who, in 1876, built a submarine
called the “Fenian Ram.” The “Ram” collapsed with the collapse of the
Fenian movement. Other boats were built and tried, but the successful
period of the submarine was deferred until after 1893, when the United
States Congress appropriated $200,000 to encourage such an enterprise
and invited inventors to submit designs. This, and a similar movement in
France, formed the first official recognition of the value of vessels of
this class.
The prize offered by Congress brought out three designs, one by Mr.
Holland, the “Ram” inventor, one by George C. Barker, and a third by
Simon Lake. The names of Holland and Lake have since been closely
associated with the history of the submarine. Mr. Holland’s device
secured approval and in 1894 he received a contract to build a submarine
vessel. This, named the “Plunger,” was begun in 1895, but was finally
abandoned and a vessel of different type, the “Holland,” was built in
its place. It was accepted by the government in 1900. A number of others
similar to the “Holland” were subsequently built.
The American Types.
The type of these vessels was what became known as the “diving.” They
were controlled by a rudder placed at the stern of the vessel and acting
in both a horizontal and a vertical direction, the force of the screw
propeller driving the boat forward in the direction desired. In 1904 the
navy of the United States possessed eight Holland boats and there were
also a number of them in the British navy.
Mr. Lake’s design, offered in 1893 but not accepted, had as its novel
feature a plan by which a door could be opened in the bottom of the ship
and the crew leave and enter it in diving suits, the water being kept
out by the force of compressed air. To maintain the vessel on an even
keel he introduced four vanes, called “hydroplanes,” for regulating the
depth of descent. By aid of these and the horizontal rudder it was found
that the vessel would run for hours at a constant depth and on a level
keel. There were other devices for diving or rising to the surface.
In 1901 Mr. Lake built a large vessel of this type which was sold to the
Russian government and was in commission at Vladivostock during the
Russian-Japanese War. He afterwards received orders from this and other
governments for a number of vessels of the even-keel type, and his
principles of control have since been generally adopted as the safest
and most reliable controlling agency for under-water craft.
We have not in the above brief statement described all the efforts to
invent a satisfactory under-water boat. In several of the nations of
Europe experiments, more or less available, had been tried, but the most
practical results were achieved by the American inventors, Bushnell,
Fulton, Davy, Holland and Lake. It will suffice here to say that the
most successful of submarines were those constructed by Holland and
Lake. An important addition was made in 1901 in a French boat, the
“Morse,” built at Cherbourg. The difficulty of navigators telling where
they were when under water, and of changing their course safely without
coming to the surface to reconnoitre, was in a large measure overcome by
the addition of a “periscope.” This, rising above the water, and
provided with reflecting lenses, enabled the steersman to discover the
surface conditions and see any near vessel or other object. The “Morse”
was able to sink in seventy seconds and her crew could remain under
water for sixteen hours without strain.
[Illustration: A MINE-PLANTING SUBMARINE DESIGNED IN BERLIN BY SIMON
LAKE IN 1895 FOR THE RUSSIAN GOVERNMENT]
Twentieth Century Submarines.
We have given an epitome of the development of the submarine vessel up
to the opening of the twentieth century. It had now reached a successful
status of achievement and during the early years of that century was to
display a remarkable progress. Holland and Lake may be looked upon as
the parents of the modern development of the submersible boat, their
designs being at the base of the great European progress.
France took up the work actively, its most successful early vessel being
the “Narval,” built in 1899. This was 118 feet long by 8 feet 3 inches
beam, 106 tons surface and 168 submerged displacement. She was a
double-deck vessel controlled by Lake hydroplanes, and had installed
steam power for surface travel and electric power for undersea work. The
French at this time kept their methods secret, and no useful type had
been developed in England, the result being that a plant was provided
for the building of Holland boats in that country. Germany used the Lake
devices, which had not been patented in that country and were made use
of by the Krupps. Thus it appears that the modern submarines, as now
built and used in the navies of the world, owe their success to
principles of construction and devices for control originated and
developed by American inventors.
Engine Power.
The internal-combustion engine is the heart of the submarine. Steam,
with its heavy engine, has been long set aside, and electricity, derived
from the storage battery, yet awaits sufficient development. Gasoline
succeeded them. The internal-combustion engine became essential from its
light weight and the fact that it could be started and shut down
instantly. This is of prime importance, as permitting quick submergence
or emergence, either to escape from a high-speed destroyer or to capture
a merchantman. It weighs less per horse power, takes up less room and
requires less fuel per hour than any other reliable motor. It was early
used in both the Holland and Lake boats and is still the chief prime
motor.
[Illustration: A PROTECTOR FITTED FOR EXPERIMENTAL WORK UNDER ICE]
The difficulty with the early boats was that they were slow in speed,
making only from eight to nine knots per hour. Increased speed was
demanded by governments and more powerful engines, within a fixed limit
of weight, were demanded. In doing this engines were built of such
flimsy construction that they soon went to pieces. The gasoline used
also gave off a gas of highly explosive character and one very likely to
escape from leaky tanks or joints. Several explosions took place in
consequence, in one of which twenty-three men were killed. As a result
all the nations demanded that a non-explosive fuel should be used, and
builders turned to the Diesel engine as offering a solution to the
difficulty.
This heavy oil engine, weighing about five hundred pounds per
horse-power, was not adapted to the submarine, and efforts have been
made to decrease the weight. These have not as yet had a satisfactory
result and experiments are still going on.
The Periscope.
As the engine is the heart of the submarine, the periscope is its eye.
This is, in its simpler forms, a stiff, detachable tube from fifteen to
twenty feet long and about four inches in diameter. On its top is an
object glass which takes in all objects within its range and transmits
an image of them through a right-angled prism and down the tube. By
means of other lenses and prisms an image of the external object is thus
made visible to those within the submarine. In this process of
transmission there is a certain loss of light, and to allow for that the
image is magnified to about one-quarter above natural size.
[Illustration: A SUBMARINE UNDER ICE]
To obtain in this manner a correct idea of the distance of the object
seen proved difficult, but by continued experiment this difficulty has
been overcome. Mr. Lake developed an instrument suited to this purpose
and one which gave a simultaneous view of the entire horizon. There is
one fault in the periscope not easy to obviate. It is an instrument for
day use only. When dark comes on it becomes useless, and this does away
with the possibility of a successful submarine attack by night.
The periscope is the one part of the submarine scout equipment that is
open to vision from the surface. But while the outlook of the undersea
captain, aided by his telescopic sights, has a radius of several miles,
the periscope tube, of only four or five-inch diameter and painted of a
neutral tint, is not easily seen. If the sea is a little choppy it is
difficult to discover it with the naked eye at about 300 or 400 yards
away, or in a smooth sea at over 500 yards.
The idea that a submarine may be located by an aeroplane is looked upon
by Mr. Lake as a fallacy, except in water of crystal-like clearness,
like that of the Mediterranean or the Caribbean, and periscopes are now
being made to scour the heavens as well as the horizon, so that the
presence of an enemy aeroplane can easily be seen. An attack by an
aeroplane bomb, therefore, can readily be avoided, in view of the
difficulty of hitting such an object from the upper air.
The submarine is the guerrilla of the sea. Its tactics are like those of
the Indian who fights under cover or lies in ambush for his enemy. It is
the weaker party and can hope for success only through strategy. The old
adage that “all is fair in love and war” applies to this new weapon of
destruction as to every warlike instrument. It is its invisibility that
makes the submarine the terror of the seas. This has been well proved
during the European war. The North Sea and the English Channel have been
invaded by German submarines which have made great havoc among merchant
ships. And it is well to draw attention to the fact that submarines are
safe from each other. In no case has a battle taken place between two of
these armed sharks except in the one instance reported of an Austrian
sinking an Italian submarine. But in this case the Italian boat was on
the surface and was at the time practically a surface ship.
During the war the Germans were especially active in the use of the
submarine, and did much in making them an effective terror of the seas.
With no mercantile marine of their own to guard, they had a free field
for attack in the abundant shipping of their foes. The loss of ships was
so numerous and became such a common occurrence that little attention
was finally paid to them except when great loss of life took place, as
in the signal instance of the “Lusitania.”
[Illustration: TYPE OF HIGH SPEED OCEAN-GOING SUBMARINE]
The Voyage of the “Deutschland.”
The great mission of the submarine during the European war was as a
commerce destroyer. Many ships were sunk and many lives, with cargoes of
great value, were lost, and it was not until the summer of 1916 that the
submarine appeared in a new rôle, that of a commerce carrier. On July
9th of that year the people of Baltimore were astounded by the
appearance in their port of a submarine vessel of unusual size and novel
errand. Instead of being a destroyer of merchandise, this new craft was
an unarmed carrier of merchandise. It had crossed the Atlantic on a
voyage of 4,000 miles in extent, laden with dyestuffs to supply the
needs of American weavers.
This new type of vessel, the “Deutschland,” was an undersea craft of 315
feet length and a gross tonnage of 701 tons, its cargo capacity being
more than 1,000 tons. It had crossed the ocean in defiance of the wide
cordon of enemy warships which swarmed over part of its route, and
reached port in safety after a memorable voyage, to the surprise and
interest of the world. Leaving the port of Bremenhaven on June 18th, and
halting at Heligoland for four days to train its crew, it made its way
across the Atlantic in sixteen days. During this voyage it lay for two
hours on the ocean bottom in the English Channel and was submerged in
all not over ninety hours, the remainder of the voyage being made on the
surface.
Its crew, composed of twenty-six men and three officers, found their
novel voyage rather agreeable than otherwise. Supplied with plenty of
good food, a well-selected library, a graphophone with an abundance of
music records, and other means of convenience and enjoyment, their
voyage was more of a holiday then a hardship, and they reached their
transatlantic port none the worse for their hazardous trip. It was not
the longest that had been made. Other submarines had voyaged from German
ports to the eastern limit of the Mediterranean, but it was the most
notable and attracted the widest attention.
[Illustration: THE GERMAN MERCHANT SUBMARINE “DEUTSCHLAND” WHICH CROSSED
THE ATLANTIC IN 1916, AFTER ELUDING THE BRITISH BLOCKADE
_Courtesy of Baltimore American and C. & P. Telephone Co._]
The return voyage promised to be more perilous then the outgoing one. A
fleet of British and French ships gathered around the outlet of
Chesapeake Bay, alert to capture the daring mariners and their ship, if
possible. Ready to leave Baltimore on July 20th, with a return cargo of
gold, nickel and rubber, the captain of the “Deutschland” shrewdly
awaited a favorable opportunity and on August 1st began his voyage,
plunging under sea as he left the American coast-line and easily evading
the line of floating foemen. The return to its home port a success, a
second round-trip voyage was made and completed on December 11th, in the
course of which a convoying tug-boat was rammed and sunk with the loss
of several lives, shortly after leaving New London, Conn. The
“Deutschland” was sent out by private parties, for purely commercial
purposes, not as a military enterprise.
Such is the story of a pioneer enterprise, that of the use of submarine
vessels as commerce carriers. It is one not likely to be supplemented in
times of peace, since surface boats would be cheaper and more available.
But in future wars--if such there are to be--it may point to a future of
advantageous trade.
Submarine Dredging.
Commerce is not the only peaceful mission of the submarine. In 1895 was
organized an association known as the Lake Submarine Company, its
purpose being to use the Lake type of submarine boat for the recovery of
lost treasures from the sea bottom and for other possibilities of
undersea work. This company is still in existence, its various purposes
being to recover sunken ships and their cargoes, to build breakwaters
and other submerged constructions, to aid in submarine tunnel building,
to dredge for gold, to fish for pearls and sponges, and for similar
operations.
The first vessel adapted to these purposes was the “Argonaut,” built by
Simon Lake in 1894. The important feature of this boat was a diver’s
compartment, enabling divers to leave the vessel when submerged, for the
purpose of operating on wrecks or performing other undersea duties. This
vessel and its successors have bottom doors for the use of divers, as
previously stated. They are now used for numerous purposes for which
they are much better adapted then the old system of surface diving, the
sea bottom being under direct observation and within immediate reach.
This sea bottom, in localities near land, is abundantly sown with
wrecks, old and new, and in many cases bearing permanently valuable
cargoes, such as gold and coal. The Lake system greatly simplifies the
work of search for sunken ships, the vessels being able in a few hours’
time to search over regions which would have taken months in the old
method. Many wrecks have been found by these bottom-prowling scouts and
valuable material recovered. Thus vessels laden with coal have been
traced that had been many years under the water and deeply covered with
sand and silt, and their cargoes brought to the surface.
[Illustration: A SEMI-SUBMERSIBLE WRECKING APPARATUS]
The gold-dredging spoken of refers to the working of gold-bearing sands
found at the mouth of certain rivers in Alaska and South America. Places
on the Alaskan coast, laid bare at high tide, are said to have yielded
as much as $12,000 per cubic yard. With the Lake system it is possible
to gather material from such localities to a depth of 150 or more feet,
the material being drawn up by suction pumps into the vessel and its
gold recovered.
Another important application is that of fishing for pearl shells,
sponges and coral. This is blind work when done by divers from the
surface, the returns being largely matters of chance. By aid of
submerged boats, with their powerful electric lights, the work becomes
one of certainty rather than of chance. The recovery of the oyster, clam
and other edible shell-fish is also a feature of the work which the Lake
Company has in view. The present method of dredging is of the “hit or
miss” character, while the submarine method is capable of thorough work.
Vessels have been designed for this purpose with a capacity of gathering
oysters from good ground at the rate of 5,000 bushels per hour. In
regard to submarine engineering, of its many varieties, the Lake system
is likely to be a highly useful aid and assistance.
These particulars are given to show that the submarine vessel is not
wholly an instrument of “frightfulness,” as indicated by its use in war,
but is capable of being made useful for many purposes in peace. Some of
these have here been very briefly stated. With continued practice its
utility will grow, and by its aid the sea bottom up to a certain depth
may become as open to varied operations as is the land surface.