THE BRITISH FLEETS

Dominion, Volume 10, Issue 2959, 23 December 1916, Page 7

THE BRITISH FLEETS

MORE POWERFUL THAN BEFORE THE SCARS 0F JUTLAND VISIT TO THE NEW ZEALAND (From Captain Malcolm Ross, War 'Correspondent with tie New Zealand Forces.) I awoke suddenly in the dim light of eajly morning, and thought I saw a man climbing over the parapet. I rubbed my eyes, and found that it was only my tunic and "slacks," crowued :witli my hat, all on the one peg, 1 and swinging'to tlio motion of a sleeping car on the Highland railway. I raised the blind, and tho sceno upon which I looked was not the broken brown earth and dismembered trees of the Soinrne battlefield. There -were no trenches, and so no parapet over which a man could climb. The trees' were fir trees, and Jio at all like the elms and poplars of Picardv. And the fields, too, were different. They were hemmed with hedges, and black-faced sheep were grazing contentedly in their pastures., .Later wo ran. through wilder scenery, than anything you can find in Northern France. The rivers ran swift and strong, their flanking hills clothed ■with heather. Autumn had already splashed -with her lavish brush the woodland foregrounds, and', to make the contrast the,greater, winter had whitened the background with a thin snow coating. With a whirr a .covey of grouse rose from a late oat-field. We climbed' the jjass' to Culloden Moor, where we picked heather half in bloom and half in eeed.

■That night, I slept in a. great Toom in an inn in the Far North, from which, almost, you can. seo ,tlie comings and goings of .the Grand' Fleet. I liad come, at the invitation of the Admiralty,straight from the battle zone of tlio Somme—by car across miles of Northern France, by boat across tho Channel, by"train through London,'and so on; here; Next morning I was on board a destroyer steaming at thirty knots an hour out to tho Fleet. All this I had done without ■ let or hindrance, oven without discomfort. One thing was clear. The War Lord had not yet reaped tho fruits' of his victory (!), when, in the words of our- Admiral, on May 31, 1916, tho German High Sea. Fleet "was brought to action to the westward of Jutland Bank, off tlio coast of Denmark." • The Creat Crey 1 Fleet. In days of peace one had . seen the Blue Fleofc steaming majestically past the Firth of Forth in the game it had to play with the Red Fleet. That was a wonderful, sight. J It gave ono a .sense of majesty and of enormous pmyor. But all that ono saw then dwindled in comparison with tho Great Grey Fleet as it exists to-day. A glimpse of- tho Grand. Fleet, with all its attendant auxiliaries, is, in spite of the Kaiser's boast, a thrilling sight. It is, of course, a great privilege to see it at all. ; And, the, privilego. is none the less because there is so much about it that cannot bo mentioned. It is the last word—or very near tho last word—in naval' construction and naval gunnery. ....... .

r 'No sooner had wo settled ourselves ill the more 'dr. less sheltered spots available on that part of tho destroyer that is courtesy called a deck than we wero : invited on to' the bridge. Hero la-signalman, with a clattering iron- Venetiair blind that screened a flaming aro light, was already telling the hidden' Fleet all it, needed to'know about us. Ho was not'talking direct to the Flag, but to an intermediary in the shape of a grim. headland. And the headland replied with steely flashes —flashes that made tho daylight pale. With her grey funnels,' blistered by the heat of her hidden oil fires, and her mass of top hamper and gear and guns and tubes that seemed to be piled haphazard 011 board, our destroyer cut a graceful curve in the water, and went racing on through a swirling rip towards the boom that guarded tho Great .Grey ■ Fleet. A • foaming wave .curved from her bow .on either side. Her' speed ,was 'such that, on a calm day you found yourself ( in a strong wind. / . 1 •

Tlio; stern .scenery of the Far North seemed a fitting setting for the scene that was soon to burst upon our gaze. Outside the boom, thousands of fluttering gulls and tern' were making; a breakfast of the'fish that are checked there. There is little other fishing now. The sturdy Highlanders and Islanders who were, wont to sweep the ukieways for the harvest of the sea are dragging bicker nets for bigger fish farther a/ield, and dragging them to some purpose, as the War Lord too well knows. \They are scattered across the seas, of other lands '■<

From the"dim shieling and the misty Island v 'Mountains divide them and a world of

seas; But still Hie blood is strong, the blood ,is Highland, And they, in dreams 'heboid the Hebrides. : - - .

True/it is .not the Hebrides to which we have come, but tho sentiment is the same. Those of them' who remain are quiet, thoughtful, frugal, well-read men. They have few books, but such as they have are good books, and they know .them well. There are men hero who have sent their sons to success in the outermost confines of Empire. , 'I'hey have carved new homes in tho forests of the New Lands, they have made new and successful ventures in Industry and Commerce, and they have been preachers and leaders of the Bar and even Prime Ministers as far away as the Antipodes. ' They make fine sailors, and you-will find them in tlje Fleet on the North Sea, and the Aegean, and in the

trenches in l'icardy and Flanders. You can tell them by their talk and by their strong faces —they are men of the breed. The old Norse words persist lo this day f in their vocabulary. But it is not by these alone that the Fleet is manned. There are in this Great Grey .Fleet alsq the best of the English race. On the quarter-deck of some of the biggest ships to-day you ?an shake hands with direct descendants of Drake and "Grenville. 011 the lower deck you can hold converse with men from the South Devon—men who will tell you that the strange beating in the air that comes to England now on calm days across the Channel is Drake's Drum sounding once more in presage of victory. The Ship and ths Guns. And, so we sweep through the boom, and swing slowly round a promontory that reveals the long lines of tho Great Grey Fleet. It is a glorious morning, with sunlight and a distant haze, and the lanes'and streets of ships fade away between grey water and grey mist. Steaming majestically, through a narrow entrance comes a lino of battleships. Through tho glass you can pick out the huge armour-plated turrets, and tho jutting muzzles of their long guns. Great tripod masts of steel give them an unwonted look. You gaze spellbound as the huge, masses of floating steel come 011 with an enormous sense of power, yet with the ease and grace of a swan swimming in a garden pond. You miss the old straight masts ar/d the heavy old-time _ spars, and some people with an artistic' pose lament their loss, but the modern tripod with its throe thin steel yards crossing a thin steel mast, high above the bridge and, the oval funnels, has a beauty of its own. ■ Not all the poetry has gone with the advent of the age of steel. Since the sixties there have been vast strides made.

.'Noting all this and much more, wo have still time to glance round along the streets and lanes of floating steel upon which we have so suddenly come. Away on the left threo leaden-coloured with the oil and smoke coming from their short, squat' funnels, are already under way. They have seen the oncoming of the big ships, and' liavo marked them as their prey. With wonderful celerity they have got up a high speed, and come racing past us in lino in a welter of foaming sea. Tho water foams up to ■ their hawsepipes and spreads a great white wake famviso behind. Nearing the big ships they turn, manoeuvre again • into line, and pass on. It is a beautiful movement seen in daylight; but it is meant to be a deadly night attack, and long , before tjfo uestToyors. havo i passed tho ' battleships a second time, 0110 or more would have been at tlio bottom of tba sea. - '

Armour plating, the steam turbine, and oil" 'fuel liavo dono much for the ■modern .-ship* of-war. I-boarded 0110 sucTi ship—the latest of the kind—and after hoi- all the other ships seemed l of lesser interest, excepting, of course, those that had on them the honourable soars of the Jutland Battle. One ivatched with fascinated interest the flaming oil of her furnaces far below in a clear, cool atmosphere, woll ventilated, and marvelled at the ponderous case with which her great guns and turrets worked at the behest of ono man. That man, with the pressure of a thumb , and . finger, can send two thousand pounds of forged steel charged with liigir explosivo tearing through the air on to the dock of an enemy ship ten miles away. ' Inside the lrago turret you stand agapo at the almost diabolical nWemonts and the clang and rattlo of machinery "as the great loading tray comes up from tho bowels of tho ship with the enormous'shell, and a clattering, bending chain rammer pushes it home. The propelling charge is sent home moro quickly, the tremendous breach swings easily-on its hinges, pushes its nose into the gun, and locks. Then the gun is fired and more slowly its former position in fll'e liugo mass of metal coines flashing Back with the recoil, only to resume readiness for the whole performance to be repeated again and again. You are standing level; with." tho-'marine artilleryman who is on the gun piairorm, and he, in the intervals , of noiso Trom. this roaring loom of destruction, is carrying 011 a. conversation with you. "I suppose old So-and-So," he says, ,"is still footling about Portsmouth." .'.Than there is a toucli on a lover, and as tlie long barrel of the gun goes skyward he and his iron platform disappear into the dim recesses below. Another touch on the lever and lie comes up. It is your, opportunity to give him his answer before he does Ins disappearing trick again. One' might' write a great deal about the things one saw and heard ini this ship,' but the'writing would never be published—at all events in -war-time. As a junior lieutenant said: "We-are not giving away picture postcards of this ship—nob just yet." The; Man and His Message, .On the flagship .'we were welcomed by _ a-.short; alert man with, a.-' kindly smile on his face and a telescope under, his ann. He is the man at whose bidding the great ■ grey fleet goes out through its gateways: .There is 110 mistaking who he is;. We know him at a glance.' He is the Nelson of to-day, and the whole fleet has a supreme confidence' in his judgment and ability. He is a typically modest sailor; and he would, not, thank me for saying more thaii this about him. At ' luncheon afterwards ive asked him for a message to the Overseas Dominions, and his reply was typical of The man. "You ask mo'for a message to the Dominions," he, said. "Well, all I would say to ! them .is. 'Go on as you have begun.'" _ We left his ship to visit others, and .everywhere there wa? the-same tale of readiness and effieincy. On the Warspite the men pointed to tho honourable wounds of the Jutland fight, and told talcs of the fighting, half of which cannot yet bo published. Healed and patched in the dockyard, these wounds are now scarcely noticeable. The War Lord told his credulous people and, tho people of other nations that he had sent her to the bottom of tho sea. But sho is not one whit the worse for* the War Lord's powder, and at any moment is ready as ever to take .her place in the line wlien the German fleet comes out ajiain. , , A Gift Ship. When the peoplo of the 'farthermost' Dominion gave the battle-cruiser New Zealand to the Navy they'little dreamt that in .a few short years sho would have such battle honours blazoned on her steel. "Heligoland, August, 1914," "Doggor Bank, January, 1915,"' "Jutland, ftlay, 1916," are battle honours that will remain 011. ships of.that name, so long as the Empire stands. At another base in which long lines of ships stretched into the morning mists I found tho Now Zealand. As our destroyer sped up between the linos of battlo cruisers the roar of | British cheering came across tho placid •waters, and looking ahead we saw tho boats' crows of two ships straining at thoir oars in tho finish of a race. New Zealand had won. It. was their'second win that day in a contest between crews of tho Ist Battlo Cruiser Squadron. "Now Zealand" has had giyat luck in being in three battles and' in coming through almost scathlcss. Later in tho day I'boarded her, and noted that sho had tho British ensign painted on her forctop. Sho of all ships therefore cannot strike her colours not that any other ship in the Navy would do so. On her forctop, too, thero is painted the tattooed head of a Maori chief. This is the mascot of tho ship, and to this her sailors attribute her good luck. At tho time of my visit she was being repainted, but tho head of tho chieftain was not touched. "If

it is painted out you can bet your life it will soon bo painted in again," said her commander.

On her deck is a great chunk of steel, placcd so that all may see it. It -was punchcd out of the glacis of one of her turrets by a German shell that came aboard, but did no other damage. It is ;i treasured" memento of, the greatest naval battle in history. i 'The New Zealand's part in the fight, even so far as it can bo told now k is interesting. Tlio Fleet was steaming along on a. normal cruise, 1 and it is quite certain that neither fleet knew that the other was out. The last thing anyone was thinking about was battle. On the New Zealand the officers were at afternoon tea, when suddenly the call came "To Action!" They tuought it rather a bore—the usual battle practico they thought. One lieutenant said: "I'm damned if I go up until I've finished my tea.". But this time it was the real thing, and, by the time ho had gained the deck, two enemy cruisers were reported in sight. Within a few minutes tho action had actually begun, but at very long range. In a few minutes more the Indefatigable was hit by the second salvo from an enemy ship and blew -up. Her picket boat could be seen turning over, and over- in the air five hundred feet up. The New Zealand till then had been firing at the fourth ship in the enemy line. She liad now "to alter her fire to the last ship. Before this she liad fired four or. five salvos, and. had "straddled" hor first opponent. In other words, she had put one short and tho other over, and the chances were that with lier next'she would have hit. When,she.was firing at the last ship •she got very little reply, so presumably she had. got kqr shots on to her right away, but owing to tho haze she could not make certain of this. She was practically firing at the flashes of tho enemy's guns in tho mist, and only occasionally could the ships bo. seen. Eighteen minutes after the Indefatigable blew up those on board the New Zealand saw the Queen Mary disappear.The Tiger plungeu"into her black smoljo, and was in dark,ness for about ten seconds. The New Zealand swerved and passed part of the Queen Mary's hull sticking up out. of water. When tho New Zealand was hit, the piece of steel punched out by the shell fell 011 to the working parts of tho turrent and it was stopped, but only for twenty minutes, and the ship probably fired more rounds than any other ship in the battle. '