WAR TRICKS OF PAST DAYS.

Pukekohe & Waiuku Times, Volume 5, Issue 141, 4 February 1916, Page 2 (Supplement)

WAR TRICKS OF PAST DAYS.

INGENUITY IN BATTLE The finest compliment ever paid the slim expedients resorted to by our fore, fathers in war time is the adoption of qutie a number of them in the present struggle. Some of these old-time wiles of war were remarkably ingenious. For instance, it would be considered well night impossible to-day for a 20-ton barque to sink a 1,000-ton warship in the open sea in daylight. Yet this was frequently performed in past centuries, with, to the victim, the most exasperatng simplicity. The little vessel, with a depleted crew, was purposely put across the track of a big adversary, who promptly bore down with the intention of boarding the pigmy and securing it intact. But just as the two ships came together there was a muffled roar, followed by a scamper of the barque's men into a cutter moored at the stern. Almost imediately thereafter both ships were seen to bo rapidly sink'ng. What had happened? Simply a cannon, whose muzz'o was placed hard up against the side of the smaller craft well beneath the water-line, had been fired, tearing a gaping hole through both hulls —ship murder and suicide in one fell blohv.

Another ancient dodge practised with varying success was for a small boat to be noiseless'y rowed with muffled oars, out to an t neniy'.s warship when darkness had fallen.. Towed behind it was a huge cask crammed with explosives and fitted to the side of tiie unsuspecting foe, whereupon the boat crew drew cautiously away, unreeung as they went a long cord which controlled the trigger. When a safe distance had been reached the cord was sharply pulled, and wie betide the ship at the trigger end.

SUBMARINE MEN. Another lrdden danger to which those wooden ships of war were particularly liable was the attention of subinarine men. who, equipped with air helmets, could swim under the surface for several minutes and have enough air left to sustain them while they drilled holes well under their quarry's water-line. Many a mysterious .sinking of some towering warship was afterwards explained thus. Sometimes, by way of variety, the divers carried through the water with them in earthen pots combustibles of the Greek lire order which eoukl not be extinguished by water, and these they threw aflame into open portholes. A few years later, a still more deadly contrivance was introduced, tpiite eclipsing anything that had gone before. This w;;s a simple-looking device, sometimes referred to a-; a catarman, and convsted of two nain/.v planks of wood, each about nine te long, with a cross bar i:i the middle oil which the daring navigator, dressed entirely n black, sat. The weigiit ol his body caused this fr;;il support to sink so low into the water that he was practically submerged, and, unless an enemy knew exactly where to look, it was almost impossible to detei t him at night. As the only means oi' propulsion was a double-bladcd paddle,_ his speed was almost funereal. especially as he was towing behind him a coflinshaped box full to tlse br in with the most powerful explosives available. Screwed to the centre of the box was a clock which exploded the contents whep a given time was reached. Many a good -hip received her death wound in this way, but more frequently something went amiss w'th the man 111 the black clothes. A SCHEME WHICH WENT WRONG. When a famous attempt was made outside Dunkirk to sink the British flagship in this way, the pilot of an explosive coffin found that, .strive as he might, he could make no progress against the tide, whose strength he had miscalculated. Turn'ng round some time later to squint at the clock, he made the hair-raising discovery that in a few minutes it would explode :3Uo'bs. of gunpowder,so without more ado, and small blame to him, he cut his convoy adrift, and the tide arrying ,i aga nsi a rnendly ship it exploded with such remaikable success t'un there was nothing but debris Kit to mark the spot.

When we fought tlio American* a couple of centuries ag<j tin* most extraordinary slim dodges were resorted to, the Americans in particular excelling. A Yankee engineer constructed a new-tangled contr.vance, termed a turt'e boat, hv wlio.se aid lie claimed to lie able to sink the whole British Navy in time. But when an opportunity did arrive the inventor evinced so strong ail antipathy for the job that a daredevil soldier had to be requisit oned. This man was prepared to blow up any. thine, hiniielt included, but alter three attempt■; on H..U.S. Eagle lie only managed to sink a small cutter full or sailors, and then palpab'y by a. mischance. THK " DEVIL-SHIP" OF ANTWEUP. The " Devil-ship" of Antwerp was a much more successful and impies.si\e affair. It was designed by an Hal an engineer, and when finished promised promised to be so tremendously destructive a power that it was resolved to sue it against the great fortified bridge which the Duke of Parma had thrown across the Scheldt, to prevent relief coming to beleaguered Antwerp. This ship, 'I ship ; t could be called, was formed out of two schooners, united together by a olid Inundation oi brickwork and' cement with a great tower of solid masonry, having waHs live feet thick, built on th" top. Into the cXiie-ed cavity formed before the erection i\;h roofed some 'Jl),!)i)Hlbs. oi gunpowder together with iron beams, old anchors. harpoons ( and even tombstones. were put. It was a devil-slip in the strictest sense of the term. At la-t all was ready for fiie great vent m e. and this ponderous twin vessel bore down slowly but surely on its obective in the darkuc-s of a moonless nigh t. II it wa.s detected from the I'oTtilled bridge there, probably, wis imilhiuv left alive to tell, for. timed to a nicety, the powder was fired, ami i:.■ xt moment the surrounding country lor miles iiround w:h rudely shaken and covered w th debris. I'.xplns;ou ■ bio a'id bridge had van shed a> il tln-.v had never existed. It Wa- reco'Vtd licit a foiiibst I'le weighing over I'cWt-. \\ ,'r- (li-eiix Cl'e lin house tno miles :i:i v. I! had come riLiht through the .•; i b'e. faking ha 1 i the wall with it.