Armoured Vehicles.

Waimate Daily Advertiser, Volume II, Issue 103, 1 February 1900, Page 1

Armoured Vehicles.

It is just 17 years since the armoured train appeared as a factor in warfare, and ?bt that time it received as much ridicule as, would probably bo heaped upon any other armoured vehicle at the present day. In 1882, Admiral, then C:ipt»in, Fisher, of the Inilexible, extemporised an armoured train with sand-bags and boiler-plates, and found it an efficient weapon against the Arabs. Even before this the idea had b^en spoken of in a more or less practical manner. When first steam was used for motive purposes, men's minds seem to have pictuied iron mon&ters that would create havoc on the battle-field. It was at first thought likely that steam locomotives would to a great extent, take the place of cavalry. These machines, whose wheels were to be equipped with scythes, alter the manner of Boadicea's chariots, were to crash through the ranks of the enemy, mowing down those who stood in their path, while a fuither refinement provide^ for the emission of noxious vapours to suffocate those who escaped the rotating 1 wheels. But these terrible engines of destruction got no further than the pages of one of Jules Verne's novels where they assumed the shape of a kind of bomb-proof elephant. In LS47, Mr James Anderson, of Edinburgh, prepared and patented some ideas in this connection, and submitted a wot king model for the inspection of distinguished engineeis and artillery officers, but failing to obtain adequate support, he abandoned his hobby. Since 1882 the armoured train has made little progress. The question is not one of speed so much as invulnerability. To secure the latter desideratum, goods engines of the most powerful description are needed. If the train is a long one, and if it moves slowly, it will assured'y be captured unless it has an effective garrison. The great drawback, of course, is the fact that the line of railway may be broken at any time, either in front of the train or behind it, and its retreat may be cut off without ranch trouble. A handful of cavalry, with a trifle ot guncotton, could make a railway impracticable. In regard to the suggestion that motorcars would be a good substitute in some places, it is pointed out that even they must have rly good roads to work -> n and once they are within reach of artillery fire, things are not likely to go well with them. As to armoured traction engines, they have hardly yet come within the region of practical military operations.

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