Draft (ship)

“ But, as I am only capable of doing one man's work, and require rest like other weakly mortals, I must tell you plainly that I for one should be very sorry to undertake to work this ship to the English Channel, unless you would guarantee that by dawn this morning we should receive a draft of at least six men out of a passing vessel. ”

“ Old, yet young compared to the ship. Overlooking the ship, on a platform on the very brow of the hill, a long, old-fashioned six-pound gun was mounted on a naval carriage. Back of the gun rose a tall flag-staff, and from the top fluttered night and day a small blue flag with two stars, the ensign of a rear-admiral. There were no masts or spars upon the ship below the hill, of course, but aft from the mouldering taffrail a staff had been erected, and from it flew the stars and stripes, for during the last half of her existence the ship had rejoiced in a crew and a captain! ”

“ Steam tactics, too, were very impressive. The eight battleships would be steaming along in two ordered columns of four ships each. A string of gaily coloured bunting would suddenly appear at the flagship's masthead, to be repeated by the rear-admiral leading the other line. Hardly had the flags blown out clear than every other vessel would be flying a white-and-red 'answering pendant,' meaning 'I have seen and understood.' The flagship's signal would come down with a rush, and after a brief interval of suspense every ship would be swinging round under the influence of her helm. ”

“ She was built with three closed decks, a forecastle, a half-deck, a quarter-deck, and a round-house. She carried in all 102 or 104 guns, and was pierced for thirty guns on the lower, thirty on the main, and twenty-six on the upper deck; the forecastle had twelve, and the half-deck fourteen ports. She also carried ten chasers forward, and as many aft. She was provided with eleven anchors, of which one weighed two tons.
The Royal Sovereign may fairly be taken as representing the commencement of a better school of ship construction. ”

“ Rapidly, yet as steadily as though the crews were merely being put through their sail drill, the heavy folds of canvas were let fall from the yards, sheeted home, and hoisted, the head-yards were braced a-back, and in another minute or two the bows of both craft paid off, and they stood out from the land, close-hauled upon the larboard tack, to rejoin the rest of the fleet, our old ship delivering her port broadside, as the guns were brought to bear, by way of a parting salute. ”

“ It is very sad, but this is war time, and the fleet must be manned.
All day long duty-boats keep going up and down. Now it is an admiral’s twelve-oared barge with the flag at the bows; now a captain’s gig, or a pinnace, pulling between ship and shore; now a midshipman’s boat scurrying off to answer the flagship’s signal. Ships’ long-boats with water-casks and pursers’ stores for various men-of-war in harbour, pass and repass, and beer hoys and yard craft of all kinds. ”

“ The subject of forced draft is of great importance, and, as a corollary of high-speed development, is being studied with keen interest. There are wide differences of opinion not only as to the proper systems, but even as to the value of the principle. ”

“ And although the steamship has a romance and daring of its own—a puny hull that carries forth upon the waters a little flare of flame to wage the old warfare—it was with sails aloft and no wires from shore that a lad then, who had the gift of using the decisive moment, would best find a career. The master of a ship was master in the markets ashore, and there, or afloat, he must be quick to seize fortune as it came. ”

“ She was indeed a proud ship, with the tautest masts and the squarest yards of any ship in the British navy. She carried one hundred and four guns, all of brass—forty-two pounders on the lower-deck; thirty-two on the middle deck; and twenty-four pounders on the quarter-deck, forecastle, poop, and main-deck. ”

“ In all the modern French ships, as well as in the Admiral class, a light steel superstructure of considerable height is built above the level of the belt-deck; the living quarters of the crew and the stations of the auxiliary armament are contained within this light erection, which also surrounds the armored communications from the barbette towers to the magazines. In this manner a ship with a small height of armored freeboard is converted into a high-sided ship for all purposes of ordinary navigation, sea-worthiness, and habitability ”

“ To man our ships in time of war three means are open: voluntary enlistment, draft or impressment, or employment of men enrolled in a naval reserve. It would be unreasonable to depend altogether upon the loyal and unselfish patriotism of necessitous men serving before the mast, and there is a chance that mere enthusiasm would not induce a seaman to join the navy if employment was being offered elsewhere at increasing rates of pay. Impressment under any name is unpopular. In its common form it is illegal, and the draft is ever a last resort and always a dangerous measure. ”

“ THE 'IMPERIEUSE.'
22-ton guns and thicker armour than any of the early ironclads. It is more the service on which they are to be employed than any special form of construction which has put them in the cruiser category. No more ships of this type have been built. In this country the further development of the cruiser has been in the direction of giving up external armour, and devoting all weight we can give to protection to a steel deck for the whole length of the ship, varying in thickness according to her size. ”

“ At the time of our arrival on board neither the captain nor the commander had joined. The first lieutenant was, however, awaiting us on the quarter-deck, and who, with the [5] promptness of an old sailor, allowed no time to be wasted, but proceeded at once with the work of stationing his crew.
At length every man knows his place on the watch-bill, and we hurry off to the lower deck to look after our more private affairs.
It needs not that I enter into a long and dry description of the peculiar construction of our ship, of the guns she carries, or how she is fitted out. ”

“ Their escort consisted of twenty soldiers, eleven voyageurs, and nine frontiersmen. The main craft was a keel boat fifty-five feet long, of light draft, with square-rigged sail and twenty-two oars, and tow-line fastened to the mast pole to track the boat upstream through rapids. An American flag floated from the prow, and behind the flag the universal types of progress everywhere—goods for trade and a swivel-gun. Horses were led alongshore for hunting, and two pirogues—sharp at prow, broad at stern, like a flat-iron or a turtle—glided to the fore of the keel boat. ”

“ Whatever the toleration extended in courts of admiralty to the use, in practice, of words apparently superfluous, the word 'ship' embraces her boats, tackle, apparel, and appurtenances, because part of the ship as a going concern, and, for the same reason, 'ship or vessel of war' includes her armament, search lights, stores,-everything, in short, attached to or on board the ship in aid of her operations. ”

“ That your Royal Highness’s memorialist, on the 28th May, 1807, proposed a plan to build round bows to ships of the line, which gives great additional strength to the ship, more convenience and comfort to the crew, and security in time of action. The superiority of this plan was so apparent that it has been generally introduced in His Majesty’s navy, by directions from the Lords Commissioners of the Admiralty, dated 29th May, 1811. ”

“ The port side of the deck belongs to the other officers. The Captain almost never goes there, although, being the Cap [278] tain, he can go where he pleases. Each officer's room is sacred when the curtain is drawn. And so on through the ship there is a little piece of territory sacred to each man or set of men. The fo'c'stle deck is the men's.
Launch etiquette, however, is peculiar. One of the first things to learn about travelling in a naval launch is that it is a little ship of itself. You salute its deck, so to speak, when you enter it if you observe the niceties. ”

“ Let the captains of the guns try their hands upon her individually, doing their best to cut up her spars and rigging. We want to capture, not to sink her; she is far too fine a ship to be sent to the bottom, therefore spare her hull as much as possible.”
The first lieutenant went down on the main-deck and personally repeated the Captain’s instructions; and before he returned to the quarter-deck the first of our long 24-pounders spoke its message, the shot passing through the stranger’s foresail and narrowly missing the mast. ”

“ As he was speaking, Nettleship came into the berth.
“The captain was sent for on board the flag-ship, and he’s just returned,” he said. “I hear that he met all the captains of the fleet on board, and the admiral told them to set their watches by his timepiece, and directed all the ships to slip or cut their cables at eleven o’clock. The sternmost and leewardmost ships are to get under weigh first, and so on in succession, and we’re to stand on under easy sail, in sight of each other, till we receive further orders from the admiral.” ”

“ If you or any other two or three of the fleet discover any sail at sea to the windward or leeward of the admiral, which the admiral cannot discern, if she be a great ship you shall signify the same by striking or hoisting of your main topsail so often as you conceive the ship to be hundred tons of burthen; and if you discover a small ship you shall give the like signs by striking your fore topsail; but if you discover many ships you shall strike your main topsail often and put out your ensign in the maintop ”

“ This is a new and pleasant boat, almost 6,000 tons and fitted up with every contrivance for mitigating heat. But there are far too many persons on board: nearly 1,200: and as they simply can't breathe between decks, the decks are as crowded as a pilgrim ship's. There are over forty units represented: including drafts from about twenty-eight T.F. battalions. ”

“ The ship was brought to the wind on the starboard tack, a manoeuvre which was followed in succession by the other vessels of the squadron, which had been previously directed to keep, though still within signal, at long distances from each other during the day, closing up at night, in order to spread a broad clew and give greater chance of meeting the enemy.
The young captain paced the quarter-deck alone—no man is ever so much alone among his fellows as the commander of a ship—a prey to his own sad thoughts. ”

“ As regards the Navy, it must revolutionise Naval Tactics for this simple reason—that the present battle formation of ships in a single line presents a target of such a length that the chances are altogether in favour of the Whitehead torpedo hitting some ship in the line even when projected from a distance of several miles. ”

“ The ship, now distant not more than half a mile, came surging on, with her broad expanse of canvas fully distended by the following gale, and straining at the stout spars and tough hemp rigging as though it would tear the very masts themselves out of the hull and come flying down to leeward like cobwebs before a summer breeze; or as though, when the ship rose upon the ridge of a sea, lifting her fore-foot and some forty feet of her keel clear out of the water, she would take flight, and, leaving the sea altogether, soar away upon her canvas pinions like a startled sea-fowl. ”

“ Before we could carry our hawsers to the schooner, the carpenter reported the water up to the orlop-deck, and the ship having bilged forward; we therefore gave up the idea of attempting to heave off, for had we succeeded, the ship must inevitably have foundered. The spare pumps were down the fore hatchway, but the water still increasing upon the gun-deck, rendered all our exertions useless. The officers were unanimous with me in opinion, that nothing could be done to save the ship ”

“ The armored belt extends for three fifths of the length of the ship amidships, ending in armored athwartship bulkheads, which rise to the height of the spar-deck beams. A heavy iron deck prolongs the lower edge of the belt to the bow and stern, protecting the steering-gear aft and forming a support for the ram forward. The guns are all carried on a covered deck, giving a flush spar-deck. The breastworks on the main-deck at the bulkheads form a side protection for the forward and after guns, the corners being cut for angular ports and the side recessed for fore-and-aft fire. ”

“ To most Englishmen of that time any attempt to apply science to shipbuilding must have appeared as far-fetched and grotesque as these practices of the Laputans. Ship design was still an art, veiled in mystery, its votaries guided only by blind lore and groping along an increasingly difficult path by processes of trial and error. ”

“ We midshipmen are upon watch every night for four hours together; we do nothing but walk the quarter-deck, if the ship [Pg 52] is not sailing. There is always half the crew upon deck when the ship is sailing, and we and the lieutenants order them to do so and so about the ropes and sails. All the men’s hammocks are brought upon deck, and laid in places at the side for the purpose, both to give room for the men to work under the decks, and to give them air. All the decks are washed and well scrubbed every morning, which is very right, as they are often dirtied. ”

“ We carried six twelve-pounders and four brass swivels and a plentiful store of small-arms and ammunition. Our ship was five years old, a good sailer, handsomely found in all respects of sails and tackling, so that any prospect we might contemplate of falling in with privateers and such gentry troubled us little; since with a brave ship and nimble heels, high hot hearts, English cannon and jolly British beef for the working of them, the mariner need never doubt that the Lord will own him wherever he may go and whatever he may do. ”