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g.|j; -he Naval Programme.

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g.|j -he Naval Programme. (IMPORTANT PRONOUNCEMENT BY SIR EDWARD REED, M.P. early a Dozen First Class Men-of-War Totally Unfit for arty a Dozen First Class Men-of-War Battle. In responding for the Naval and Military Hrees at the Chamber of Commerce banquet Cardiff on Wednesday night, ( Sir E. J. REED, M.P., said it was his good fortune to know that, even in the diying a" novel and distracting days of the Otodern Navy, the Naval Service bad not been gv peond wanting' either to their Queen to 0 (Applause.) In representing thi3 ft fr*.a.i maritime town in Parliament, he had |j, tmrer thought himself so entirely an inappro- j} jjpriate representative as some other persona Unconsidered him. He had been accustomed all vi'"the time to think of Cardiff as connected hj in- ly visible, but very efficacious, lines with every r filter port in the world, and he had always felt if that the man who represented this town in [f Parliament without a careful regard to its ft naval greatness would be an insufficient, if not an M: unworthy representative. (Applause.) Some P ,people talked as though we lived in a period R fWhen national dangers had all passe |1 Sway, and when they had nothing t 1 Ijo but sit under their own vines D Sod fig trees, "none daring to make us afraid | ,while the world lasted. (A laugh.) He could B not forget, however, that it was only a century a»ago since the French created a great revolution, C'imd it was le3S than a century that one of the If i greatest conquerors in the world cast his eyes | upon this little country with no indifferent f rejrard, and who, after acquiring Prussia, and Austria, and many other states, would have i deemed it the proudest leaf in his crown of Imperial laurel to have mastered this island, and brought it under the doaainion of his Imperial Will. Why, in former days, were they able to eapture the superior ships of France ? Because those battles allowed one element, by sea and land, which they had always turned to account, Bumaly, the element of time. In the old days the warships, not only could they not sink tium in five minutes, but they could hardly sink ftem at all. They could drive the enemy brought it under the dominion of bis Imperial Will. Why, in former days, were they able to capture the superior ships of France ? Because those battles allowed one element, by sea and land, which they had always turned to account, Bumaly, the element of time. In the old days of the warships, not only could they not sink them in five minutes, but they could hardly sink them at all. They could drive the enemy 5 Mhere, set him on fire, dismember and dismantle I kim, and destroy his crews, but rarely, indeed, did they succeed in sinking him, because his Ships were built of very floating material, not r«nly in the immersed, bat also in the unimmersed Aarts, and many a time, on the sea as on the pand, the English people had been de- feated for a time, but they made the best use ef that time, and succeeded in bringing if konour to their country. If in the past he had ken with seriousness and anxiety about the if kiaval service, they would permit him to say a (that he had an excessive responsibility resting g; flip-on himself. It fell to his lot between the fflUyears 1863 and 1870 to advise the Admiralty as S whether it should or should not abolish the g" jftncient Navy and the ships, which were nothing 3 ^Btore nor less than the improvements extending rough many centuries. He advised the Board jMof Admiralty not to put their trust in S* ships, but to build of iron, because St. £ hey might be made as safe, and would be many times more valuable, than the wooden struc- ji tores of the past. But he declared, upon his jj Jbonour, that if he had foreseen some of the 0" insanities to which successive boards had lent a themselves, he would have given them the ft opposite advice. (Applause.) Not long ago, ft .eniy just before the late Admiral Sir George g "Tryon was made admiral of the Fleet, he sat w Kext to him at dinner in London, and said he did Fttot believe in these new-fangled ships built of iron top-rotect them between the wind and the water, d if he ha.d to hoist his flag to Ajwet an enemy he would rather hoist it on the H^eld Hercules or Sultan. He (Sir Edward) jr mentioned this because he had been told they c øpected him to say something about the s necessity (or alleged necessity) of an increase in the Navy. (Applause.) There was one suffi- r cient reason fer a large and urgent increase in the Navy, and that was the public recognition, at last, of the unfitness for battle of nearly a dozen first-class line of battleships. That was "tào statement he would like to justify. He supposed everyone present was aware that if they made any kind of ordinary iron or steel vessel ,,of light material and pitched it into the water it would float, but if they made holes in it be- neath the water it would sink. But what pros- pect was there of their ships not having holes inade in them ? Well, he was concerned in the construction at this moment of a foreign cruser. (Hear, hear.) It was a vessel without any armour at all, and without pre- tenaiona, but to be a very fast vessel, to do what mischief she could effect under comfortable conditions. (Laughter.) "But that vessel carried two Sin. guns, ten 6in. quick firing guns, twelve 3-pounder guns, ten 1-pounder guns, two guns of something under Ain. in the barrel, and two Gatling guns, and he had no hesitation in saying there that night that .very one of those guns could penetrate the un- armoured ends of ten of their line of battleships, which, being penetrated, must sink. (Hear, Itear.) Let him give them corroboration. The Admiralty had taken this question in hand, and, in reporting on the Victoria, case, had token upon themselves the responsibility of toying to persuade them and this country that these ships were sufficiently safe. Let me give them reasons for doubting their statements. (''Hear, hear," and laughter.) In the first place let him mention Dr. Elgar, who was there during the time of the visit of the naval archi- tects. (Applause.) He was a fellow student and a fellow colleague of his (bir Edward's) for years under Mr. White, the present naval con- structor, and they now stood equally on a scien- tific basis with each other, (Applause.) Moretban that Dr. Elgar was some years ago appointed director ef her Majesty's Dockyards by the Conservative Government, in recognition of his distinguished skill and ability. (Hear, hear.), Dr. Elgar had reviewed the Victoria report. Writing in Nature on December 14, 1893, he (Mud — The foregoing considerations may IUltice to show that we see no sufficient grounds for believing the Admiralty to be right in the Msertien that the absence of an a.rmour belt at the bow had no influence upon the final result of the collision in the ease of the Victoria, still less that an armour HIt could not be made more effective than it now is." (Applause.) He further said, meakiag of the ships he had condemned, and the Admiralty—as he would show them—had condemned, Their names now figure in the Its.. of first-class battleships and make our Navy appear stronger in this class of ships wan it really is. If they were classed according to their real fighting value, the necessity fer adding to the number of battle- ships would appear stronger than it now does to those who cannot judge the relative merits of ahipa." This was a distinct statement of one of the Kiost distinguished naval architects alive-that I those ships were not to be reckoned with the line of battle, and could not fight their battles at sea. (Applause.) He would next quote a Gladstonian admiral—if he was permitted to so call him—Admiral Lord Alcester, who was the naval secretary to the First Lord of the Admiralty, and who after- wards bombarded the fortifications of Alexandra, and was raised to the peerage, and who was a. man who, he knew, would be most hesitating in his condemnation of this kind. (Applause.) What did he say recently? Writing to the Daily Graphic on November 22,1893, he said:- "I would hardlyi care to stake my reputation with some of our 'weak-bowed, unarmoured-end battleships in commission to-day in any fleet I took into action. You may, perhaps, think this a strong thing to say, but it is my deliberate opinion, Why, it is simply preposterous to suppose that the enemy is going to make a target of your protected centre just to suit your convenience." If they defended one-third of the ship with armour and left the two-thirds un- defended, the enemy, who kiiew all about their battleships, would not waste time in attacking the armaured portions, but would concentrate their efforts upon the undefended parts. (Applause.) He had another thing to say, and it was this Since he drew attention to this question of the Victoria, and pointed out that ten other ships were as certain as she was to suffer in the same way, several of these ships had been re-called from public service. (Applause.) The Inflexible, the Duke of York, the Colossus—certainly three or four of them had been brought home, and they—that was to say the great commercial ports of this country were to have them placed at the entrance to their rivers for their defence because, he presumed, they were not fit to defend them elsewhere. (Applause.) He had another fact. The Admiralty in the Victoria case, when they made a defence of the ship—what did they say ? They said that the Victoria only had a minute's notice to close the watertight doors, whereas they ought to have had four minutes' notice, and then the ship would just have floated after the injury — in smooth water that was. But no man ever had four minutes' notice of collisien. (Laughter.) No man could expect or demand four minutes' notice of a collision. (Renewed laughter.) If a man could know four minutes before the time he was going into collision, he would not go into collision—unless he was mad. (Continued laughter.) What bad happened? He said to Sir E. Shuttleworth in the House of Commons, when these reports on the Victory appeared, You have put the question in a new position. You and Lord Spencer and your colleagues at the Admiralty have now guaranteed te this country those ships that I condemned, and you will be the men who will send those seamen to their doom if they go to it after this warning you have had." (Ap- plause.) And, now, what did they read in the newspapers ? The sister ship to the Victoria was the Sans Pareil—a ship stationed in the Mediterranean. She was a flagship. After the loss of the Victoria she was taken into the port of Spezzia to carry the flag of the admiral, although every French officer derided the situation. In the Globe of January 5, 1894, under the heading of Naval Notes," occurred the following:- I have just received the following from the Sans Pareil, which appears to me sufficiently valuable to quote We are still at Malta, and by the work they have got to do I think we shall stop here till next May. They are putting five new watertight bulk- heads into us, but I shall look out all the same for myself if we get a bump, for my opinion is we should do a Victoria.: j Here was the Admiralty itself taking a flagship to the Mediterranean, away from her work, and putting her away in dock for weeks and months for the purpose of adding more bulkbeads and putting her in something like a fit condition to perform what was required of her. (Hear, hear.) Some of their battleships, to which he had re- ferred, were, like the Chinese painted forts, parading the Mediterranean and high seas, while for years past every naval station knew, as he had known, that they were totally unfit for battle, and could only go into it with the certain loss of millions of money and thousands of their men. (Applause.) With this corrobo- ration he thought that, as the representa- tive of a. great commercial seaport, in which the importance of the naval strength of the country must be keenly felt, he thought he should have been justified in doing all he could to bring to an end the present state of things. (Applause.) Prac- tically, they might consider the thing as good as done. (Hear, hear.) They might depend upon it very few more of those condemned vessels would be sent out under the pretext of fighting their battles, and those that were out would be re-catled as soon as they conve- niently could be re-called. (Applause). He was, in this connection, thankful to tell them that the agitation which, he almost single- handed, had kept up for many years past had had this effect, at any rate, of putting an abso- lute end for several years past to the adoption of those unarmoured line of battleships of the country. (Applause.) He had had reflections and imputations cast upon him in Cardiff as being a. man who merely disapproved of the ships because he had not designed them, and because somebody else did. The lowest motives—motives that would be dis- graceful in a rat-had been freely attributed to him, even in that town, but he disclaimed them all—(hear, hear)—and the other day, when public anxiety was being felt about the Navy, he wrote a letter to the Times for the purpose of allaying that anxiety, and shewing that he was just as ready to praise a, good Admiralty ship as he was in condemning a bad one. (Applause.) The unarmoured ship must become the subject of the gun, or ram, or torpedo with greatest quickness, and he challenged the right of any man, be he naval architect, naval officer, or politician, to send a single ironclad ship into battle with English lives on board to which ship he had denied that protection of armour- plating, which was the only way of keeping them proof against the multiplicity of small shot and shell that would be directed against every ship that ventured into action. (Hear, hear.) He was extremeiy indebted to them for allowing him to attend there that night. It was always a plea- sure for him to attend non-political meetings of that kind. (Hear, hear.) During his fourteen years of political contact with the town he had never met a single Conservative who had said an unkind word to his face, and he had met thousands who had shown him the greatest possible kindness. (Applause.)

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