Protecting the British Fleets with Chain-Nets 



No enemy submarine can thread the English 

 Channel without being caught like a fish in a seine 



DISPATCHES from Europe tell re- 

 peatedly that hostile submarines 

 have been caught in nets, but none 

 of them have indicated how it was done. 

 The English fleet is kept in the Orkney 

 Islands, protected by 

 great steel chains 

 woven in the form 

 of simple nets which 

 are not stationary 

 but mobile. If they 

 were anchored so 

 that they could not 

 be moved there is 

 little doubt but that 

 the industrious Ger- 

 man commanders 

 would find some way 

 of getting through 

 occasionally. 



The nets covering 

 the grand fleet are 

 stretched out in great 

 arms from the shores of the Islands, com- 

 pletely covering the fleet. Various types 

 of enemy vessels have come steaming up 

 to these barriers, though of course under- 

 water, in the effort to catch the great fleet 

 happing. Whenever a daring commander 

 has attempted such a coup he has always, 

 so far, found himself not only nosing against 

 a network of great chains but when he 

 turned to run he has found himself in a 

 circular net and doomed. 



The British operations are simple. A 

 sharp lookout, and probably electric look- 



There are a few loopholes in the nets, 

 known to officials only, through which 

 commercial vessels may pass in safety 



outs as well, keep the chain operators in- 

 formed as to what is going on. When an 

 enemy submarine enters the net its presence 

 is soon known and the operators, taking 

 the ends of the chain, draw it together to 

 form a circle. The 

 trap is then sprung. 

 The British wait un- 

 til something hap- 

 pens- — until the sub- 

 marine comes cau- 

 tiously to the sur- 

 face to look about, 

 for there is nothing 

 else that the com- 

 mander can do. Once 

 up he has the choice 

 between destruction 

 by shell or surrender, 

 and to the credit of 

 Germans it must be 

 admitted that very 

 often the commander 

 refuses to surrender, hoping that some 

 means of escape may still lie open. 



The same sort of traps exist in the 

 English Channel, where great chains are 

 spread from the coast of France to the 

 coast of England, with but a very few loop- 

 holes which are known to British officers 

 only, through which commerce may be 

 carried on in safety. Every time a raider 

 or a submarine cargo boat slips out of 

 Germany it takes the northern passage. 

 The channel is impossible to negotiate for 

 any uninformed ship captain and it probably 



A r 



A decoy ship leads a pursuing submarine 

 into a circle of nets which immediately 

 close up around it so that there is no escape 



Once enclosed by the chain of nets, the 

 commander of the intruder faces destruc- 

 tion from the shells or complete surrender 



112 



