164 Testing the Value of Guns hy Firing under Water. 

 XVII. — Testing the Value of Guns Tjy Firing under Water. 



BY HENRY A. MOTT, JR., PH. D., E. M. 

 Read May 13th, 1878. 



While investigating the force of explosives under water, 

 with the object of perfecting a counter- torpedo for Count 

 Kolowrat, my attention was directed by Mr. Julius H. Stried- 

 inger, the well-known civil engineer, to some experiments 

 conducted by Maj. Gen. Uchatius,* in Austria, in regard to 

 firing unde* water. 



Uchatius, when reading in Jules Yerne's " Twenty Thou- 

 sand Leagues under the Sea," how Captain Nemo, with his in- 

 voluntary guests, sheltered in a diving-bell, devoted himself to 

 the pleasures of hunting, and how with a pneumatic gun, at a 

 depth of 10 meters, he shot an albatross while flying a meter 

 above the surface of the sea, asked himself the question, — Is it 

 possible, as a general thing, to shoot underwater? And, if it 

 be so, why are not divers provided with fire-arms for defense 

 against large fishes ? It is known, says Uchatius, that fishes, 

 if they are not too deep under the surface of the water, can be 

 shot from the land or from boats. But it is also known that 

 the covering of a war-ship reaches at the most only 2 or 3 

 meters under the surface of the water, and below this depth 

 the ship is considered invulnerable for the greatest hostile 

 shots ; since the latter can strike only under an angle of 

 20 to 30 degrees, and, consequently, before their contact with 

 the unprotected part of the ship, must have passed through 

 from 6 to 8 meters of water. 



The subject appeared sufficiently interesting to Uchatius to 

 prompt him to conduct a series of experiments. 



Under a raft built of timber, he fastened a rejected Austrian 

 service rifle, by means of iron spans, so that when the raft 

 floated on the water, the gun was held from 0.5m. under the 

 water in a horizontal position. The discharge was effected 



* Mittheilungen uber Gegenstande dea Artillerie-und-Geuie-Wesens, Vol. XIII, n. 54-53. 



