348 
COMMENDED ESSAY, 1897 . 
Suggested 
improvement ii 
loading 
arrangements^. 
Troposed 
alterations of 
drill. 
teaching a cut and dried system of fire command, which requires endless 
modifications and adaptations to suit the numerous varieties of trace, 
construction, communications, and ammunition supply to be found in 
different works—varieties which are of quite as much importance in 
the question of training men for war as varieties in the armament 
itself, and this should be borne in mind in selecting a fort for practice 
when a company cannot fire from its own. 
Whenever practice takes place all the communications which affect 
the fort or forts involved should be worked. Part of the practice will 
be purely company, or “ fort ” practice, but part of it must be reserved 
for combined practice with other companies and forts ; and this com¬ 
bined practice must include a concentrated fire from several forts at 
one target. It requires considerable practice to readily distinguish 
between the splashes caused bj T simultaneous shots from two or more 
forts when firing at the same target, and in war this uncertainty would 
be increased by the smoke of the enemy’s guns, unless he were using 
smokeless powder. Concentration of fire can often be carried out with 
a towed target, but if there is any risk a drifting or sailing target can be 
used. 
By keeping companies to their own forts both for drill and practice 
there ought to be a great gain both in readiness and rapidity of firing ; 
but rapidity of firing cannot be kept up for any length of time with 
heavy guns owing to the labour involved, which soon wears men out. 
Sailors on board ship are much better off in this respect than gunners 
on shore, because they almost always have the assistance of adequate 
mechanical appliances for bringing the ammunition up to the muzzle or 
breech of the gun, and considering that most of the time taken in 
loading a heavy gun on shore is spent in hoisting the projectile, it is 
somewhat surprising that no steps have been taken to make this opera¬ 
tion easier and quicker. There is a simple contrivance used with 
Krupp’s mountings which might easily be applied to many of our guns 
and would save a vast amount of time in loading. It consists in making 
the head of the loading derrick itself capable of dipping to the gun-floor 
so that the projectile may be attached to it. The derrick is hinged to 
the slide and has a continuation below the hinge. As it dips, this con¬ 
tinuation compresses either the air in a cylinder or a strong spring 
attached to the slide, and when the head is low enough a catch retains 
it in position. For raising the projectile the catch is released, and the 
derrick rises without any difficulty, bringing the projectile to exactly 
the right height for loading. The whole movement is under the control 
of one man by means of a winch handle. The time saved in raising the 
projectile is of course taken up in lowering the derrick, but the latter 
is done during the ramming home and running up, so that there is no 
loss of time on that account. Possibly a counterweight could be 
arranged more easily than an air cylinder or spring ; and even without 
altering our derricks a slight change in the arrangement of the tackle 
could be made so that a counterweight could be raised, whilst the other 
operations of loading and firing were going on, which would in its turn 
serve to raise the projectile for the next round when required. 
But apart from the question of the time taken to load there is no 
doubt that with our present system of fire control the delivery of a 
rapid and accurate fire from a fort requires a very high degree of 
training on the part of all the officers and non-commissioned officers 
and of most of the men. From beginning to end of a practice series 
