ARTILLERY IN COAST DEFENCE. 
405 
guns, in well-constructed batteries; and also from the fact that, with 
modern range and position-findiug instruments, the accuracy of the fire 
of those guns has been enormously increased. This latter advantage 
has not been counterbalanced by any corresponding advance for guns 
afloat; tbe difficulties of finding the range, and of obtaining accurate 
fire from an unsteady gun-platform, having still to be overcome. 
However, even in the days before rifled ordnance, tbe superiority of 
shore guns was recognised, and it used to be laid down that a battery 
of four guns well mounted, should be able to give a good account of a 
120-gun ship; bombardments were attempted and successfully car¬ 
ried out in those days and so may possibly be again. At any rate 
as gunners we are more concerned with the methods by which we may 
hope to successfully resist such an attack, should it occur, than with the 
question of its likelihood ; and by being well prepared to meet it we 
shall render its attempt less probable. 
Should then an enemy decide to seriously engage the forts, it is 
probable that he will bring his ships to as close a range as possible, for 
it is only by coming to close range that he can hope to make good 
practice; and since the fact of bombardment being resorted to pre¬ 
supposes a great superiority in guns, and consequently a large number 
of ships, it will be necessary for them to anchor, as at close range they 
would not have room to manoeuvre. 
At Alexandria the fleet commenced the action at very long ranges 
and in motion, but finding that their fire was not very effective under 
those conditions they anchored, still at considerable ranges; but as a 
matter of fact the damage done to the armament was not heavy, and it 
has been stated that of the guns which were silenced only three could 
not have been remounted in time to renew the action the following 
day; so that, had the defence been determined, it would probably have 
been found necessary to renew the bombardment at a closer range. 
In the American Civil War at the Federal attack of Fort Fisher the 
first bombardment, lasting two days, was a failure in spite of the fact 
that the fleet consisted of some sixty vessels carrying 619 guns, while 
Fort Fisher only mounted 44 guns in all, of which 24 were on the sea 
front. In the second bombardment which lasted four days, the fleet 
came in much nearer, and each vessel was told off to attack a certain 
gun* the range to which from its station was previously ascertained : 
the guns on the land front were completely silenced, 16 being rendered 
hors-de-combat , and the place, after resisting one assault, fell to a second 
assault by an overwhelming force from the land side. Confederate 
accounts state that 50,000 projectiles were thrown into the fort by the 
fleet. 
Every effort should be made to open an effective fire on the fleet 
whilst advancing to take up its positions, as it is during this period 
that the forts will have the advantage over the ships ; and, by a well- 
directed fire, the plans of the enemy may be so deranged as to prevent 
some of the ships reaching their assigned stations; besides which it is 
of importance to draw the fire of ships as early as possible so as to 
exhaust their ammunition, their supply of which must necessarily be 
limited. 
