Читать книгу The Sea: Its Stirring Story of Adventure, Peril, & Heroism (Vol. 1-4). The History of Sea Voyages, Discovery, Piracy and Maritime Warfare онлайн

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H.M.S. VANGUARD AT SEA.

There is probably no reasonable being in or out of the navy who does not believe that the ironclad is the war-vessel of the immediate future. But that a woeful amount of uncertainty, as thick as the fog in which the Vanguard went down, envelops the subject in many ways, is most certain. The circumstances connected with that great disaster are still in the memory of the public, and were simple and distinct enough. During the last week of August, 1875, the reserve squadron of the Channel Fleet, comprising the Warrior, Achilles, Hector, Iron Duke, and Vanguard, with Vice-Admiral Sir W. Tarleton’s yacht Hawk, had been stationed at Kingstown. At half-past ten on the morning of the 1st of September they got into line for the purpose of proceeding to Queenstown, Cork. Off the Irish lightship, which floats at sea, six miles off Kingstown, the Achilles hoisted her ensign to say farewell—her destination being Liverpool. The sea was moderate, but a fog came on and increased in density every moment. Half an hour after noon, the “look-out” could not distinguish fifty yards ahead, and the officers on the bridge could not see the bowsprit. The ships had been proceeding at the rate of twelve or fourteen knots, but their speed had been reduced when the fog came on, and they were running at not more than half the former speed. The Vanguard watch reported a sail ahead, and the helm was put hard aport to prevent running it down. The Iron Duke was then following close in the wake of the Vanguard, and the action of the latter simply brought them closer, and presented a broadside to the former, which, unaware of any change, had continued her course. The commander of the Iron Duke, Captain Hickley, who was on the bridge at the time, saw the spectre form of the Vanguard through the fog, and ordered his engines to be reversed, but it was too late. The ram of the Iron Duke struck the Vanguard below the armour-plates, on the port side, abreast of the engine-room. The rent made was very large—amounting, as the divers afterwards found, to four feet in width—and the water poured into the hold in torrents. It might be only a matter of minutes before she should go down.53