Page:Collier's New Encyclopedia v. 09.djvu/502

LEFT TOBPEDO 440 TOBFEDOES ally average about half that weight, with the disk about 30 inches broad. T. hebe- ta7is, more rarely met with, is dark choco- late-brown above, white beneath. They are also called cramp fish and numb fish. A well-known American species is T, oc- cidentalis. TOBPEDO BOATS, small vessels built for speed ajid fitted with tubes for firing torpedoes by either compressed air or gunpowder. They are of two classes: those with powerful engines designed to steal on an enemy under cover of dark- ness, and those which can be used on the surface or submerged to do their work unseen beneath the water. The first torpedo boat was built about 1873, by Thornycroft, of England, for the Nor- wegian Government. This had a speed of 15 knots an hour, which has been raised in subsequent vessels of the kind to over 30 knots. The first of the present class of torpedo boats was built by Thor- nycroft in 1887 for the Spanish Govern- ment. The torpedo boat destroyer does not differ essentially from the torpedo boat, except in its greater speed and its power, owing to its greater weight, to maintain that speed in the face of a considerable sea. Its armament is also heavier and its guns of longer range. In the American-Spanish War, Admiral Cervera had three torpedo boat destroy- ers in his ill-fated squadron and all were destroyed by the American ships, two of them, the "Pluton" and "Furor," at San- tiago, by the converted yacht "Glouces- ter." They form a useful protection to larger ships in battle, and in the World War were employed in great numbers by the combatants. The torpedo boat de- stroyer developed from the torpedo boat. See Submarine Mines and Navigation. TOBPEDO-BOAT DESTBOYEB, a torpedo boat of a most formidable kind, designed for the destruction of ordinary torpedo boats. The destroyers are usual- ly armed with one 12-pounder gun and from three to five 6-pounder guns, be- sides their equipment of torpedoes, and carry a crew of four officers and about 40 men. They are capable of 30 knots an hour, and, as they carry from 70 to 100 tons of coal, can make a voyage of 1,300 to 1,500 miles without recoaling. The World War introduced many im- provements in destroyers. They per- formed invaluable services in naval oper- ations. In the battle of Jutland the German destroyers raised a smoke-screen before the German fleet, which enabled the German admiral to withdraw his ships from immediate danger from Brit- ish guns. See Torpedo Boats. TOBPEDOES. The torpedoes known to modern warfare are all automobile; that is to say, they run by their own power, differing in this respect from pro- jectiles fired from guns, which otherwise they rather closely resemble. And not only do they run by their own power, but they carry a complicated mechanism by which they steer themselves, regulate the depth at which they run, and render themselves harmless after a certain length of time if they fail to hit their mark. Torpedoes of various forms have been known and used for several centuries, but the automobile torpedo of today ia essentially a development of the last fifty years, having been invented about 1870 by an Englishman, Whitehead, who, fail- ing to secure recognition from the British naval authorities, took his invention to Austria, where it was at once adopted. It was slow in making its way in other countries, and even as late as the begin- ning of the World War, in 1914, was regarded in many quarters as of no great practical value. It accomplished nothing in the Spanish-American War of 1898 and little or nothing in the Russo-Japa- nese War of 1904; and even those who had most faith in its possibilities were unprepared for the manifestation of its efficiency given by the Germans in the first months of the World War and there- after. A large part of this efficiency was due, of course, to the remarkable development of the submarine, a develop- ment which at that time had been car- ried much farther in Germany than else- where. But the outstanding feature of the submarine campaign was the thor- oughness with which the two factors — the torpedo and submarine — had been adapted to each other. Both the British and the American navies took the lessons of the war to heart and both have now, a little late, carried both the torpedo and the submarine far beyond the point attained by the German navy at its best. Figure 1 shows the principal features of the torpedo. At the forward end is the ivar-head, A, carrying the explosive charge, 600 pounds of gun-cotton or tri- nitro-toluol. The fuse by which the charge is exploded on striking projects from the nose of the war-head but is rendered inactive until the torpedo is fired by a safety device which is re- leased by pressure of the water. For purposes of drill the war-head is replaced by an exercise-head made of soft metal which collapses when it strikes a hard surface, thus indicating that the target, often the side of a friendly battleship, has been hit.