{"id":1751740,"date":"2022-11-26T06:30:27","date_gmt":"2022-11-26T11:30:27","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/?p=1751740"},"modified":"2022-11-26T07:03:52","modified_gmt":"2022-11-26T12:03:52","slug":"the-worlds-first-torpedo-strike","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/the-worlds-first-torpedo-strike\/","title":{"rendered":"The World\u2019s First Torpedo Strike"},"content":{"rendered":"<aside class=\"mashsb-container mashsb-main mashsb-stretched\"><div class=\"mashsb-box\"><div class=\"mashsb-count mash-medium\" style=\"&quot;\"><div class=\"counts mashsbcount\">10<\/div><span class=\"mashsb-sharetext\">SHARES<\/span><\/div><div class=\"mashsb-buttons\"><a class=\"mashicon-facebook mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/sharer.php?u=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.conservativenewsdaily.net%2Fbreaking-news%2Fthe-worlds-first-torpedo-strike%2F\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Facebook<\/span><\/a><a class=\"mashicon-twitter mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/intent\/tweet?text=&amp;url=https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/?p=1751740&amp;via=ConservNewsDly\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Twitter<\/span><\/a><a class=\"mashicon-subscribe mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"#\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Subscribe<\/span><\/a><div class=\"onoffswitch2 mash-medium mashsb-noshadow\" style=\"display:none\"><\/div><\/div>\n            <\/div>\n                <div style=\"clear:both\"><\/div><\/aside>\n            <!-- Share buttons by mashshare.net - Version: 4.0.47--><div><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/11\/Wildenberg-NH-ND-2220120hero.jpg\" class=\"ff-og-image-inserted\" alt=\"image\" \/><\/div>\n<p>In 1900, the first submarines were commissioned in two of the world\u2019s navies. Serious students of American naval history are familiar with the USS <em>Holland <\/em>(SS-1), which entered service on 12 October 1900. As her first commanding officer noted: \u201cThe submarine problem, which had beset experts for a century, had at last come within the field of practical and successful application.\u201d<sup>1<\/sup> Over the years, many writers have characterized the invention of the submarine as \u201ca product of American ingenuity.\u201d<sup>2<\/sup> The <em>Holland<\/em>, however, was not the first submarine to be commissioned as a naval warship. Before she entered service, both the <em>Morse<\/em> and <em>Gustave Z\u00e9d\u00e9<\/em> already had been commissioned in the French Navy.<\/p>\n<p>Like the <em>Holland<\/em>, whose design was perfected from a series of experimental undersea craft engineered by its creator, John P. Holland, the <em>Gustave Z\u00e9d\u00e9 <\/em>(laid down and launched before the <em>Morse<\/em>) evolved from a number of experimental undersea boats beginning with the <em>Plongeur<\/em>, launched in 1863.<sup>3<\/sup> The <em>Plongeur <\/em>was designed by Captain Sim\u00e9on Bourgeois and naval constructor Charles Brun in response to a request from the <em>Conseil des Travaux<\/em> (Construction Board of the Ministry of Marine) for designs for a submarine. She used compressed air stored in tanks to run an air-powered reciprocating engine, making her the first submarine to run on mechanical power instead of manpower.<\/p>\n<p>That compressed air also served to clear out the ballast tanks. Stability issues stemming from her length, according to one authority, limited the depth of her dives to 33 feet.<sup>4 <\/sup>Pumps were added to provide a counterbalance to the tilt, but they proved too slow to be effective. The <em>Plongeur<\/em> was displayed at the 1867 <em>Exposition Universelle<\/em>, where she came to the attention of author Jules Verne, who ended up using her as the conceptual basis for the fictional Captain Nemo\u2019s <em>Nautilus<\/em> in the classic <em>Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea<\/em>.<\/p>\n<figure role=\"group\" class=\"align-center\"><figcaption>Launched in June 1893, the 159-foot Gustave Z\u00e9d\u00e9 was destined to blaze new trails in the nascent days of submarine power\u2014but not until a host of improvements saved her from an early relegation to the scrap heap.\u00a0Alamy\u00a0<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p>Further testing of the <em>Plongeur<\/em> after her electrically fired spar torpedo was removed did not improve her performance, and her use as a submarine was discontinued on 2 February 1872.<sup>5<\/sup> Sixteen years would pass before the French Navy renewed its interest in submarines.<\/p>\n<h4><strong>New Technologies, New Possibilities<\/strong><\/h4>\n<p>In the late 19th century, the French Navy believed it had only one viable adversary, the Royal Navy.<sup>6<\/sup> To counter the British fleet, the French established a new school of naval thought known as the <em>jeune \u00e9cole<\/em> (young school). A key tenet of the <em>jeune \u00e9cole<\/em> was the principle that the less-powerful opponent should take advantage of new technological advances and the tactical and strategic options they promised. For those who adhered to the theories of the <em>jeune \u00e9cole<\/em>, the advent of steam and self-propelled torpedoes were regarded as \u201ctechnological leaps opening new opportunities for an inferior navy.\u201d<sup>7<\/sup><\/p>\n<p>In line with these concepts, Admiral Hyacinthe Laurent Th\u00e9ophile Aube, who became Minister of Marine in 1886, initiated sea trials to test the seaworthiness of small torpedo boats, followed by maneuvers pitting torpedo boats against battleships.<sup>8<\/sup> Aube also ordered an experimental submarine to be built, designed by Gustave Z\u00e9d\u00e9. Z\u00e9d\u00e9, who had served as the deputy director of marine equipment at the Ministry of Marine, based the new submarine\u2019s design on plans developed by French naval architect and aeronautical inventor Charles Henri Laurent Dupuy de L\u00f4me, who had died the previous year.<sup>9<\/sup> In a note from the <em>Acad\u00e9mie des Sciences <\/em>meeting of 5 April 1886, Z\u00e9d\u00e9 wrote:<\/p>\n<blockquote>\n<figure role=\"group\" class=\"align-right\"><figcaption>The visionary Admiral Hyacinthe Laurent Th\u00e9ophile Aube, France\u2019s Minister of Marine, adhered to the tech-savvy-underdog tenets of the jeune \u00e9cole philosophy; he thus ordered the construction of an experimental submarine designed by naval architect Gustave Z\u00e9d\u00e9. Alamy<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p>The question of submarine ships is being studied everywhere today, and at the Academy we will certainly learn with interest that my late master and friend Dupuy de L\u00f4me had found a simple and practical solution. He often told me that the issue of aerostats and that of submarine boats were intimately linked and that, the day the first was resolved, the second would be very close to being resolved. Indeed, the capital point seemed to him, in both cases, to imagine a powerful and light engine . . . When he learned of the success of the Meudon balloon thanks to its electric motor, he said to me: \u201cWe will now resume the study of the submarine boat.\u201d<sup>10<\/sup><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n<p>In October 1887, Z\u00e9d\u00e9 submitted plans to Admiral Aube for his approval for the <em>Gymnote<\/em>, an experimental submarine that was 59 feet long and 6 feet in diameter, with a displacement of 30 tons.<sup>11<\/sup> The boat was built under the supervision of Gaston Romazotti, first-class assistant engineer of marine, at the Mourillon dockyard in Toulon. Her hull, shaped similarly to a Whitehead torpedo, was constructed of steel. The submarine\u2019s buoyancy was adjusted using forward and aft ballast tanks that were filled or emptied by an electrically driven pump or from a compressed air system. She was propelled by a single four-bladed screw 4.8 feet in diameter driven by a 55-horsepower electric motor, powered by an 11-ton battery.<sup>12<\/sup> A telescopic conning tower was provided for observation on the surface and an optical tube for use below. The <em>Gymnote<\/em> also was equipped with a rudimentary periscope (of questionable value) that may have been installed after the boat was launched on 15 September 1888.<sup>13<\/sup><\/p>\n<p>Testing of the <em>Gymnote<\/em>, which began at Toulon in November 1888, revealed numerous problems that required extensive modifications, in particular to the diving planes, and the removal or replacement of equipment, including the removal of the telescopic conning tower and the replacement of the electric motor and battery.<sup>14<\/sup><\/p>\n<figure role=\"group\" class=\"align-right\"><figcaption>Gustave Z\u00e9d\u00e9\u2019s prototype boat, the 59-foot Gymnote, was launched in September 1888.\u00a0 Z\u00e9d\u00e9 would not live to see his follow-up submarine completed; she would be named in his honor. Public Domain<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p>The <em>Gymnote<\/em> was attached to the <em>Defense Mobile<\/em> of Toulon during the spring and summer of 1890 to participate in various military exercises.<sup>15<\/sup> In August 1890, a test was conducted to see whether the boat could escape from and reenter a harbor clocked by torpedo boats that were on the lookout for her. The boat was submerged for 40 minutes and surfaced two and a half miles beyond the torpedo boats without being detected. On the return trip she passed immediately under one of the torpedo boats, and, although seen for an instant, was not pursued. The French Ministry of Marine considered these tests sufficiently successful to warrant the building of another submarine similar to but larger than the <em>Gymnote<\/em>\u2014the <em>Sir\u00e8ne<\/em>, ordered in October 1890. Gaston Romazotti took over to the project after Z\u00e9d\u00e9 died on 26 April 1891, from an explosion that occurred while he was testing the propulsion system for a new torpedo.<sup>16<\/sup> On 1 May 1891, the <em>Sir\u00e8ne<\/em> was renamed the <em>Gustave Z\u00e9d\u00e9<\/em> to honor the man who had contributed the design of the first French submarine.<sup>17<\/sup><\/p>\n<h4><strong>Shattered Hopes, Then Great Success<\/strong><\/h4>\n<p>Launched on 1 June 1893, the <em>Gustave Z\u00e9d\u00e9<\/em> was 159 feet long and 12.4 feet in diameter; she displaced 266 tons when submerged.<sup>18<\/sup> Her hull was constructed of Roma metal, a malleable bronze alloy adopted by the French Navy for screws, torpedo tubes, plates, and rivets, because of its high strength and resistance to seawater corrosion.<sup>19<\/sup> She was fitted with a single screw, driven by two 360-horsepower motors, fed by a lead-chloride battery weighing 130 tons furnishing 1,800 amps of electricity under 300 volts.<sup>20<\/sup><\/p>\n<figure role=\"group\" class=\"align-right\"><figcaption>Crowds line the Marseille waterfront to cheer on the Gustave Z\u00e9d\u00e9, hailed by the French public as a potential great equalizer between France\u2019s fleet and the dominant Royal Navy. Alamy<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p>Diving and steering were managed on the same principle as that employed in the <em>Gymnote<\/em>. The <em>Gustave Z\u00e9d\u00e9<\/em>\u2019s armament consisted of a single bow-mounted torpedo tube and three 18-inch Whitehead torpedoes, one of which was carried in the torpedo tube. The battery, composed of 720 Laurent Cely cells, had so many defects that it had to be replaced before the boat put to sea. When a new battery was installed, the charging current was so strong \u201cthat the stern of the submarine was almost blown to pieces,\u201d necessitating the elimination of half of the battery cells and reducing her design speed from 15 to 8 knots.<sup>21<\/sup><\/p>\n<p>It took 18 months to correct the foregoing problems before the <em>Gustave Z\u00e9d\u00e9<\/em> was ready to go to sea to conduct preliminary trials of what was then the largest submarine in the world. \u201cBut after her first trip,\u201d as one knowledgeable author wrote, \u201cany remaining faith in her possessed by the French nation was shattered, and it was only by chance that the <em>Gustave Z\u00e9d\u00e9<\/em> was not on the scrap heap.\u201d<sup>22<\/sup><\/p>\n<p>Her performance was so bad that the following changes had to be made: The battery elements were removed and replaced, the canvas conning tower was removed and a metal tower substituted, the pumps regulating the water ballast were modified, and a new system of diving rudders was affixed, bringing the total number to six\u2014two forward, two in the center, and two in the stem. Trials began again with the new systems installed.<\/p>\n<p>To everyone\u2019s surprise, the modifications proved highly successful, providing almost perfect stability and increasing the surface speed to 12 knots. Although much improved, not all of problems that had beset the <em>Gustave Z\u00e9d\u00e9<\/em> had been corrected. The Sautter-Harle periscope that was fitted to the metal conning tower, for example, remained practically useless because of the fuzzy and distorted image it produced, requiring the submarine to surface periodically to verify her position.<sup>23<\/sup><\/p>\n<h4><strong>\u2018Approaching Us with Lightning Speed\u2019<\/strong><\/h4>\n<p>On 18 November 1898, French Minister of Marine Edouard Etienne Antoine Lockroy charged the commanding officer of the <em>Gustave Z\u00e9d\u00e9<\/em>, Lieutenant Lucian Mottez, with finding ways to demonstrate the military value of the boat during forthcoming exercises with the Mediterranean Fleet.<sup>24<\/sup> In the first week of December, Mottez sailed unaided from Toulon to the Iles d\u2019Hy\u00e8res, a distance of 41 miles, to participate in the naval maneuver taking place in the vicinity.<\/p>\n<figure role=\"group\" class=\"align-center\"><figcaption>The Gustave Z\u00e9d\u00e9 made history with the first submarine torpedo strike against an underway warship, the ironclad Magenta (left); had the test-torpedo carried an actual charge, \u201cthe Magenta would have been sunk.\u201d The pioneering submarine soon proved her mettle again, scoring a hit on the Charles Martel (right); the battleship\u2019s light guns subsequently gave the boat a resounding salute. left: public domain; right: courtesy of the author<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p>During the exercises that followed, the <em>Gustave Z\u00e9d\u00e9<\/em> torpedoed the ironclad battleship <em>Magenta<\/em> twice\u2014the first time when the battleship was at anchor, the second while she was under way. Edouard Lockroy\u2019s description of the event\u2014he was on board the <em>Magenta<\/em> at the time\u2014appeared in the Paris newspaper <em>Le Matin<\/em> and was republished around the world:<\/p>\n<p>The eyes of all on board were fixed on the sea. Officers and men stood watching the crest of the waves, and every minute there were exclamations as someone fancied he had seen the submarine boat. We imagined we saw it everywhere, and it was nowhere. . . . Suddenly a precise and exact observation was made. The cupola of the <em>Gustave Z\u00e9d\u00e9<\/em> had just appeared 400 yards away still abreast of us, notwithstanding the distance we had covered. Immediately orders were issued. The guns were brought to bear upon her and the quick-firers were depressed in her direction. But this submarine boat was no longer there. She had avoided our fire and was hidden from our view. A minute elapsed. Though orders were given to engineers to put on steam, and the <em>Magenta<\/em> had gone some considerable distance in these 60 seconds, the Admiral and I, leaning over the railing of the bridge, saw approaching us with lightning speed an elongated body shining like gold. It struck the ship about four yards below the water-line, and was smashed on the iron armor; had it been charged the <em>Magenta<\/em> would have been sunk.<sup>25<\/sup><\/p>\n<p>As naval historian Nicholas Lambert noted: \u201cThe significance of this achievement was enormous. The submarine had demonstrated for the first time that it was no longer and engineer\u2019s toy but capable of performing deadly acts of war.\u201d<sup>26<\/sup><\/p>\n<p>More striking proof of the submarine\u2019s danger to the world\u2019s battle fleets took place during the naval maneuvers of 1901. On 2 July, the <em>Gustave Z\u00e9d\u00e9<\/em> sailed from Toulon, arriving in the vicinity of Ajaccio Harbor, a distance of 175 miles, on 5 July. She entered the harbor and submerged to await the departure of Admiral Edgard de Maigret\u2019s squadron of battleships.<sup>27<\/sup> As the battleships were leaving the harbor, the <em>Gustave Z\u00e9d\u00e9<\/em> launched a dummy Whitehead torpedo that struck the <em>Charles Martel<\/em> below the waterline. The submarine surfaced a few minutes afterwards and was saluted by the light guns of the <em>Charles Martel<\/em>. On 6 July, the French press, aglow with the feat of the <em>Gustave Z\u00e9d\u00e9<\/em>, declared that France\u2019s submarine boats would make its navy the strongest in the world.<sup>28<\/sup> By then, the French navy had four submarines in service and ten more on order.<\/p>\n<p>The threat to the Royal Navy, then the most powerful in the world, did not go unnoticed. In February 1900, Admiral Sir John Fisher, commander-in-chief of Britain\u2019s Mediterranean Fleet, contacted the Admiralty with an urgent request for advice on how best to protect warships at anchor from the threat of submarine attack.<sup>29<\/sup> By then the Admiralty, after having dismissed the <em>Gustave Z\u00e9d\u00e9<\/em> as a failure, was being flooded with reports indicating that submarine development was rapidly progressing. It was not until the Admiralty learned of the American decision to purchase John Holland\u2019s submarine, however, that the Royal Navy, which had no experience building submarines, was given permission to buy a Holland torpedo boat.<sup>30<\/sup> Built under license by the Vickers company, the first Royal Navy submarine, the <em>Holland 1<\/em>, was launched on 2 October 1901.\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>In 1900, the first submarines were commissioned in two of the world\u2019s navies. Serious students of American naval history are familiar with the USS Holland (SS-1), which entered service on<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":1751743,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_mo_disable_npp":"","fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/cndimages.nyc3.digitaloceanspaces.com\/breaking-news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/01\/IMG_2758-scaled-1.jpg","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[547],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1751740","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-the-bongino-report"],"fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/cndimages.nyc3.digitaloceanspaces.com\/breaking-news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/01\/IMG_2758-scaled-1.jpg","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1751740","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1751740"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1751740\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1751743"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1751740"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1751740"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1751740"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}