. St. Nicholas [serial]. particular part of the job to do, and,like a foot-ball player, has learned to do it just atthe right moment and in the shortest possibletime. Strength is required as well as skill, forone load weighs over half a ton, and must beraised from the handling room to the turret, aheight of forty or fifty feet. During the same period that the ammunitionand gun crews are handling and loading the pow-der and shell, the pointers and trainers are get-ting on the target. This seems almost a super-human task; for the ship, by rolling and pitch-ing, and steaming ahead at the same tim
. St. Nicholas [serial]. particular part of the job to do, and,like a foot-ball player, has learned to do it just atthe right moment and in the shortest possibletime. Strength is required as well as skill, forone load weighs over half a ton, and must beraised from the handling room to the turret, aheight of forty or fifty feet. During the same period that the ammunitionand gun crews are handling and loading the pow-der and shell, the pointers and trainers are get-ting on the target. This seems almost a super-human task; for the ship, by rolling and pitch-ing, and steaming ahead at the same time, isgiven a peculiar zigzag or corkscrew motion,and the target has also had time, while the shellis in flight, to move 100 feet and change its posi-tion vertically ten feet with one wave, and startin the opposite direction on the next. Referenceto the skill of these men means skill in itsbroadest sense. Target-practice, like everything else in this eraof progress, has been a development. Many 774 FOR THE PENNANT [July,. SPLASHES OK THE raph, copyright, by Enrique Mitller. Michigans twelve-inch shells problems had to be solved and all sorts of ob-stacles overcome by long experience, before fourimmense crewless and rudderless target hulkscould be successfully operated at a speed whichwould faithfully represent cruising vessels. It has been but a few years since the targetconsisted of a stationary piece of triangular can-vas, ten feet high, stretched between two masts,and intended only as an aiming point. Observers near the target would note the splashes and calcu-late how many shots would have been hits hadthe targets been 25 feet by 100 feet. Actualholes in this target were not looked for. On a recent practice, an old boatswain on theMichigan, who had served on the Kentucky, toldme how, at her early practices, the latter vesselhad used an island for a target. The island wasinhabited by gulls. If the shot struck anywhere
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Keywords: ., bookauthordodgemar, bookcentury1800, bookdecade1870, bookyear1873
