The Life of Thomas, Lord Cochrane, Tenth Earl of Dundonald, Vol. II

Those extracts from Lord Dundonald's letters to the friend with whom he corresponded most freely will suffice to show in what temper he watched the progress of his inventions during 1844. At the close of the year he hoped that his labours to bring them into general use were now nearly at an end; but in this he was disappointed. The Woolwich authorities, who had at the time expressed their approval of the boilers, sent in an adverse report to the Admiralty, and Lord Dundonald had to wait several months before he could disprove the statements made against them; and opposition of the same sort – the common experience of nearly every inventor – encountered him at every turn, and had again and again to be overcome. His Portsmouth engine continued to work well; but in September, 1845, he learnt that a malicious trick had been resorted to, to prevent its working better. "On a recent examination of the pumps in the well," wrote Mr. Taplin, the engineer, "to our utter astonishment we found, in the middle suction pipe, an elm plug, driven in so tight that we were obliged to bore and cut it out. The plug stopped that suction pipe effectually, and from its appearance must have been there from the time the pumps were first put in motion. As proof of this, we never had such a supply of water as at present." And that is only an illustration of the obstacles, accidental or designed, that occurred to him.

By them, the Janus was delayed for a whole year. She was to have been completed in 1844; but this was not done till the end of 1845. "I have just returned," Lord Dundonald was able to write on the 24th of December, "from a nine days' trip in the Janus, the result of which has been successful, both in regard to the properties of the engines and those of the 'lines' on which she has been constructed. Nothing can exceed the beauty of her passage through the water, without even a ripple, far less the wave which ordinary steamboats occasion." That success, however, was to be followed by a long series of disasters. The weight of the Janus had been miscalculated, and though she could proceed admirably in smooth water, she was found to lie so low that there was constant danger of her being wrecked in rough seas and bad weather. Other faults, incident to the bringing together for the first time of so much new workmanship, were also discovered. She had to be returned to dock, and fresh hindrances of every sort occurred during the two following years; each hindrance being attended by tedious correspondence or controversies with petty functionaries jealous of a stranger's interference, and only eager to bring discredit upon his work. Much discredit did result. Loud complaints were made concerning the waste of public money resulting from Lord Dundonald's experiments, and on him, of course, nearly all the blame was thrown. All this, added to his previous difficulties in securing for his boiler and engine any notice at all, was very grievous to him. Every complaint and every entreaty from him was met by a new excuse and a new reason for delay. "Ten days are always added," he said, in one letter, "and ten days yet are said to be required."

The days became weeks and the weeks months, and still the Janus was incomplete. She was unfinished when Lord Dundonald left England for more than two years in order to fulfil the duties assigned to him as commander-in-chief of the North American and West Indian squadron, and his absence caused a final abandonment of the works.

The tedious process of her construction, however, to which only sufficient reference has here been made to serve as illustration of one phase of Lord Dundonald's life, was attended by many good results. To himself she brought only trouble and expense; but the obstacles thrown in her way and in his did not deter private adventurers from acting upon some of the principles developed in abortive attempts at her completion by public functionaries. Lord Dundonald's inventions – his revolving engine, his screw-propeller, his boiler, and his "lines of ship-building," – have all proved useful in themselves, and have been of yet greater use in their influence upon the improved mechanism of our own generation.

To him must be attributed no slight share in the revolution that has been effected in the materials for naval warfare. Of the superiority of steamers to war-ships, he was one of the first advocates. His own rotatory engine was never extensively adopted, and was superseded by other engines which, lacking the great merit of direct action upon the paddles, that it was his object to attain, had other and greater merits of their own; but in their adoption his great object was realized, seeing that that object was not his own aggrandisement, but the development of the naval strength of England.

CHAPTER XXV

LORD DUNDONALD'S SECRET WAR-PLANS. – HIS CORRESPONDENCE CONCERNING THEM WITH LORD LANSDOWNE, LORD MINTO, LORD HADDINGTON, AND LORD AUCKLAND. – HIS LETTER TO THE "TIMES." – THE REPORT OF A COMMITTEE CONSISTING OF SIR THOMAS HASTINGS, SIR JOHN BURGOYNE, AND LIEUT. – COL. COLQUHOUN UPON THE SECRET WAR-PLANS. – A FRENCH PROJECT FOR NAVAL WARFARE WITH ENGLAND. – LORD DUNDONALD'S OPINION THEREUPON. – HIS VIEWS ON THE DEFENCE OF ENGLAND.

[1833-1848.]

Zealously as the Earl of Dundonald strove through nearly twenty years to perfect and to make generally useful his inventions in connection with steam shipping, he attached yet greater importance to another and an older invention or discovery, which, though its efficacy has been admitted by all to whom it has been explained, has never yet been adopted. This was the device known as his "secret war-plans," for capturing the fleets and forts of an enemy by an altogether novel process, attended by little cost or risk to the assailant, but of terrible effect upon the objects attacked.

These plans were conceived by him in 1811, and in the following year, as he has told in his "Autobiography," he submitted them to the Prince Regent, afterwards King George IV. By the Prince they were referred to a Secret Committee, consisting of the Duke of York, as President, Lord Keith, Lord Exmouth, and the two Congreves; who, on the details being set before them, declared this method of attack to be infallible and irresistible. Lord Dundonald was pledged to secrecy by the Prince Regent, and it was proposed to employ the device in the war still proceeding with France. That proposal, however, was abandoned, and another, for a trial of the plan under Sir Alexander Cochrane in North America, in 1814, was prevented by the Stock Exchange trial. After that, the long peace enjoyed by England would have postponed the experiment, even if Lord Dundonald had not been debarred from pursuit of his calling as an English naval officer. He might have used his secret in Chili, Brazil, and Greece; but his promise to the Prince Regent, and patriotic feelings, that were even more cogent than that promise, restrained him. Once used, it would cease to be a secret; and he resolved that the great advantage that would accrue from the first use should be reserved for his own country.

The project, however, was not forgotten by him. Soon after the accession of King William IV., he explained it to his Majesty, who acknowledged its value, and paid a tribute to Lord Dundonald's honourable conduct in keeping his secret so long and under such strong inducements to an opposite course. Soon afterwards, and during many years, the prospect of another war induced him to engage in frequent correspondence on the subject with various members of the successive Governments.

"I long ago," wrote the Marquis of Lansdowne – then President of the Council – in May, 1834, "communicated the substance of the paper you left with me, on the important objects which might be accomplished by the agency you describe, in an attack upon an hostile marine, to such of my colleagues as I then had an opportunity of seeing, and more particularly to Lord Minto, whom I found in some degree apprized of your views upon this subject. As questions of such importance to the naval interests of the country can only be satisfactorily inquired into by the Admiralty Department of the Government, I should recommend your entering into an unreserved communication with him on the subject, which I know he will receive with all the attention due to your high professional character and experience."

The Earl of Minto gave many proofs of his regard for Lord Dundonald; but he was not disposed to think favourably of the secret war-plan, and it was kept in abeyance for four years more. In the autumn of 1838 Lord Dundonald again pressed its consideration upon Lord Lansdowne, alleging as a reason the warlike attitude of Russia. "I am obliged to you for your letter," wrote Lord Lansdowne in reply, on the 5th of November, "and will certainly make use of the communication it contains in the proper quarter, if the occasion arises, which I sincerely hope it will not. Ambitious and encroaching as Russia is seen and felt to be in all directions, I am confident that her own true policy is to avoid giving just cause for war, and that, busily as she may use all indirect means towards her ends which she thinks she can justify, she will yield to remonstrance when these limits are transgressed by her agents. This is a course, however, which requires to be, and I trust will be, most carefully watched."

In that interesting letter, Lord Lansdowne showed, by his silence, that he was not inclined to investigate the war-plan; and a like indifference was experienced by Lord Dundonald in his repeated efforts, during the ensuing years, to secure its acceptance by the Government. It was submitted to a favoured few, and all to whom it was explained acknowledged its efficacy; but no more than that was done. Its most competent critic was the Duke of Wellington, who recognised the terrible power of the device, although he objected to it on the score that "two could play at that game." "If the people of France shall force their Government to war with England," wrote Lord Dundonald to Lord Minto on the 3rd of August, 1840, "I hope you will do me the favour and justice to reflect on the nature of the opinion you received from the Duke of Wellington in regard to my plans, which is the same as that given to the Prince Regent by Lords Keith and Exmouth and the two Congreves in the year 1811, and that your lordship will perceive, that 'although two can play at the game,' the one who first understands it can alone be successful. In the event of war, I beg to offer my endeavours to place the navy of France under your control, or at once effectually to annihilate it. Were my plans known to the world, I should not be accused of over-rating their powers by the above otherwise extraordinary assertion." Lord Minto's answer was very brief: "I shall bear your offer in mind; but there is not the slightest chance of war."

For the same reason the secret plans were set aside by the Earl of Haddington, who was First Lord of the Admiralty after Lord Minto. He rendered considerable aid to Lord Dundonald in testing his steam-engine and boiler, but considered the fact that England was at peace as a sufficient reason for not discussing the value of a new instrument of war.

Lord Dundonald, however, who knew the value of his invention, thought otherwise. While vast sums of money were being spent at Dover, Portsmouth, and elsewhere upon fortifications and harbours of refuge for trading-vessels, which, in war time, could have no chance of safety against fighting steam ships in the open sea, he deemed it especially important that attention should be paid to a project calculated to effect an entire revolution in the principles and methods of warfare. If his project was feasible, it furnished an instrument by which fortifications and harbours of refuge would be rendered useless, seeing that the most powerful enemy might by it be effectually prevented from coming within reach of those defences, or, if he was allowed to approach them, could use it with a terrible effect, to which the most formidable defences could offer no resistance. It was under this impression that, on the 29th of November, 1845, finding Governments indifferent to his arguments, he addressed a vigorous letter to "The Times."

"Had gunpowder and its adaptation to artillery," he there said, "been discovered and perfected by an individual, and had its wonderful power been privately tested, indisputably proved, and reported to a Government, or to a council of military men, at the period when the battering-ram and cross-bow were chief implements in war, it is probable that the civilians would have treated the author as a wild visionary, and that the professional council, true to the esprit de corps, would have spurned the supposed insult to their superior understanding. Science and the arts, both of peace and war, nevertheless, in despite of all such retarding causes, have advanced, and probably will advance, until effects and consequences accrue which the imagination can scarcely contemplate.

"It is not, however, my intention to intrude observations of an ordinary nature, but to endeavour to rectify an erroneous opinion which appears to prevail, that consequences disastrous to this country may be anticipated from the introduction of steam-ships into maritime warfare. I am desirous of showing that the use of steam-ships of war, though at present available by rival nations, need not necessarily diminish the security of our commerce; that still less need it necessarily endanger our national existence, which appears to be apprehended by those who allege the necessity of devoting millions of money to the defence of our coasts. I contend that there is nothing in the expected new system of naval warfare, through the employment of steam-vessels, that can justify such expensive and derogatory precautions, because there are equally new, and yet secret, means of conquest, which no devices hitherto used in maritime warfare could resist or evade.

"That the like prejudice or incredulity which in all probability would have scouted the invention of gunpowder, if offered to notice under the circumstances above supposed, may exist to a considerable extent in the present case, is extremely likely; yet I do not the less advisedly affirm, that with this all-powerful auxiliary invasion may be rendered impossible, and our commerce secure, by the speedy and effectual destruction of all assemblages of steam-ships, and, if necessary, of all the navies of the whole world, which, for ever after, might be prevented from inconveniently increasing. Away then with the sinister forebodings which have originated the recent devices for protruding through the sterns of sluggish ships of war additional guns for defence in fight! Away with the projected plans of 'protective forts and ports' of cowardly refuge! Let the manly resolution be taken, when occasion shall require, vigorously to attack the enemy, instead of preparing elaborate means of defence. Factitious ports on the margin of the Channel cannot be better protected than those which exist, respecting which I pledge any professional credit I may possess, that whatever hostile force might therein be assembled could be destroyed within the first twenty-four hours favourable for effective operations, in defiance of forts and batteries, mounted with the most powerful ordnance now in use.

"In the capacity of an officer all hope seemed to be precluded, that in time of peace I could render service to my country. A new light, however, has beamed through the cloud, for in the pursuit of my vocation as an amateur engineer it has become apparent that a plan, which I deemed available only in war, may contribute to prevent the naval department from being paralysed by wasteful perversion of its legitimate support. Protective harbours (save as screens from wind and sea) may be likened to nets wherein fishes, seeking to escape, find themselves inextricably entangled; or to the guardian care of a shepherd, who should pen his flock in a fold to secure it from a marching army. No effective protection could be afforded in such ports against a superior naval force equipped for purposes of destruction; whilst their utility as places of refuge from steam privateers is quite disproportioned to their cost – privateers could neither tow off merchant vessels from our shore, nor regain their own, if appropriate measures shall be adopted to intercept them.

"Impressions in favour of so expensive, so despondent, and so inadequate a scheme, can have no better origin than specious reports, emanating from delusive opinions derived from a very limited knowledge of facts. The hasty adoption of such measures, and the voting away the vast sums required to carry them into execution, are evils seriously to be deprecated. It is, therefore, greatly to be desired that those in power should pause before proceeding further in such a course. It behoves them to consider in all its bearings, and in all its consequences, the contemplated system of stationary maritime defence, subject, as that system may become, to the overwhelming influence of the secret plan which I placed in their hands, similar to that which I presented in 1812 to His Royal Highness the Prince Regent, who referred its consideration confidentially to Lord Keith, Lord Exmouth, and the two Congreves, professional and scientific men, by whom it was pronounced to be infallible, under the circumstances detailed in my explanatory statement.

"Thirty-three years is a long time to retain an important secret, especially as I could have used it with effect in defence of my character when cruelly assailed (as I have shown at length in a representation to the Government), and could have practically employed it on various occasions to my private advantage. I have now, however, determined to solicit its well-merited consideration, in the hope, privately, if possible, to prove the comparative inexpedience of an expenditure of some 12,000,000l. or 20,000,000l. sterling for the construction of forts and harbours, instead of applying ample funds at once to remodel and renovate the navy – professionally known to be susceptible of immense improvement – including the removal from its swollen bulk of much that is cumbrous and prejudicial.

"However injudicious it might be thought to divulge my plan, at least until energetically put in execution for an adequate object; yet, if its disclosure is indispensable to enable a just and general estimate to be formed of the merits of the mongrel terraqueous scheme of defence now in contemplation, as compared with the mighty power and protective ubiquity of the floating bulwarks of Britain, I am satisfied that the balance would be greatly in favour of publicity. It would demonstrate that there could be no security in those defences and those asylums, on the construction of which it is proposed to expend so many millions of the public money; it might, therefore, have the effect of preventing such useless expenditure, and of averting the obviously impending danger of future parsimonious naval administration, abandonment of essential measures of nautical improvement, and the national disgrace of maritime degradation – all inseparable from an unnatural hermaphrodite union between a distinguished service, which might still further be immeasurably exalted, and the most extravagant, derogatory, inefficient, and preposterous project that could be devised for the security and protection of an insular, widely-extended, colonial and commercial State."

A few months after that letter had been written, Lord Dundonald's hopes that his secret plans would be accepted by the Government were revived. In 1846, his friend Lord Auckland took office as First Lord of the Admiralty; and by him, with very little delay, it was proposed to submit the plans to the judgment of a competent committee of officers. This was all that Lord Dundonald had asked for, and he gladly accepted the proposal. The officers chosen were Sir Thomas Hastings, then Surveyor General of the Ordnance, Sir J. F. Burgoyne, and Lieutenant-Colonel J. S. Colquhoun. By them the project was carefully considered, and on the 16th of January, 1847, they tendered their official report upon it. "These plans," it was there said, "may be classed under three heads: – 1st. One, on which an opinion may be formed with experiment, for concealing or masking offensive warlike operations; and we consider that, under many particular circumstances, the method of his lordship may be made available as well by land as by sea, and we therefore suggest that a record of this part of Lord Dundonald's plans should be deposited with the Admiralty, to be made use of when, in the judgment of their lordships, the opportunity for employing it may occur. 2nd. One, on which experiments would be required before a satisfactory conclusion could be arrived at. 3rd. Nos. 1 and 2 combined for the purpose of hostile operations. After mature consideration, we have resolved that it is not desirable that any experiment should be made. We assume it to be possible that the plan No. 2 contains power for producing the sweeping destruction the inventor ascribes to it; but it is clear this power could not be retained exclusively by this country, because its first employment would develop both its principle and application. We considered, in the next place, how far the adoption of the proposed secret plans would accord with the feelings and principles of civilized warfare. We are of unanimous opinion that plans Nos. 2 and 3 would not be so. We therefore recommend that, as hitherto, plans Nos. 2 and 3 should remain concealed. We feel that great credit is due to Lord Dundonald for the right feeling which prompted him not to disclose his secret plans, when serving in war as naval commander-in-chief of the forces of other nations, and under many trying circumstances, in the conviction that these plans might eventually be of the highest importance to his own country."

That report was, in the main, highly gratifying to Lord Dundonald. It recognized the efficacy of his plans, and recommended their partial use, at any rate, in time of need. "Permit me to express, as far as I am able," he wrote to Lord Auckland on the 27th of January, "my deep sense of obligation to your lordship in causing my plans of war to be thoroughly investigated by the most competent authorities, and for the extremely kind terms in which you have informed me of the satisfactory result. With regard to their disposal, I submit that it would be advisable to retain them inviolate until a period shall arrive when the use of them may be deemed beneficial to the interests of the country, I have to observe, as to the opinions of the commission, that plans Nos. 2 and 3 would not accord with the principles and feeling of civilized warfare, that the new method resorted to by the French, of firing horizontal shells and carcases, is stated by a commission of scientific and practical men appointed by the French Government to ascertain their effects, to be so formidable that 'it would render impossible the success of any enterprise attempted against their vessels in harbour,' and that, 'for the defence of roadsteads, or for the attack of line-of-battle ships, becalmed or embayed, its effect would be infallible,' – namely, by blowing up or burning our ships, to the probable destruction of the lives of all their crews. I submit that, against such batteries as these, the adoption of my plans Nos. 2 and 3 would be perfectly justifiable."

That the French, not yet forgetful of the injuries inflicted on them in the last great war, and in the frequent wars of previous centuries, were still hoping and planning for an opportunity of retaliation, and that their plans needed to be carefully watched and counteracted, were convictions strongly impressed upon Lord Dundonald in these years; and in 1848 he had a singular verification of them. "I enclose a paper of some consequence," wrote Lord Auckland to him on the 30th of June. "It contains the plan which, in contemplation of war, has been submitted to the French Provisional Government for naval operations. It is, perhaps, little more than the pamphlet of the Prince de Joinville, carried out methodically and in detail, and the writer seems to me to anticipate a far more exclusive playing of the game only on one side than we should allow to be the case; but, nevertheless, such a mode of warfare would be embarrassing and mischievous, and I should like to have from you your views of a counter project to it, and your criticisms upon it."

The report here forwarded to Lord Dundonald by Lord Auckland, entitled "La Puissance Maritime de la France," and designed to show that "une guerre maritime est plus à redouter pour l'Angleterre que pour la France," besides affording curious confirmation of Lord Dundonald's opinions, is a document very memorable in itself. Its main idea was that in naval warfare victory is to be obtained, not by mere numbers, but by superiority in ships and guns. "In the present condition of our marine," said its author, "we must give up fleet-fighting. The English can arm more fleets than we can, and we cannot maintain a war of fleets with England without exposing ourselves to losses as great as those we experienced under the First Empire. Though during twenty years, however, our warfare, as carried on by fleets, was disastrous, that of our cruisers was nearly always successful. By again sending these forth, with instructions not to compromise themselves with an enemy superior to them in numbers, we shall inflict great loss on English commerce. To attack that commerce is to attack the vital principle of England – to strike her to the heart."