Spar torpedoes 1890 handbook - illustrations

[bruce d]

spartorpedoinstr00unit.pdf

[Roger Pellett]

Interesting stuff!

It is amazing that by 1890 anyone would have expected a crew in a small craft to still be able steam up to a major warship and poke it with a spar torpedo.  I guess it’s all about the generals, or in this case admirals, being ready to fight the last war.

 

Roger

[Bob Cleek]

Well, the inside cover of the book bears the name of a "Major Robert S. Meade," and since there were no majors in the Navy, this may explain why "by 1890 anyone would have expected a crew in a small craft to still be able steam up to a major warship and poke it with a spar torpedo."

 

Edited July 2, 2022 by Bob Cleek

[mtaylor]

13 minutes ago, Bob Cleek said:

Well, the inside cover of the book bears the name of a "Major Robert S. Meade," and since there were no majors in the Navy, this may explain why "by 1890 anyone would have expected a crew in a small craft to still be able steam up to a major warship and poke it with a spar torpedo."

 

Ah.... maybe it was for guerilla warfare?  Or for river graft?   Heaven knows what that author was thinking... by perchance did he do instructions on how do a charge by a light brigade?

[BANYAN]

Interesting find Bruce, thanks for sharing.

 

cheers

 

Pat

[wefalck]

Nice find, thanks.

 

This Major Meade was just one previous owner of the book.

 

I own a set of 1894-1902 set of intruction books for torpedo-handling in the Austria-Hungarian Navy in which also one still finds a detailed description of spar-torpedos to be deployed from ships' steam-launches. At the moment I don't have access to my library, so I cannot check what tactical concepts they had in mind. In any case, they would not be effective against the capital warships of the time. One could think of attacking commercial craft or perhaps piers or lock-gates with little anti-torpedo craft defences - a task for which today you would employ underwater demolition teams.