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Further Reading

HMS Royal Sovereign

Captain Cowper Coles, as far back as 1859, maintained that by applying turntables (very similar to those in use on every railway in England) in the center of a ship's deck, a gun of any weight could be turned as easily round the circumference of a circle as one of the heavy express locomotives and tenders, weighing sometimes sixty tons, were turned by three or four men; that instead of the slide of the carriage being detached from the deck, as in an ordinary ship, it could be fixed to the platform of the turn-table, and act as a mere tramway on which the gun-carriage ran in and out. On the edge of and attached to his turn-table he placed a circular shield of iron, which could be increased in weight or thickness, so as always to be proof against any cannon the world's manufacturers could produce. Within it all the combatants or gunners were collected in action.

The decks of such vessels, Captain Coles said, being properly curved or sloped, might be made perfectly proof against the impact of rifled or spherical shot or shell, so as to protect efficiently all the machinery, magazines, and other vulnerable parts of a warship; and lastly, be maintained the great importance of reducing the flat vertical target offered by a ship's side to a minimum quantity, and obtaining height of battery, and what is called freeboard for sea purposes, by curving or sloping the decks upwards towards the central battery.

He argued that, startling as his innovations might appear to those accustomed to sail and fight in men-of-war whose guns were ranged in port-holes along the sides, time would show his system to be sound both in a seaworthy and fighting point of view; that the battery of such ships was invulnerable; and that, although the water might wash over the low side and decks up to the central battery, his vessels would be perfectly safe, far more steady in a seaway, and fight their guns longer than any of the armored broadside ships.

It was not until the 1st April 1862 that the Royal Sovereign, three-decker, was taken in hand to convert into a turret-ship by the dockyard authorities at Portsmouth. The news of the repulse of the ram Merrimac by a turreted ship had just reached England. Not only was the Federal Navy enlightened as to the true value of an ironclad over a wooden war-ship, but likewise as to the inferiority of an ironclad broadside ship compared with a turret one. The Royal Sovereign was cut down some feet too low amidships ; and having got into a mess, on 10th June 1862, Captain. Coles was applied to, and first officially informed of the odd idea entertained at Whitehall of what a turret-ship should be.

In addition to the Royal Sovereign, the Royal Navy commenced to build in Mr. Samuda's yard on the banks of the Thames an ironclad turret-ship, to be called the Prince Albert, in compliment to that accomplished Prince, who was almost the first to appreciate the true value of the invention of the English naval officer. It is remarkable that Captain Coles'a next difficulty was, insisting on his turrets being constructed to carry and fight 12-ton or heavier guns, instead of the ?-ton pop-guns then used in broadside ironclad frigates. Even His Grace the Duke of Somerset, in 1862, having consulted a naval oracle, asserted that it was out of the question to think of working such guns in a turret ; and it was not until 21st November of that year that the inventor carried his point. These were mere smooth-bores, because we were not then sure of the beat mode of rifling them ; but although the 9-inch rifling has long since been decided on, the Royal Sovereign has smooth-bores still.

Within a few years, by 1867, it was clear that Captain Coles was right, and the department at Whitehall wrong. Furthermore, it is probable that instead of 12-ton 9-inch guns only being afloat, navies would before long have 30-ton guns in turrets. But if slow in adopting the central - battery system, 1863-64 saw British arsenals in full swing with ironclad broadside ones; and all the attention and resources of every department were directed to making them more efficient, more capable of carrying heavier cannon, and more fit to carry heavier armor. From long, fast, handsome ships like the Black Prince - from steady platforms like the Achilles - the Royal Navy launched into all the curiosities of naval architecture ; but nothing was done to assist Captain Cowper Coles in improving his designs, or testing his ingenious views.

All 1863 was frittered away in cavilling over the little imperfections exhibited by the American turret-vessels. The Royal Sovereign became what is known as a fancy job in the dockyards, on which workmen were put on and taken off in a way only to be understood by those conversant with the naval dockyard, system, and what is called "appropriation" of expenditure. But even that had to come to an end ; so one day, March 22, 1864, the Duke of Somerset thought it was high time to try a turret-ship, and his private secretary was directed to offer it to Captain Osborn, who had just returned from China and placed his services at the disposal of the Admiralty. That officer gladly accepted the Royal Sovereign ; and although he knew she had been "a fancy job," he very soon discovered that she was not to be "a fancy ship;" and that apart from the civilian rulers of the navy, there was a very general wish implied in the naval quarters that Cowper Coles, the Royal Sovereign, and her captain (who had strenuously supported the turret system) should, in sailor parlance, "go to the devil together."

The Royal Sovereign was of that degree of ugliness which a wooden shipwright delights to produce when working at an ironclad ; and sailors generally suppose that the object in doing so is to frighten them back into wooden fleets. Her captain's heart almost sank as his eye for the first time lighted on England's youthful essay in the turret line. From the old three-decker's ample proportions in the way of beam, the newly-razeed Royal Sovereign resembled a largo washing-tub that had been cut down low indeed; the fore-end was left with that silly overhung look which some sailors, and many ship-builders: to others it always gave an expression of idiocy to a ship, just as a man's face does when it has run all into nose. The captain sighed, but thanked Providence that the Constructor of the Navy had not placed any excrescences under water in the shape of rams, beaks, or bills, and then turned to look at the other end of his ship. It was still more wonderful, for around that Hottentot-Venus-like stern was spread a profuse arrangement in carved fir, elegantly decked out in black and white. "The trophies of war, sir," said a delighted carpenter, who was pleased to recognise the useful purposes to which timber could still be turned in an ironclad. Trophies of war they were indeed! Spoils of the State would have been the more correct.

It was evident the carver's department of her Majesty's dockyard did not intend turret-ships to exist without their services. But to show they had no prejudices against wood, when applied in so harmless a way, the in-ventor and captain, with the wisdom of serpents, suggested that to balance all the wooden drums and guns, fifes and pikes, banners and bayonets smeared over the stern, and a gorgeous wooden lion should be stuck on the stem. It would render the beauty of the Royal Sovereign perfect and unique. idea was gratefully seized upon; no sheets of foolscap or red sealing-wax were necessary. The thing was done, and remains unto this day, a proof that advocates of armored ships know exactly when and how to propitiate the wooden interest, A truce, however, to badinage.

There was, beauty apart, something very formidable in the five enormous guns which peered out of the low turrets, and sweep the was so long the type of beauty wide and unprotected deck. There with were four of these turrets, rising like castles about five feet high along the center line of the ship, Each of the three after-turrets carried a single 12-ton gun, but the foremost turret was a double-gun one, containing two 12-ton guns, parallel to each other, just as a double-barrelled gun would, Now, as the double-gun turret only weighed 160 tons, and the single- gun turrets each weighed 150 tons, it was evident, as the inventor explained, that, provided the guns equally well in both, though double-barrelled turrets were the ones for ships where weight was an object. For instance, three double-gun turrets in the Royal Sovereign would have given her six guns in the stead of five, and 112 tons less weight to carry, with more room on the upper and lower decks.

Below, everything was in a more unfinished state than is usually customary in a man-of-war. There was, however, plenty of room, good term; ventilation, and many mechanical novelties, such as steam-capstans and steam-pumps, calculated to make the ship all the more efficient and formidable as a warship. To make her a success - to make her win - was her captain's as well as inventor's determination, that resolution carried them over many disappointments and many obstacles, on which it is unnecessary to dwell.

On July 5th the pendant was hoisted on board the Royal Sovereign, with a crew of 296 men. There was no one point on which the fighting capacity of the ship had not exceeded the anticipations of her officers. In short, there was no want of turret advocates on board the Royal Sovereign. An order came down on the 1st October ordering the ship to be paid off with "tho utmost despatch," the crew to be distributed into the Victory and Achilles, and the vessel handed over to tho Reserve at Portsmouth. The order was obeyed forthwith; and after having been eighty-seven days together, the crew were dispersed, wondering what crime they or their officers had committed.