FOR TEN TEARS A TARGET.

Otago Witness, Issue 2302, 14 April 1898, Page 49

FOR TEN TEARS A TARGET.

What the Old Resistance has Undergone.

An interesting commentary for the naval historian,- a marvel to the privileged sightseer, and a veritable object lesson to the chronicler of modern sea fights, is the old Resistance, now lying in Portsmouth Harbour.

Though never in a hostile engagement, yet fiom stem to stero, from top-sides to keel, this vessel is riddled, indented, and otherwise disfigured by modern engines of war. She has-been a passive victim, a vicarious offering on tb.e altar of naval science, and her gaping wounds point eloquently the moral of international arbitration. ONE OS THE" FIRST IRON BATTLESHIPS.

H.M.S. Resistance, 6270 tone, one of the earliest of iron-built and armoured- battle-ships,-was added to cur navy during the spirited policy that' followed the Russian War.' In February 1863 she formed one of the magnificent fleet that escorted the beautiful Danish Prircess Alexandra- from Flushing to English shores prior to her marriage with the Prince of Wales,

After passing through the ordinary uneventful vicissitudes pi home and foreign commission?, the Eesistance was sant some 10 years ago to Portsmouth for experimental purposes, and has since been subjected to the uriremitting'aUacks of almost every type of offensive missile that gunnery experts have devised. For in "matters martial experiment is tha ofcly absolute. t?sfc of. efficiency, and more than one brilliant theorist has seen bir pat theories literally exploded orkcocked to piecos on board the old R?»i3tance. UNDERGOING HEE "BAPTISM OP FIRE."

j Her "baptism. of fire" took the form of I explosive shells. Fitted with the usual tophamper of boats and spars, she wa3 towed out to sea and fired at. The idea was .to demonstrate the effect of bursting shells up.on upper-deck gunner?. To this end a number of " dummies " — life-sized men of j stuffed coarse canvas — were placed in such ; positions as the exigencies of duty would recjmre of them during action. Stoat sleei plates were also erected amidji the overhead gear so as to explode tha percussion shells and scatter the death-dealing fragments in the most effective manner | possible. The scene on the upper deck { after this bombardment was strange, gruesome, and suggestive in the extreme. A GRUSSOME AND REALISTIC SPECTACLE. To a present day poet or painter, to an up-to-date dramatist or novelist blindiy struggling towards some realisation of a modern sea-fight, the spectacle would have been a vivid inspiration. Widespread debris and mutilated bodies of (dummy) meu etxewed the deck. Here, a bodiless head ; there, a shattered arm or leg ; near by, one man completely decapitated, and another transfixed by a huge splinter o£ wood. Ever and anon from the wreckage projected .scarcely recognisable remnants of the gunners, all torn and shredded by the whirling, scattered fragments of wood and iron ; while above this miurio carnage hung at intervals the dismembered -trunks of others

who, for convenience ia pasturing, had been thu3 suspended from the overhead beams. As a result of this experiment several ingenious devices have been adopted in recent waiships to lessen the terrible devastating effects ot shell fire.

Next .ths Resistance becanue for some months a floating target for EsJir'nur-piercicg shot and shell from ths new qnick-firisg guns. This played ffarf&l havoc with her sides, deck, and" interior fittings. la many cases the shot has gone clean through the vessel — in at one side and out at the other (12in thickness of iron piate and 3Gin of wood backing I), wbils from the great ragged holes and rents can be teen the lighter portions of ths ship, gouged, twisted, aad battered into all conceivable bhappg. TORPEDOES FAILED TO DESTROY HER. Still tha staunch, maltreated old craft kept her torn and wounded bides above water] so the ever-aggressive experimentalist resolved to encompass her destruction by means of that most deadly, though most erratic, of modern engines of war, the torpedo. The victim was to be given a fair chance ; so she was fitted with a complete set of tcrpsdo defence nets. These consist of strong steel nets hung around the vessel afe anchor to protect her from unseen floating mines. The exploding torpedoes destroyed her nets, threw up huge water spouts of sea and spray, and shook the whole structure of the ship, until some of her internal fittings fell away ; still she survived with nothiag more serious than a few large indentations on her lower plating. She seemed to bear a charmed 15f c ; and the query began to ba circulated, " Was she unsinkable 1 " ANOTHER AND TERRIBLE ORDEAL. Alas 1 the official plotters bad another terrible ordeal in store for her. Taking her to a quiet part of the harbour, they placed a heavy charge of gun-cotton under her, and in utter sang froid fired ifc. The vessel gave a great lurch, rolled violently, and began to sink. A jagged rent, some 30 square feet in area, had been torn in the bottom of her. But the end was not yet. Aided by her watertight compartments and a few ships' artificers she was successfully placed in dry dock, and after temporary repairs sgain subjected to untold indignities by naval experts. Finally — some little time since—Government workmen stripped her entirely of side armour, and will use it in the construction of a large plate and shot-testing battery on the famous Whale Island Gunnery School, Portsmouth.

Now— the last act of all— neglected and defenceless, the old scarred veteran calmly awaits the valuation of the ship-breaker. There is no Chelsea, no Greenwich, to receive the disabled man-of-war. Soon, like "The FigbfciD£ Temeraire " o£ lamer.'*

famous picture, the Resistance, in tow of a brisk little tug, will take a final i'aruwell of the scene 'of her many exploits, aod in the hands of strangers suffer speedy dissolution.