Sea of Shadows eBook - Navy Thriller.com

108 JEFF EDWARDS
Whitehead applied his engineering skills to the first problem: depth
control. It took him two years to solve it, but by 1868, he had the solution:
a device that he referred to as the secret. Many European countries were
becoming interested in the automotive torpedo, and Whitehead was
intensely aware that he had a growing list of competitors. To throw them
off the scent, Whitehead hinted strongly that his secret depth control
device was highly complex and would be difficult or impossible to
duplicate. In fact—despite its dramatic title—the secret was little more
than a piston, a cylinder, and a spring attached to the horizontal fins by a
mechanical linkage. Seawater flowed into the cylinder by means of a
small vent just behind the warhead. As the water pressure increased with
depth, the seawater in the chamber would exert force on the piston,
compressing it against the spring. The motion of the piston would in turn
move the mechanical linkage, which would change the angle of the
horizontal fins, making the torpedo climb or dive. When the force exerted
on the piston by the seawater became equal to the opposing force of the
spring, the fins would return to a level position, causing the torpedo to
level off. By adjusting the tension on the spring, Whitehead was able to
pre-select the depth to which a torpedo would dive. To make depth
changes even smoother, Whitehead attached a pendulum to the linkage to
dampen minor oscillations as the piston shifted positions.
The basic design of Whitehead’s secret depth control device was so
successful that it remained in use—with very few changes—for nearly a
hundred years.
With the depth control issue finally solved, Whitehead turned his
attention to the problem of steering. Unlike the depth control issue, which
had yielded to Whitehead’s engineering expertise in only two years, the
steering problem seemed to defy solution. Whitehead (and his
competitors) spent the next several decades trying to solve it.
In the meantime, the unsolved steering problem did not prevent the
torpedo from gaining popularity. Over the social and moral objections of
many naval officers, nearly every navy in Europe began buying or building
automotive torpedoes. Small, steam-powered torpedo boats began
appearing in increasing numbers, and many larger warships were backfitted
to carry torpedoes. The situation escalated into an arms race, and
conventional wisdom held that any navy that did not arm itself with
torpedoes was likely to fall prey to one that had embraced torpedo warfare.
On January 25, 1878, the automotive torpedo found its first real use in
combat. Russia, under the rule of Tsar Alexander II, had been at war with
Turkey since April of the previous year. On the night of January twentyfifth,
two Russian torpedo boats, Tchesma and Sinope, conducted attacks