Submarines Sink Eleven Battleships
Eleven of the largest battle-ships of the American navy engaged in sham battle, on May 24, off Block Island Sound, in the neighborhood of Newport, Rhode Island. They were to be attacked by five submarines. They were on the lookout for these submerged war-ships. One of the little submarines came to the surface off the bow of the flag-ship Wyoming on purpose that it might be seen, and before the guns of the flag-ship could be trained on the little submarine, a dummy torpedo struck the Wyoming well below the water line. In a similar manner all the eleven war-ships were struck by torpedoes from these submarine vessels. The judges of the trial combat said that all the war-ships were theoretically sunk by the torpedoes from these submerged vessels. Experiments of this kind are causing the quandary as to the advisability of building these immense battle-ships that can be so easily sunk by a little war-ship that sails like a fish, entirely out of sight.