Long Beach (CGN 9) - Naval Cruise Book

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For close range combat, grapeshot and canis- ter were used. Canister was not used much be- yond three hundred yards, although ccgrapew was heavy enough to be effective against ships at up to four hundred yards, and against ex- posed personnel, small boats, etc., at up to one thousand yards. Both grapeshot and canister were used in running past forts as, while incapa- ble of injuring structures, the rapid and continu- ous fire of caseshot from a vessel's broadside usually drove and kept the enemy's gunners from their embrasures. Solid shot was used for battering, smashing walls of forts, or shattering penetrating armor. Shells were used against unarmored vessels Qthe shells of the period invariably broke up on striking all but the thinnest armorj, earthworks, personnel, etc. Carriages used were the old four-wheel truck carriage, the newer two-wheel Marsilly, and piv- ots of various types. The turret guns of the monitors were on fixed slidemounts, which re- volved with the turret. V Aboard CCN-9 are two complete missile sys- tems, ASROC, 5 38 guns and a Mark 32 battery of homing torpedoes. The Talos missile, housed in a dual launcher aft, is lethal against targets at extreme heights, and ranges of over 65 miles. It provides Long Beach with an offensive and defensive weapon against subsonic and supersonic air targets, can destroy aircraft carrying air-to-surface missiles, and is capable of intercepting both aircraft and missiles well away from the ship. Guided to its target on a beam rider, it is also capable of homing on its target. The shipls inner defense against surface and air targets at close and intermediate ranges is the Terrier, a supersonic, solid-fuel radar-guided missile. The ship has two dual launchers, and the capability of transferring its missiles between the forward and after magazines. The launching system components function automatically to deliver missile and booster from the ready serv- ice magazine to the power-driven remote control- led launcher in condition to fire. After firing, the Terrier separates from its booster and begins receiving guidance informa- tion from tracking and guidance radar, these inputs are converted to hydraulic signals, which operate the missile wings and fins in a manner to bring the vehicle into the center ofthe guidance radar beams and maintain it there until detona- tion. The Terrier Qwith boosterj is 27 feet long, weighs about one and one-half tons, and has a range of over 10 miles. Several Weapons Department Divisions are concerned with the fire control aspect of modern warfare, an art considerably more refined today than in even recent history. In the early days of naval gunnery, fire control was merely a matter of the gunner sighting along the barrel of his muzzle-loader, training it by a simple lever, and estimating the range. The weapon was elevated higher by means of a wedge under the breech or by a screwed shaft. Such crude tactics, under- standably, became ineffective as the range of guns increased. Sailors who manned the guns on the old cruiser USS Chicago had onbf guns to ight with, but Long Beach has, in addi- tion to her 5 38 guns, three complete weapons systems - Terrier ana' Talos anti-aircraft missiles ana' ASROC, an antz'-submarine rocket. 17

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, . ,. .Qu-v V: .. ,.,.- -rr ,,,, 4.1: - 4. - -.- . - , . V V - - - - . - rfsfvcfrr-'r 1'f wr f.2sz,,qT?,,'L'c::15575-'rrzzszziiriii213377171 154192 43293-Er. ..Ag:1g:.2gg5,a,...-PL4- ,.,, .. ' 4,,,ff1 -'5 With the introduction of gunpowder tO U16 Western World came the cannon. Introduced into northern Europe in the mid-Fourteenth cen- tury, such early fire-arms probably were more potent for their psychological effect than for the damage they actually caused. These early guns threw stones, individually or in masses. In the Middle Ages there seemed to be an arms race for the development of the largest cannons, although the speed with which they could cast their missiles decreased with size. At the siege of Constantinople both large and small weapons came into play, the Christians used small arms casting five or ten stones at a time, while the Turks had one cannon capable of firing a 600 pounds bullet, although only seven times a day. Another cannon employed there by Mahomed I-I couldihurl a 1,200 pound stone three or four times a day. ' As knowledge increased, improvements were made, the size of cannons were reduced, they were cast in iron and bronze, and fired projectiles of iron. Such weapons were of great importance to land forces, but their adoption by naval units was fairly rapid. At the Battle of Lepanto in 1571 Cduring which a massive Turkish Fleet was overpowered by the forces of Don John of Austria, representing Spain, Venice, Genoa, Mal- ta and the Papal Statesj the Venetian galleasses were fitted with swivel guns, the forerunner of the modern turret. In this battle the heavier allied guns were effective at along range fup to ap- proximately 1,800 yardsj sinking several of the Turkish ships before they could sail close enough to attack. The concepts of both ancient and modern sea warfare was demonstrated when the Venitian Admiral, his own guns having been very effective, was killed by an arrow from one of the enemy's ships. Every schoolboy knows of the Defeat of the Spanish Armada, one of the most famous sea battles of all times. Here, in 1588 it was fire- ships, rather than conventional naval weapons, which resulted in Sir Francis Drakels victory over the Spanish, whose Philip II had vowed to invade England. The range of naval guns increased with the years, Dutch cannon in the 17th century had an 16 -4- V----L-... . A '-1 .L'L1.t. ' : w-4---. approximate range of 2,000 yards, French can- nons of the next century could shoot only 300 yards further, and the best eighteenth century cannons had a range of 3,000 yards, while Monitor and M errimac fought their famous bat- tle at Hampton Roads in 1862 boasting guns which could fire 4,000 yards, according to Cliver Warner's Great Sea Battles. Since exactly a century has elapsed since the Civil War, it is particularly interesting to review the state of naval ordnance in that era. Naval weapons were as varied as the ships themselves. The standard broadside gun in the Federal Navy was the 9-inch Dahlgren. It was supplemented by heavier guns mounted on pivots which could be brought to bear on either beam and which, if located on poop or forecastle, gave a wide arc of fire. Smaller vessels often carried the 32-pounders, 6.4-inch, in various weights, as a broadside gun. New Iromides mounted 11- inch guns on the broadside. The heaviest gun in use was the 15-inch, mount- ed in some of the monitors while the smallest was the 12-pounder boat howitzer. While rifles had more range and accuracy than smoothbores, much of the advantage was lost because of the difficulty of aiming from a heaving, rolling deck. The crude elevating mechanisms did not permit the gun captain to keep the target always in his sight, regardless of the vessel's motion, and the gun was fired at the instant the roll of the ship brought the target into line. Consequently, ranges were kept as short as possible, with con- siderable reliance placed on ricochet fire fthe same as skimming a stone across waterj. Water caps over the fuses helped prevent the extinguish- ing of the fuse as the shell skipped along the surface. Ricochet firing was quite accurate up to about a mile in smooth water, but a rough sea made it virtually impossible. Many rifled guns were used, however. Most of those in the Federal service were Parrotts, ranging from the 8-inch, 150-pounder down to 20-pounders. The Con- federates used many Brooke rifles, which were generally heavier than the Parrotts of corres- ponding caliber.

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1 11 it . ul 1 3 1 1 1 E H ! 1 9 1 ELELQEQY -11 11 1 11 i 11 11 ,1 111 11 111 11 1 1 11 11 1 1 H1 111 11 1 1 I ,, 11 11 1 1 11 -1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 111 11 4 1 1 11 11 ,1 1 1 1 1 11 11 '1 T wo offensive and defensive mainstays on inany classes of U S. slzzlos during World War 11 were the 5 38, below, and the 40 rnni,above. These weapons were credi'ted with countless lfills be- tween 1941 and 19452 out the speed of rnodern aircraf required greater veloc- izjz, range and accuracy. Right, an 8 sliell is about to be rammed into a gun in a turret aboard the cruiser Boston in the latter stages of Second World War. An early improvement was the range finder, with calculations worked out so that a gun could be elevated a given number of degrees to have the missile fall on target at the proper distance. Weapons development had avanced to the point that shells could be fired over 10,000 yards by World War I - and this presented new prob- lems. HFirst, according to EncyclopediaBritan- nica, it was no longer possible to fire at the target directlyg allowance had to be made for the projectile's time of flight and the target's speed and course. Second, allowances had to be made for wear of the gun barrels, temperature of the powder, meteorological phenomena affecting the projectile's ballistic qualities and temperature of , 117747271 f. M