DEPARTMENT OF ELECTRICITY, MINES, AND MECHANISM.

Instruction was given in this course by Capt. Henry C. Davis, Artillery Corps, the head of the department, and embraced the following subjects:

Mechanism-Mechanics.-Principles, definitions, and units under the following heads: Energy, force, velocity, acceleration, work, moments, composition, and resolution of forces, etc.; mass, density, moments of inertia; pressure, flow, and expansion of fluids; harmonic motion and curve, composition and resolution of same. Illustrative problems.

Machines.-Theory, simple machines, and their application to the transmission of power and motion. Study and manipulation of such as are available. Problems.

Steam.-Description, installation, operation, and care of the steam boiler and its accessories, with inspection and test. Description, theory, installation, operation, and care of the steam engine and accessories; indicator diagram and brake test.

Oil engines.-Kinds, theory, description, installation, manipulation, and care; accessories and test.

Electricity-Currents.-Manifestation, transmission, units, laws of flow, conductors, circuits, effect, heat, magnetism, attraction, induction, coils, transformers, rheostats, problems.

Electrical measurement.-Principles, description, installation, manipulation, and care of instruments; testing.

Production of currents.-Chemically, primary batteries, theory, description, installation, and care of such kinds as are available. Mechanically; theory and laws; dynamo, general description, D. C. and A. C. generators; shunt and compound winding; regulation and combination; special dynamos; installation, operation, care, and test. Motors.-Theory, description, uses; D. C. and A. C. motors; installation, operation, and care.

Storage batteries.-Kinds, installation, and care.

Electric lighting. Theory, circuits, transmission of power; lamps, installation and testing; specifications for plant.

Electrical apparatus. Theory, description, installation, operation, testing, and care of; switch board, telegraph, telephone, telephotos, bells, annunciators, anemometers, time-interval instruments, fuses, explosives, searchlight; X-rays, wireless telegraphy, etc.

DEPARTMENT OF ARTILLERY, CHEMISTRY AND EXPLOSIVES.

The instruction in this department by Capt. Erasmus M. Weaver, Artillery Corps, the head of the department, included subjects as follows:

Chemistry.-Essential principles of chemistry. Chemistry of substances composing service powders and high explosives. Service tests of service powders and high explosives. Experiments in handling and using high explosives.

Artillery.-Requisite properties of gun steel. Study of the details of assembling the parts of built-up guns from plates or blue prints. Rifling. The stresses and strains in a built-up gun "at rest" and "in action."

Study of different types of coast carriages. Modes of checking recoil, of traversing, of giving elevation. The setting of base rings.

Study of the details of telescopic, open, and auto sights. Principles of deflection scales. The quadrant and its use.

Study of the different service methods of supplying ammunition and the hoists, trolleys, cranes, trucks, etc., used in connection therewith.

Kinds of projectiles used in coast defense, properties of projectile metals, principles controlling the use of shell, shot, shrapnel, capped projectiles. Care, storage, and shipment of projectiles. Kinds and properties of service powders. Care, storage, and shipment of powder and high explosives.

Construction and functioning of time, percussion, and combination fuses. Principles of delayed-action fuses.

Kinds of ship armor and characteristic properties of each kind. Strength of armor. Consideration of formulas for perforation of armor. Study of the distribution of armor on war ships.

Study of the different classes of war ships and of their capacity for attack and defense in action with coast forts. Identification study of the characteristic features of individual war ships, with outline target drawings thereof.

The defense of coasts and harbors against naval attack. Study of the authorized system of coast defense, organization, fire control, and fire direction. Installment, adjustment, and practical manipulation of all instruments and apparatus used in range and position finding. Laying of guns in each of the three "cases" of firing. Tables of fire for fire commanders, battery commanders, and gun commanders. Difference charts and their preparation. Target practice, applying the principles of fire direction and fire control as prescribed in the Drill Regulations for Coast Artillery.

DEPARTMENT OF ART AND SCIENCE OF WAR.

The head of this department, Capt. V. H. Bridgman, Artillery Corps, being incapacitated by sickness from the performance of duty, instruction was given in the department by Capt. Erasmus M. Weaver, Artillery Corps, embracing the following subjects:

Organization for coast defense, personnel and material. The defense of coast fortresses against naval attack, (a) blockade, (b) bombardment, (c) direct attack. The defense of coasts against landings. Functions of the navy and harbor defense.

Solution of problems in the defense of particular localities.

Student officers were required to prepare a project for the complete defense of a given locality to include:

1. A discussion of the principles of defense, under the following heads:

(a) A description of the locality and its environments, with a view to discovering those features that might serve to invite a naval attack. (b) The conditions influencing the selection of points of defense, including topography of contiguous country, hydrography of water areas involved, and character of the shore line as affecting possible landings.

(c) Bearing of the foregoing on the nature of naval attack to be expected.

(d) Number, kind, and location of A. P. and R. F. guns.

(e) Number and location of mines.

(f) Electric plant for light, power, and fire control.

(g) Position finder and fire-control system.

(h) Computation of the personnel required for the service of all material, and the proper manning of the defenses in war.

2. A chart showing the portion of the coast under consideration, illustrating the details developed and the conclusions arrived at in the discussions.

DEPARTMENT OF SPECIAL COURSES.

Instruction in the department under the direction of Capt. Ira A. Haynes, Artillery Corps, the head of the department, included military law, customs and usages of service, property returns, correspondence, regulations, etc. As the student officers were also assigned to duty with the coast batteries at the post, the actual performance of all the different duties of an officer at a military post was required of them.

ARTILLERY SCHOOL LIBRARY.

The additions to the library during the year have been limited to such books on military subjects as have been purchased from the school appropriation or have been furnished from the War Department. The library has been used constantly by the student officers in their studies and investigations and by others who are accorded the privileges of the library.

The library now contains 14,547 books, 2,208 pamphlets, 1,752 maps. During the year 728 books, 663 pamphlets, and 88 maps have been added to the library.

The library also has the benefit of the exchanges of the Journal of the United States Artillery, which is printed on the Artillery School press. These exchanges comprise 138 foreign and domestic periodicals. Collectively, these offer to the student officer the current professional thought of the world. It is estimated that the annual value of these exchanges amounts to over $500.

The back volumes of these periodicals are bound at the school bindery, and the bound volumes are then entered in the catalogue of the library.

In this way, year by year, a unique collection of periodical literature is being made.

In the opinion of many, the Artillery School library has now one of the most complete collections of technical artillery literature in existence, and it is of great value to all artillery officers.

Attention is called to the great danger from fire to which the library is exposed. The building now used to contain the library is an ordinary frame structure, 60 by 35 feet, heated by stoves and lighted by electricity. It is walled and ceiled on the interior with yellow-pine boards very pitchy. A fire starting from any cause would instantly spread over this pitchy surface and make it impossible to save any considerable portion of the library.

The capacity of the building is far too small. A large room in an adjacent building has had to be fitted with shelves, on which are placed books and pamphlets for which there is no room in the library proper. This room is now filled to its utmost capacity.

It will be seen, therefore, that a new library building of larger capacity and fireproof in its structure is most urgently needed. This

building should be of such capacity as not only to contain the present library, but also to allow for future additions at the rate, say, of 1,000 volumes a year.

Attention is also invited to the necessity of a more scientific and permanent management of the library. It has been the policy in the past to appoint an officer on duty at the post of Fort Monroe as librarian and to allow, as an assistant, an enlisted man from one of the companies on duty at the post, this man being placed on "extra duty for the purpose.

It is not believed that this arrangement best serves the interests of the United States. Officers detailed as librarians are, in the first place, without experience as such, and therefore not fitted to undertake the management of a valuable library; but what is still more objectionable, officers so detailed are, by the necessities of the service, obliged to be relieved from time to time and no continuous policy or direction is possible. During the past four years the library has thus been in charge of three officers, no one of them being in position by previous experience or current opportunity to develop and present to the officers at the post the full possibilities of the library.

No printed catalogue of the library has been issued since 1888. The card index has many omissions and deficiencies and is about three years behind in its entries.

It has been impossible, of course, for the enlisted men detailed to assist the officer in charge to properly attend to these matters.

The position of librarian has come in these days to be one requiring special study and preparation. It is thought that a special classification of librarians exist on the civil-service list.

In view of the special character of this library, its importance to the artillery service, and the impossibility of its full usefulness being developed under existing arrangements, it is urgently recommended that an expert civilian librarian be employed to take charge of it. It is thought that, perhaps, authority might be obtained to have the Civil Service Commission designate a skilled civilian librarian who would be in every way competent to bring the condition of the library up to a high standard, and to maintain it at that standard.

BINDERY AND PRINTING PRESS.

The bindery and printing press connected with the Artillery School have been efficiently and economically managed and have contributed materially to the needs of the different departments of the school.

THE SCHOOL FOR ELECTRICIAN SERGEANTS.

and was

This school was established at this post December 22, 1899, made a branch of the Artillery School by General Orders, No. 71, Adjutant-General's Office, May 22, 1900. It was successively under the charge of Capts. J. P. Wisser, George L. Anderson, and H. C. Davis, Artillery Corps, the last-named officer assuming the duties of instructor August 14, 1900. The course of instruction was based on General Orders, No. 71, Adjutant-General's Office, May 22, 1900, and was much hampered by various causes, among them the lack of modern appliances and a general misfit of what was on hand. The apparatus at the school is limited, and as the men ordered for instruction joined

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in small numbers at many different times during the progress of instruction, it was not possible to organize them into classes. The result was a necessity for a more personal supervision of individual members, which requires much more time to accomplish the same amount of instruction. Better results would be obtained if all the students of a particular class were ordered here at the same time.

Certificates of proficiency have been given to 47 students at the school, 4 candidates have been returned to their companies as not qualified and 1 electrician sergeant has been reported as not proficient. In connection with the work of the school it is recommended that provision be made for a sufficient number of electrician sergeants to allow one of each "fire command," instead of but one to each post, as at present. This is considered absolutely essential for the care of the property and the proper conduct of the important work required.

THE PORTABLE SEARCHLIGHT.

The portable searchlight sent to the Artillery School, in accordance with instructions of the Secretary of War, has been utilized for purposes of instruction, and the following report as to its utility and working, based upon the report of the instructor in the department of electricity, mines, and mechanism, is submitted.

The whole plant is in good condition generally. It could be used in any fortified place if a good road is provided, or if it remains stationary. The boiler is too heavy for the width of tire and ordinary type of unimproved roadway. For this reason its adaptability to field service is doubtful. A determination of this could best be made at one of the line schools.

Shifting the position of a searchlight in a fortified place may be very desirable, but if this is contemplated, a much simpler device will accomplish the purpose. A motor generator on a truck, taking its driving current from fixed stations or a high potential line from the central station that in the near future is sure to supersede the present detached plants, will replace the heavy boiler and engine by a single machine, lighter than either. The purchase of any more of these searchlights for seacoast fortifications is not considered desirable.

The following defects are noted: The switch throwing on the automatic feed is badly designed and very liable to get out of order, or rather, break off.

The contacts on the reel are not effective. The bearing is on the side of the wheel, instead of on the slip rings on the axle. Warping of the wheel causes trouble, in spite of the springs that are intended to prevent it.

The box inclosing the reel is too small, and unless the cable is very carefully wound it binds and jams.

The pump is cracked from the freezing of water left therein when the boiler was emptied. This is presumably the cause, as there is no drain to the pump.

REMARKS.

No instruction in submarine mining, etc., was given at the school on account of the entire lack of appliances and facilities which were not furnished, though applied for. It is understood that everything necessary will be furnished for the new school year.