alternatehistory.com

24 November


A question is asked in the House of Commons whether the Royal Navy can guarantee the ability to enforce the London Protocol against either Denmark or the German Confederation, if it is necessary.
While the question is at first innocuous - the answer is "plainly yes" as the Danish navy is rather small (they have one Coles-designed ironclad) and the combined German navy hardly any larger - the questioner is himself a former navy man (Dalrymple-Hay), and has an ax to grind. He has seen correspondence about the Prussian General Staff and how they have contingency plans for all manner of issues, and by comparison the Admiralty system strikes him as slow, ad-hoc, and missing opportunities.
Informed by personal correspondence with his former colleagues, Dalrymple-Hay points out that the campaigns of the Royal Navy in recent times - while carried out with the full bravery and verve that should be expected of any campaign of the Royal Navy, were marked by the spirit of improvisation which should not be required for a long-anticipated naval engagement (with the only exception being the Charleston campaign, for which some planning was available in advance).

Coming to the end of his speech, Dalrymple-Hay declares that, as Prussia is a land power, so should Great Britain be the foremost of the sea powers; as Prussia has a General Staff, so the British Empire should have an Admiral Staff to make plans for contingencies before they arise rather than after; and that as the British Army is a projectile to be fired by the Royal Navy, then the two services should collaborate to have plans to put into place in any contingency.

Put this way it is hard to argue with. (Arguing about it promptly starts anyway.)



26 November


The German Confederation issues a resolution that Holstein should be occupied as soon as practical. No mention is yet made of Schleiswig.

Additionally on this date, Cowper Coles demonstrates a model turret design which makes the problem of passing ammunition into the turret easier - relying on four cutouts in the turret floor at 0, 90, 180 and 270 degrees and three cutouts in the roof of the deck below at 330, 0 and 30 degrees, this reduces the maximum angle change to allow ammunition to be passed to just fifteen degrees.
Reed points out that three of these twelve loading positions place the ammunition feed chain directly in front of the turret guns, and Coles retaliates by turning the rest of the ship 180 degrees - so the ammunition will always be passed up from positions close to the superstructure - before asking Reed under what circumstances a turret gun would be aimed directly at the main body of its own ship. (Reed concedes the point.)
The problem of steam training for a Coles-type turret is still being worked on - the Monitor style spindle system is considered frankly unsafe, and the current Royal Navy alternative of having several dozen seamen push the turret around is inelegant.


27 November

Grenadierzy advance on the Warsaw Citadel under cover of a heavy snowfall.
In a daring move, Traugutt has the three heavy Krupp guns manned by the Polish army fire a pre-registered barrage of three shots each. While this has mixed results (only five of the nine shots hit the citadel at all) the result is shattering on both the wall and on the local morale of the defenders.

More Polish infantry - both regular and huszaria - move in behind the assault penetration (which captures a section of the wall, rendering it unable to cover the beaten ground) and close-quarter fighting in which the front Grenadierzy regiments can make best use of their repeaters rages for most of an hour before - with the magazines and a large stretch of the defences in Polish hands - the garrison commander offers his surrender and that of his men.