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Who Won The Great War? 
 
 ji . 
 
 The Revelations of the late 
 
 CORNELIUS VAN TROMP 
 
 Turned the Tide of 
 
 THE GREAT WAR 
 The Second Day of May, 1917 
 
 And Made Possible 
 
 THE VICTORY AT SEA 
 
 and 
 
 THE VICTORY ON LAND 
 
 German Invocation: 
 
 'The New Convoy System — Gott Straffe the Man 
 
 Who Proposed it." 
 
 Copyrighted, 1921 
 By W. R. HINSDALE 
 
I THE LIBRARY 
 OF CONGRESS 
 WASHINGTON 
 
 T 
 
 
 PROLOGUE 
 
 The New Convoy System, devised by William Russell Hinsdale 
 of Orange, New Jersey, May 2nd, 1917, as an aggressive warfare 
 against the German Submarines under the "Van Tromp Revela- 
 tions," was described by the British Admiralty Board as a "New 
 Science of accuracy and skill and without its loyal co-operation 
 the enemy's submarine campaign must inevitably have attained 
 its object." 
 
 Glaucus, an officer of high rank in the United States Navy 
 has written an interesting analysis of the situation at that time. 
 It will be noted that he, and all other writers quoted herein, have 
 ascribed the winning of the Great War to this new science of 
 accuracy and skill, extolled by the British Admiralty Board. 
 
 From the report of The Ship Protective Committee of the 
 Naval Consulting Board of The United States, organized in 1915, 
 Mr. Thomas A. Edison, President : 
 
 "There is no question that the most effective thing developed 
 during the Great War for protecting vessels was the New Convoy 
 System. 
 
 "The safeguarding of vessels by torpedo-boat destroyers was 
 very efficient and with a sufficient number of destroyers, practically 
 complete immunity from submarine attack was had." 
 
 cms visir* 
 
 NOTE: — For a clear understanding of the crises of May 1st, 1917, 
 as met by the Van Tromp Revelations of May 2nd, 1917, 
 observe the dates respectively quoted herein. 
 
WHO WON THE GREAT WAR? 3 
 
 The American Who Baited 
 
 The German Submarine 
 
 BY DELT EDWARDS 
 
 (COPYRIGHT, 1919, BY THE N. Y. HERALD CO. 
 
 War time secrets guarded carefully for more than two years 
 by President Wilson, Secretary Daniels, David Lloyd George, 
 Arthur J. Balfour and other high officials of the American and 
 British navies are now revealed, disclosing that the Man Who 
 Baited the German Submarine was an American — William Russell 
 Hinsdale, of Orange, N. J. Mr. Hinsdale is a consulting engineer 
 and metallurgist and well known in New Jersey and New York. 
 
 One month after the United States entered the war American, 
 British and French officials in Washington were admitting publicly 
 that the submarine situation was desperate. More than one million 
 tons of shipping had been destroyed in April. Four hundred 
 thousand tons had been sunk in one week. The U-boats were 
 destroying and disabling more vessels than the combined efforts 
 of Great Britian and America could offset. Every practical and 
 scientific means suggested had been tried but found of no avail. 
 The situation was growing worse daily. 
 
 France and England were urging the United States to send 
 her troops to the battlefields. President Wilson favored it. The 
 American General Staff advised against it. No such troop trans- 
 portation ever had been attempted, and now the submarine stood 
 a solid barrier against safe communication. 
 
 Starting the war 
 
 On May 2, 1917, according to a series of communications which 
 Mr Hinsdale has just been permitted to make public, the Orange 
 engineer wrote to President Wilson explaining how the hopeless 
 defensive warfare against the submarine could be turned into an 
 aggressive, successful one. He knew the simplest secret. It lay 
 in the weakness and limitations of the submarine. The undersea 
 boat could not survive a six or eight inch shell exploded above, 
 below or close beside it. The burst of the shell in the non-com- 
 pressible water had the effect of driving a column of water like 
 a steel shaft into the hull of the boat. Mr. Hinsdale was familiar 
 with these limitations, and years before had helped Simon 
 Lake launch his submarine enterprise, and, moreover, the German 
 
WHO WON THE GREAT WAR? 
 
 submarine was an exact copy of its prototype, the American craft, 
 for about fifteen years ago Mr. Lake had gone abroad to sell his 
 craft to the German government, and Wilhelmstrasse, with chara- 
 teristic astuteness, put off the purchase and retained the blueprints. 
 Mr. Hinsdale, adapting the new convoy system, to the limita- 
 tions of the submarine, suggested to President Wilson that the 
 whole undersea campaign should be reversed. He recommended 
 that the submarine be sought, not evaded; that a bait in the shape 
 of large numbers of ships moving in convoys properly protected 
 by destroyers should be sent out ; that the submarines should be 
 tempted into the net and there destroyed with much more ease 
 than they had been destroying. 
 
 The Method Simple 
 
 The very next day, and twenty-four hours after officials of all 
 the allied nations had taken a very gloomy view of the situation, 
 Secretary Daniels announced that the submarine would be met 
 "in a direct way." He asserted that he could not go into the details 
 of the method, because by so doing he would be giving away the 
 scheme to the Germans. The simplicity of the new method was one 
 which would have been understood in a moment. Almost im- 
 mediately after Secretary Daniels' announcement the first Ameri- 
 can destroyer flotilla was sent to Europe, arriving in Queenstown 
 May 16. Within a few weeks the U-boats were scurrying out 
 for the bait. Then came swift destruction. The back of the 
 submarine peril was broken and the American troops swarmed 
 across the seas by hundreds of thousands with a degree of 
 safety that was marvelous. The whole campaign of frightfulness 
 was changed almost over night. 
 
 For Germany, when America entered the war, was gloating, 
 and well could gloat, over the victories of her undersea navy. She 
 had staked practically the outcome of the war on her ability to 
 choke off supplies to England and France, and the supplies were 
 slowing up. She felt so confident that she risked the entry of 
 the United States on the throw of the submarine dice. Even with 
 America in, a little more submarine success, by which she would 
 prevent the transportation of any considerable number of troops, 
 would have meant practically a severance of the lines of communi- 
 cation, for the outcome of the world war now hung on the weight 
 that America could throw into the balance. Germany gloried in 
 the increased sinkings, from a mere 50,000 tons a month to close 
 on to a million. She was beginning to glory in the deaths of 
 American soldiers and British soldiers who became the victims of 
 her U-boats. She openly boasted that the submarines were winning 
 the war. 
 
WHO WON THE GREAT WAR? 5 
 
 And in the words of no abler judge than Rear Admiral William 
 S. Sims, commanding the American naval forces in European 
 waters : — 
 
 "When we arrived in April, 1917, the Central Powers were 
 winning the war, whether you knew it or not. There were 
 700,000 to 800,000 tons of shipping being lost each month and we 
 did not know how to stop it. 
 
 The Beresford Warning 
 
 Recalling some of the more important conferences on the 
 submarine immediately after the United States declared war, on 
 May 1, Admiral Lord Beresford, speaking in London, voiced the 
 appalling situation. He complained of the incompleteness of the 
 official returns on the sinkings. He declared that he was inclined 
 to risk the penalties of the Defense of the Realm act and tell the 
 people the truth that they might realize the gravity of the situa- 
 tion. The same day British naval experts, accompanying a com- 
 mission headed by Foreign Secretary Balfour in Washington, were 
 impressing upon the American government the importance of 
 moving as speedily as possible to stay the destruction. The 
 French naval authorities were equally pessimistic. 
 
 That same day, May 1, before Mr. Hinsdale's letters were 
 written, the situation engaged the attention not only of President 
 Wilson but of a conference arranged by Secretary of State Lansing. 
 This was attended by Mr. Balfour, Sir George Foster, acting 
 Minister to Canada ; Admiral de Chair, Sir Richard Crawford and 
 others. Lord Eustace Percy, British trade expert, said : — 
 
 "The seriousness of the situation is shown by the fact that 
 forty British vessels were sunk in the third week of April. The 
 balance of the situation is the tonnage the United States can 
 supply. But even the present rate of production of the United 
 States and Great Britian does not equal the percentage of losses 
 caused by submarine depredations. The output of merchant ships 
 in the United States must be increased if the submarine menace 
 is to be overcome." 
 
 In the afternoon of May 2, when Mr. Hinsdale was penning 
 his first communication to President Wilson, the extreme gravity 
 of the situation was being discussed at a meeting of the Cabinet in 
 Washington. Franklin K. Lane, Secretary of the Interior, whose 
 able and outspoken counsel was regarded most highly by the 
 President, made the startling declaration to the State Councils of 
 Defense that 400,000 tons of shipping had been destroyed by sub- 
 marines in a previous week. At that rate, he said, it meant that 
 
WILLIAM RUSSELL HINSDALE 
 Date of Writing The Van Tromp Revelations 
 
WHO WON THE GREAT WAR? 7 
 
 Germany would send to the bottom 2,000,000 tons of shipping in 
 the month — twice the amount that even the optimistic Berlin 
 Admiralty started out to sink. 
 
 Secretary Lansing Quoted 
 
 Secretary Lansing himself, prone to talk openly and freely on 
 few occasions, made the observation : — 
 
 "The people might as well wake up to the fact that the situa- 
 tion is serious." 
 
 Secretary Daniels, watching the submarine peril continually, 
 said the navy had fully realized the seriousness of the menace for 
 a long time and that with the coming of spring and longer days 
 the loss of tonnage was steadily increasing. 
 
 "Germany appears determined to sink every ship she can in 
 the barred zone," he said. "There can be no question about the 
 seriousness of the menace. Our problem is to find something to 
 counteract it. This we are endeavoring to do. For many weeks 
 American Scientists have been at work on the problem. A large 
 number of new devices have been tested. Most of them, at least 
 eight out of every ten, have been found worthless. Every device 
 that shows any promise is given further rigid tests." 
 
 Then he added : — 
 
 "Up to date nothing has been evolved which solves the pro- 
 blem presented by the submarine." 
 
 Herbert Hoover, returning from Europe, said : — "The increas- 
 ing sinking by submarines in the last eight weeks shows the 
 situation. It is serious, you can make sure of that." 
 
 By this time the menace had grown so that Germany was 
 jubilant over the declarations and admissions. Her U-boats became 
 practically surface boats with almost a free hand. They were 
 increasing their cruising radius, and reports already had been 
 received in Washington of 400-foot submarines with 6-inch guns. 
 They were said to be cruising off the Azores, a thousand miles 
 out in the Atlantic, and it was only a matter of progression before 
 they would reach the Atlantic coast. Frequently U-boats hovered 
 around in the ocean, waiting for supply ships, replenishing their 
 provisions and fuel at will. Lying on the surface in comparative 
 security, they took enormus toll. They sank their victims with 
 their guns, instead of being compelled to launch the more or less 
 uncertain torpedo. Sometimes they were engaged at destruction 
 for hours. It was of no uncommon occurence for a submarine 
 to come up leisurely, halt a ship, put out a boat, send a crew 
 
8 WHO WON THE GREAT WAR? 
 
 aboard and place a bomb with a time fuse, return to the submarine 
 and after the destruction of the ship open fire on the passengers 
 in the small boats. 
 
 Mr. Hinsdale Acts 
 
 Warring on the U-boats in the Seven Seas was an impossi- 
 bility. It would require thousands of destroyers and the gain 
 might be little. Mr. Hinsdale saw the futility of trying to search 
 out the submarines and while the Cabinet was worrying over the 
 situation and while Thomas A. Edison, Hudson Maxim and other 
 great scientists were cudgelling their brains night and day to 
 obtain an instrument that would defeat the submarine, Mr. Hins- 
 dale turned to more practical methods. He thought the menace 
 must be blocked with the means that were then at hand rather 
 than by waiting for some miracle worker that might be discovered 
 when it was too late. 
 
 Hence his letter to President Wilson, dated May 2. This 
 read : — 
 
 "His Excellency the President of the United States : — 
 
 "The reported destruction of a German U-boat recently by a 
 shot direct at the exposed periscope is not an unreasonable con- 
 clusion if the shot was an explosive shell. 
 
 "A six or eight inch shell exploded on the water immediately 
 over a submarine boat lying several feet below the surface would 
 effectually put the submarine out of commission, due to the down- 
 ward thrust of a column of non-compressible water with the effect 
 of a bar of steel, if suddenly forced downward on top of the sub- 
 marine boat. 
 
 "In this connection I would suggest that the present policy 
 of feeding valuable ships and their human lives and cargoes one 
 by one to German monsters without quid pro quo of German U- 
 boats in return is wrong in theory and procedure. 
 
 "This method of dealing with the problem without a systematic 
 return warfare on the submarine is contrary to good policy, as the 
 U-boats continue their depredations practically unmolested. 
 
 "A perfectly successful war on these German pirates could be 
 waged by sending your freight and other steamers through the 
 infested zone in fleets of twenty or more vessels convoyed by as 
 many or more scout cruisers and torpedo boat destroyers disposed 
 on either side of the fleet. 
 
 "At night the surface should be swept by numerous search- 
 lights and day or night a shell or two should be dropped on any 
 suspicious appearance indicating the vicinity of a periscope. 
 
 "This will act somewhat as a warning and as a deterrent to 
 
WHO WON THE GREAT WAR? 9 
 
 active operations of U-boats. Should an attack be made and a 
 torpedo launched a thousand eyes in all parts of the convoy and 
 fleet are watching for indications of the passage of a torpedo 
 through the water and its attendant wake will indicate its 
 direction. Shells exploded in line of its advance would perhaps 
 divert it from its intended course and other shells having been 
 dropped as nearly as possible above the submarine if submerged 
 or if on the surface, its destruction will have been accomplished. 
 
 "If a large number of submarines are encountered all of them 
 will have been exposed to the destructive effect of shell fire. 
 
 "In the event that a successful torpedo should be launched 
 the whereabouts of the U-boat will be disclosed and a dozen shots 
 directed to its destruction and an injured ship will have ready help 
 for passengers and crew. 
 
 "An increased number of enemy submarines will under such 
 circumstances insure their destruction all the more and in a com- 
 paratively short time the present U-boat menace to navigation 
 will have become a legend with some of my former dealings with 
 pirates. 
 
 "Revealed by the late 
 
 "Cornelius Van Tromp." 
 
 Cornelius Van Tromp was the name of an old Dutch admiral 
 in the seventeenth century who swept the seas of the pirates who 
 were raiding the Dutch merchantmen. 
 
 The President Acts 
 
 President Wilson received this communication the very next 
 morning, May 3, while the destructive submarine campaign was 
 perhaps the most vital subject under discussion at Washington. 
 
 On May 3, Mr. Hinsdale wrote his second letter to the Presi- 
 dent. It read : 
 
 "His Excellency the President of the United States: — 
 
 "Hunting the German submarine is comparatively easy. The 
 quarry, when found, is easily killed. 
 
 "You cannot hunt them successfully through the Seven Seas 
 with cruisers or with seaplanes. Battle ships and dreadnoughts 
 are unsuitable for the purpose. As I revealed to you yesterday, 
 your quarry must be baited to draw it within killing distance. A 
 single ship with a single gun is not enough. Seaplanes should aid 
 the convoy. 
 
 "Ten submarines could not sink two vessels of the fleet I 
 described to you yesterday. If they attempted it nine out of the 
 ten submarines would be easily destroyed. 
 
 "Revealed by the late 
 
 "Cornelius Van Tromp." (He with the broom). 
 
10 WHO WON THE GREAT WAR? 
 
 Following the Advice 
 
 Pursuing his policy of information gained from actual know- 
 ledge of the submarine and its limitations, Mr. Hinsdale wrote 
 again to President Wilson on May 4, 1917. All of his communica- 
 tions carried as a subject title the phrase "The Submarine or 
 German U-boat Menace." This letter read: — 
 
 "His Excellency the President of the United States : — 
 
 "On May 3, I revealed to you that the hunting and killing of 
 German submarines with the means you have at hand should be 
 regarded as a sport and not as a fearsome task. 
 
 "The public should be regaled with cheerful tales of the 
 prowess and skill of the huntsmen and not with shivering dread of 
 an encounter with cowardly pirates who will make your people 
 'walk the plank' if they do not win, or fight to the death. 
 
 "Your allies should stop the rat holes whence the pirates come 
 and then your task, or sport, as you choose to make it, will soon 
 be over. 
 
 "Revealed by the late 
 
 "Cornelius Van Tromp." 
 
 Here was the first suggestion of an offensive against the 
 great ports at Ostend and Zeebrugge, on the Flanders coast, 
 whence the German submarine raiders were continually sweeping 
 out into the North Sea and thence after the Alied Ships. The 
 British navy soon thereafter began its preparations for raids on 
 these two outlets. The heroic old Vindictive led three block ships 
 to the Zeebruggee Mole and then engaged the Mole and shore 
 batteries while the block ships went directly into the entrance 
 of the Bruges Canal and there sank themselves. This contributed 
 not only one of the most effective means of choking off the 
 raiders but also wrote one of the most heroic stories of the war. 
 Later the Vindictive led the block ships into Ostend Harbor. 
 
 Writing Again 
 
 On May 8, 1917, Mr. Hinsdale, following up his communica- 
 tions, wrote again to President Wilson. 
 
 His Excellency the President of the United States : — 
 
 "In my revelations to you of recent date I suggested a fleet 
 of vessels as a bait for submarines to bring the game within killing 
 distance of the convoy of hunters. 
 
 "Five or seven such vessels may be properly convoyed by your 
 fast cruisers and torpedo boat destroyers with economy and the 
 number of vessels in the fleet may be increased when you see the 
 success of the sport as I see it. And thus you may see and your 
 
WHO WON THE GREAT WAR? 11 
 
 public will see that you do not need to wait for your modern 
 miracle workers to delay your action. Instant results are de- 
 manded by present conditions and you have all the means at your 
 command. 
 
 "Revealed by the late 
 
 "Cornelius Van Tromp." 
 
 Believing that he might just as well reveal his identity now Mr. 
 Hinsdale sent the following letter to President Wilson, dated Ma} r 
 22, 1917 :— 
 
 "His Excellency the President of the United States : — 
 "Lest we forget, and as a souvenir, I send you herewith a 
 certified copy of 'Revelations' in re 'The Submarine or German 
 U-boat Menace,' dated May 2, 1917. Faithfully yours. 
 
 "(Signed) W. R. HINSDALE." 
 
 Mr. Hinsdale also mailed copies of the Presidential communi- 
 cation to Secretary Daniels, Mr. Balfour, at Washington ; Lloyd 
 George and to the British Admiralty direct. Secretary Daniels 
 acknowledged the receipt of the communications in the following 
 letter, dated May 23, 1917, and written on his official stationery: — 
 
 "My Dear Mr. Hinsdale: — I have received your letters and 
 thank you for sending me a copy of the articles you have sent to 
 the President on 'The Submarine or U-boat Menace.' 
 "Sincerely yours, 
 
 "(Signed) JOSEPHUS DANIELS." 
 
 Effect of Shells 
 
 Mr. Hinsdale wrote to President Wilson as follows under 
 date of May 28, 1917 :— 
 
 "His Excellency the President of the United States : — 
 
 "In my communication to you under date of May 2, 1917, I 
 wrote: — 'A six or eight inch shell exploded on the water immedi- 
 ately over a submarine boat lying several feet below the surface 
 would effectually put the submarine out of commission, due to the 
 downward thrust of a column of non-compressible water with the 
 effect of a bar of steel if suddenly forced downward on top of 
 the submarine boat.' 
 
 "Many times it serves to break and open riveted joints and 
 the submarine quickly fills with water, drowning all within. 
 
 "If the stroke is near the end the boat will be suddenly tilted, 
 and in nearly all cases will spin over and over, mixing the crew 
 up with the machinery, maiming and killing some or all of the 
 occupants. A similar spinning and breaking of riveted joints will 
 be the result if the shell is exploded close alongside the boat. 
 
12 WHO WON THE GREAT WAR? 
 
 "A submarine two or three hundred feet in length furnishes 
 a substantial mark for undersea exploding shells, and their use, 
 under conditions I described to you, will render the U-boat 
 operations too hazardous to last. 
 
 Faithfully yours, 
 
 "(Signed) W. R. HINSDALE." 
 
 Soon after the receipt of the fourth letter by President Wilson 
 the first American destroyer flotilla was sent to Europe. It arrived 
 in Queenstown May 16, and the young officer in command, when 
 asked when he would be ready to go to sea, promptly replied : — 
 
 "We are ready now, sir." 
 
 Within a few weeks the new convoy plan was working well. 
 Success was apparent immediately. The early reports from Admiral 
 Sims read like fairy tales. Marine insurance dropped twenty-five 
 per cent. The sinkings began to dwindle fast. April was the 
 biggest month in the history of the submarine campaign, the 
 second month after Germany had declared her ruthless campaign 
 for all the seas. In March 61 vessels of over 1,600 tons were sunk, 
 28 of under 16,000 tons and 37 fishing vessels. In April 132 first class 
 ships paid the toll, 52 second class and 41 fishers. The first week 
 of May took 24 first class steamers and 22 second class. Then the 
 sinkings decreased, 18 first class for each of the next three weeks 
 and 5, 9 and 1 of the second class, respectively. 
 
 The Figures 
 
 There were 115 first and second class vessels sunk in May, as 
 against 184 in April. June saw a further falling off to 85 first class 
 ships, 25 second class, or 110 in all. Eleven fishers were lost, but 
 these were out all the time, practically without protection, for 
 their value was nothing as compared to the more vital transports. 
 In July the new convoy system was working perfectly and the 
 rush of American troops was beginning to shape up. Only 82 first 
 and second class vessels were sunk in that month ; only 80 in 
 August, the sinkings of the big ships dropping off more than 
 twenty-five per cent. By September the troop transportation was 
 well under way. Month by month the loss was scaled down, until 
 by January, 1918, the submarine was little feared by the soldiers 
 in the convoys. That month only 46 first and second class vessels, 
 all of them supply ships, were sunk and seven fishers. And 
 America then was using the gigantic German liners taken over. 
 Even Germany's own figures, published to represent the greatest 
 loss, showed a falling off of nearly thirty-three per cent, in sinkings 
 between April and October. 
 
WHO WON THE GREAT WAR? 13 
 
 On December 8, 1918, Secretary Daniels told a happy story of 
 the navy's participation in the war. His report said : — 
 
 "The 'adoption' of the new convoy system was suggested by 
 President Wilson shortly after our entrance into the war, and this 
 convoy system was our major operation during the war and will in 
 the future stand as a monument to the greatest and most difficult 
 troop transportation effort ever conducted across seas, an anti- 
 submarine convoy and escort system, the results of which have 
 surpassed even the most sanguine expectations." 
 
 Mr. Hinsdale makes the claim only to having adapted the con- 
 voy system to the limitations of the submarine. No naval officer 
 makes any such claim and the "adoption" of the scheme was sug- 
 gested by the President, as Secretary 'Daniels' letter shows. Ex- 
 plaining why he thought the limitations of the submarine were 
 not understood, Mr. Hinsdale said: — 
 
 "The German U-boat was a new and unfamiliar foe never be- 
 fore encountered in the world's history of wars, and while the con- 
 voy system of defense against the aggressiveness of surface fight- 
 ing ships was old in the navigation of the seas, its adoption by 
 the department at the time had not been deemed practicable owing 
 to unfamiliarity with the limitations of the submarine boat, con- 
 sequently the submarines for all practical purposes for the time 
 being became surface boats and had a perfectly free hand in 
 dealing with their victims. 
 
 The Undersea Exploding Shell 
 
 "The British navy had for some time been developing an 'un- 
 dersea exploding shell' for use in their patrol system, but this 
 availed them little until used in connection with the new convoy 
 system. 
 
 "On May 2, 1917, after reading the report of Lloyd George on 
 the sinkings of vessels by the German submarines for the month 
 of April and realizing that the United States had been at war with 
 Germany for nearly a month and yet no effective steps had been 
 taken by our Navy Department nor by the navies of any of the 
 Allies for a systematic warfare against the submarine, I wrote the 
 Van Tromp revelations to induce the establishment of a new 
 convoy system of defense. 
 
 "The practices of the Allies up to that time were generally 
 understood and reported as that of 'patrolling,' as it was called, 
 here and there at random, looking for U-boats everywhere except 
 where they were doing the most serious damage, our vessels were 
 being sent through the barred zone singly with instructions to com- 
 
WILLIAM RUSSELL HINSDALE 
 In 189S, Date of Organizing Lake Submarine Co. 
 
WHO WON THE GREAT WAR? 15 
 
 manders to try to dodge the submarines by steering a zig-zig 
 course, developing their speed as much as possible. If two ships 
 were in communicating distance of each other, one being attacked 
 the commander of the other ship was under orders to escape if 
 possible, leaving the passengers and crew to perish under the 
 piratical attack, instead of going to the assistance of the stricken 
 vessel. During this time the Navy Department was busily engag- 
 ed in testing many secret and trivial devices with which to fight 
 the mysterious and insidious foe. 
 
 "Under these circumstances the complete system of warfare 
 described in the Van Tromp revelations was written by me and 
 read by James L. Webb and A. D. Latchford in my offices in 
 Newark and then forwarded to the President, the first letter being 
 mailed at five o'clock in the afternoon of May 2, and the remaining 
 letters mailed according to their respective dates." 
 
 Who Mr. Hinsdale Is 
 
 Mr. Hinsdale is known from one end of the country to the 
 other through his engineering work. In 1894 he suggested the 
 Duwamish River improvements for the State of Washington, 
 which were carried out as he had planned — filling the tide lands, 
 widening and deeping the river, building miles and miles of docks 
 for manufacturing concerns, shipbuilding concerns, airaplane plants, 
 steel mills, brick yards and sawmills. He was associated with 
 William G. Fargo, president of the American Express Company, 
 in the early 60's ; then with the late General Henry W. Slocum in 
 the promotion of the Merchants' Union Express Company, later 
 consolidated with the American Express Company. He was 
 instrumental in the checking of the great Chicago fire, where he 
 was present from first to last and working with Colonel Starr on 
 the staff of General Phil Sheridan, planned the blowing up of a 
 number of private houses. After the fire he came to New York 
 and became interested in the construction of a railroad from New- 
 town to Babylon, L. I., to form a connection between the north 
 and south lines. In the summer of 1873 he submitted to Alexander 
 T. Stewart a plan to reclaim the "great barrens," as the Hempstead 
 plains were then known. Mr. Hinsdale supervised the build- 
 ing of many miles of roads and the construction of Garden City, 
 with its hotel, cathedral and schools on the cathedral foundation. 
 In the spring of 1880 he began the designing and construction of 
 the great system of piping steam through the streets of New York, 
 a method which today furnishes much of the heat and power for 
 the great skyscrapers and other buildings in the lower part of the 
 city. In 1888 he organized the American Tungsten Mining and 
 Milling Company for the production of material for use in the 
 
16 WHO WON THE GREAT WAR? 
 
 manufacture of self-hardening steel. And in 1895 he organized the 
 Lake Submarine Company and was managing director. It was 
 his knowledge of submarines that led to his adaptation of the 
 new convoy system to drive the submarine from the sea. 
 
 THE VAN TROMP "REVELATIONS" 
 
 The "Revelations" (Cornelius Van Tromp, the noted Pirate 
 Killer of the Dutch Republic in the Seventeenth Century), dis- 
 closed a specific adaptation of the convoy system into an aggres- 
 sive warfare against the German submarine and a perfect defense 
 for our transports and other ships in their passage through the 
 barred zone and, by a prompt and in a unique manner, brought 
 this aggressive and defensive method of submarine warfare to the 
 notice of the Commander-in-Chief of our Navy, as well as the 
 Navy Department of England on the afternoon of the second of 
 May, 1917, while the world stood aghast and helpless before the 
 frightful destruction of life and property by the unhindered pirates 
 of Germany. 
 
 The British Admiralty Board says that the new convoy system, 
 which played so important a part in frustrating the enemy's designs 
 and in securing a safe passage for the army of the United States, 
 carries with it a new science of accuracy and skill and without its 
 loyal co-operation, the enemy's submarine campaign must inevita- 
 bly have attained its object. 
 
 10 Downing Street, Whitehall, S. W., London, 
 
 June 28, 1917. 
 Dear Sir : — 
 
 I am desired by the Prime Minister to thank you for your 
 courtesy in sending him the copies of your correspondence dealing 
 with the submarine menace, together with the press extract on 
 the same subject. 
 
 Yours faithfully, 
 
 (Signed) F. L. STEVENSON. 
 W. R. Hinsdale, Esq. 
 
 In his address to the Rear Admirals and other officers sum- 
 moned to hear him on board the Warship Pennsylvania, President 
 Wilson disclaimed any technical knowledge that would enable him 
 to say what steps should be taken to overcome the submarine 
 menace. 
 
 His address was confidential and delivered August 11th, 1917, 
 on the quarter-deck of the battleship, to Admiral Mayo and the 
 officers of the fleet, assembled at Yorktown, Va. 
 
 "I have come here to say that I do not care where it comes 
 
WHO WON THE GREAT WAR? 17 
 
 from. I do not care whether it comes from the youngest officer or 
 the oldest, but I want the officers of this Navy to have the dis- 
 tinction of saying how this war is going to be won. I am saying 
 that I want the youngest and most modest youngster in the service 
 to tell us what we ought to do, if he knows what it is, if the 
 oldest does not. 
 
 I wish that I could think and had the brains to think in the 
 terms of marine warfare. I, for my part, am sorry to play so 
 peaceful a part in the business as I myself am obliged to play. 
 
 Well ! Nothing was ever done so systematically as nothing is 
 being done now. America has always boasted that she could find 
 men to do anything. She is the prize amateur nation of the world. 
 Now, when it comes to doing new things and doing them well, 
 I will back the amateur against the professional every time." 
 
 PARAGRAPHS FROM THE WORLD'S WORK, IN "THE 
 VICTORY AT SEA," ADMIRAL SIMS' OWN STORY 
 
 (Copyrighted) 
 
 "In the month of April, 1917, I had found the British Officials 
 just about as distressed as the Germans were jubilant. 
 
 "Already the latter in sinking merchant ships had successes 
 which almost equalled their own predictions; no adequate means 
 of defense against the submarines had been devised, and the chiefs 
 of the British Navy made no attempts to disguise their apprehen- 
 sion for the future. 
 
 "It is not too much to say that the responsibility for the safety 
 of the British Empire rested upon Admiral Jellicoe's shoulders. 
 As First Sea Lord, Jellicoe controlled the operations, not only of 
 the Grand Fleet, but also of the entire British navy ; he had no 
 superior officer. 
 
 "After the usual greetings, Admiral Jellicoe took a paper out 
 of his drawer and handed it to me. It was a record of tonnage 
 losses for the last few months. I was fairly astounded; I had 
 never imagined anything so terrible and I expressed my conster- 
 nation to Admiral Jellicoe. 
 
 "Yes," he said, as quietly as though he were discussing the 
 weather and not the future of the British Empire. "It is impossible 
 for us to go on with the war if losses like this continue." 
 
 "It looks as though the Germans were winning the war, I 
 remarked. 
 
 "They will win, unless we can stop these losses — and stop them 
 soon," the Admiral replied. 
 
 "Such was the atmosphere of gloom which prevailed in Allied 
 Councils in April, 1917. 
 
The World's Work, Sims Own Story, Copyrighted Underwood & Underwood 
 
 THE WAKE OF A TORPEDO 
 This was the telltale sign which betrayed the presence of the submarine. 
 It was a foamy disturbance, four or five feet wide, similar to that caused by the 
 propeller of an ocean liner. As soon as the destroyer saw this wake, it ran up 
 and dropped undersea exploding shells, at the end — obviously the place where 
 the submarine was when the torpedo was fired. 
 
WHO WON THE GREAT WAR? 19 
 
 "For the greater part of 1917, the German people believed that 
 their submarines could bar the progress of the American Armies. 
 By March of 1918, they had awakened from this delusion. Not 
 only was the American Army, millions strong, in process of forma- 
 tion, but the alarming truth now dawned upon Germanic mind that 
 they could be transported to Europe. 
 
 "Does any sane person believe that we could have put two 
 million Americans into France had the German submarines main- 
 tained, until the Spring and Summer of 1918, the striking power 
 which had been theirs in the Spring of 1917? Merely to state the 
 question is to answer it. 
 
 "In that same twelve months we had gained much experience 
 which was exceedingly valuable when we began transporting 
 troops. 
 
 "The most efficacious protection to merchant shipping, the New 
 Convoy, was similarly the greatest safeguard to our military trans- 
 ports. Those methods which had been so successfully used in 
 shipping food, munitions and materials were now used in shipping 
 soldiers. 
 
 "The sinking of a great transport with four or five thousand 
 American boys on board, would have been a dreadful calamity and 
 would have struck horror to the American people. 
 
 "No such army movement had ever before been attempted. 
 The discouraging forecast made by a brilliant British Naval 
 authority in July, 1917, reflected the ideas of many military people 
 on both sides of the ocean. 
 
 "Admiral Von Man (German) took several submarines away 
 from the trade routs and sent them into the transport zone, but 
 they did not even succeed in attacking a single east-bound troop ship. 
 
 "In March, 1918, it became apparent that the German sub- 
 marine campaign had failed. The prospect that faced the Allied 
 forces at that time, when compared with the conditions which had 
 faced them in April, 1917, forms one of the most impressive con- 
 trasts in history. In the first part of the earlier year the cause of 
 the Allied Powers, and consequently the cause of Liberty through- 
 out the world, had reached the point almost of desperation. On 
 both land and sea the Germans seemed to hold the future in their 
 hands. 
 
 "The results which the German submarines could accomplish 
 seemed at that time to be simply a matter of mathematical calcu- 
 lation. The Germans figured that they could sink at least 1,000,000 
 tons a month, completely cut off Great Britian's supplies of food 
 and war materials, and thus end the war by October or November 
 of 1918. 
 
20 WHO WON THE GREAT WAR? 
 
 "The seas presented two impressive spectacles in those terrible 
 months of April, May and June, 1917. One was the comparative 
 ease with which the German submarines were sinking merchant 
 vessels. 
 
 "The Kaiser and his associates had figured that the war would 
 end about July 1st or August 1st, and English officials with whom 
 I came in contact placed the date at November 1, 1917, always pro- 
 vided of course that some method were not found for checking the 
 submarines. 
 
 "How then could we defeat the submarines? In other words, 
 how could we win the war? 
 
 "What was this strange new type of warfare that was bringing 
 the Allied cause to its knees? Nothing like it had ever been 
 known in recorded time. Nothing like it has been foreseen." 
 
 Confirmation By Vice-Admiral Sims 
 
 (New York World, April 8, 1919) 
 
 "In April, 1917, the Central Powers were winning the war, 
 whether you knew it or not. There were 700,000 to 800,000 tons 
 of shipping being lost each month, and we did not know how to 
 stop it. We had to adopt a new method. We established first 
 the new convoy system ; second, the depth charge ("Undersea 
 Exploding Shell). The new convoy system might have been put 
 into operation sooner than it was, but it had undergone a period 
 of incorrect information." 
 
 Reprinted from the New York Herald. Copyrighted. 
 
 "CONFESSIONS OF A U-BOAT CAPTAIN" 
 
 One of Germany's Master Pirates, Captain of the U-71, Makes A 
 
 Complete Confession. Restrictions Forbid the Publication 
 of the German Captain's Name 
 
 "After the New Convoy system had been developed, the 
 American troop ships were so very thoroughly protected, that we 
 simply had to leave them alone. Time and again we sighted them 
 and would have made an attack had it not been for the very power- 
 ful escort. Naturally I would have been very glad to get a troop 
 ship. I did everything possible to approach close enough to put 
 out a torpedo or two, but I could not. 
 
 "There is a vast difference between being under fire on land 
 and being under fire under water. Even if you are wounded' on 
 land, you have some chance, but if the submarine is wounded it is 
 finished and badly finished. 
 
WHO WON THE GREAT WAR? 21 
 
 "We always feared two destroyers that were in supporting 
 distance of each other a great deal more than twice as much as one 
 destroyer. Any skipper who attacked a convoy that was 
 adequately escorted, that is had the right number of destroyers, 
 ought to have a medal for bravery and a court martial for risking 
 his own ship and crew. 
 
 "I believe that the very best defensive measures against sub- 
 marines are destroyers and aircraft patrol. 
 
 "The submarines giving up the chase meant giving up the 
 ghost also." 
 
 With blunt frankness, the Captain of the U-71 summed up the 
 entire submarine situation thus : "The war ended just in time to 
 save a few good U-boat skippers and their entire crews from 
 destruction." 
 
 The Germans were unable to record a single successful troop 
 ship attack on some seventeen thousand vessels that cleared from 
 the United States with their hundreds of thousands of soldiers. 
 
 (Editorial N. Y. World, May 4th, 1917) 
 
 "The sinister aspect of the U-boat situation is not the losses 
 of this week or last week or last month, but the fact that after 
 more than two years of unceasing effort on the part of the British 
 Admiralty no adequate method has been discovered of meeting the 
 menace. Today the submarines are far more effective than they 
 were at the beginning and no means of combating the menace has 
 yet proved successful." 
 
 The Saturday Evening Post states that the new convoy system 
 was instituted upon the insistance of the Americans, and submarine 
 warfare changed from the defensive warfare the British have been 
 making to the offensive warfare the Americans demanded with 
 the new convoy system. 
 
 The American contention was that the patrol system of 
 seeking submarines was not getting results, and that the real way 
 to make the German U-boat warfare inoperative was to bring the 
 U-boats to the ships rather than to send the ships out to find 
 them. In other words, by concentrating the prizes the submarines 
 were after into convoys and guarding these convoys the subma- 
 rines would be obliged to come where the ships were instead of 
 lying in wait for them to come one by one. 
 
 It is a matter of public record that in April and early in May 
 the enormous loss of life and property by reason of the U-boats 
 was effected by lying at will on the surface and sinking 
 their helpless victims with their guns instead of torpedoes. Some- 
 
22 WHO WON THE GREAT WAR? 
 
 times they were thus engaged at their leisure for hours at a time. 
 One oil tanker required nearly four hours of this surface warfare 
 before the tanker was finally overcome and sunk. 
 
 It was a common occurrence that some of the crew of a sub- 
 marine boarded, and in some cases deliberately placed a bomb 
 with a lighted fuse in position to sink the ship and leisurely 
 returned to their submarine on the surface and afterward enter- 
 tained their crews by deliberately sinking the small boats and 
 their passengers with shots from their exposed deck guns. All 
 these things could not have occurred under the New Convoy 
 System of the Van Tromp Revelations. 
 
 Newark, New Jersey, April 7th, 1919. 
 Hon. Lloyd George, Premier of England, Paris, France. 
 
 I feel sure that you have marked your calendar of great events 
 the second day of May, 1917, as the turning point of the War, 
 because you know that on the first day of May, 1917, at Washing- 
 ton, the despatching of American troops to European battlefields 
 was bitterly opposed by the American General Staff on account 
 of the German Submarine Menace. 
 
 British naval experts accompanying the Commission headed 
 by Foreign Secretary Balfour were urging the importance of 
 finding some means of staying the destruction of the merchant 
 marine of the world, carrying munitions and supplies to the Allied 
 armies. 
 
 The French naval representatives were fully in accord with 
 the pessimistic view their British ally held, unless some method 
 was speedily devised to curtail the sinking of cargo ships in the 
 German submarine zone. Lord Percy said the losses were greater 
 than can be replaced. 
 
 The 'Van Tromp Revelations" of the second day of May, 1917, 
 answered all arguments of the American General Staff against 
 the sending of American troops to France, and the war was won. 
 Faithfully yours, 
 
 W. R. HINSDALE. 
 
 The Westminister Gazette Says American 
 Conquers U-boats 
 
 Life of Submarine War is Measured, says London Paper 
 
 London, May 26, 1917. — The Westminister Gazette publishes 
 a message from a correspondent, who says the submarine menace 
 is being mastered by a simple method, devised by an American. 
 
 "It is giving away no secret," the correspondent writes, "to 
 say that the method, which is reputed to be infallible, requires 
 
WHO WON THE GREAT WAR? 23 
 
 only a little time to come into full effect and wear the German 
 submarines out. It is a model of simplicity. This resourceful 
 American has worked along independent lines." 
 
 Lloyd George says : "By a method which is simplicity itself 
 we already have the life of the U-boat campaign measured. Watch 
 the returns." 
 
 Sir Eric Geddes, First Lord of the British Admiralty, reported 
 the result of the adoption of the American Convoy System in 
 place of the British patrol plan as follows : 
 
 "During the first part of the German unrestricted submarine 
 war, fifty percent of the losses ocurred more than fifty miles from 
 land. Today (March 6th, 1918) the losses outside the fifty mile 
 limit have fallen to one per cent. 
 
 There is a growing reluctance on the part of the German 
 crews to put to sea. The cause for their reluctance is obvious." 
 
 The Right Honorable Arthur James Balfour said, "Things 
 were dark when I took that trip to America. The submarines 
 were constantly on my mind. I could think of nothing but the 
 number of ships they were sinking. At that time it certainly 
 looked as though we were going to lose the war." 
 
 Newark, N. J., Feb. 4, 1919. 
 Hon. Josephus Daniels, Secretary of the Navy, 
 
 Washington. 
 My Dear Mr. Daniels: — 
 
 I am about to remove the ban of secrecy as to authorship 
 and purpose of writing the "Van Tromp Revelations" addressed 
 to the President, as commander-in-Chief of the Navy of the 
 United States, and shall expect your co-operation. 
 
 Hon. Edward W. Gray, M. C, Representative from New 
 Jersey proposing the introduction of a Joint Resolution in Congress 
 recognizing my services, I have requested him to call upon you 
 for a brief statement of facts of Historical interest in this con- 
 nection merely. 
 
 Faithfully yours, 
 
 W. R. HINSDALE. 
 
 Navy Department 
 
 Washington, March 3, 1919. 
 My Dear Mr. Gray: 
 
 I have the honor to acknowledge the receipt of your letter 
 of recent date forwarding certain correspondence from Mr. W. 
 R. Hinsdale claiming that he was responsible for the Government's 
 adoption of the new convoy system. 
 
y 
 
 24 WHO WON THE GREAT WAR? 
 
 Mr. Hinsdale's letters were considered by the Department. 
 
 As regards the convoy carrier, there was some question as to 
 the proper method to employ to obtain the best results. By send- 
 ing ships in convoys, the vessels of which are necessarily obliged 
 to proceed at the same speed, much time was lost, and it was 
 estimated that, neglecting the loss from submarines, a reduction 
 of about twenty per cent, in the total carrying capacity of ships 
 would be caused by the adoption of the new convoy system. 
 
 There was some difficulty, on account of the scarcity of suitable 
 vessels for escort work. After a careful consideration of this 
 subject, however, and after a study of the operations of our Allies, 
 it was decided to dispatch cargo carriers in convoys also. 
 
 The Department appreciated the patriotic motives which 
 inspired Mr. Hinsdale to make these suggestions. 
 
 (Signed) JOSEPHUS DANIELS. 
 The Hon. Edward Gray, M. C. 
 
 House of Representatives, Washington, D. C. 
 
 Newark, New Jersey, April 7th, 1919. 
 His Excellency the President of the United States, Paris, France. 
 
 My dear Air. President : I am enclosing you a leaflet setting 
 forth the authorship and purpose of writing the "Van Tromp 
 Revelations," May 2nd, 1917. 
 
 I wish to direct your attention to the Leaflet as showing 
 reasonable cause for delay of more than forty days after war was 
 declared against the Empire of Germany before the Destroyers 
 were used in a "perfectly successful war" on the German pirates, 
 the success of which prompted Vice-Admiral Sims to write from 
 London, April 10, 1918, "We will win or lose according to whether 
 we beat the submarine or it beats us; we must depend chiefly 
 upon destroyers for this. Destroyers on this side are worth their 
 weight in gold." 
 
 Personal responsibility for the delay should not rest upon the 
 President nor upon any subordinate in the Navy "Department. 
 Faithfully yours, 
 
 W. R. HINSDALE. 
 
 Our Destroyer Flotilla was immediately dispatched to Queens- 
 town, arriving on the 16th day of May, and forty days after our 
 war with Germany began, reported as ready to commence opera- 
 tions under the inspiration of the Van Tromp Revelations; con- 
 tinued success followed. 
 
 The early reports from Admiral Sims read like a page from 
 the Van Tromp Revelations, and confirm the accuracy of the 
 
WHO WON THE GREAT WAR? 25 
 
 conclusions therein stated as to the conditions of a perfectly- 
 successful U-boat warfare, and under these conditions Marine 
 Insurance was soon reduced 25 per cent. 
 
 In May, 1917, the Japanese, jointly with English vessels, were 
 engaged in patrolling at various points in the Mediterranean Sea 
 with little success in their search for German U-boats. 
 
 Soon after the receipt of the Van Tromp Revelations by Sir 
 Arthur J. Balfour in Washington, the patrolling vessels in the 
 Mediterranean were ordered to rendezous at Marseilles and convoy 
 Merchant shipping in fleets, as the order stated, so long as the 
 experiment proved a success. 
 
 Jellicoe admits that no high sea convoy was got into operation 
 till late in May, 1917, when a convoy passed successfully to 
 England from Gilbralter, and the first homeward bound Atlantic 
 convoy started May 24, 1917. 
 
 Up to this date the "time honored" British convoys had been 
 directed to protection from German Sea Raiders then infesting 
 the high seas. Some of them were destroyed by British crusiers 
 and many sought safety in ports of the United States and other 
 neutral countries and were interned preventing their further 
 damage to commerce. 
 
 Prophecy and Fulfilment 
 
 The remarkable accuracy of the predications set forth in the 
 Van Tromp Revelations, adapting the Convoy System to aggres- 
 sive warfare on the German U-boats, having been so com- 
 pletely verified by evidence herewith from the reports of Rear 
 Admiral Sims, Admiral Jellicoe, First Sea Lord of the British 
 Navy, Von Tirpitz, Grand Admiral of the German Navy, and the 
 graphically stated confessions of the Master Pirate Captain of the 
 German U-boat 71, prompts me to direct special attention of the 
 reader to a comparison of paragraphs indicative of the through 
 knowledge of the subject by the writer on that fateful second 
 day of May, 1917, which has prompted Rear Admiral Sims to say, 
 "All this time that we were seeking a solution of the submarine 
 problem, we really had that solution in our hands." 
 
 W. R. HINSDALE. 
 
 By Alfred Von Tirpitz 
 Grand Admiral of the German Navy 
 
 "In 1916 our U-boats could play havoc among the enemy 
 merchant ships like wolves among sheep ; later they had to fight 
 
26 WHO WON THE GREAT WAR? 
 
 regular battles. A work of destruction had become a dangerous 
 operation with many casualties. Americans turned the scale." 
 
 From the report of The Ship Protective Committee of The 
 Naval Consulting Board of the United States, consisting of twenty- 
 four noted scientists, with Mr. Thomas A. Edison as President. 
 Organized in 1915 
 
 "There is no question that the most effective thing developed 
 during the Great War for protecting vessels was the New Convoy 
 System." 
 
 "The safeguarding of vessels by torpedo-boat destroyers was 
 very efficient and with a sufficient numbers of destroyers practi- 
 cally complete immunity from submarine attack was had." 
 
 ENGLAND WAS NEAR TO DEFEAT BY U-BOATS 
 
 Analysis of conditions at that time 
 
 Written by Glaucus, an Officer of high rank in the 
 
 United States Navy 
 
 Copyright by New York Herald 
 
 THE NEW CONVOY SYSTEM 
 
 England's great battle ships and cruiser fleet could not fight 
 the submarine any more than a bulldog can fight a salmon. The 
 submarine will not stay and fight. Furthermore it is more than 
 foolhardy for a big ship to remain in the vicinity of a submarine 
 submerged, because the big ship cannot harm the submarine, as 
 it cannot tell its location, and the big ship is helpless to avoid a 
 torpedo when fired at short range. Once the submarine leaves 
 the surface it disappears from sight, and despite all pretences to 
 the contrary, it cannot be heard with any degree of accuracy or 
 even reliability. 
 
 Her First Weak Answer 
 
 So battle ships and cruisers, the monarchs of the sea, are help- 
 less before the submarine in the same way that a prize fighter is 
 helpless before a burglar with his automatic pistol drawn. The 
 prize fighter cannot dodge a bullet. 
 
 England's reply was characteristic of her past sea strategy 
 developed through countless years of controlling the sea highways 
 — a concentration of warships to fight the submarine at the foci 
 of trade routes, but this method, although it had brought success 
 to England in the past, did not do so in this case and the reason 
 was that "an enemy which fights in the open can be met and 
 
WHO WON THE GREAT WAR? 27 
 
 defeated by superior surface force, but one that lurks in the depths 
 of the sea cannot be subdued by those familiar means, but must 
 be met by a new and more up to date method of attack." The 
 patrol method was wasted effort, yet the Admiralty held to this 
 method until forced by outside opinion to abandon it. 
 
 The consequence was that England in attempting to apply 
 the old principle of concentration of force against the submarine 
 found herself face to face with failure and her population and army 
 faced with starvation, and all bcause the Admiralty was attempting 
 to apply a well known principle in the old way without appreciating 
 that, although the principle was applicable, yet the method of its 
 application was wrong, owing to the changed characteristics of 
 its enemy, and it was not until American counsel was added upon 
 our joining the war that the Admiralty at last agreed to throw 
 overboard the patrol system and adopt the new convoy system. 
 
 The British Admiralty's principle objection to convoy was that 
 there were not enough of the proper types of warships to guard 
 the convoys and that therefore submarines could concentrate and 
 slaughter ships in convoy as wolves in a flock of sheep. This 
 reason seemed sound in the British mind, but it was not, for the 
 reason that the number of guards required was not as great as at 
 first thought, and they soon found that many of the patrol war 
 ships could be dispensed with and used to guard convoys. The 
 new convoy system required careful planning to prevent contacts 
 at sea at night or in fogs, but after all merchantmen were in 
 convoy the risk of collision at sea was much less, for convoys 
 travelling in one direction were given routes clear of those in 
 another direction. 
 
 England Finally Adopts the New Convoy System 
 
 The underlying principle of the new convoy system may be ex- 
 plained by saying that it "brought the mountain to Mahomet." 
 Before its adoption England permitted about twenty-five hundred 
 cargo ships to arrive singly into her ports and about the same 
 number to depart singly. This made a procession of ships passing 
 and repassing over the same narrow sea routes. What a wonder- 
 ful chance for the submarine ! 
 
 To protect this never ending procession small patrol vessels 
 of many types had been scattered over these narrow waters and 
 their duty had been to attack the submarine when sighted. In- 
 sufficient numbers of patrols permitted ships to be torpedoed by 
 the score weekly, while the patrol boats arrived only in time to 
 rescue the crews after the ships had disappeared beneath the 
 waves. 
 
 While the German was torpedoing or sinking by gunfire the 
 
28 WHO WON THE GREAT WAR? 
 
 unescorted merchantman he was in no danger, for it was impossihle 
 for the few patrol boats to cover all the seas. It seemed therefore 
 like play to the German. He was on the crest of the wave — 
 winning — his morale was high. He saw the enemy's great ship sink 
 without resistance. Should a patrol appear on the horizon, the 
 submarine quietly passed from the insecurity of the surface to the 
 more hospitable depths of the ocean, where no eye or ear could 
 detect him. 
 
 Playing the New Game! 
 
 But with the new convoy system — Gott straffe the man who 
 proposed it ! 
 
 This was entirely different from the game the submarines had 
 with so much joy been playing. There existed now a very strong 
 element of danger to the submarine. Besides, it put the subma- 
 rine always on the defensive. There was seldom an opportunity 
 to practise the offensive. The long suspense which the personnel 
 endured while attacking a convoy, when only one person knew 
 what was going on outside, and that one the captain at the peri- 
 scope, began to gradually tell on the men. After each return to 
 Germany they blessed their stars to be back and dreaded the com- 
 ing of the day when they must again take part in those long dreaded 
 attacks, when any moment an undersea exploding shell might 
 destroy them. Many of their companions never returned, and this 
 they could not help knowing. The vein of yellow began to grow 
 and when the victories on land by the Allies began to be under- 
 stood by the German people, this yellow streak again widened and 
 suddenly we were shown the pitiful sight of a nation fully 
 equipped in material giving in on account of a collapse of the 
 morale in its personnel — not only the fighting men but of the 
 nation behind them. 
 
 From the first day that this new method of convoying ships 
 was adopted it was an unqualified success in defeating the sub- 
 marine campaign. By August 1, 1917, more than 10,000 ships had 
 been convoyed, with losses of only one half of 1 per cent. Up 
 to that same date not a single ship which had left North American 
 ports in convoy had been lost. By August 11th, 261 ships had been 
 sent in convoy from North American ports, and of these only one 
 had fallen a prey to the submarines. The new convoy gave few 
 opportunities for encounters with submarines. I have already said 
 that the great value of this system as a protection to shipping was 
 that it compelled the underwater boats to fight their deadliest 
 enemies, the destroyers, every time they tried to sink merchant 
 ships in convoy, and they did not attempt this often on account 
 
WHO WON THE GREAT WAR? 29 
 
 of the danger. There were destroyers commanders who spent 
 months upon the open sea, convoying huge aggregations of cargo 
 vessels, without even once seeing a submarine. To a great extent 
 the new convoy system did its work in the same way that the 
 Grand Fleet performed its indispensable service — silently, un- 
 obtrusively, making no dramatic bids for popular favor, and 
 industriously plodding on, day after day, and month after month. 
 All this time the world had its eyes fixed upon the stirring events 
 of the Western Front, almost unconscious of the existence of 
 the forces that made those land operations possible. Yet a few 
 statistics eloquently disclose the part played by the new convoy 
 system in winning the war. In the latter months of the struggle 
 from 91 to 92 per cent, of Allied shipping sailed in convoys. The 
 losses in these convoys were less than 1 per cent. And this figure 
 includes the ships lost after the dispersal of the convoys : in 
 convoys actually under destroyer escort the losses were less than 
 one half of 1 per cent. 
 
 Up to the time of the Armistice, despite all the assistance 
 rendered to the navies by the best scientific brains of the world, 
 no sure means had been found of keeping track of the submarine 
 once he submerged. The new convoy system was, therefore, our 
 only method of bringing him into action." 
 
 The Revelations of the late Cornelius Van Tromp settled the 
 status of the submarine for war purposes, showing that capital 
 ships and transports need not fear submarines when under convoy 
 of destroyers. 
 
 The limitations of the submarine boat, as shown by the recent 
 loss of a large modern submarine of the British Navy with fifty- 
 two officers and men when making a practice dive, are disclosed 
 in the "Chartless Course of the Submarine." 
 
 The Chartless Course of the Submarine Boat 
 
 Lying on the surface, the submarine boat has the stability 
 and buoyancy of a surface boat of the same lines and weight. 
 It is amenable to the forces and physical laws governing the 
 surface vessel buffeted by the winds and waves, but when sub- 
 merged, new laws intervene and the limitations of the undersea 
 boat become apparent. 
 
 It cannot lie at rest answering to the winds and waves as it did 
 while on the surface, but must have an uninterrupted motion 
 through a succession of impulses from its engines and propellers, 
 directed by its steering and diving rudders. It brooks no delay 
 on the part of its propellers. 
 
30 WHO WON THE GREAT WAR? 
 
 It is obvious that in the construction of a submarine boat it is 
 impracticable to so build it and locate engines and other machinery, 
 storage batteries, ballast, supplies, etc., that its centre of gravity 
 shall coincide with its centre of form, therefore to keep it on a 
 comparatively even keel fore and aft, the diving rudders must be 
 continually manipulated, as the tendency of the heaviest end to 
 sink must be continually overcome by the diving rudders and un- 
 interrupted forward motion of the submerged boat. Thus the 
 course of the submerged boat viewed horizontally will be a suc- 
 cession of waves and not a level line, although the water may be 
 comparatively still. 
 
 The "undersea exploding shell," first particularly described in 
 the Van Tromp Revelations, would, if exploded within a short 
 distance from the submerged boat, either above, below or along- 
 side, disable its engines, rudders, propellers, one or all of them 
 checking its forward motion, when the heavier end would immedi- 
 ately begin to sink, and the commander and crew could not even 
 bring their boat to the surface for surrender, but must sink to the 
 bottom of the sea with no escape possible. If the ocean at that 
 place should be sufficiently deep, the sides of the subermine would 
 be crushed in by pressure unless the boat should perhaps be 
 protected from collapse by reason of its having been filled with 
 water through the breaking of rivetted joints : in either case 
 the officers and crew must suffer a horrible death. Cases have 
 been noted from salvaged submarines where the occupants had 
 evidently fought with each other in their madness preceding the 
 catastrophe. 
 
 This, the ghastly sequel to the Van Tromp Revelations. 
 
 Atlantic Coast Defense 
 
 His Excellency The President of the United States : — 
 
 February 15, 1918. 
 By the Author of the "Van Tromp Revelations" in re 
 The German Submarine Menace 
 Sir:— 
 
 It is not generally understood that our Atlantic coast is 
 peculiarly adapted for defense against attacks by submarines 
 owing to the comparatively shallow water for a considerable 
 distance from the shore. The depth increases on an average of 
 only seven and one-half feet to the mile. 
 
 The bottom is very even from North to South, excepting at 
 the mouths of rivers, harbors and estuaries, and is composed of a 
 hard white or gray sand extending from Newfoundland to the 
 
WHO WON THE GREAT WAR? 31 
 
 Florida Keys, and off shore to the Gulf Stream, with the excep- 
 tions noted. 
 
 Under these conditions an enemy U-boat cannot readily 
 submerge by diving, near enough inshore to have used its guns 
 against coast cities, with serious effect. The transparent waters 
 permit the defending vessels and aeroplanes to locate and destroy 
 the enemy submarine, with great precision, as the U-boat cannot 
 sink to the obscurity of deep water. 
 
 With harbor defenses our Atlantic coast is practically immune 
 from U-boat raids. 
 
 The reported increase in the size of the German submarines 
 recently built only serves to accentuate the immunity claimed — 
 they are as easily killed as the smaller submarines. 
 
 Faithfully yours, 
 
 W. R. HINSDALE. 
 
 Note : — An impressive verification of statements contained in 
 the foregoing letter was furnished when the crew of American 
 submarine S-5 executed their "Crash Dive," fifty-five miles off 
 Cape Henlopen, from which they were rescued September 3, 1920, 
 after being held in great peril head downward in the sand beneath 
 the Atlantic ocean for nearly two days. 
 
 Printed By 
 
 F. W. WEAVER & CO. 
 
 West Hoboken, N. J. 
 
(A 
 
 mm 
 
 V/:iirsMAu.,a.W. K 
 
 27th. September, 1917. 
 
 Dear Sir, 
 
 I am desired by the 
 Prime Minister to acknowledge 
 the receipt of your letter of 
 the 8th. instant, and to say 
 that the matter will receive 
 attention. 
 
 Yours faithfully, 
 
 ?/Ttv 
 
 Yf.E. Hinsdale, Esq., 
 
 W92 
 
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