Cowper Phipps Coles
Captain Cowper Phipps Coles | |
|---|---|
 | |
| Allegiance |  United Kingdom |
| Service |  Royal Navy |
| Years of service | 1830-1870 |
| Rank | Captain |
Captain Cowper Phipps Coles, C.B., R.N. (1819 – 7 September 1870), the son of the Reverend John Coles and his wife Mary Ann Goodhew Rogers, was an English naval Captain and inventor. Coles died when HMS Captain, an experimental warship built to his designs, sank with him onboard.
Naval Career
He entered the Royal Navy at the age of eleven. On 9 January 1846 he was promoted to Lieutenant and on 5 December 1849 posted to Phaeton commanded by George Augustus Elliot. On 24 October 1853 posted to Agamemnon as flag lieutenant for his uncle, Rear Admiral Sir Edmund lyons. He distinguished himself at the siege of Sevastopol during the Crimean War against Russia. On 13 November 1854 promoted to Commander and on 2 August 1856 was commander of the paddle boat Stromboli in the Black Sea.
It was at this time that he and other British naval officers and sailors constructed a 45 ft raft named the Lady Nancy from twenty-nine casks lashed together with spars. The raft supported a long 32 pounder gun and because of its small draft could be moved into shallow water from where it was used to attack some Russian stores. Coles became a hero for this action, when the press correspondent onboard Stromboli reported his daring deeds. Coles expanded the idea by drawing up plans for a better raft, mounting a gun enclosed within a hemispherical shield. Admiral Lyons was impressed with the ideas and Coles was sent to London to present his ideas to the Admiralty. Plans were prepared for 90ft by 30ft rafts with a draft of 3ft 7in which would be used to attack the Cronstadt forts. The rafts would be able to approach through shallow waters not protected by the fort guns. Unfortunately for Coles, the war ended before the raft could be built.[1]
Turret ship designer
On 27 February 1856 Coles was made captain. He was placed on half pay after the war ended and spent his time creating designs for turret ships. Up to this time the principle armament of warships had been batteries of guns firing from fixed ports in the sides of the ship. On 10 March 1859 he filed a patent for a revolving turret, although it is not clear how he came by the idea. The American USS Monitor constructed by John Ericsson in 1861 incorporated a revolving turret and Ericsson claimed the idea of a revolving protected gun was an old one. The London Times suggested that Marc Brunel had given Coles the idea. Coles design aim was to create a ship with the greatest possible all round arc of fire, as low in the water as possible to minimise the target. This proved to be a weakness in designs he created, because he was unwilling to compromise these aims for the practical necessities of sailing ships rigging, decks sufficiently high to be clear of heavy seas and other necessary superstructures which restricted the guns rotation.[2]
The admiralty accepted the principle of the turret gun as a useful innovation, but could not accept his other ideas on ship design. Coles submitted a design for a ship having ten domed turrets each housing two large guns. The design was rejected as impractical, although the admiralty remained interested in turret ships and instructed its own designers to create better designs. Coles submitted his plans to anyone who might be interested and succeeded in enlisting a number of supporters including Prince Albert, who wrote to the first Lord of the Admiralty, the Duke of Somerset, supporting the construction of a turret ship. In January 1862 the admiralty agreed to construct a ship, the Prince Albert which had four turrets and a low freeboard, intended only for coastal defence. Coles was allowed to design the turrets, but the ship was the responsibility of the chief Constructor Isaac Watts.[3]
Coles had another proposal, to take an existing timber ship, remove its upper decks and existing broadside guns and replace them with four turrets on a flat deck. The ship was also to be fitted with 5.5in of armour in a belt around the waterline. HMS Royal Sovereign was completed in August 1864, ahead of Prince Albert. Like Albert it had only minimal sails intended to steady the ship rather than drive it along at any speed. The low freeboard was countered by hinged sections increasing the height of the sides above the deck which could be dropped down to allow the guns to fire.[4]
While these ships were building, Coles made further proposals which the admiralty resisted pending completion of the trial ships already under construction. However, once Royal Sovereign was completed and had received favourable reports he requested admiralty assistance in creating a new design. This was to be based upon the existing Pallas designed by the new Chief Constructor, Edward James Reed. The admiralty provided the original plans of the ship plus Joseph Scullard, constructor at Portsmouth dockyard, to assist. The resulting single turret design was rejected, but the admiralty instructed Reed to create a larger version with two turrets which became HMS Monarch, laid down in 1866 and completed in June 1869. Coles complained at the inclusion of a forecastle and poop which prevented the guns firing fore and aft, and the high position of the guns 17 ft above water level, but his objections were dismissed. Reed maintained the features were all intended to improve seaworthiness.[5]
In 1867 Reed designed the revolutionary Ironclad Breastwork Monitor Cerberus the first major British built Warship to entirely dispense with sails and featuring two Cowper Coles gun turrets mounted on the center line of the ship. This design eventually proved the blueprint for future British Pre-Dreadnought Battleships up to about 1906. Cerberus became the Flagship of the Victorian Colonial Navy in Australia and can still be seen, with her Cowper Coles turrets intact, in Port Phillip Bay Melbourne. There is an active and ongoing campaign to save and preserve this unique ship led by 'Friends of the Cerberus' http://www.cerberus.com.au/ with members around the world.
HMS Captain
Coles once again resorted to public opinion to obtain support for a ship more closely in accord with his design ideas. The civilian First Lord remained agreeable to his plans although the board of admirallty was split. Eventually the board agreed to pay for the construction of a ship, although this was to be supervised by Coles himself in an admiralty approved yard and Laird Brothers agreed to build her. Plans for HMS Captain were submitted to the admiralty as would be normal, but Reed declined to 'approve' them, instead marking all drawings 'not objected to'. Construction commenced in January 1867.[6]
In July 1867 Coles was captain of the Royal Sovereign which was brought temporarily into service for the Naval Review.
Captain was designed to have a freeboard of only eight feet, but due to mistakes in construction causing increased weight the ship eventually floated 14in lower in the water. She had a full set of sails and the highest masts in the navy. She was completed in January 1870 and initial trials were successful. In May she accompanied the Channel fleet and successfully weathered a gale. Vice-Admiral Sir Thomas Symmonds commanding commented favorably on both Captain and Monarch. Captain achieved 14.25 knots compared to Monarch's 14.9 under steam, but with smaller engines. Under sail, Captain was faster. All in all, she was hailed as a vindication of Coles' ideas.[7]
In August the ship sailed again with Coles onboard. This time weather deteriorated and again she had to face a gale. This time, however, the wind was gusting and unpredictable. It was demonstrated that the ship had a maximum righting moment at an angle of heel around 18 degrees. If she was pushed over more than this, then the force declined. By contrast Monarch had a maximum restoring force at an angle of 40 degrees, so that any heel up to this limit would always meet increasing resistance. Gusts had pushed Captain past the safe angle and she had capsized, even though at the time she was carrying little sail.[8]
Extensive rigging was necessary to make the ship ocean-going. This forced the creation of a "hurricane deck" above the turrets, which increasingly caught the wind as she heeled over. This may have been instrumental in Captain's tragic capsize.[9]
Coles perished in the disaster after midnight on the night of 6 September.
Family
In 1856, Coles married Emily Pearson, niece of Admiral Lord Lyons. Coles was himself a nephew, by marriage, of Admiral Lord Lyons, his mother being the sister of Augusta, Lyons' wife.
Issue
| Name | Birth | Death | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|
| Cowper Bickerton Cowper-Coles | 1857 | 1920 | married 1895, Maud Beatrice Cresswell |
| Fanny Augusta Cowper-Coles | 1859 | 1951 | married 1877, Admiral Sir Baldwin Wake-Walker, CMG, CVO, 2nd Baronet |
| Rogers Lyons Cowper-Coles | 1860 | 1915 | married 1884, Margaret Lucie Dawes |
| Alice Mary Cowper-Coles | 1861 | 1910 | |
| Minna Spencer Cowper-Coles | 1864 | 1948 | married 1892, Walter Vernon Anson |
| Samuel Hood Cowper-Coles | 1866 | 1932 | married 1892, Hon. Edith Bailey, daughter of 1st Lord Glanusk |
| Sherard Osborn Cowper-Coles | 1866 | 1936 | married 1919, Constance Hamilton Watts |
| William Burgoyne Cowper-Coles | 1867 | 1955 | married 1891, Rebecca Smith |
| Commerell Markham Cowper-Coles | 1869 | c.1906 |
References
- HMS Captain
- Brief biography
- K. C. Barnaby (1968). Some ship disasters and their causes. London: Hutchinson.