296 Chapter Eightperts. ... I have been guided by the representations of my naval
colleagues and the advice of experts on whom the Admiralty must
rely.”^55
Yet the machine “developed by service experts” could only work if
a ship followed a straight-line course while firing its guns, whereas Pol
len’s device could adjust for a changing course as well. There were
other defects in the fire control system installed on British ships from
1913 onwards. In particular, the Royal Navy’s optical range finders
gave far less accurate results than those the Germans used at Jutland.
Tests which might have shown the superiority of Pollen’s system were
never held. To have done so would have cost large sums, risked having
to pay the £100,000 the Admiralty had promised Pollen in case of suc
cess, and discredited an influential coterie of experts inside the Ad
miralty as well.^56
One may argue, of course, that a machine capable of working under
limited conditions and costing a good deal less was indeed, as
Churchill said in Parliament, “more satisfactory” than the more expen
sive private design. Given the financial pressures that the navy had
begun to experience, reasonable men might so decide. Moreover,
firing from line-ahead formation was traditional. How else could an
admiral keep control of a fleet and bring maximum firepower to bear?
How else could naval tradition be upheld in a desperately confusing
world? If it made range-finding for the enemy easier than firing from a
zigzag pattern would do, what matter? The preferred tactic among
British admirals was to fall back on the Nelsonian formula and close
the range as fast as possible so as to achieve a decisive victory. To alter
fleet management and tactical doctrine in deference to a piece of ma
chinery few besides its inventor really understood—that was too
much.
It seems clear that the angry cross-purposes that came to bear upon
the controversy quite obscured the technical matters at issue. FewGreat Gunnery Scandal: The Mystery of Jutland (London, 1980), p. 145. This book,
written by the inventor’s son, polemically corrects earlier misinformation about Pollen’s
work. Playing fast and loose with private patent rights was not unprecedented. In a
famous instance, Admiral Fisher himself sent copies of Alfred Yarrow’s boiler designs
for the new destroyers to rival shipbuilders. Yarrow advertised publicly for information
that might lead to the discovery of the culprit; and a public apology was made by the
navy, but without ever openly implicating Fisher. Hough, First Sea Lord, p. 101; Eleanor
C. Barnes, Alfred Yarrow, His Life and Work (London, 1923), pp. 102–5.
- Parliamentary Debates, Commons, 30 June 1913, vol. 54, col. 1478.
- Pollen was a friend of Admiral Beresford. This made him persona non grata to
Fisher and his followers, who remained in control of the Admiralty after 1906.