The Man who Missed the War Read Online Free PDF

anti-submarine vessels. But as the Admiralty has squandered the best part of its money on these absurd battleships—huge things so vulnerable that they each have to have more escorts than a convoy before they dare move out of harbour themselves—there’s not the least prospect of our getting the small fast craft we’ll need. The only alternative safeguard against a German undersea blockade of the British Isles proving fully effective, that I could see, seemed to be some method of increasing shipping space from the United States quickly and at comparatively little cost. I’ll go fully into the whole thing again and get something down on paper. Then I’d very much like to have your opinion on it.’
    ‘Splendid!’ beamed the Canon. ‘Is a week long enough for you?’
    Philip nodded. ‘Yes, it shouldn’t take me more than two or three evenings to draw a diagram of the thing I have in mind.’
    ‘Right then! Come and have dinner with me again today week.’
    A week later, after they had dined, Philip collected a long roll of stiff paper from the hall and, clearing a space among the books scattered all over the big table in the Canon’s library, spread it out. At the top there stood out in bold letters the words ‘ ATLANTIC RAFT CONVOY’ .
    ‘By jove!’ exclaimed the Canon, as he peered over Philip’s shoulder. ‘Rafts, eh! That’s a darn’ good idea—if only it’s workable. But surely it will take as much steampower to tow loaded rafts across the ocean as it would to transport the goods in the holds of ships?’
    ‘Yes, ordinarily it would,’ Philip agreed. ‘That was just the snag I had to get over. My first idea was that every ship coming from the States should tow a large raft behind it. But I soon saw the objections to that. A raft of any size would act as such a drag on its towing vessel that it would increase the time of each voyage to a degree at which we’d almost certainly lose rather than gain on our imports. In addition, during storms, the strain on the cables would become so severe that they’d snap; then we’d not only lose the cargo on the raft, but the rafts themselves, driftingwild, might prove a serious danger to our other shipping. Nevertheless, it was that last thought about a raft drifting loose in the Atlantic that really put me on the right track. Do you realise where it would land up?’

    The Canon thought for only a second, then he cried: ‘Why, somewhere on the coasts of the British Isles most probably—on account of the Gulf Stream.’
    Philip nodded, his blue eyes shining. ‘That’s it. The Gulf Stream, and the prevailing winds, would bring it slowly but surely north-east, until it beached in England, Ireland, Scotland or Norway. The next step was to find a way of harnessing those god-given forces of nature, because the danger to shipping remained if the Americans just launched scores of these big rafts on to the open ocean, and a percentage of them would be bound to be lost through being dashed on to rocks or washed up on the coasts of the Azores, Eire, Ireland and Scandinavia; so this is the scheme I’ve worked out.’
    They both bent over the diagram as he went on to explain it. ‘My idea is that a hundred square wooden rafts should be connected together in ten strings of ten by strong cables, and that the first raft in each string should be similarly connected to its neighbours. Those lozenges marked A and B are sea-going tugs attached to the two outermost rafts in the front line.’
    ‘But two ocean-going tugs would never have the power to tow that number of rafts, if they were of any size,’ objected the Canon.
    ‘Of course not,’ Philip replied impatiently. ‘For power we must rely entirely on winds and current, but two fair-sized tugs
would
have enough pull in them to influence direction, and provided they were not required to steam
against
the current they would be able to some extent to check drift to south or north of the shortest course between the