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Upon the 24th April, 1878, I received orders by telegram to proceed from Hong Kong (where I was then stationed) to Singapore, there to meet the General Officer Commanding, who was about to start from England. At that time affairs with Russia were assuming a serious aspect, and war appeared to be imminent, so much so, that the various Colonies were ordered to adopt such measures as they were able to defend themselves against the attack of hostile cruizers, and, above all, to defend or burn their coals. At Hong Kong measures were taken to throw up earthworks and mount guns; and when the telegram referred to arrived, I was hard at work designing and constructing the necessary batteries.
I arrived in this Colony on the 18th May, and at once put myself in communication with his Excellency the Governor, who acquainted me with what was being done in the matter of defence. This could be but little. An antiquated smooth-bore armament (56-pounders) was being mounted in old Fort Palmer, which was being cleared of jungle; but, as I pointed out the fire of such armament (which was the only one available) could be considered effective only over a very small zone of defence, extending, indeed, not even to the front of the town.
However, as it seemed probable that guns of modern construction were being hastily dispatched from England to the various Colonies, Mount Palmer Battery would have formed a convenient platform to have mounted two guns in a temporary manner to bring a fire to bear over the eastern entrance to the New Narbour; but the battery itself was so unfortunately situated on the side of the hill, and its design was so faulty and feeble, that no idea could be entertained of its being occupied for a permanent measure. The Colonial Government had likewise purchased a quick steam-launch, with the idea of fitting her with extempore spar torpedoes.
Before the General arrived I visited the sites of the batteries as recommended by Governor Sir William Jervois, R.E., and found them much overgrown with thick jungle. Had war broken out, it would seem to have been the best policy to have closed the narrow western entrance of the New Harbour with a boom, defended against boat attacks by light guns mounted in tongkangs inside the point. A strong cable then lying at the New Harbour Dock Company's wharves would have formed the nucleus of a good boom, the composite beams of which could have been constructed at Tanjong Pagar in a few days.
Any guns which might arrive would have been mounted on wooden racers in pits on the hills on either side of the eastern entrance, these pits being gradually strengthened as time allowed of it.
I also saw the managers of the Tanjong Pagar Dock Company and of the Telegraph Company with the idea of having made boiler-plate torpedo cases, and of getting cables and make-shift instruments to fire the charges. Dynamite I could get from the Borneo Company.
On the arrival of the Major-General, however, I found that the Imperial authorities had voted a much larger sum of money than I had anticipated, and that substantial batteries mounting ten 7-inch guns of 6 tons and six 64-pounders were to be erected, at a cost of 17,600, one on either end of Blakan Mati, and the third on Mount Palmer. A supply of torpedoes was being sent from England, and notification was made that a fourth battery was to be afterwards constructed at Tanjong Katong. The distribution of the guns was to be determined on the spot; and this could not be done with cer- tainty until the jungle was cleared away. But, having visited the sites with the Major-General, it was proposed, for local and military reasons, to slightly deviate from the distribution proposed by the War Office, and to make preparations to mount-
Four 7-inch muzzle-loading rifled guns and two 64-pounders at Blakan Mati East.
Three
Ditto
ditto ditto
ditto ditto
Mount Siloso. Mount Palmer.
Appendix No. 4.
SINGAPORE,
Upon clearing the sites no change was found to be necessary, and, the matter being subsequently fully reported to the War Office, met with entire approval.
Singapore is not a Royal Engineer Station; the service upon which I was engaged was a special one, and of an emergent nature. The contractors here are for the most part men without the neces- sary capital to start a large work of the nature of which they were unacquainted. Prices are high. Blakan Mati bears a very bad name amongst the natives; the coolies are a very indifferent subject from Amoy and Swatow; and altogether the execution of the works in a speedy and satisfactory manner seemed to be a matter of much difficulty. The Major-General therefore determined, at my request, to treat the work of constructing the new defences quite as a special case, and to invest me with the entire responsibility of making all the contracts and arrangements for their due execution, and to commence operations as soon as ever I could prepare desigus, the necessary plans being subsequently transmitted for information and approval.
The charge thus entrusted to me was a most responsible one, entailing as it did the adoption of such measures as would be of practical value in the event of war breaking out, but which could be included in the larger and stronger works to be constructed if a longer period of time became available. Without delay, men were set to work to clear away the jungle on the sites of the proposed batteries, and contoured surveys made of the positions.
The Chinese contractors showed no anxiety to take up the contracts; the distance from the town, the alleged unhealthiness of the island, the cost of transport, and ignorance of what was required to be done being the principal arguments against their offering to tender.
To an advertisement in the public papers calling for tenders above the scale of rates shown in the schedule of prices in use by the Public Works Department of the Colony, and to notices of the same effect in Chinese distributed amongst the contractors, there was but one application, at a rate of 100 per cent. above the Public Works Department schedule.
I therefore determined to make the transport a separate question, and to divide up the contracts, and to give persons intending to tender an idea of the sort of work they would have to do, drew up a blank schedule of what would be the principal items, the rates of which could then be filled in by them,
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