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Appendix No. 4.

SINGAPORE.

points as little as possible, and yet secure the ends aimed, will be the aim of the Committee in its recommendations.

8. The present authorized works were admittedly decided on at an emergency, and therefore it is no imputation on the very able officers who designed and sanctioned them to state my opinion, with the little weight that can be attached to it as a civilian's, that they are only to be considered as such part of a plan as then existing circumstances would allow to be hastily carried out. Circumstances have now changed; a very much more powerful force than was then possible might now attack us. We now have time, and consequently have no excuse for an incomplete scheme.

9. Even what we now propose may have to be strengthened and increased at some not very distant period, for the importance of this station, as a base of operations and an Imperial strategical point, cannot be overrated, in relation to the Archipelago, to the China Seas, and to Australian communica- tions with England, and therefore whatever is done should be done with a view to the possibility of a future conversion of this point into a first class defensible position.

10. The weak points in our defence are, in my opinion, these:-

I. The guns originally selected, though they may be utilised, are too light for the heaviest armour- piercing ordnance at long range that we require. The exact weights of our heaviest guns may perhaps, in the present changing state of the science of gun-construction, be best decided on at home, if the objects are definitely stated, but they must be armour-piercing at a considerable range.

II. The weakness of the present works now in hand seems to me to be as follows:-

(a.) The battery at Tanjong Katong is, by itself, hardly powerful enough. There is an immense gap between it and the battery on the Serapong point of Blakang Mati, which itself should mount heavier guns and be better defended from long range fire in its rear.

(b.) The Mount Palmer Battery is a good one, but it has hardly heavy enough guns.

(c.) The Mount Siloso Battery also needs heavier guns. It might be enfiladed or raked by the fire of ships anchoring close to the reefs off the mainland, some 1,700 yards distant, and few of its guns could reply. It has been proposed by Captain McCallum and Lieutenant Rhodes, R.E., to construct a battery ou Ayer Batu Point commanding ships so situated by a cross-fire with Mount Siloso, and this new battery-which I think urgently needed--would also form the extremity of the land defences of the coal depôts, and command land as well as sea.

11. There are two hills on Blakang Mati Island looking into the Serapong Battery and Mount Siloso respectively. These hills, if taken, would also command the coal depôt at long range. A redoubt has been authorized and is in course of construction on the most important one, and it is proposed to build another-or rifle pits-on the second above Mount Siloso.

12. It may be assumed that an enemy will try to take the forts in detail and crush one of them and effect a lodgment; then, if necessary, take the others in detail. The isolation of our forts points to this. Now, at present ships may lie on the south-west side of Blakang Mati, near Terumbo Seleger Reef, at very long range on the flank of Mount Siloso Battery, with only two (?) guns bearing on them, and no gun bearing on them from the Serapong Battery, whilst that battery might itself be annoyed in the rear by their shell. The ships, having silenced two guns of the Mount Siloso Battery, might land a force on Blakang Mati, and possibly take one of the commanding hills mentioned before, in which case, if they could get up a gun or two, the position would be very critical. No provision seems to have been made against such a landing, but Captain McCallum and Lieutenant Rhodes propose, by building a third battery on Blakang Mati, to provide against it.

It must be remarked also that Mount Siloso Battery might at present be both enfiladed and taken in flank (its south face), and its unsupported fire crushed by the fire of a squadron. The proposed new battery, now just mentioned, would, however, support it against a flank attack, and should another new battery be authorized at Passir Panjang Point in Singapore Island, as proposed by Captain McCallum and Lieutenant Rhodes, and alluded to in an early part of this paper, ships would find it too hazardous to take up the enfilading position, and Mount Siloso and the entrance and torpedo lines may be considered practically safe. It is not likely that any enemy will be able to afford time for continuous operations; he will be in constant dread of a relieving fleet in search of him, and, being far from any basis of operations or place to refit, he will hardly run very great risks. He may, however (finding the Mount Siloso and its two proposed supporting batteries too strong for him), engage at long range with Mount Serapong or Tanjong Katong, and if he finds the defence weak press his attack, if not, content himself with sending in a fast light vessel or two, at night probably, to burn the shipping, and do what other damage he may find possible. Probably the Mount Palmer Battery and the torpedoes would, in this case, save the coal depôts; their only danger would be from chance shells, and provision might be made to guard against fire from such a contingency. But admitting this, the fact remains that a successful dash by gun-boats into our crowded shipping in the roadstead would be attended with immense loss, both material and moral.

13. In considering this part of the question, it would seem to me that if Mount Serapong Battery be taken, the whole defence is in danger of collapse, and that if Tanjong Katong be taken or silenced, great destruction of property must ensue, and consequently a bad moral impression be made, and the idea of English power be lessened in these parts, whilst the latter objects might be effected (even though neither these two forts were silenced) by a dashing attack on the roadstead by gun-boats, or by a swift cruizer. I have good naval authority to support me in this view.

14. All this is possible, because, as I have before said, the distance is so great between the batteries that they do not support one another properly. The first remedy is to place in them much heavier guns than was intended. The second remedy is to erect a battery on the reef in the shoal water between Tanjong Katong and Point Serapong batteries. (I think not far from the present man-of-war anchorage.)

15. To erect such a battery would be, no doubt, a great expense, and if it be considered for the present too great an expense, then the weakness of this point must be supplemented by naval means.

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