Ports And Guns And Deceiving An Enemy

You can see the depth markings on the stern by the rudder.

They are draft marks. There are draft marks on the aft of the ship and there are draft marks at the bow.

Loaders use them to ensure the ship is sitting balanced fore and aft in the water. And they make sure the ship is not overloaded, which could risk the ship grounding in shallow channels.

A ship can be too top heavy. Guns can make a ship top heavy.

Something Tamara and I learned on the Amsterdam is that the builders might put more gun ports than guns on a ship to make a potential enemy think twice about engaging it.

When the ports are closed, anyone looking at the ship could not know whether there was a gun behind the port.