Henry Ernest Dudeney/Puzzles and Curious Problems/258 - Deploying Battleships/Solution

Puzzles and Curious Problems by Henry Ernest Dudeney: $258$

Deploying Battleships

Ten battleships were anchored in the form here shown.

The puzzle is for four ships to move to new positions (the others remaining where they are)

until the ten form five straight rows with four ships in each row.

How should the admiral do it?

Solution

The white dots indicate where the ships were moved from.

The black dots indicate where they were moved to.

The blue dots indicate ships that did not move.

Also see

• $255$ - A Peg Puzzle and $257$ - Five Lines of Four, both similar to this.

Sources

• 1932: Henry Ernest Dudeney: Puzzles and Curious Problems ... (previous) ... (next): Solution: $258$. -- Deploying Battleships
• 1968: Henry Ernest Dudeney: 536 Puzzles & Curious Problems ... (previous) ... (next): Answers: $440$. Deploying Battleships