The first is that Tryon was mistaken in the orders which he gave. It has variously been suggested that he might have been ill or indisposed in some way, supported by his curt comments to officers who queried him at the time, and his apparent inattention to the results when the manoeuvre commenced. Alternatively, that he was of sound mind, but mistook the turning circle of the ships involved. It has been suggested that a much more frequent manoeuvre was a turn of 90°, for which a space allowance of two cables per ship would have been correct. On this basis, the ships would have completed their turns inwards at a spacing of two cables, then re-traced their course to the correct point to turn to their final anchor positions. Whatever the possible reason for the initial mistake, some confirmation of this explanation comes from the reported statement of Lieutenant Charles Collins, who had been officer of the watch on "Victoria" at the time of the incident. Memoirs written by Mark Kerr related that Collins had confirmed to him that Tryon had admitted on the bridge that this was the mistake he had made. One historian has gone so far as to suggest that Tryon's incomprehensible letters to Lord Charles Beresford indicate that he "was suffering from some deterioration of the brain; that his fatal error was no mental aberration such as is to be expected of the young and inexperienced, but the consequence of a disease which at times clouded and confused his judgement and ideas."