Thursday, January 16, 2014

OUR NAVY FAR IN THE REAR


USS Monadnock (BM-3)
The Cortland News, Friday, October 1, 1886.

OUR NAVY FAR IN THE REAR.

Estimated Life of the Present Fleet—What the New Boats are Like and When They Will be Completed—the Guns to be Used.


   WASHINGTON, D. C., Sept 26, 1886.—Chief Constructor Wilson estimates the active life of the wooden warships of our present navy as follows: The Tennessee, the only one classed as first rate, six months; the Trenton, Omaha and Vandalia, second rates, and the Mohican third rate, ten years; the Lancaster and Brooklyn, second rates, and the Adams, Alliance, Essex, Enterprise, Nipsic, Tallaposa and Yantic, third rates, six years' the Harford, Richmond and Pensacola, second rates, and the Juniata, Ossippe, Quinnebaugh, Swatara, Galena, Marion, Iroquois and Kearsage, third rates, five years. These with the iron ships Monocacy, Alert and Ranger, third rates, and the Michigan, Palos and Pinta, fourth rates, constitute the available fighting force of the present navy. The most powerful of their weapons are the converted guns, having a range of perhaps two miles—excellent arms for operations against wooden ships and ancient fortifications or for shelling towns, but inefficient against modern armor.

   The very best of these ships is held by our naval authorities to be far behind the times as a reliance for offense or defense in actual warfare. The list of ironclads comprises more than a dozen monitors, but none of them are in a condition for service.

   With this showing the United States is placed by her own authorities at the foot of the list of naval powers in essential matters of ships and guns, there being three South American, two Asiatic and fifteen or sixteen European powers which outrank us.

   That portion of our prospective "new navy," the construction of which has already been sanctioned by Congress, numbers eighteen ships of all classes to cost an aggregate of something more than twenty million dollars and the last barring accidents or the failure of appropriations is expected to be afloat four years hence. They are required to be built entirely of metal and no device known and approved at the date of their planning to secure efficiency as fighting machines has been or is to be omitted in their construction.

   Their armament throughout will be of modern high-powered guns, the largest weapons at present contemplated being the twelve-inch breech loading rifle, carrying a missile which weighs more than 800 pounds and requiring more than 400 pounds of powder for each discharge. The theoretical range of such weapons is about twelve miles, but difficulties in the matter of elevation and otherwise serve to reduce this somewhat in practice.

   Seven of these ships are to be armored, the heaviest probably carrying sixteen inches of steel as a protection. Three will be "protected cruisers," that is, vessels whose thick lower decks of steel dip their edges below the water line and serve as a protection to the machinery, magazines and other vital parts of the vessels. The others will be four steel cruisers, two gunboats, one first-class torpedo boat, and the Dolphin, 1,500 tons displacement, is already completed and receiving her armament. The Atlanta, 3,000 tons, is on her trial trip and her armament is being tested, while the Boston, 3,000 tons, and the Chicago, 4,500 tons, are well advanced in construction. Five of the armored vessels are of the double turret monitor class, each designed to carry four heavy, high-powered guns, throwing 500 pound shells with a possible range of ten miles. Though not designed for cruising, they can in emergencies be sent abroad. The Miantonowh, 3,315 tons, will be ready for service this year; the Puritan, 6,000 tons, has her engines in place and is nearly ready for her armor, while the Terror, Amphitrite and Monadnock, 3,815 tons each, are not receiving their machinery.

   The other two armored ships have not yet entered upon their first stage of existence, their construction having only been authorized by Congress at the end of its last session. They are to be of 6,000 tons displacement, to have double bottoms, engines designed to drive them at a speed of sixteen knots an hour, and complete torpedo outfits and armaments of the most effective kind and are to cost not more than $2,500,000 each. The dynamite gun cruiser will be a novelty, comparable probably to nothing now in existence.

   With all these vessels afloat, the United States as a naval power will outrank Brazil, Chile, the Argentine Republic, China, Japan, Greece, Norway, Portugal and Sweden, and will be abreast of Turkey, Spain, Holland and Denmark. She will still be outranked by England, France and Germany, Austria, Italy and Russia.


References:

1) U. S. Navy Active Ship Force Levels, 1886-present:
http://www.history.navy.mil/branches/org9-4.htm

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