Show THE HEW WAR SHIP The Scenes at the Recent Launching Launch-ing of the Maine I AN ESTIMATE OF HER EFFICIENCY She Could Have Sunk Both the Monitor and the Mcrrlmac in One Minute I BROOKLTX N Y Nov12 lSOOSpecial correspondence of THE HERALD Just before be-fore noon on Tuesday tho 18th inst there will be launched from tho Brooklyn navy yard the greatest war vessel and armored steel cruiser combined that has ever yet floated under the flag of this country The fact that she has been thus far constructed entirely by the United States government and not by private contract would be in itself sufficient to make the occasion an interesting in-teresting and important one but oven that fact aside the day will be a red letter one in the annals of the American navy for it will mark another and a giant stride in tho renewed life of an invaluable branch of the national service which less than a decade ago seemed almost doomed not to obliteration exactly but to a lingering useless use-less and unhonored existence with all its glories in the past and none to be hoped for in the future When therefore the great steel ship slides easily into deep water on the day appointed ap-pointed for its launching and Miss AVil merding the granddaughter of the secretary secre-tary of the navy amid theboomiug of guns n y X64 thp ti = c I THE CTUISTESIXO the screeching of whistles the dipping of colors and the cheers of thousands of seamen sea-men and landsmen christens it the Maine it will all mean that a new maritime mari-time monster has been let loose on the seato sea-to maintain and defend if need be whether at home or abroad the honor of the flag it sails under and the rights of the people it represents That by the time it is fully equipped and ready to go into commission it will be amply able to do all that is expected ex-pected of it and to cope with any foe on equal terms is the chief reason why the launching of the Maine in this present month of November appeals to the pride andthe enthusiasm of patriotic Americans everywhere Its actual completion two years hencefor the launching is simply that of a massive shell with empty compartments com-partments will give to the whole country an added sense of security in case of threatened foreign invasion and an added feeling of readiness to act in case of foreign insult or injustice For the Maine although called a cruiser is also a warship and is built to hold her own against warships She is not a revolution revo-lution in naval architecture but is rather a development and so far as this country is concerned is the one illustration of the highest stage of development recorded in the era which began when the little original orig-inal Monitor was sent down to Hampton Roads to put an end to the destructive performances per-formances of the then confessedly invinci I3 w f Cf THE ELECTRIC DRILL ble Merrimac Details and figures illustrative illus-trative of the dimensions of the Maine and of what she may be expected to perform have been published many times of late but when yesterday I had explored every section of the great hull in its still unfinished unfin-ished state stood outside the ship house which still incloses it to view the mammoth mam-moth steel prow poking out aft it does through the front wall and stretching landward land-ward surveying the stately proportions of the stern towering far above the basin into which the vessel is to be launched and then looked alone the outer sides from stem to bow I thought of the time when John Ericksons Monitor was welcomed as the hope of the nation in its hour of crises and doom and realized that here indeed was development in the art of building iron warships For had the Maine been afloat at tile time of that memorable combat between be-tween the Monitor and the Merrimac it could have acted the part of arbiter with a vengeance and sent both those terrors of eastern coast waters to the bottom withiu l j N v V r i1 It I I t THE STERN sixty seconds That however would have been a feat scarcely worth mentioning F Beside me on the dock near the launching basin gazing with rant admiration at the lofty stern and occasionally casting a criti criti cruiser stood a genuine old salt of the typ a ical old schoolold Captain Coffin you I might almost believe come back to life againand rigged out in the sea togs which II always commanded his heartiest affection and the best efforts Of 1115 l ptenr Stllltlflnif inC of the wondrously rapid stres in the 1 science of naval architecture I addressed myself to this rare old specimen of all that used to seem best inAmerican seamanship and after a little introductory talk said lilt wouldnt perhaps be too much to say that this cruiser if afloat twenty years ago could have more than held her own against the whole British navy of that day There was mild but unmistakable contempt con-tempt in the glance the veteran mariner bestowed be-stowed upon me and the conviction was fast stealing over me that indeed it was too much to say and that I myself had rashly said it in the presence of superior wisdom When the old man finally spoke his words brought genuine relief If that ere craft was afloat twenty years ago he said slowly and impressively shed a been more than a match single i handed for all the navies of the hull world I Sweeping wasnt it1 But when a little later I talked with distinguished naval officers of-ficers naval constructors and naval I draughtsmen I found that the old salts opinion was their opinion too Indeed I iflt l l l tl 111 THE BOILER ROOV was informed that it was an opinion accepted ac-cepted and unreservedly concurred in by Secretary Tracey The Maine twenty years ago could have faced the war ships of the world and have swept them out of existence one after the other with comparative com-parative ease Is the Maine then to be invincible you ask Not at all The invincible warship war-ship has never yet been built and probably proba-bly never will be built Naval development develop-ment take it all in all is never onesided Side by side with development in protective protec-tive armor we have always seen and probably proba-bly always shall see development in destructive de-structive forces Look at the Maines own wonderful guns with which she has yet to be equipped as a convincing example of the truth of the trite assertion Four of those guns are to be placed in the cruisers turrets two in each Any one of those four guns is capable of hurling a 300pound steel ball at the rate of 2000 feet per second sec-ond a distance of nine miles or as men in I gunnery say an effective distance of I nine miles That means that those enormous enor-mous guns car be so delicately adjusted as to insure with proper handling the striking strik-ing of a target nine miles away even though the targetitself cannot be seen its position being merely indicated by some other object ob-ject The masts of a hostile vessel for example ex-ample are in sight nine miles away but the hull is below the horizon Perhaps no masts are seennothing but the smoke from the smokestack Even that is often sufficient to indicate to the practiced eye the position of a vessels deck One of the big guns is trained and in less than half a minute later if all calculations be correct and the aim be trueand in modern warfare war-fare nothing is left to chancea 500pound r ARMOR BERTH DECK steel cannon ball will tumble with an unceremonious un-ceremonious and all destructive crash onto on-to the deck of that hostile vessel nine miles away Long distancecombats will probably proba-bly be preferred at sea hereafter especially especi-ally as the projectiles referred to are warranted war-ranted to pierce at a thousand yards the armor of almost anything afloat Then too neither the Maine nor any other vessel is completely armored The Maine is to wear an armor belt and to carry such other armor as will afford reasonable and perhaps almost absolute protection to her vital parts such as her engines boiler steering apparatus powder magazine conning con-ning tower or wheelhouse as we landsmen lands-men are most apt to call it torpedo room etA Men are not vet considered vital parts of a war ship and poor Jack in action will be in almost as much danger of running against a bullet or a cannon ball on board the new steel armored cruiser Maine as were his gallant elder brethren of the old wooden Cumberlands crew There are parts nf the Mainps decks find elsewhere in the vessel too which might easily bo swept by shells even of the oldfashioned sort The Maine is going to be a seven knot vessel and she will not carry a pound of extra armor that would be likely to interfere in-terfere with that rate of speed The views here presented furnish excellent excel-lent representations of scenes on the Maine during the present week Menmostly rivetersare at work everywhere hastening hasten-ing to get the new cruiser in readiness for launching The interior resembles that t R s F 1 4 = = = = = = = = THE DOW of a mammoth foundry Here and there the electric drill obtaining its motor power through a single thin cable Is making its 2400 revolutions a minute and astonishing astonish-ing even the men who handle it by the marvelous mar-velous rapidity of its work No complete sketch of the vessel in its present state can be taken because of the fact that its ship house still encloses it and rafters board ings and gangplanks are on all sides of it The view from tho main deck shows a section sec-tion of the navy yard water front with some of the White Squadron vessels moored to the dock The White Squadron by the I I way is a landsmans term and is not recognized recog-nized by naval officers 1t is the fashion 1 just now in this country to paint all iron war ships whitR Byd lt citip1e tb i M life is ready to go fate CQU1Dts5 o n lonfe bthtfr color may be in vogue The view of the stern of the Maine shows I also the basin into which she will be launched for the Maine is going into the water stern foremost There is no special rule as to this everything depending of u I course as to whether it is mcst convenient to build the vessel with her prow pointing landward or seaward Vessels have even been inched broadside out but that is are and > a dittla clumsy The Maine will launched just as thousands of wooden ships haVe Keen launched before her no change in launching methods have been deemed necessary to meet the requirements of iron vessels When she slides into the water the largest war ship in the United States will be afloat i t 1 h r I + 1Y k n 1 vIEw rno3I MAIN DECK Not in the world England has one or two just one size largerfor creat warships war-ships like needles and pearl buttons come in sizesand there are a few of this larger size elsewhere in the civilized world This government is now making arrangements to have two of the extra large size cruisers built but it will take five years to construct them and that will give the Maine at least three years to enjoy the honor of being ut the head of the American navy and to be the admirals flagship After she is launched she will go into dry dock to receive re-ceive her armor belt plaitings etc machinery ma-chinery guns and her famous hollow steel or military masts with revolving gun platforms aloft These with her abilities I as a torpedo boat have been so often and so fully described that it is not necessary I to do more than refer to them here There has in fact been no intention in the present I pres-ent article of indulging in a repetition of details the only object being to invite renewed I re-newed attention at what seems an appropriate appro-priate time to the steady increase of great war vessels in the once feeble American I navy and also to take a hastj passing glance at the tremendous possibilities of modern warfare We all hope I am sure that the future of the new American navy may ever be a peaceful one but suppose all our hopes should count for naught and suppose the great cruiser and war ship Maine so soon to be launched with a fair young girls smile and benediction should find itself in deadly contest with a foreign vessel of equal power and resources What a battle of the giants that would boW bo-W H CURTIS JR |