The Sun.
London, England, 1862-01-09 00:00:00

THE NAVY.

Preparations for a naval war continue to be made
with undiminished energy at Portsmouth. Nearly
4,500 men are at present employed in the dockyard
alone, and this number is exclusive of seamen rig-
gers and men from the Steam Reserve. The forego-
ing number of men at work in the yard comprises
1,279 shipwrights, 879 of whom are the established I
class, and the remainder are hired hands; 80 esta-
blished and 13 hired caulkers, 147 established and
90 hired joiners, 11 wheelwrights, 200 established
and. 89 hired smiths, 76 established and 60 hired
millwrights, 59 coppersmiths, 47 at the woodmills,
90 sawyers, 181 established and 764 hired labourers,
about 60 locksmiths, braziers, and painters, and in
the steam factory department about 750. All this
'crowd of men are fullyemployed, and many of them
are working extra hours to complete some of the
most pressing portions of the work, as in the mast
making department, which is now working up to 8
p.m., to complete the masts and yards for the Black
Prince, Glasgow, and Octavia. The smiths' shop,
with its 102 fires, seven furnaces, and seven Na-
smyth's hammers ranging from a lOcwt. to a 5 ton
head—the latter having attached to it a hydraulic
crane with a5O ton lift—is as busily employed
throughout as the other departments in providing
for the want of the ships preparing for the pennant.
2he ten decks possessed by the yard are all occupied
in one way or another, and in the majority of them
swarms of workmen may be seen engaged on every
part of the vessels, in carrying out the necessary re-
pairs, &c. In No. lis the Coquette, 5, screw, now
nearly complete for commission. In No. 2 the re-
mains of the Meteor, iron cased floating battery,are
being broken up as rapidly as possible to render the
dock available for the general work of the yard. In
Nos. 3 and 4 the Highflyer, 21, screw, and the
Rosamond, 6, paddle; the former unopened, but
requiring heavy repairs, and the latter partially re-
paired and destined for a floating steam factory.
From both these vessels the men hitherto employed
on them have been withdrawn, and placed upon
more pressing work. In No. 3 is the Esk, 21, screw,
with stem out, and partially stipped of bow plank-
ing, disclosing a very rotten and defective state.
Her time for being out of the dockyard hands is
given for the 9th of May, but at present she has not
quite 50 hands upon her. In No. 6is one of the
harbour steamtugs. In Nos. 7 and 10, the double
dock, is the Black Prince, the great trouble of the
dockyard officials. Internally she is a vast work-
shop, in which artisans of every kind are busily at
work with but little hope of finishing their labours
by the time given for her to be out of hand—the
30th of April next. The teak lining forward and
aft of her armour plating is being completed, and
the scuppers leading to the main sewer are being
enlarged and increased in number. Another bridge
is also being constructed across the quarter deck.
In addition to the construction of the model for her
fish head, and the general fitting of her main and
upper decks, an immense deal remains to be yet
done—such as the construction of her hammock
nett ings, alterations and additions to her head rails,
netting, and fitting of her cabins below. In the
Black Prince, as in the Warrior, the crew sleep and
mess on the main deck, in lieu of the lower deck as
in ordinary frigates, owing to the iron ships below
the main deck being divided into compartments.
These consist of, in the after part of the ship abaft
the armour plating—lst compartment from stern,
store rooms ; 2d compartment, the officers' mess
room and cabins, or ward room ; and the 3d com-
partment, next to the armour plating, containing the
clerks' office in the centre, with a mess room on
each side, one for the midshipmen and the other
for the engineer officers. The next compartment,
inside the armour plating, contains the magazines,
store and light rooms, succeeded by five others
within the armour plating, containing respectively
the engine room, chain and shot lockers, shell rooms
and coal rooms, after boiler space, fore boiler space ;
and, lastly, the fore hold and fore magazine. For-
ward of the armour plating is the cable tier, prisons,
and provision rooms, the warrant officers' cabins,
the sick bay, and lastly, in the bows, warrant offi-
cers' store rooms. Outside the ship the bilge pieces
on the bottom are nearly affixed to the angle irons,
and the scraping of the ship's bottom has been
Les., tv prepare it to receive a coating Or the
patent composition, prepared by the Admiralty
chemist, Mr. Hay, with which also the bottom of
the Resistance, at Chatham, is ordered to be coated.
One serious defect, of an almost if not quite irreme-
diable character, exists in the construction of iron-
cased ships as constructed at present, and is fully
exemplified in both the Warrior and Black Prince.
This evil is the penetration of water between the
teak and armour plates. The water naturally
forces for its exit a passage between the joints of
the armour plates, and the opinion at present is
that nothing can remedy this under the circum-
stances of tongued and grooved edged plates hung
on a ship's sides by through bolts. Caulking is
stated to be useless, and that cannot be wondered at
considering the slung weight to be dealt with, and
the ship's motion at sea. But the effect of the action
of the water in the grooves of the plates and upon
the iron bolts can only be expected to be such that
in four or five years from the time of commission
each ship will require replating. In No. 8 dock,
the Glasgow, 51, screw, is being caulked and pre-
pared to receive her copper. Her time for being
out of the dockyard hands is the 28th pros. No. 9
dock has been used of late for breaking up old ships,
but it has been cleared during the past week, and
yesterday received the Chanticleer, 17, screw, Com-
mander C. Stirling, and is therefore now added to
the list available for general service. In the steam
basin are the Prince Regent, 89, screw, complete in
machinery ; the Octavia, 50, screw, ordered to be
finished by March 1 ; the gunboats Swinger and
Savage received their 100-pounder Armstrongs
to-day, and were to be ready for sea this evening;
the gunboat Jasper, 80-horse power, being brought
forward as quickly as possible by the shipwright
and factory departments ; the Hazard, with Capt.
C. Cole's shield model, and the Wallace, steam ten-
der. Alongside the north wall of the basin is the
Dart, 5, three-masted screw schooner, nearly com-
plete in rig stores and armament ; and the four gun-
boats, Earnest, Foam, Cracker, and Pheasant, only
requiring each their 40-pounder (they
,have their
carriage and equipment on board) to make them
ready to proceed to sea as soon as their crews and
powder could be sent on board. In the ship basin
the Tribune, 28, screw, has her machinery in order,
and is being hurried forward in the other parts of
her outfit; the Sultan is fitting for a receiving ship,
and the Juno fitting for a police ship. Her upper
deck seams have been payed on opposite sides by
the patent waterproof glue and ordinary pitch, to
test the merits of the former, of which much is ex-
pected. The poop of her Majesty's ship Victory is
also to be caulked with it, as are two ships to be
named by the Admiralty, one of which will be des-
patched on service in a hot climate, and the other
in a cold ono. The Britannia, naval cadet ship,
Capt. R. Harris, is to be taken into this basin on
the 14th inst. to complete her outfit for Portland.
Alongside the shear jetty of the ship basin the Dun-
can, 101, screw, is carrying on her outfit, to be com-
pleted by the 28th inst., and yesterday shipped her
Griffiths propeller; while off in the stream, moored
in a line with each other, at about a cable's length
apart, lie, ready to proceed to sea at an hour's no-
tice, three of the finest 50-gun frigates in the world
—the Euryalus, Shannon, and Sutlej. In the build-
ing slips there is no great bustle, all the labour of
the lard being devoted to bringing for ward the craft
most urgently wanted. In No. 1 slip the Helicon,
paddlewheel despatch vessel, 835 tons and 200 horse
power, has her timbers in position, with the exception
of a portion of her stern. In No. 2, the Harlequin, 17,
screw, 950 tons, 200 horse power, is in frame and
nearly ready for planking. In the next slipthe Dryad,
51 gaps, 3,027 tons, and 600 horse-power, is com-
plete in her framing, getting her deck beams in po-
sition, &c• 'The next but is designed
for slip is empty, de • d
for the Kent, iron-plated frigate. In the last ship
stands the Royal Alfred, laid down for a 91, but
now converted to a frigate of 50 guns, and to be
cased with 4 plates from the manufactory of
Messrs. Brown and Co-, the Atlas Steel and Iron
Works, Sheffield. One peculiarity in these plated
frigates will be that they will have a stem falling
inboard from the water line, ant", carry no project-
ing figure-head. In addition to the number of men