Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1896-01-30
OF PECULIAR DESIGN.
The Sister Of the Helena Was Launch
ed In October.

The Sister Of the Helena Was Launch
ed in October.
The gunboat Helena is one Of two ships of
peculiar design built for the navy by the
Newport News Company, her sister Ship
the Wilmington, having been launched last
October. The purpose was to secure an
| efficient type of vessel for the navigation
OF shallow and shifting rivers, such as are
found in China, which might still possess
seagoing qualities sufficient to insure safe
passages from the United States to foreign
stations, and also to enable them to be used
in carrying the United States flag into the
many ports of South and Central America
which are now inaccessible to our Warships
ewing to Shoal water.
So the Helena when complete, with all
stores aboard will draw only nine feet of
water, and may go where any schooner able
to navigate the seas can enter, and while
| rot a attic ship in the sense of not possess
irg armor and big guns, will carry eight
four-inch rifles guns quite large enough to
meet anything short of armored craft and
heavy Notifications, and number of small
er machine guns so mounted as to afford an
extremely destructive fire upon mobs or
troops on shore, or a boarding party.
To enable the Helena to make her Way IN
and down narrow and crooked channels she
has double rudders, giving great turning
power, and these are SO shielded that the
stern may be run into soft bank and the
bow swept around by the current, as is
| customary in some of our Florida rivers.
To give the screws sufficient water to
work in, and at the same time to protect
them from snags and drift in the freshet
streams, they are placed in two tunnels
worked in the bottom Of the boat. The gen
eral lines of the boat above water are broad
and this results in giving much more than
the usual allotment Of space for berthing,
so that the boat will be peculiarly fitted for
service in the tropics, and will be also able
to give refuge to many people in time of
stress.
There will be no sails upon this vessel and
FER one mast is a big steel tube, large
enough to permit of a spiral staircase inside
giving access from the deck to the top
| where four machine guns are placed to
sweep the shores, and the steersmen NAV sit
in safety forty feet above the water and
thus look clear over the narrow bends in
Chinese rivers. The Helena is $50 feet o
inches long by 40 feet inch broad, with A
speed Of thirteen knots and will carry 40
officers and men.
She is built Of steel throughout and is
launched just two years after the award Of
the contract for building her to the NeWport
News Shipbuilding Company, at s2SO,OOO:
although the appropriation for the shin was
rot to exceed 100000. In her construction
comfort has been placed. She has a double
bottom as a guard against collision and
groundings, and Is believed to be a model
gunboat for the special services she was de-
signed to meet.
Tho other vessel Is merchant steamer
built for the Plant line, and destined to run
between Tampa and the Bahamas: but as
requirements of the subsidy act she is SUBJ
ject to call by the government at any time
to serve as a vessel of the auxiliary navy
She Is fully half as big again as the Helena