Shepherdstown register. [volume] (Shepherdstown, Va. [W. Va.]) 1849-1955, 1898-04-28
NEW VOL. 33.---NO. 26.
Facts About the Navy.

The United States is the fifth naval
power in the world. The navies OF
Great Britain, France, Russia and
Italy rank ahead in the order named.
Germany and the United States are
about tied.
Our present effective fighting force
consists Of four battle ships Ofthe first
class, one battle ship of the second
class, two armored cruisers, eighteen
cruisers, fifteen gunboats, SIX double
turreted monitors, one ram, one dyna-
mite gunboat, one dispatch boat, one
transport and eight torpedo boats.
The powder used is brown. A
charge for the biggest guns weighs
500 pounds, and is hoisted to the
breech by derrick, the powder being
sewed up in burlap bags.
Armor plates are tested by firing
steel projectiles weighing from 100 to
1900 pounds at them from guns
charged with 500 pounds of powder
and at distance of about city block.
Our battle ships have speed of
from fifteen to seventeen knots an
hour. Cruisers make nineteen to
twenty-four knots, while the moni-
tors can travel about twelve knots.
The biggest guns in the navy are
forty-nine feet long, big enough for a
man to crawl into; four feet in dame
ter at their largest part, and weigh
135, 800 pounds, or thereabouts.
There are six rear-admirals in ac-
tive service. The Offices of vice-ad-
miral and admiral are untitled, so
there is no head of the navy excepting
Secretary Long.
The fastest vessels in the navy are
the torpedo boats Porter and Dupont,
each of which can travel 27.5 knots
an hour.
Battle ships cost from $2,5OO,OOO
to $3,75O,OOO, and cruisers from
$6OO,OOO to $3,OOO,OOO A good tor
pedo boat costs over 100000.
Battle ships are for the heavy work;
cruisers are commerce destroyers;
monitors are useful only for coast de-
fense.
The Indiana could lie outside San
dy Hook and throw l, ,20O-pound shots
into New York at the rate Of four
minute.
Those artists who show smoke in
their pictures of naval battles are
wholly wrong. Smokeless powder Is
used.
All Of the cruisers are named in
honor of cities, and the battle ships,
except the Kearsage, in honor of
States.
A big battle ship has on board an
electric plant capable of Lighting a
town of 5000 inhabitants.
The boilers of the Iowa have
heating surface of eight acres and holds
thirty tons of water.
Great Britain has 294 torpedos and
torpsdo-boat destroyers; Uncle Sam
has only eight.
Five hundred and forty-six men
and forty officers are required to man
the cruiser New York.
At present the total enlisted force
of the naval militia is 3,870 officers
and men.
Behind the heavy armor there is a
padding of either corn pith or cocoa
husks.
1t costs $500 every time one Of the
big guns on board ship is fred.
The Brooklyn and the New York
are our armored cruisers.
Sailors are paid from$9.5O to $3.50
per month and board
An act of Congress in 1872 abol-
ished Aogging in the navy.
The American navy has practically
all been built since 1888.
A captain in the navy ranks with
a colonel in the army.
The oldest iron vessel is the Mich
igan, built IN 1914.
Five battle ships are now under
construction.
We have the only ram-the Ka-
tahdin.
An Egg Joke Rolling.