The herald., 1898-03-29
/. t1Dd1dn ~ Indicate that anvtling WAs the
matter with the electric works.
5fst TruTYV nT OW

Lieut. q. b. Blow was the officer Of the
day on the day Of the explosion and re-
ceived the reports at 8 p. m. He said the
usual reports were made, to the effect that
lights. fires and everything else were Sc
cure.
ATTENDANT TARPIN
Mess Attendant y H. Tarpin was the last
man who saw Lieutenant Jenkins. He
met Lieutenant Jenkins in the mess room,
and by that time the water was up to his
breast.
"Mr. Jenkins started forward, and the
whole compartment lit up. That whole
compartment where the torpedoes- were
light right up, and saw Mr.. Jenkins throw
up both hands and fall right by the storage
pantry"
The explosion sounded to him like dis
tAnt thunder.
ENGINEER BOWERS
Z Passed Assistant Engineer Bowers, Sc
nior assistant engineer to the chief. was
examined as to the precautions taken on
board the Maine against spontaneous COM
bustion. He said the order had been to
inspect the bunkers every day and log
them. He was on duty on the day before
the explosion The coal in Bunker A. he
said, had been stored in Norfolk or New
port News. There were about 40 TONS
and 1t was soft coal. The bunkers imme-
diately aft were empty. The door leading
from the bunker to the 1O-inch loading
room was kept closed.
The after boilers, he said, were practical
" banked, and were in good condition. and
he did not consider that there was any
danger of their having too much pressure
tn 20 faf ,;,,~r roft tlo ,,<
sion. Bowers said that thte had never
been fire from spontaneous combustion
In the bunkers.
CLERK DRAIN
Henry Drain, clerk in the United States
consulate of Havana was examined as to
the receipt of an anonymous letter re-
ceived by the consul general in relation
to the explosion of the Maine. Witness
produced the letter, the date Of which was
February Is of the present year. 1t was
signed IAN Admirer.''
Drain said it seemed to be the document
of fairly well educated man. 1t was
written in Spanish. The translation was
produced, and was handed to the judge ad-
vocate and read by him. he letter was
referred to in the record as being marked
"F." but was not appended.
afss Il CONSTRUCTOR HOOVER
Naval Constructor ]. B. Hoover appeared
as witness on March s. His testimony
was very technical describing the various
parts of ship by number of frame and Sec
tion. Summed UP, 1t was that the bottom
plates of the. sDlip at the explosion, the
berth deck over them and protected deck
had been turned over and forwarded, re.
volving through an angle Of eight degrees.
The six-inch magazine was just below the
pieces of the deck as they originally stood.
GUNNERS MATE SMITH
Gunner's Mate Smith described his first
descent, which landed him in ten-inch
shell room. The shells were there In
good order, most of them nose up, but
some toppled over by the shock of the ex-
plosion which had wrecked the woodwork
Of the magazine and blown the aft bulk
head over from port to starboard. He
crawled over this bulkhead down and be-
hind 1t found a ten-inch powder tank bent
and dented, but not exploded. 1t was in
tact with powder and cartridge bags.
On his next descent he went down in the
port frame toward the ship, down till he
struck plates that were blown from port to
starboard-in board. He followed the
plates down till he came to the six-inch
shells still in the sings for sending them
up out Of the shell room. The forward
part of the six-inch reserve magazine
seemed to have been blown away alto
gether. The ragged edges of the steel
floor to the Shell room were turned up
and Smith walked over them out into the
mud.
Coming back from his trip into the outer
+ asia 4~II
q lot Of six-pounder shells and shell cases,
some of them not even broken away from |
the shells.
Lying right across the middle of the ten
inch shell room he found an armor plate |
that had been torn away from the ships |
side. The plate, on being ripped loose by |
the explosion, had turned a complete |
somersault and landed with the thick edge |
in the mud and the plate leaning obliqueyl |
over the wreck of the shell room There |
were six-inch pound tanks scattered over |
the ten-inch shell room, most of & EN- split |
A number of them were sent up, but more |
remained.
On his fourth trip down he slid down the
outer edge of the ship by the port crane.
"The skin 70 the ship" said he. "is In
good condition till you come to the jagged |
opening leading into the six-inch shell
room before mentioned. Here the steel |
edges are blown inward"
Crawling into the hole he felt the double
bottom and the Jagged edges Of the cement
turned up. He described in detail the ten
iEch powder tanks found here, none of
them apparently exploded, but with the
soldered seams split and the cases fiat
tened.
Witness was questioned closely as to the
plates that he found blown inward, and
whether they might not have been bulk
heads. but he insisted that they were the
outside skin of the ship near the bottom
and located them accurately on the plans
about the middle of the six-inch shell room.
where ''in big circle there is none of the
outside of the ship left at ALL"
He did not find the forward turret, but 1t
was missing from the place where it be.
longed.
The importance Of this testimony caused
1t to be gone over and over again, and add-
tional questions along the line already in
dicated were put, but they only served to
point out more clearly that abreast of the
six-inch shell room the whole side of the
ship had disappeared from the harbor bed
to water line, and the edges of the rent
were turned inward. Further, the ten
Inch magazine had not exploded.
GUNNER SMITH RECALLED
Gunner's mate Smith, who had previous
ly testified, was recalled.
He told of three trips down In diving