El Paso daily herald. (El Paso, Tex.) 1881-1901, 1898-07-09
ABOUT THE WARSHIPS
Classes and Characteristics of the
Vessels That Make up Modern
Fighting Fleet.
item specially for the HERALD.

enough to fight one of her own size
must be fast enough to run away. Any
vessel which is inferior in armament
and has no compromising superiority
in speed is outclassed. The same is
true of any vessel which is equal In
armament but inferior in speed to an
adversary. The size of q vessel is
measured by its displacement. This
displacement is the number of tons of
water she will push aside to make
room for herself. A vessel of 10, 900
tons will take engines of certain
weight and power to drive her at q
given speed, and the larger the engines
the larger the boilers and the greater
the supply of coal required. Now, if
it is necessary to give this vessel
heavy protective armOr and big guns,
the additional weight of this equip
ment must be saved somewhere else,
and usually in the engine room, re-
ducing the speed of the vessel.
The maximum of guns and armor
and the minimum of speed are to be
found in the first class battleship,
which is simply q floating fortress, 30
constructed that she need never run
away, but can stand up and fight rs
long as her gun turrets will rev0lve.
The general plan Of construction in q
battleship is to surround the engines,
boilers, and magazines with wall OF
Harveylzed steel armor eighteen inch
es thick and seven or eight feet high,
which extends about four feet below the
water line and three feet above it.
This armor belt is not only on the
sides of the ship, but is carried across
1t fore and aft, Immediately in front
of and behind the space occupied by
the engines and magazines, and the
whole affair is covered with q solid
steel roof, three or four inches thick.
Outside this central fortress and en-
tending from it clear to the bow and
stern at each end is protective deck
of steel, three inches thick, which Is
placed several feet below the water
line. Everything above this deck and
outside this fortress might be shot
away, and the vessel would still float
and fight. On the roof of the fortress
are placed the turrets containing the
big guns. The largest of these guns,
each, and will carry a shell weighing
100 pounds about twelve miles. The
turrets are circular, as rule, large
enough to hold two guns and are
made of face-hardeued steel from fif-
teen to eighteen inches thick. They
revolve within a barbette or ring OF
steel eighteen inches thick which pro-
tects the machinery by which the
guns are trained. Further back on
the roof of the fortress are other and
lighter turrets made of 8-inch steel
and carrying S.inch guns, and at other
places are stationed rspid-fire guns of
lighter calibre, protected by thinner
armor than that in the main belt.
If all this secondary battery is strip
ped off, leaving nothing but the tur-
rets with the big guns, and these are
brought down close to the water, and
the armor belt is reduced to seven or
eight inches in thickness, the type of
vessel known as the monitor Is reach |
ed. 1t is simply battleship on q re-
duced scale. Such vessels are very
slow and cannot stand rough weather.
on account Of their low freeboard. The
speed of monitors is seldom more than |
twelve or fourteen miles an hour, and |
they are intended to act in coast de- |
fence usually in connection with shore |
batteries. The best types in the navy
are the Terror and the Puritan.
The speed of battleship is about eigh- |
teen miles an hour. The bes tspeci- |
men in the navy is the Indiana, declar- |
ed by its admirers to be the most pow-I
erful battleship afoat.
Second-class battleships, like the
Texas, are smaller vessels, usually
about 1000 tons, and they have q much |
lighter armor belt, about twelve in-i
ches, and do not carry so heavy an ar
mament as ships of the first class. The |
Maine was q second-class battleship. /
Her largest guns were of 10-inch cali
bre; her armor was twelve inches thick /
and her turrets were eight inches
thick only.
The first step in reducing the arma-l
ment from that of the battleship pro-
per, at the same time increasing the |
speed, produces the armored cruiser. |
This type of vessel may carry no guns |
of more than S-inch calibre, and the |
armor belt Is reduced to three or four |
inches in thickness. Instead of the |
roof over the armOr belt, the protec- |
tive deck is carried all over the ship, |
but it is not fat, NOR Is it of equal |
thickness, as in battleship. On the |
top and in the middle it is three inches
thick, but sides are sixinches, and
they slope abruptly to below the water.
A cruiser is not supposed to fight
with q battleship, because 1t could not
accomplish anything with its S-inch
guns against the lS-inch armor of it's
heavier rival, while one well-directed
shot from the 13-inch guns of battle
ship or monitor would probably sink
any armored cruiser afoat. For this
reason the cruiser must be faster than
the battleship, 80 that she can run
away; and the weight that is saved in
the armor belt and big guns Is there
fore put into the engine room. The
average speed of an armored cruiser Is
about twenty-four miles an hour, and
the best types of this class in the navy
are probably the Brooklyn and New
York.
The next step in reducing armament
and increasing speed produced the pro-
tected cruiser, which carries no
armor belt, but retains the protective
deck, upon the slopinR sides of which
ia stored the coal The turrets dis
appear altogether, and there is usually
only one inch gun, the battery being
principally made up of 4-inch rapid
IRE guns and 6, 4. and 1 Founders. The
best types of the protected cruiser in
the navy may be found in the Column
bia and Minneapolis which have q