Weekly independent. [volume] (Elko, Nev.) 1887-1914, 1898-04-29
Facts About Our Navy.

we nave II only ram-tne hatan
din.
The Brooklyn and New York ar
u armored cruisers.
A captain OF the navy ranks Will
a colonel in the arm.
An act OF Congress in 1873 abol
ished coin in the navy.
Sailors are paid from $3.50 to sl2.5
per month and board.
1t costs $500 every time one Of the
guns on board a ship is fired.
Battleships are covered with nickle
steel from five to seven inches thick
4 submarine torpedo boat to be
known rs the PIuner is nearly com
pleted.
At present the total enlisted force
! OF the naval militia is 1870 officers
and men.
We have five armored b~attleslnps
the Indiana. Iowa, Massachusetts,,
Oregon aud Texas.
Great Britain has 2i torpedo boats
and torpedo boat de~stroyers; Uncle
Sam IA only eight.
Behind the heavy armor there is a
heavy padding Of either corn pith Or
cocoa husks.
Five hundred and twenty-six men
and forty officers are required to han.
die the cruiser New York.
a big %battleship has on board an
electric plant capable OF lighting a
town OF 5000 inhabitants.
All the cruisers are named III honor
OF cities, and ba.tleships. except the
kearsarge, in honor OF States.
Marines are the police on board
ship.
Originally they were employed to
prevent mutiny among the sailors.
Those artists who show smoke in
their pictures OF naval battles are
wholly wrong. SmOkeless powder is
used.
B~attleships are for the navy work;
cruisers are commerce de~stroyers;
monitors are used only for coast de-
tense.
The Indiana could lie outside
Sandy Hook and throw l2.pound
shot into New York ut the rate
of four a minute.
The fastest vessels in the navy are
the torpedo Loats Porter and Dupont,
each OF which can travel 27.5 knots
at hour.
Battleships cost from S2,500.ONO to
s3,750,000. a good torpedo boat costs
over 100000.
Some Of the guns in the navy can
fire u shot twelve miles, farther than II
man car see, for tie guns are aimed
and sighted by machinery.
The amount expended by the navy
department during 1897 was s:3i,-
59G,jiG. This il a larger sum than
has been expended in any year since
1866.
There are six rear Hdmirals in ac-
tiv" service. The officers Of vice adj
miral and admiral are untitled, tlIer e
is no head 10 the navy excepting Sec.
Rotary Long.
The biggest guns in the navy are
forty-nine feet long; big enough for
a mnn to crawl into; four feet in
diameter at their biggest part, aud
weigh l35,500 pounds or tbereabouts.
Our battleships have a speed OF
from fifteen To seventeen knots nm
hour. Cruisers make nintecn Ia
twenty-iour knots. while the moni.
tors can travel only live to seven
knots.
Tho United States il the ffth naval
power in the world. Tho navies Of
Great Britain, France. Russia and
Italy rank ahead in the order named
Germany and the United States arc
about tied.
Tho powder used In brown and In
hunks about the aize Of u caramel. a
charge for the biggest guns weighs
90 pounds md is boosted IL the breccl
by II derrick, the powder being SO wed
up in buriap bags.
Tho Iowa weighs nearly 10000 tons
and ns twenty tons IL III, average
load for n freight chr and twelve
cars ia II good load for a locomotive
engine, IL wonld tako fifty locomo.
tives 10 haul the great steel H,ruc.
tute.
Our present effective lighting force,
consists at five ~battlcships Of the firsr
class, IL Of the second class, ty,
nrmored cruisers, fifteen gunboa,s
six double turroted monitors. on,
dispatch boat, n transport nnt
eight torpedo boats. This docs no
include the new purchases.