The Plymouth tribune. (Plymouth, Ind.) 1901-1911, 1907-01-31
RUSH NAVY BUILDING.
Nations Hurry Construction of Big
Battle Ships.

Russia and Japan have influenced
naval construction all over the world
The tendency is toward bigger battle
ships, and the great nations are be-
ginning to build them England set
the pace with the Dreadnaught,
which at present is the most talked
aoout ship in the world. No Euro
pean power laid the keel of a battle
ship for year, waiting to see how
the Dreadnaught turned out. She is
the first battle ship to be built with
turbine engines, as we'll as the most
powerful ever constructed, and has
been a great success. We have hes
itated about adopting turbines until
Japan has got ahead of us. She is
having two turbine engines built for
battle ship and a cruiser at the
Fore River Shipbuilding Company's
yard at Quincy, Mass, and they
promises to be very successful.
In the naval appropriation last year
Congress provided for a 10000 ton
battle ship, but did not appropriate
the money to pay for it. The Navy
Department was directed to submit
plans for the approval OF Congress.
Those plans have been submitted for
10000 ton ship with $4,000 horse
power engines, speed OF twenty-one
knots, to carry ten twelve-inch guns.
1t will cost about $10,0O0,0O0. Our
most expensive battle ship up to date
has cost about 100000. The pro-
posed ship will require thirty officers
and $50 men.
The Dreadnaught is little smaller
having displacement of $4,000 tons,
and a little faster, having a speed OF
twenty-one and half knots, and has
the same armament /, the leviathan
proposed for our nav Three dupli-
Gates of the DreadIaught are now
approaching completion in the Eng
lish shipyards, and the admiralty has
decided to ask parliament for the
money to build three more.
England also has under construc-
ton three vessels of an entirely new
type. They may be called light-ar-
mored battle ships or swift battle
ship cruisers. They have the tonnage
and armament of battleship with
the speed and the armor of cruiser.
Their displacement is 1890 tons
their engines will carry them at the
rate of twenty-five knots an hour and
their turrets will be armed with eight
twelve-inch guns Their armor is
considerably lighter than that of the
Dreadnaught
Germany will have eighteen battle
ships of the anew Dreadnaught type
of $4,000 tons, twenty-one knots
speed and ten twelve-inch guns by
1910
France is building six battle ships
of a similar type, to be called the
Danton, Mirabeau, Voltaire Diderot,
Condorset and Vergnaud, each with
. displacement of 1880 tons, 22,500
horse power turbine engines, four
propellers, nineteen knots speed, with
coal capacity of 1000 tons, capable
of steaming $3.50 miles, and requir-
ing a crew of thirty-one officers and
GAO men.
Japan is building seven battle ships
and cruisers, and has provided for
several more. She has two twenty
one knot battle ships of 10000 tons
under construction, for which the
turbine engines are being built in the
United States. One of them is the
Satsuma, which has length OF 49,
feet and beam of eighty-three and
one-half feet. Her draught is twenty
seven and one-half feet and her ton
mage is $4,000, or 200 more than the
Dreadnaught Her horse power is to
be $4,000 and her armament will con-
sist OF four twelve-inch and twelve
i20-millimeter guns.