Kure Naval Arsenal
After Kirby’s death, the company survived under Japanese government receivership, coming under the control of the Kure Naval Arsenal in 1890. Louis-Émile Bertin, the French naval engineer and senior foreign advisor to the Meiji government and director of the Yokosuka Naval Arsenal recommended that the shipyard concentrate on the production of torpedo boats. In 1893, the name “Onohama Shipyards” was dropped, and the facility as designated a branch of the Kure Naval Arsenal until it was closed in 1895.