Japanese battleship Asahi Background . Combat experience in the First Sino - Japanese War of 1894 – 1895 convinced the Imperial Japanese Navy of weaknesses in the Jeune Ecole naval philosophy , which emphasized torpedo boat s and commerce raiding to offset expensive heavily armoured ships . Therefore Japan promulgated a ten - year naval build - up programme , to modernize and expand its fleet in preparation for further confrontations , with the construction of six battleships and six armoured cruiser s at its core . These ships were paid for from the £30 , 000 , 000 indemnity paid by China after losing the First Sino - Japanese War . As with the earlier " Fuji " and s , Japan lacked the technology and capability to construct its own battleships , and turned again to the United Kingdom for the four remaining battleships of the programme . " Asahi " , the fifth battleship of the naval programme , was ordered from the Clydebank Engineering & Shipbuilding Company shipyard in Clydebank , Scotland . Design and description . The design of " Asahi " was a modified version of the s of the Royal Navy with two additional guns . The ship had an overall length of , a beam of , and a normal draught of . She displaced at normal load . " Asahi " had a complete double bottom with 55 water - tight compartments and she was subdivided into 223 water - tight compartments in the main part of the hull . The ship was fitted as a flagship and her crew numbered about 773 officers and enlisted men , including the admiral ' s staff . The ship was powered by two vertical triple - expansion steam engines built by Humphrys , Tennant , each driving one propeller , using steam generated by 25 Belleville boiler s at a working pressure of . The engines were rated at , using forced draught , and designed to reach a top speed of although " Asahi " reached from during her sea trials on 23 March 1900 . She carried a maximum of of coal which allowed her to steam for at a speed of . The ship was fitted with three steam - driven dynamo s . " Asahi " s main battery consisted of the same four Elswick Ordnance Company 40 - calibre twelve - inch guns used in all of the preceding battleships . They were mounted in twin - gun barbette s fore and aft of the superstructure that had armoured hoods to protect the guns and were usually called gun turrets . The hydraulically powered mountings allowed the guns to be loaded at all angles of traverse while they were loaded at a fixed elevation of + 13 . 5° . Each mount could traverse at total of 240 degrees . They fired projectiles at a muzzle velocity of . The ship ' s secondary armament consisted of fourteen 45 - calibre quick - firing ( QF ) guns mounted in casemate s . Eight of these guns were positioned on the main deck and the other six guns were placed above them in the superstructure . They fired shells at a muzzle velocity of . Protection against torpedo boat attacks was provided by twenty QF 12 - pounder 12 cwt guns . The 12 - pounders fired , projectiles at a muzzle velocity of . Lighter guns consisted of eight three - pounder Hotchkiss guns and four 47 - millimetre 2 . 5 - pounder Hotchkiss gun s . The former guns were mounted in the superstructure and the latter in the fighting tops . The three - pounder gun fired projectiles at a muzzle velocity of while the 2 . 5 - pounder fired shells at a muzzle velocity of . The ship was also equipped with four submerged 18 - inch torpedo tube s , two on each broadside . The waterline main belt of " Asahi " consisted of Harvey armour high , of which was above the waterline at normal load , and had a maximum thickness of for the middle of the ship . It was only inches thick at the ends of the ship and was surmounted by a six - inch strake of armour that ran between the barbettes . The barbette s were thick , but reduced to behind the upper armour strake . The barbette hoods were protected by 10 inches of armour on their face while their sides were 6 inches thick and the roof was thick . Diagonal bulkheads connected the barbettes to the side armour , they were 12 – 14 inches thick , but only 6 inches thick at the lower deck level . The frontal armour of the casemates protecting the secondary armament was also 6 inches thick with the rear protected by armour plates . The flat portion of the deck armour was thick and thick where it sloped down to the sides of the ship . The conning tower was protected by 14 inches of armour . " Asahi " , like all the other Japanese battleships of the time , was fitted with four Barr & Stroud FA3 coincidence rangefinder s that had an effective range of . In addition the ships were also fitted with 24 - power magnification telescopic gunsight s . Construction and career . " Asahi " , literally " rising sun " , a poetical name for Japan , was laid down on 1 August 1899 in Clydebank , Scotland by the Clydebank Engineering & Shipbuilding Co . and completed by John Brown & Company which purchased the company before " Asahi " was completed . She was launched on 13 March 1899 and completed on 31 July 1900 , her completion was delayed by about three months when her bottom plating required repairs after running aground off Southsea while returning from her sea trials . The ship departed England on the day of her completion and arrived at Yokosuka , Japan on 23 October 1900 . " Asahi " became flagship of the Standing Fleet on 22 May 1901 and she was assigned to the 1st Battleship Division of the 1st Fleet when the Combined Fleet was formed on 28 December 1903 . At the start of the Russo - Japanese War , " Asahi " , commanded by Captain Hikohachi Yamada , was assigned to the 1st Division of the 1st Fleet . She participated in the Battle of Port Arthur on 9 February 1904 when Admiral Tōgō Heihachirō led the 1st Fleet in an attack on the Russian ships of the Pacific Squadron anchored just outside of Port Arthur . Tōgō had expected his surprise night attack on the Russians by his destroyers to be much more successful than it actually was and expected to find them badly disorganized and weakened , but the Russians had recovered from their surprise and were ready for his attack . The Japanese ships were spotted by the which was patrolling offshore and alerted the Russian defences . Tōgō chose to attack the Russian coastal defences with his main armament and engage the Russian ships with his secondary guns . Splitting his fire proved to be a bad idea as the Japanese and six - inch guns inflicted very little significant damage on the Russian ships who concentrated all their fire on the Japanese ships with some effect . Although a large number of ships on both sides were hit , Russian casualties numbered only 17 while the Japanese suffered 60 killed and wounded before Tōgō disengaged . " Asahi " was not hit during the engagement . The ship participated in the action of 13 April when Tōgō successfully lured out a portion of the Pacific Squadron , including Vice Admiral Stepan Makarov ' s flagship , the battleship . When Makarov spotted the five battleships of the 1st Division , he turned back for Port Arthur and " Petropavlovsk " struck a minefield laid by the Japanese the previous night . The Russian battleship sank in less than two minutes after one of her magazine s exploded , Makarov one of the 677 killed . Emboldened by his success , Tōgō resumed long - range bombardment missions , which prompted the Russians to lay more minefields which sank two Japanese battleships the following month . During the Battle of the Yellow Sea on 10 August , " Asahi " , now commanded by Captain Tsunaakira Nomoto , was second in line of the column of Japanese battleships , behind " Mikasa " , and was one of the primary targets of the Russian ships . She was only hit by a single 12 - inch shell which wounded two crewmen . Both guns in her aft 12 - inch gun turret , however , were disabled by shells that detonated prematurely in their barrels . In turn she concentrated most of her fire upon the battleships and although both ships were only lightly damaged by the Japanese shells which generally failed to penetrate any armour and detonated on impact . The ship made the critical hits of the battle when two of her 12 - inch shells struck the bridge of " Tsesarevich " , killing the Russian squadron commander , Vice Admiral Wilgelm Vitgeft , two of his staff officers and the ship ' s quartermaster . The ship ' s wheel was jammed to port by wreckage and then slowed to a halt which threw the rest of the Russian ships into total confusion . The second - in - command , Rear Admiral Prince Pavel Ukhtomsky , eventually gained control of the rest of the squadron and headed back to Port Arthur . Slightly more than two months later , on 26 October , " Asahi " struck a mine off Port Arthur while on blockade duty . Severely damaged , she was under repair at Sasebo Naval Arsenal from November 1904 to April 1905 . Battle of Tsushima . At the Battle of Tsushima on 27 May 1905 , " Asahi " again followed the battleship into combat , this time against the Second and Third Pacific Squadrons detached from the Baltic Fleet . " Mikasa " opened fire at the battleship , the Russian flagship , at 1410 , and was joined by " Asahi " and the armoured cruiser shortly afterwards . Within an hour the Japanese ships had started a serious fire aboard the Russian ship , badly wounded the fleet commander , Vice Admiral Zinovy Rozhestvensky , knocked out her rear 12 - inch gun turret , and jammed " Knyaz Suvorov " s steering so that she fell out of formation . The Russian ships were concentrating their fire on " Mikasa " during the early part of the battle and " Asahi " was not damaged during this time . Tōgō was able to cross the T of the Russian squadrons . " Knyaz Suvorov " s steering was later repaired , but she blundered between the Japanese and Russian fleets several times later in the battle and was heavily damaged . " Asahi " seems to have mostly engaged the battleships and later in the battle although fired the shots that caused the " Borodino " s magazines to explode and sink her . She fired more twelve - inch shells , 142 , than any other ship during the battle . In total , " Asahi " was hit six times during the battle , but none of them damaged her in any significant way . While " Asahi " s casualties are not precisely known , the Japanese only lost 110 men killed and 590 wounded to all causes during the battle . During the battle , Captain W . C . Pakenham , the Royal Navy ' s official military observer under the Anglo - Japanese Alliance , took notes of the battle ' s progress from a deck chair on " Asahi " s exposed quarterdeck . His report confirmed the superiority of Japanese training and tactics and publicized the victory in the West . Post - war career . In 1908 , " Asahi " was part of the Japanese fleet which escorted the American Great White Fleet through Japanese waters during its round - the - globe voyage . The ship was assigned to the 1st Fleet in 1908 and 1910 – 11 . In 1914 , " Asahi " became a gunnery training ship and in 1917 she was re - armed with Japanese guns replacing her original British - made guns . Also that same year the ship was assigned to the 5th Division of the 3rd Fleet . The following year she became flagship of her division and participated in the Japanese intervention in the Russian Civil War . She escorted troop convoys to the Russian Far East and was guard ship at Kamchatka from January to August 1918 . " Asahi " was reclassified as a first - class coastal defence ship on 1 September 1921 and began disarmament in 1922 at Yokosuka in compliance with the terms of the Washington Naval Treaty . The ship was reclassified as a training and submarine depot ship on 1 April 1923 and her disarmament was completed in July of that same year . Her displacement dropped to with the loss of her armour and guns , and her speed was limited to . " Asahi " began the first stage of her conversion to a submarine salvage ship with the installation of the specialized salvage equipment from February to August 1925 . From 1926 to October 1927 , the ship ' s 25 Belleville boilers were replaced with four Kanpon Type RO boilers at Kure Naval Arsenal . One of her two funnels was also removed , and two large lifting frames were installed as part of the second stage of her conversion . The ship conducted experiments in submarine rescue using the old German submarine " 0 - 1 " ( ex - ) . In May 1928 , " Asahi " was fitted with a compressed - air aircraft catapult on her forecastle and successfully launched an E2N1 Type 15 seaplane . After repeated accidents , the catapult was replaced by one powered by gunpowder . On the completion of testing in 1928 , " Asahi " was placed in reserve . In November 1937 , after the Marco Polo Bridge Incident that started the Second Sino - Japanese War , " Asahi " was taken out of reserve , and was used as a transport to land troops in an amphibious landing at Hangzhou Bay . Afterwards the ship began conversion at Kure as a repair ship which was completed on 18 December 1938 . " Asahi " was fitted with dummy wooden main battery fore and aft to resemble an old battleship after her arrival in Shanghai on 29 December . In May 1939 the ship was modified to act as a torpedo depot ship and carried out patrols between 29 May and 7 November 1940 . She was transferred to Camranh Bay , French Indochina on 15 November and transported the 11th Base Unit from Kure to Camranh Bay 19 November – 7 December 1941 . From 13 March 1942 , " Asahi " was stationed at Singapore , and performed repairs in April on the light cruiser " Naka " that had been torpedo ed by the submarine USS " Seawolf " off Christmas Island . Departing Singapore for Kure on 22 May , the ship was sighted by the submarine USS " Salmon " on the night of 25 / 26 May 1942 , southwest of Cape Paderas , Indochina . Of " Salmon " s four torpedoes , two hit the ship in her port central boiler room and aft spaces . At 0103 , moments after being hit , " Asahi " sank at . The ship ' s captain and 582 crewmen survived , although 16 men were killed . External links .