*Address delivered by Captain Evans before the Kiwanis Club of Chicago.
The American Navy has been the outgrowth of the desire to protect our merchantmen lest the swarming pirates be thereby made more acrimonious than ever; secondly, to compel the warring nations of Europe to treat us justly. There is rampant today the feeling that a “strong Navy incites a nation to go to war,” and yet, if we turn back the finger-stained pages of history, we find the contrary to be true. For eleven years prior to the War of 1812, the American people, striving to carry on without a navy, suffered every indignity with enormous and incalculable losses of property, life, and happiness.
The influence of the American people has always been exerted for the promotion of peace, and this influence has been effective in proportion to the strength of our Navy.
This paper has not a desire to quote sayings of some of our famous fighting Navy men, and yet, the saying of John Paul Jones, “I have not yet begun to fight,” or of Commodore Perry, “To windward or to leeward, they shall fight today,” or of Dewey, “You may fire when you are ready, Gridley,” will go down in the annals of American history as the acts of men who faced an enemy for the love of home and country.
When the liberty of the colonies was threatened, it was unanimously declared by the Rhode Island Assembly “that the building and equipping of an American fleet as soon as possible would greatly and essentially conduce to the preservation of the colonies.” This idea was not considered very popular in the minds of the peace-loving members of the Congress of the colonies. It was even thought to be “the maddest idea in the world.” On November 2, 1775, Congress appropriated $100,000 for the fitting out of armed vessels and ships of force. On November 25, rules for the regulation of the Navy of the United States Colonies were considered and adopted. This little Congress used for the first time the term “Navy of the United Colonies.” The first vessel to sail under the central authority was the cruiser Lee. Her commission was signed by President Washington and not by Congress.
The Second Committee of Congress met on December 13, 1775, and authorized the construction of five ships of thirty guns; five of twenty guns, and three of twenty-four guns, making a total of thirteen ships. The cost of each of these ships did not exceed $66,666. Before the end of the Revolutionary War, the colonies had sixty-four ships in service. With these ships—and a squadron loaned by the French to John Paul Jones, the founder of our Navy, we safe-guarded our liberty and freedom and planted the seed for a navy that is now a decorous flower to American manhood and a respected organization to the world. Before this seed took root it was threatened by the winds and frosts of internal and external contention, but, planted by the hands of an honored and honest people, it received strength and vigor by the repeated acts of sacrificial heroism. These American farmers left home, wife, mother, and sweetheart, not to strike for dominion, but for a deathless principle; not to bleed for gold, but for a priceless ideal; not to satisfy blood lust, but to prevent oppression; not to fight against a people, but to destroy a monstrous system; not to prolong a bloody conflict, but to roll back the stone of despotism and recall peace from her crimson grave to immortality. These men fought to win and consecrate this continent to the principles of political and religious liberty. On December 22, 1775, we formally organized the first American fleet, consisting of two ships, the Alfred and the Columbus; two brigs, the Andrew Dorea and the Cabot. We afterwards borrowed 400 muskets from the Pennsylvania Committee of Safety. Then the schooners, the Fly and the Wasp, and the sloop Hornet were added. From first to last, the salt water navy of the Revolution included forty-seven vessels. The first navy ships were thirteen frigates ordered on December 13, 1775. It is interesting to note that while the guns on these ships were mounted on wooden carriages, it was with considerable effort that they were loaded, aimed, and fired. Elevating was done by means of a handspike under the breech where a wooden wedge, called a “quoin,” was inserted when the desired angle was reached. There were no gun sights as we have today, because ships fought at close quarters. Firing was done on some ships by flint locks, but they missed so often that the priming quill was more popular. This was a split quill, full of powder, inserted in a touch hole of the gun. The cartridges had already been punctured by a sharp wire thrust through the touch hole, so that when a slow match in the hands of the captain of the gun touched off the powder in the quill the discharge followed almost instantaneously.
From the beginning of the Revolutionary War, there were swarms of American privateers and state navies. The state navies were maintained by all the states except two, for the protection of their coasts. These vessels were small and of shallow draft, designed for river and harbor defense. The work of the privateers was of vast importance. In 1775 Congress provided for commissions to be issued to privateers and while many, even Franklin, realized that privateering was merely legalized piracy, the people as a whole contended that privateering was not only permissible but praiseworthy. During the war, Congress bonded 1699 privateers. Salem, Massachusetts, alone had 150; Boston, 365. In fact, Massachusetts had more than 600 privateers. While the privateers were bonded at a great expense, it seems now that if the privateer forces could have been properly concentrated and handled, they would have swept the enemy from the American coast and then from the seven seas. Greed blinded patriotism and statesmanship then as it does now. There is no instance on record where such splendid power was wasted as was the sea power of the United States in the War of the Revolution. These facts demonstrate the importance of building the most powerful ships possible. The work of the privateers was lauded so highly that it was felt that they were adequate to defend the nation from every kind of aggression. When to this faith was added the hatred of a standing army that had had so large a part in the development of the revolutionary spirit, the mass of the people concluded that the maintenance of a navy would be a menace to American liberty.
When the Revolutionary War ended we had left as a nucleus of a navy, our best frigate—one ship—the Alliance. But this ship, too, met the fate of an unbelieving people and was sold as a merchantman. Her bones lie today in the Delaware. With the vestige of protection gone, we became slaves to the hordes of African despots and pirates. Like an unprotected child, we were a hopeless prisoner chained to the dark dungeon floors of despotism. Our white breasts were covered with blood and were it not for the fact that we paid those pirates the sum of two million dollars in tribute, our fires of life might have been quenched.
On March 27, 1794, in order to protect the commerce of the United States against Algerian cruisers, the President signed an act providing for five frigates. These were the President, United States, the Chesapeake, the Congress, and the Constitution. However, before these frigates were built, a treaty with the pirates was issued, costing the government a huge sum in buying the treaty and ransoming prisoners. The act which legalized the construction of these ships are, nevertheless, the beginning of the permanent American Navy. Upon the accession of John Adams as President, not only did Congress agree to complete the frigates costing $1,141,160, but, on April 20, 1798, $950,000 was voted for the purchase and equipment of an additional naval force. We were by this time imbued with the fact that, after all, a navy was at least a guarantee to our commerce. On April 30, of the same year, the Navy Department was established. Various activities sprung up with enthusiastic alertness. On May 4 the President was authorized to procure cannon and build foundries and armories. This act was soon followed by the appropriation of $80,000 for galleys to be used as porcupine quills. With what was already appropriated, the President was authorized to accept, if offered by private citizens, six frigates and six sloops of war, and to pay for them with government bonds. We were no longer an easy object—nor defiant—but we at least were convinced that we were our own best friends. We were no longer like the proverbial “groundhog,” afraid to show his shadow. We decided to show ourselves. In some respects, the most important act ever passed by Congress took place at this time, when the President in June, 1798, authorized naval ships to “subdue, seize, and take any armed French vessel which shall be found within the jurisdictional limits of the United States or elsewhere on the high seas.” I say important, because it became a law at the beginning of the work of the new Navy and it declared that if we were to compel an enemy to do us justice, we must not depend on harbor galleys but must send ships fit to keep the sea in search of the enemy in his own waters. The new American Navy—three frigates and twelve converted merchantmen—was ordered forth to fight for the flag.
No more tribute and ransom. In the hope of peace, we had submitted to every outrage upon the life and the liberty as well as the property of our citizens. Now, like hunted beasts driven to a corner, we had turned and shown our teeth.
When the war with Napoleon began, Thomas Jefferson was President. He had seen in the work of President Adams an effective method of ending such troubles. He had also read a report to the House of Representatives under date of January 12, 1801, in which he said:
“When the United States owns twelve ships of seventy-four guns and double the number of strong frigates .... confidence may be indulged that we may then avoid those wars in which we have no interest and without submitting to plunder. . . . . ”
However, while Mr. Jefferson intended to coerce, he never thought of doing so with guns afloat. His first act was to lay up five frigates on the basis that he wished to avoid taxing the industry of his fellow citizens for the support of the Navy. The work on six ships of the line which Congress had authorized was suspended. President Adams, in 1800, spent $3,448,716 on the Navy, and in 1802 Mr. Jefferson spent $915,562. Once more we were a prey to vultures. In 1812, when we cowered under the party lash, we finally changed to a growl that was unmistakably heard. When everyone knew that the nation was wholly unprepared for war, when the ships in the British Navy numbered 1,042 and those in the American Navy numbered seven, when great losses were inevitable and the utter destruction of the nation was really to be feared, the American people brushed aside every sordid appeal and demanded a war for the vindication of right.
At the outbreak of the War of 1812, we had sixteen serviceable war vessels; among them there was not a single one of the line. True indeed, we had three splendid frigates of forty-four guns: viz., the United States, the Constitution, and the President. We likewise had 207 gunboats. These, however, were built for coast defense and were utterly useless as sea-faring ships. We all recall the victory of the Constitution over the Guerriere but perhaps we do not know that this victory saved the nation and made permanent the establishment of the Navy and induced the government to give the ships their share in the fighting.
In the years following the war with Tripoli, many prominent citizens were in favor of doing away with the Navy entirely, as had been done after the Revolution. The administration, having no confidence in its ships when opposed to the overwhelming forces of England, was inclining to the course by preventing their capture by holding them locked in fortified harbors. The victory of the Constitution changed this. When she came into port the exultant shouts that arose along the shore swelled to a mighty roar that was heard and felt to the uttermost parts of the nation. Once more the national spirit was resurrected, which made possible the success of the war for the Union in 1863.
In 1814, in the memorable battle of the Essex and the English squadron, we had exemplified the necessity of speed. Had the Essex the necessary power to give her the needed speed, Admiral Porter might have won the day. From this dates the need of steam-propelled ships. We hear it said on all sides today that speed is a craze and that the quality most needed in a fighting ship is ability to stay in the battle line. If we are to invite the enemy to come to our shores to do the fighting, then speed is of no consequence. But, the men of the Navy who can be trusted to force the fighting in time of battle are a unit in demanding ships that will have power to reach the fighting line, and that when there, will have guns with which to demonstrate the truth of the words of Farragut, “The best protection against the enemy’s fire is a well directed fire from our own guns.”
Prior to and during the War of 1812, naval battles were fought between ships of sail. However, on account of serious blockades on the Atlantic coast at will and the further fact that New York suffered continually, steam ships appeared.
In 1813 Congress authorized the building of a battleship with a single paddle wheel, having a speed of 5.5 knots an hour. This ship was built by Fulton and was called by him Fulton the First. However, this steamer was not completed in time to take part in any war. On July 4, 1829, she was destroyed by the explosion of her magazine. By an act of Congress, 1816, authority was given to construct a steam warship. However, it was not until 1837 that the hull of this ship was launched. Engines that developed 625 horsepower were installed which drove her at a sustained speed of 12 knots. This was, properly speaking, the first ship of the steam Navy of the United States. In 1839 three steam vessels were constructed by an act of Congress, each displacing 3,200 tons. They were completed in 1842. In 1849, John Ericsson, an Englishman, constructed a screw propeller ship instead of paddle wheels, with her engines entirely below the water line. This ship was known as the Princeton. The need was felt in 1854 for the construction of screw propelled ships capable of long cruising, on account of European nations reaching out for more possessions on the American continent. We were desirous of keeping the Monroe Doctrine. As we did not have a sufficient number of ships of the steam type, Congress passed an act for the construction of eighteen ships “which shall combine the heaviest armament and greatest speed compatible with their character and tonnage.”
The question of guns was now considered. It will be remembered that in the War of 1812 our guns threw a spherical cast-iron ball weighing twenty-four pounds. After the war we substituted thirty-two-pounders—guns with a six-inch bore. In 1845 we introduced eight-inch guns into the Navy. In 1850, John A. Dahlgren submitted plans for a nine-inch gun that was immediately cast. Soon after, an 11-inch gun was ordered, weighing 16,000 pounds, a shot weighing 166 pounds and a shell of 136 pounds. These guns and the steam propelled vessels played an important part in the Civil War.
In this war the cast of ships was of different structure than that of former wars. The need of ironclads was important, for the Civil War was fought along the coast of the Atlantic and within range of fort guns. At the outbreak of the war the Navy was in a wretched condition. When Lincoln took office there were in commission, including supply ships and tenders, forty-two vessels, twenty-three of which were propelled by steam. The home squadron consisted of twelve, but of these five were available. The Navy, when the crisis came, was utterly unprepared. To meet the emergency, numerous ships and gunboats were hastily constructed at an expense of $45,000,000. It was President Lincoln’s plan to blockade the coast from Alexandria, Virginia, to the Rio Grande. This was in miles, 3,549, exclusive of 189 harbor openings. The task was discovered to be an impossible one. It could not be accomplished in a month nor in several months. We did not have the ships. Out of ninety vessels on the Union naval list, fifty were ships of sail. Two of the forty steamers were on stocks, two were tugs, and one was on Lake Erie. In all, there were twenty-four serviceable steamers, of which seven were in the home squadron. While the national Navy was inadequate for any kind of war, the Federal administration was much better off than the Confederate. The South had no shops nor did they have mechanics, and yet, unprepared as were both parties, the Civil War marks the end of the old in the ships and guns of the Navy and the beginning of the new.
At this time and a few years before this date, all rifled guns were muzzle loaders. In 1875 breech loading guns made their appearance. Rifled cannon, beginning in Russia about 1836, were essential in the Civil War on account of the armor on ships. These guns had the advantage of greater penetrating power, greater range, and increased accuracy. The Parrott guns of 100 and 300 pounders were used almost exclusively.
In ship construction, there was but one important innovation since the War of 1812. That was the introduction of steam as the propelling power. Ships were still built on the general lines of frigates and sloops of war and were fully rigged, for it was supposed that warships would ordinarily use steam power only as auxiliary power. There were in existence a few side-wheelers but ships of the latest type built in the United States had screw propellers. In launching the first steam man-of-war, the Fulton, in 1814, and the first screw propelled warship, the Princeton, in 1843, the United States had the distinct honor of leading the navies of the world.
By the introduction of steam as the motive power, ships not only gained in speed but could be maneuvered regardless of the wind. In consequence, they were much better able to attack or pass forts, and command harbors and rivers. Furthermore, they were adapted for a new mode of attacking other vessels, that is, by ramming. This method of fighting was virtually a return to the tactics of the Greek and Roman galleys and it proved very effective in the confined spaces of rivers and narrow bays. It was the Confederate Navy, realizing that it had no ships, shipbuilders, or seamen, which brought to light new effective implements—the torpedo boats and the ironclad.
The ironclad had its beginning in the Crimean War. The Merrimac, the first of our ironclads, was 263 feet long and was covered amidships with a shield of 178 feet, the sides of which slanted at an angle of thirty-five degrees and rose, when she was trimmed for battle, seven feet above the water line. The shield was made of rafters of yellow pine, fourteen inches thick. Super-posed on the wood was a layer of rolled iron bars eight inches wide and two inches thick. The whole was bolted through and through. Thus the vessel had an armor which was four inches of iron supported by twenty-two inches of wood but which, horizontally, gave a thickness very much greater. The knuckle where the armor joined the keel and the two ends of the vessel were submerged to a depth of two feet, rendering those parts invulnerable. The rudder and propeller were protected by a heavy solid deck or fan tail. The armament consisted of ten guns; of the eight comprising her broadsides, six were smooth bore. The Merrimac was further armed with a cast-iron beak, wedge shape, weighing 1,500 pounds.
Probably no naval conflict in the history of the world attracted so much attention as the battle between the Monitor and the Merrimac. It revolutionized the navies of the world and showed that wooden ships, which had long held control of the ocean, were of no further use for fighting purposes.
For a brief interval at the end of the Civil War, the monitors with their Dahlgren guns made the American Navy the most powerful in the world, but when not in danger of conflict, the Navy was neglected. The ships that had done good service in the war wore out. Repairs became expensive. Ten years after the Civil War the American Navy was the standard of inefficiency among the seamen of the world. On account of our weakened condition, we were again denied the respect of foreign nations. Eight years after the Civil War American ships were captured by Spanish coast guards. American citizens found on a Cuban filibuster were shot to death without trial. Our prestige was gone.
In the period since 1850 the United States Navy had been revolutionized. The wooden frigates were supplanted by ironclads propelled by steam. Three centuries had not effected such great changes as had the brief quarter of a century ending in 1865.
These revolutionary changes were mainly the invention of the rifled gun, the heavy smooth bore Dahlgren, and the torpedo, the introduction of the ironclads and the application of steam to ships of war. Of all these changes, perhaps the greatest was the supplanting of sail by steam. This made possible the revival of the ram which had gone out after the war galleys were succeeded by the sailing vessels. The first forms of the steamships, the side-wheelers, were exceedingly vulnerable; but a great advance was made by the invention of the screw propeller which permitted the defense of the machinery by submersion, and by the armor plating on the sides. The next natural step was the torpedo which was devised for use against the underwater body, the only vulnerable part of this latest type of ironclad. Thus began the race, still going on between armor and ordnance. An inventory of the ships made after the Civil War showed that most of them were unfit because of faulty design, the use of unseasoned lumber, and the hurried construction. A process of weeding out took place and the few vessels that remained, Congress regarded as sufficient for a peace footing with the addition of monitors. These monitors were built in Civil War style with wood heavily plated with iron. In 1874 they had rotted so badly that they were ordered broken up and rebuilt in iron. Congress subsequently stopped the work of reconstruction and for twenty years the United States had not a single armored ship. During the administration of President Hayes, our Navy was inferior to that of any nation of Europe; even Chile’s two ironclads would have been more than a match for all of our ships combined. All naval appropriations that could be got out of Congress was designed to keep the existing ships in repair. The Navy Department was forced to rebuild ships under old names, paying for them out of the proceeds from the sale of condemned hulls and out of the appropriations for repairs. The year 1874 marks the lowest point to which the Navy has ever sunk since the days when the United States had to pay ransom to Algiers. Out of 140 vessels of the Navy, twenty-five were tugs and only a few of the rest were in condition to make a cruise. Not a single ship was fit for warfare, and yet, 1881 marks the turning of the tide.
The first step toward a new Navy was taken by Secretary Hunt with the approval of President Garfield in the appointment of an advisory board. This board recommended the construction of thirty-eight unarmored cruisers, five rams, five torpedo boats, ten cruising torpedo boats and ten harbor torpedo boats. The smaller vessels were to be all of steel and of the cruisers it was recommended that eighteen were to be of steel and twenty of wood. There were some who opposed the use of steel and recommended iron on the ground that we had no plants capable of producing the steel required. The new market created new plants to meet its needs and the decision of the majority resulted in the rapid development of one of the greatest American industries, the manufacture of steel. The house naval committee urged the building of two cruisers capable of an average speed of 15 knots; four cruisers capable of a speed of 14 knots, and one ram. Congress, on August 5, 1882, called for two steam cruising vessels of war to be constructed of steel of domestic manufacture—then Congress neglected to make any appropriation for them. A second advisory board was appointed and recommended five vessels, one of 4,000 tons; three of 2,500 tons—all of steel—and one ram dispatch boat of 1,500 tons.
On March 3, 1883, an act was passed providing the construction of these ships with the exception of one of the smaller cruisers. These four, the first of the “White Squadron,” were the Chicago, the Boston, the Atlanta, and the Dolphin. By the contract with the Bethlehem Iron Company in 1887, facilities for making the best of steel armor and forgings for the largest of steel guns were provided.
Between 1881 and 1887, it was demonstrated that we had to build steel mills before we could build modern battleships, and it was demonstrated that even with the best of facilities, it was not possible to build a battleship in less than a year. The impetus following gave us ship yards, enabling us to build the best fighting machines in the world.
In 1890 manufacturing plants were developed in America capable of turning out the highest type of large caliber and machine guns, as well as the other requisites for the construction of a modern battleship. An offspring of this period was the lamented Maine. In the same year, 1890, the government took a long stride in naval construction. Hitherto, there were no ships larger than cruisers, but in this year Congress authorized three first-class battleships, the Indiana, the Massachusetts, and the world famed Oregon.
In 1898 our successes in the war with Spain gave the Navy a tremendous impetus which has since put the United States, for the first time, in the front rank among the naval powers of the world. The ships built in 1890 were built for coast defense. While they displaced nearly 10,000 tons and had a speed of 15 knots they had a small coal capacity. Consequently, ships of this kind had to stick closely to the coast. Our Navy at this time consisted of four battleships of the first class, two battleships of the second class, two armored cruisers, sixteen cruisers, fifteen gunboats, one ram, one transport steamer and five torpedo boats. One submarine boat was under construction. The battleships were the Oregon, the Massachusetts, the Indiana, and the Iowa. The New York and the Brooklyn were the cruisers. The Olympia was the so-called protected cruiser.
The Porter was the largest torpedo boat in commission and the first destroyer to be equipped with a wireless. She was 175 feet long and made 28.63 knots an hour. She was likewise armed with tubes for firing torpedoes.
With the building of the new ships, we also built guns adopted from plans obtained from Europe. These were of wrought steel tubes and were breech loaders. The largest of these guns weighed sixty tons. They were forty feet long, the bore was thirteen inches in diameter, and the wrought projectile weighed 1,100 pounds.
In 1899 we brought out the ships of the Virginia class with four 12-inch guns, eight 8-inch, and twelve 6-inch guns. These ships were up to date beyond question. In 1902, the Louisiana and the Connecticut were armed with four 12-inch, eight 8-inch, and twelve 7-inch guns, besides twenty most excellent 3-inch guns. With our ship development, we likewise took a step forward in gun development. In our war with Spain less than 3 per cent of the shots fired from our ships hit the enemy. Under a system of training adopted after the war, especially after Theodore Roosevelt became president, our gunners became so expert that we had a trophy ship in the American Navy in 1907 having a record of 75.782 per cent of hits with all guns at target practice.
At this time, the 12-inch gun was fired twice in a minute with much more accuracy than was obtained when it was possible to fire it but once in five minutes. At long ranges, it has been found that the 12-inch gun is more accurate than guns of small caliber; the trajectory of the big gun is flatter. Now, small guns were mounted because of the supposed greater accuracy with which they could be fired. It followed, therefore, that when twelve hits could be made in twelve successive shots from the 12-inch gun—a record actually made in the Navy—there was no longer any need for the 7- or 8-inch guns.
In 1910 we had two dreadnaughts of 20,000 tons displacement carrying ten 12-inch guns in turrets. A battery of 5-inch guns was provided against torpedo attack. Those ships were capable of making 21 knots. In armored cruisers we had eight of the North Carolina class. At the same time we had three scout cruisers, displacing 3,750 tons and making 24 knots. These ships were turbine driven ships using the Parsons and the Curtis turbines. All these ships were coal burners. Owing to an unfortunate mishap, the idea of using oil solely was discontinued until ships of the Nevada and Oklahoma class were launched. Today practically all capital ships of the American Navy consume oil solely. Electric driven ships took the place of reciprocating engines at the appearance of the Jupiter, now the aircraft carrier Langley. In battleships, the New Mexico was the first one to use electricity exclusively as a driving power.
We have today in our Navy eighteen battleships which are all that we are permitted to have by the Washington Treaty. These ships have a displacement of about 32,000 tons. Of these eighteen ships, seven are driven by electric power and have four propellers, developing a horsepower of about 29,000 and giving a speed of about 21 knots. Eight others are propelled by steam turbines with four propellers each, developing a total horsepower of about 30,000 and giving a speed of about 21 knots. The other three have reciprocating engines. Of these battleships six are coal burners and they are to be converted into oil burners. All of these eighteen battleships are armed with a main battery of guns ranging in size from twelve to sixteen inches, and with a secondary battery of 5-inch guns to be used against destroyers and eight 3-inch anti-aircraft guns to be used as protection against airplane attack.
In cruisers we have ten modern vessels of 7,500 tons each. These are all driven by steam turbines with four propellers, the total horsepower being about 90,000 and the speed being about 33.7 knots. Those light cruisers are armed each with twelve 6-inch guns and four 3-inch anti-aircraft guns. They are also equipped with four torpedo tubes. Besides these modern light cruisers we have a number of older cruisers that have no great military value but are useful in time of peace to protect our interests abroad and to show the flag.
In destroyers we have 274, of which only 110 are in full commission, the remainder being tied up to the docks in reserve owing to insufficient personnel to man them. These destroyers are of about 1,200 tons displacement and are driven by steam turbines with two propellers, producing a horsepower of about 26,000 to 29,000, giving a speed of about 33 to 35 knots. Each of these destroyers is armed with four torpedo tubes and four 4-inch guns, together with one anti-aircraft gun.1
In submarines we have built or are building seven of the larger type of a little over 1,000 tons displacement. These vessels have a surface speed sufficient to permit them to accompany the battle fleet. Besides these fleet submarines we have about ninety submarines of less than 1,000 tons which are useful for coast defense work only.
1Five of these destroyers have 5-inch guns.
In addition to the foregoing types there are a number of auxiliary vessels and one aircraft carrier, the Langley. The Langley was formerly the collier Jupiter and she is the first vessel in which the Navy installed the electric drive. She is equipped to mount seven planes on her landing deck and to stow eighteen planes below. She has a landing platform extending her complete length from which the planes can depart and return. By an ingenious method, the planes on lighting are brought to a quick but gradual stop.
Before the Washington Conference we were building six battle cruisers of 43,500 tons each with a horsepower of 180,000 which was to give them a speed of about 33¼ knots, but, as a result of the Washington Conference, all of these vessels had to be given up except two, the Lexington and the Saratoga, which are being made into aircraft carriers. These two are to have electric drive.
Much of interest might be said about the battleships. They have a complement each of about 1,200 men and about sixty officers. Ships of this type are practically huge machine shops operating completely by electricity. Their electric power consists of some four to six turbo-driven generators of 300 kilowatts each. There are three anchors, each weighing about ten tons, which are hoisted by electric winches. Each has two electric cranes with a lifting capacity of twenty tons for the handling of boats and heavy weights.
It may not be generally known that one of these great ships contains the same facilities and necessities that are found in any town or city for the welfare and comfort of the people. In addition to the natural ventilation system there is a forced ventilation. Certain electric blowers take in fresh air on deck and other electric blowers pump out the foul air. In the galleys all cooking is done on ranges which burn oil. The bake shops are equipped with electric dough mixers and two electric bake ovens with a capacity of 2,400 pounds of bread a day. Two 3-ton ice machines manufacture all ice used, insuring the preservation of meats and other perishable foods with a great degree of certainty. Each ship is equipped with telephone exchanges with about 200 connections throughout the ship. Each ship has a completely equipped laundry. Each ship also has a modern hospital provided with twenty-four beds, a complete operating room, an isolation ward, and a dental office. Each has its own post office which is authorized by the post office department. All fresh water, unknown in the old navy except for drinking purposes, is made on the modern vessel from sea water in the evaporating and distilling plants. This system dates from 1882. The salt water is first evaporated which deposits the salt, and the steam is then condensed into fresh water. The modern plants aboard the present capital ships are capable of making 20,000 gallons of water per day.
An important adjunct of our fighting fleet is our aircraft. Each major ship and cruiser carries a hydroplane which is used principally to spot the fall of shots and give information to the firing ship. This is necessary owing to the fact that the ranges at which we now fire our guns have increased to 30,000 yards and from the guns the target is often not visible. All of the guns are fired by what is known as the director method. By this method the aim at the target is taken from a station aloft, and by electric means pointers at the guns are moved and the men at the guns lay the guns to correspond to these pointers. From the station aloft the target can be seen at long ranges while at the gun it cannot be. The airplane flies over the target or the enemy ship and keeps the firing ship informed of whether the shots are hitting or going over, or short, and so forth, and the director can then adjust his aim accordingly.
The Lexington and Saratoga, which are now being made into airplane carriers, will carry from seventy to eighty planes, will have landing platforms as has the Langley, and will have a speed that will permit them to accompany the fleet.
It is perhaps difficult for the average individual to realize just how necessary are auxiliary vessels. However, a modern battleship is helpless without them. Some are specialized and must be part of the regular Navy. These include such units as hospital ships, supply ships, repair ships, transports, oil carriers, colliers, and cargo vessels. In 1907, President Roosevelt sent an American fleet around the world but had no auxiliary colliers to accompany the ships. To meet the need the government hired merchant ships and colliers from foreign lines.
It has been the endeavor of this paper to describe briefly the development of the Navy from the whaling ships to the modern super-dreadnaughts, a development that has kept a steady pace with our national emergencies, a development that has arisen in order to preserve our national integrity and to keep this beloved land of ours in preparation for any crisis.
Without this preparation, no degree of heroism, no amount of fortitude, no fertility of resources, could suffice for meeting a crisis adequately. In the development on the material side, the United States Navy has an enviable record of originality and leadership.
Today our Navy is more modern, better organized, of heavier tonnage and greater strength, more completely manned and more intelligently served than ever before in its history. The great European war has brought home to all alike the need of preparedness and never again should this nation repeat the fallacies of the past in naval policy that have in more than one period of years allowed its naval strength to deteriorate.
If we are to retain our prestige; if we are to keep our place as one of the great custodians of civilization; if we are to preserve the heritage of our freedom and our institutions and transmit that heritage unsullied to our descendants; if we are to guard our families and firesides, let us keep in our hands the power that God has given us and renounce once and forever the sophistries that would shear the Navy of its strength.
Such ships as we have are at least the equals of corresponding types in any navy in the world and the country has as much reason today to be proud of its ships and its guns, its officers and men, as in the days of old.
A navy that takes the seas with a preponderance of naval power rules the sea almost as if the opposing navy did not exist. Its lines of commerce and of military supply are practically uninterrupted. Its industries are suffering from no lack of raw material and the markets of the world are as freely open to it as if the war did not exist.
It is interesting to note the frequency with which naval warfare is “revolutionized” in the minds of the laymen. The introduction of armor was followed by many predictions that the sides of the ships could never again be pierced. The development of the gun to the point where it overmatches the heaviest armor led to the confident announcement that armor was useless and that the warship of the future would dispense with it altogether. The successful development of the torpedo was held to make large ships worse than useless until the net was introduced and hailed as reducing the torpedo to impotence. So the struggle goes on—and through all its changes the backbone of the fleet has continued to be the fighting ship of large and steadily increasing size with powers of offense and defense evenly balanced on the whole, recognizing the menace of secondary enemies and guarding against them as best it may, but seeing its real opponent in the battleships and dreadnaughts of the enemy. The dreadnaught of today has succeeded through gradual, not revolutionary, development of the line of battleship of two centuries ago. It may be that this type is soon to become obsolete, but the evidence that this is so, appeals far more strongly to the popular imagination than to the seasoned judgment of students of naval warfare.