Evening Republican, Volume 16, Number 137, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 7 June 1912 — FREAKE SHIPS OF NAVY [ARTICLE+ILLUSTRATION]

FREAKE SHIPS OF NAVY

■V Then the Monitor Bteamed ta--IAI to Hampton roads half a ■fat century ago and played f J “Delilah" to the Merrimac’s “Samson” an important era In the life of the confederacy, also in oaval architecture, was marked. The .United States began building more monitore -with -feverish -haste. Wooden sloops, cruisers, corvettes and frigates were hurried into the discard. A navy wasn’t the real thing unless it had a lot of queer looking ironclad vessels resembling "the cheese box on a raft.” Naval historians say that the building of the Monitor was an illustration of the adage, “Necessity is the mother of invention.” The United States was threatened by an unconquerable iron coated foe. A new style of fighting craft was needed. Ericsson heard and interpreted Mother Necessity’s call. The Monitor was the result, says the Kansas City Star. All well and good! But Erickson’s success caused a score of embryo naval designers to ~ strain, their eyesight and hearing searching for another Mother Necessity. Navy departments, admiralty offices and shipbuilding firms were besieged by architects. Specifications for all sorts of odd appearing war vessels were produced. Most of these met a prosaic death in the waste paper basket; many got as far as the experimental strfge; some were actually built and launched and once or twice the Beagling military establishments of the world have been given hair raising scares. Two Notable Marine Freaks. The Katahdin and the Vesuvius were the names selected by the United States for two of its more noted sea freaks. Both were radical departures from accepted naval construction. Both were expected to revolutionize naval warfare. And both failed. Rear Admiral Daniel Ammen was responsible for the Katahdin. .He lived and died believing that he had given to his country its most valuable weapon of defense. Admiral Ammen was a studious sort of a chap. He was interested in his profession. He knew how seamen had fought and how ships had been built since the days of Phoenlcla. Particularly he liked the methods used by the valiant sea fighters of Rome. He was impressed with their naval architecture, the sharp ramming beaks on solidly built craft. Why, the admiral probably reasoned to himself, could not this ram .be used lp modern warfare? He began a quiet search for Mme. Necessity. He took the ram Idea of the Romans, the armor plated Idea of his own day and the compact machinery plan of Ericsson and began work. He rolled and hammered and welded these three ideas together and produced the Katahdin. “It won’t work. It is impractical,” said the navy department officials. Then Admiral Ammen smiled and began to explain his theory again. Ammen coaxed, exhorted, demanded and besought. Also he persisted. The navy- department said go ahead. The Katahdin was built. The ram looked like a cross between a great lake whaleback grain boat and a water logged cigar of monster proportions whenit was launched in 1889. Then for four years the Katahdin was put through all the trials naval officers could devise. The boat did everything its inventor claimed. The government paid $930,000 for the Katahdin and then waited for an enemy to humiliate. In 1898 Spain balanced a husky chip on its shoulder. Uncle Sam promptly slapped It Here was the Katahdin’s opportunity. Along about- March, 1898, things looked pretty dark .for the United States navy. Spain’s fighting ships still had considerable standing. Great things were expected from the Katahdin. “We have in our nary,” one enthusiast declared, “one boat which alone could fight the whole much vaunted Spanish fleet.” He meant the Katahdin. But the Katahdin was a failure. It was designed to chase an enemy Into a corner and then puncture a hole in the side of the hostile ship with the 400.00 Q ton blow the Katahdin ram could deliver. Of course the enemy would fight back; hut the conical armored deck of the Katahdin was made to shed shells like a duck sheds water. It took only a few days to learn j

that the Katahdin couldn’t steam fast enough to ram a rowboat and, most any old popgun could punch holes In Its armor before it got under way. In addition the ram was not seaworthy. Vesuvius Terror of the Navy. So the skipper of the Katahdin brought his boat back to Washington navy yard and the Junk pile. The ram became a curiosity of naval construction instead of a revolutionizer of naval warfare. Quite recently the Katahdin met a prosaic end by acting as a target for a new style of naval artillery. The Vesuvius came nearer fame. It was launched In 1886. The SpanishAmerican war also heralded its death. The Vesuvius was a dynamite cruiser. its weapons were three bronze tubes projecting amidships and forward. From these tubes dynamite shells containing 250 pounds of guncotton were hurled by compressed air. It expected that a few of these monster charges would destroy a whole continent. And they might have had the Vesuvius been able to fire accurately. The tubes were immovable and the only way to aim was to point the ship at the target and then regulate the air pressure. In the language of one naval expert, “Sometimes we hit the island of Cuba.” The Vesuvius saw real war service in 1898. It has the Katahdin’s record beaten. The Vesuvius would sneak close in to shore at night near Santiago and fire a few dynamite shells. They made a frightful noise when they exploded and won the sobriquet of "the earthquake maker” for the ship, hut nothing more.To quote a naval officer: “The Vesuvius was turned out to be the terror of the seas and became the terror of the American navy.” —--——- Officers were afraid the dynamite magazines would explode In a heavy sea.

OLD MONITOS WAITING FOR AUCTIONEER