By Lieutenant G. W. MENTZ, U. S. Navy.

Beside torpedoes and fortifications there should be always at hand for the defense of our coasts, a sufficient number of as good iron-clads and torpedo boats as any nation in the world possesses, vessels that can go to sea, so that we can meet the enemy with the same kinds of weapons he opposes to us, and with enough of them to prevent the first hard blows. Then with this as a nucleus, and our ship-builders and our mechanics skilled in the work necessary to keep up such an establishment, we could build up a sufficiently large navy as the war progressed.

If we wait until war is upon us before we provide ourselves with such modern weapons, and such as every nation of any importance, except ourselves, possesses, our officers and men would have to fight with weapons with which they are unfamiliar, while their opponents are trained in their management.

It requires time to learn to handle the new weapons of naval warfare, which are very different and much more complicated than those of the days of wooden frigates and smooth-bore guns, such as our navy is still composed of, and that is another reason why we should keep up a navy in time of peace. Torpedo and torpedo-boat attacks, for instance, depend almost entirely upon the skill in their management. We have no such things as torpedo-boats and whitehead torpedoes, etc., and our officers have had no experience or practice with such weapons.

Germany, the leading military nation of the world, has the proper idea of preparing her navy for war in time of peace. Beside being provided with the best and most effective weapons, all her naval force, active and reserve, are exercised each summer and the men and officers are trained in their duties on board the vessels, and with the weapons they will have to use in time of war. Then, each article, from a sailmaker’s needle to a gun is kept ready at the naval stations, all the articles belonging to one ship being labeled with the ship’s name, and all kept together so that they can instantly be put on board. The German Admiralty has recently reported that the whole naval force can be put in effective working order, for offensive or defensive movements, in one week’s time. It was only by similar preparations with her army in time of peace, that she was enabled, so promptly, to meet and to conquer France in 1870.

But let us glance at the kind of weapons which would be used against us in a foreign war, and with which we are unprovided and with which we must supply ourselves. Except the United States, every nation of any maritime importance possesses immense war vessels. There are some vessels which have an average speed of sixteen miles an hour; which have their batteries and their machinery protected by solid iron of a thickness of two feet, or of steel and iron combined of one and a half feet thickness; whose battery, or armament rather, consists of a few very heavy guns, capable of sending a mass of metal weighing one ton a distance of eleven miles, several guns of less weight and power, a number of revolving cannon, a dozen or two dozen torpedoes, two torpedo-boats, each of these fitted with four torpedoes and a revolving gun; whose crews are supplied with rapid, accurate and distant-firing small arms (muskets and pistols). In addition to all this, these vessels are rams, and are themselves most powerful weapons of war, and could cut in two and sink any ship they struck. These vessels, when complete, with their guns, ammunition, crews, provisions and coal, everything in fact on board, weigh from 9,000 to 13,000 tons. About twenty-seven feet of the depth of such a vessel while she floats is beneath the surface of the water, and the whole ship is divided into fifty or more water-tight compartments, so that if any two compartments are filled with water the ship will still float. These iron-clads (more properly armor-clads) do not have this two feet thickness of iron all around the ship, only the vital parts, the engines and boilers, etc., and that part of the ship where the great guns are fought, are so protected. The armor consists of a belt eight to ten feet wide (deep) and from one to two feet thick; half of its width or depth is below the surface of the water and half is above. The machinery, engines and boilers in a war vessel are put in the ship as low down as possible, the farther below the surface of the water the better, as below the surface of the water a shot is not effective, that is, for a greater depth below the surface than one or two feet.

The machinery then is protected from shot on the sides and underneath. To protect it from shot on top, a steel deck of three inches thickness is built in the ship immediately over the engines and boilers, the deck inclining toward the sides of the ship, so that if a shot did strike the deck it would be deflected upward and away from the engines and boilers. This deck is also placed below the surface of the water, if practicable.

The guns of such a ship are generally placed in a citadel and on the deck underneath the citadel. The citadel is clad with iron or steel, and the guns on the deck beneath are protected by the belt of armor spoken of above.

The amount of metal that the guns can fire from one side of such a ship is anywhere from 6,700 to 8,960 pounds. The shot composing this mass of metal travel through the air with a velocity of 1,800 feet per second, and travel nine miles in about twenty-five seconds. When a shot weighing one ton and traveling with such velocity strikes an object squarely, the object must indeed be strong to withstand the shock.

What resistance to such a force could the walls of a wooden ship give, or even those of ten-sixteenths of an inch of steel or of seven inches of iron? Yet there is no United States war vessel with a greater thickness of side than seven inches of iron. Most of our monitors have only 5 armor.

The people of this country have reason to be proud of the deeds of their navy in the past, and many a time has the “ruler of the seas” lowered his flag to the stars and stripes. But those victories were gained with ships the equal of any in the world, and with guns which had no superiors and with crews and officers well trained and accustomed to the use of their weapons. Is it so now with our navy? No. We would go into battle with the odds all against us. The sides of our ships are as pasteboard to the high-power guns of the present time.

Our guns are as much use against two feet of iron armor, or its equivalent in steel, as a pop-gun is against a stone wall, and would make just about as much impression. And, although we have just as brave, patriotic and skillful men and officers in our navy to-day as we ever had, they are not skilled or trained in the use of the proper weapons, in the management of modern weapons—such as their opponents will use against them.

The possession of these instruments of war would make all governments very careful and respectful in their treatment of us and increase the probabilities of their never being used in actual warfare. The annual cost would not amount to the one millionth of the amount of damage Brazil, or Italy, or Germany, or France, or England, or Chili even could do us in the same length of time if we are without them.

Our navy costs about $15,000,000 yearly, about half of that sum is for the pay of officers and men, and it is misapplied, because they are being trained in the use of weapons which are no longer effective, and our people are not getting the proper return for their money. But the fault is their own and the navy is not to blame. The cause of the great change that has taken place in the last twenty years in the weapons of naval warfare is due to the use of iron and steel, instead of wood, in the construction of ships, and, although the navy has asked the country repeatedly for modern ships and guns, the people have not seen fit to grant them.

This is what our navy consists of: Of high-power rifle guns, such as almost every nation possesses, we have one, recently finished, and which, owing to lack of experience, required one year to construct.

Of cruising vessels, fit only to destroy merchant vessels of slow speed, we have thirty-six, four of which are of iron, whose sides are about one half inch thick. None of these vessels would be able to engage the battle ships of any maritime nation.

For coast defense, we have nineteen iron-clads; many require extensive repairs, and it would take time to put them in condition. None of them have sides of a greater thickness than seven inches of iron, and they could not withstand the blows of modern guns.

Of guns for the whole fleet, we have, beside the one mentioned above, eighty-seven converted rifle guns worth retaining, but they are only of fair power. The other guns in the navy, 2,577 in number, are, according to a late report of the Secretary of the Navy, “in no real sense suited to the needs of the present day.”

Of torpedo-boats such as every other navy has, we have none nor have we any torpedo-boats, except the “Alarm.”

Of the personnel, there are, all told, officers, seamen, apprentices and marines, 11,918.

Of reserves, we have none but the merchant marine, and merchant sailors require considerable training to fit them for war purposes, and none of them are trained for such a purpose now.

This force is to protect 10,000 miles of sea coast, the lake coast, the second largest merchant marine in the world, the amount of property is incalculable, and the interests of 55,000,000 of people. Our country is rich and prosperous, and the treasury is fairly bursting with the money we have saved. Every year we put away in its vaults $100,000,000, for which we have no present use. Our resources in metal in the ore, and in everything connected with the material of ship building and gun building is almost beyond comparison with any other country. With one year’s surplus of revenue we could build a navy that would cause the most powerful nations to fear and respect us, and which would be the surest harbinger of peace. But our people are beginning in a slow way to realize that we need a reorganization of the navy, and Congress has appropriated the money for the building of four new vessels. These are to be of steel, and are for the purpose of protecting our shipping, our citizens abroad, and to police the seas in time of peace and to prey upon the enemy’s commerce in time of war. They will have high speed, about seventeen miles an hour, and (if Congress appropriates the money) they will have high-power modern rifle guns which will compare favorably with the guns of similar size of other nations. But they will not be battle ships, nor coast defense ships. Their sides will be about ten-sixteenths of an inch thick, and, although of steel, that thickness will not resist a shot from a high-powered rifle gun. These four vessels have been named the “Chicago,” “Boston,” “Atlanta” and “Dolphin.” The “Dolphin” is now afloat, having been launched Saturday, April 12th, at Chester, Pa., at the works of John Roach & Co. The same firm is building the other three new vessels. They will all be finished one year from now. The guns for the armament are being constructed, some at the Washington Arsenal, some at Cold Springs, N. Y., and some at South Boston, Mass. They are all to be of steel, and this metal, which is used throughout in the construction of the ships and guns, if possible is to be manufactured in the United States, however, it may be necessary to send to England for the tubes for the larger sized guns. The building of these vessels and guns has given an impetus to the steel industry in our country and has been the means of giving employment and experience to our mechanics, which almost alone repays for the outlay in money.

Building ships and guns in our own country, and of our own metal, and with our own workmen, increases our resources just so much, and adds just so much to our war strength; and adds just so much, too, to the interest the people of the country take in their defenses, in their navy. The employment affects thousands of families; not only are the ship builder, the gun constructor and the skilled mechanics employed by them benefited, but the miners, and all those engaged in transporting the ore and the coal from the mines to the workshops, and their families are benefited. We have grown to be a great manufacturing country, and the skill and ingenuity of our mechanics in the manufacture of some articles are recognized by all. Many of our manufactured articles are in use in every part of the world. We are unrivaled in our labor-saving machines, because it requires, to think out and invent the sewing machine, the agricultural machine, etc., etc., something which the mechanics of other countries do not possess, superior mental ability, due to our free institutions and general education. Here is a field for our mechanics, the manufacture of all war material. Why should not we, instead of Mr. Krupp, supply the world with guns? Why should not we, instead of Mr. Yarrow, of England, supply the world with torpedo-boats, etc., etc.?

We have supplied other nations with muskets; an American invented the gun which fires a hailstorm of 1,200 bullets per minute, and which bears his name, the Gatling gun; and our fellow countryman is supplying the world with revolving cannon, but not from the United States. Every one of our manufacturing industries has been assisted by the government by high tariff on similar articles of foreign manufacture. But that would not be the kind of assistance the manufacture of war material would need to boom it along. All that would be necessary for the government to do for that industry is to accept and adopt such articles for the use of our army and navy as are proved to be valuable, and to provide itself liberally with them, and cease doing as it did with the Hotchkiss gun, purchase one or two, and drive the inventor to a foreign land, where his invention is better appreciated.

It is humiliating to every patriotic man and to every mechanic in our land, and a disgrace to the American people that we, a manufacturing country, a country full of mechanical genius, a country full of iron ore and of coal, a rich country, should go to other nations to buy steel plates to use as armor for our monitors, and steel for the tubes of our guns. That is what we have recently done, and the “Alert” is now bringing us some steel plates made in England. Why should not our manufacturers get the large profit there is in the manufacture of weapons of war? All they need is a little encouragement from the government, and orders would soon come in from foreign governments, for it can not be doubted that our superior mechanics in a very short time would produce a superior style of weapon. There is at present no demand by our government for such articles, while in England there is constant demand for them; our mechanics are inexperienced, and governments which have a need for such material, and which do prepare for war in time of peace, purchase from those skilled and experienced in their make. Our government, by encouraging such an industry, would be but providing itself with the best of weapons, and would be putting the country in a secure state of defense.

Germany, ten years ago, adopted a scheme for the improvement of her navy, which before that time was of little consequence, and part of the policy was, to build her own armor-clads, and everything pertaining to the navy in her own country, and she has so far succeeded that her navy, though not the largest, is one of the best in the world, and was all created by her own people, and at a small annual expenditure. Now, the private dock-yards in Germany that build some of the new ships of the navy are building war vessels for other countries. It is unnecessary to say that Germany’s wealth and natural resources are not nearly as great as our own.

At the opening of Congress in 1872, the President, in his message, called attention to this subject in the following few but apt and unequivocal words:

The Secretary of the Navy commences his annual report for the same year with this earnest appeal in behalf of the navy:

Notwithstanding such messages from the highest authority in our land, only some of the money necessary to build four new cruisers has been appropriated by Congress. Our people must instruct their representatives in Congress to provide them with the means to put them and their country in a secure state of defense, else that body, composed of many politicians and few statesmen, will never show that they have any other welfare at heart than their own reËlection, and the getting or retaining of their party in power.