| From Maine to Illinois
U.S. Pre-Dreadnoughts
in Great War at Sea
By David Hughes
September 2015
The first American pre-dreadnought, Maine,
is also the most famous. Not because she was
a good design; in many respects she was an
outdated, inferior ship when designed, let
alone laid down or completed. Rather the fame
came because of her loss, by sabotage or accident
(the former furiously held to be true by Americans
until 30 years ago). The ship's explosion
in Havana would be seized upon as an excuse
to launch the Spanish-American War.
The order for a new, sea-going armoured
ship marks the beginning of the "New
Navy." The "Old Navy" had been
a collection of rotting wooden frigates, backed
up by monitors that had seen little improvement
in design, let alone fighting value, since
their namesake of 1862. When Maine was
laid down in 1888 Congress still thought that
the Navy should be a coastal-defence force.
The resulting design was really an armoured
cruiser rather than a battleship, with two
turrets (each with two 10-inch guns) placed
on opposite sides of a central armoured barbette.
For most officers her primary weapon was her
ram, while her protection was limited to 12
inches of nickel steel (equal to about four
inches of Krupp armour). If this seems inadequate,
remember that at 6,500 tons she was small
compared with the contemporary Royal Sovereign
class battleships of the Royal Navy, which
carried four 13.5-inch guns on a displacement
of 14,000 tons.
Texas can be considered a battleship
variant of Maine, equally small and
with similar armour, but carrying two 12-inch
guns instead. Laid down a year later she had
a better-designed hull, giving her a speed
of 17 knots, almost two knots faster than Maine. By the time she entered battle
for the only time at the battle of Santiago
de Cuba hard service had made her slower and
she quickly fell behind the lead ships. Due
to her layout only one gun could fire and
no hits could be confirmed. Rate of fire was
slow, although improved when her mounts were
given all-round (but still fixed-angle) loading
just before the war. It is, in passing, exceedingly
difficult to find any reliable data on the
actual rate of fire of American naval guns.
Already obsolete when completed, she was turned
into a target for heavy guns in 1911.
The three Indiana-class ships laid
down in 1891 were America’s first true
battleships, 11,500 tons and with four 13-inch
guns. They were given 18 inches of Harvey
steel on the belt which, by the standards
of the time was both deep (nearly eight feet)
and extensive, covering well over half the
length of the hull. However, Congress had
stipulated that they were to be "sea
going coast-line battleships," which
led to some undesirable features. They had
limited freeboard which, while it did not
mean that they were un-seaworthy, did cause
problems with both guns and speed in heavy
weather. In this respect although infinitely
more capable, they retained the characteristics
of the old "sea-going" monitors.
In Great War at Sea: Remember the Maine this is why most of the early American
battleships are subject to
"low-freeboard" rules.
Their ancient turret design, very little
changed since 1865, was another weakness.
They were unbalanced (that is with no additional
weight at the back end) so that when trained
on the beam, coupled with the low free-board,
they made the ship list so much that the belt
on the high side was above the water-line
exposing the ship's tender, unprotected bottom!
Incidentally, one other navy, that of Imperial
Russia, was having a similar problem at the
same time. To persuade Congress that they
were the most powerful battleships of their
day eight 8-inch guns in two-gun turrets were
added.
Oregon made a famous navigation of
Cape Horn in 1898, rushing from San Francisco
to Florida to participate in the attack on
Cuba. She and Indiana took part in
the destruction of the Spanish cruisers at
Santiago (their sister-ship Massachusetts being
absent coaling at Guantanamo Bay). The limited
capabilities of the class led to their swift
decommissioning. By early 1906 all were out
of active service and two were used as targets
in 1920. The exception was the famous Oregon turned into a museum ship at Portland,
Oregon. In a display of institutional ineptitude,
the United States Navy decided that they wanted
her back in 1942, breaking her up for scrap,
which they then did not use.
Desperate for warships, Chile attempted
to buy all three during her arms race with
Argentina, and they appear in Chilean colors
in the out-of-print game Cone
of Fire.
Iowa of 1893 was similar on paper
but in reality a much more effective ship.
For example, her two funnels were much taller
creating more draught and giving her a higher
sustained speed. She had a raised forecastle
and although given 12-inch guns, rather than
the 13.5-inch guns of Indiana, she
carried them in the first balanced turrets
in the United States Navy. Her belt was thinner
(14 inches of Harvey) but even more extensive,
covering over three-quarters of the length.
At Santiago she proved by far the most effective
battleship, destroying both of the two armoured
cruisers she engaged. As a true sea-going
ship she lasted longer than the Indiana class, remaining active until 1911. Retained
on strength throughout the Great War, Iowa was then converted into a remote-controlled
target ship. She was finally sent to the bottom
in 1923.
The two ships of the Kearsarge class
of 1896 were controversial from the first.
Unlike most navies, that of the United States
was and is subject to the detailed decision
input (some would say interference) of its
politicians on matters ranging from displacement
to gun size. As in this case, an unbalanced
design could result. For these ships the problem
was that their displacement was limited to
being only 1,000 tons more than Iowa but
at the same time were required to carry heavier
guns (13.5-inch) and a thicker (16-inch Harvey)
belt of armour. To make matters worse, the
Navy was ordered to dramatically improve the
anti-torpedo armament, from the six 4-inch
guns of Iowa to no less than fourteen
5-inch guns. The solution was to cut the number
of 8-inch turrets in half, but this was only
acceptable if both could fire on both broadsides.
The result was the bizarre stacked turret, with a smaller
mount with a pair of 8-inch strapped on top
of the primary turret, so that the entire
monstrosity rotated as one. Why a group of
senior admirals would accept an idea that
forced the secondary armament to fire at the
same target as the primary guns is difficult
to fathom. It is particularly disturbing to
realise that the man who "invented"
the idea would later become the admiral responsible
for all naval guns and mountings!
In addition when fitting the big guns into
the "lower level" they were mounted
at the rear, since the "upper level"
was positioned further back. Since adequate
elevation was essential the inevitable result
was a pair of huge gun-ports. Actually there
was one less obvious weakness. Not only was
the double-turret very heavy but much of its
weight was so high up that it was necessary
to reduce the freeboard. The result was yet
another design, one that harked back to Indiana, which lacked true sea-going capability. Kearsarge (unique in not being named
after a state) and Kentucky were removed
from the active fleet in 1909, two years before
their predecessor Iowa, evidence that their
many weaknesses were quickly recognised. The
name-ship did survive until 1955 but only
after being stripped of guns and armour and
converted into a crane ship, even losing her
name in 1941 when it was assigned to a new Essex-class aircraft carrier.
The Illinois class of 1896 was a dramatic
improvement. The absurd stacked turret vanished
and high freeboard returned in a design that
was very similar in armament and appearance
to the slightly earlier Majestic class
of the Royal Navy. They even had the same
feature of paired side-by-side funnels and
carried 6-inch instead of the 8-inch secondary
guns found in earlier American battleships.
Another similarity was immediately obvious.
The old fashioned circular "Monitor"-style
turrets had finally vanished and been replaced
by the square cut and balanced mounts that
had come into fashion in other navies earlier
in the decade. They carried the same 13.5-inch
guns as Kearsarge but now they could
be mounted close to the sloping front face
of the turret, eliminating the older ship’s
giant gun-ports. A rapid-fire medium gun was
at last available, so the heavy 8-inch gun
turrets could be eliminated, allowed the ship
to carry fourteen 6-inch guns, all in single
armoured barbette or sponson mounts.
However they were inferior to contemporary
British ships in two ways, one being that
the Canopus class used Krupp steel.
Unfortunately the American steel makers had
the political power to stop the navy using
from foreign steel while being unable themselves
to make Krupp quality armour. As a result Illinois and her sisters Alabama and Wisconsin had to make do with a belt
of 16.5 inches of Harvey steel. The other
weakness was their speed, at 16 knots a clear
two knots slower than their European contemporaries.
Even so, they were the best American battleships
yet built and were considered valuable enough
to be given a partial modernization 15 years
after they were built. The most obvious feature
was the cage mast, an item that graced and
identified all American heavy warships. They
were retained in service through the Great
War but only as training ships. Alabama was used as a target ship, Wisconsin was scrapped and Illinois turned
into a floating barracks in New York.
Continued: From Missouri to Mississippi
Are the "best yet built"
good enough? Find out in Remember the Maine
|
