THE FLEET'S VISIT

Taranaki Daily News, Volume LI, Issue 200, 13 August 1908, Page 2

THE FLEET'S VISIT

ISKUISH PACIFIC HATTLKSIIIPS. WILL THEY liKTUII.V; (My Cable.—Press Associutios.—Coin right.) n iicceivcd 12, 11.20 p.m. London, Augu-t !•> Al»ny American newspapers reiw'to t'e disappearance of the British battleiron, the fncifie, and doubt tSr . . ' cvcn uttvr tJ>o probable IcrminaKUO. 1 " l! A, ' slu - Jl, l ,anes " Alliance in

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% 1 olograph. Press Association. . Aueckluiid, Last Nicut o w ; u " ws i ° <*. fourteen Wr tffclvß «''th Mie liotorua tniilic "I n - t0 co l ,a '"8 «o !««. than ' I-", lh,C mora " lac-lied to Uie evm- f u f Kl( 's were atwficSra^^S 00 ,"

Admiral Snerrv ' U f dred ollicers of Hn' A ' -° U t,vo ollicers of the l' lf m r n,!au " et;t . Ward and Lady Ward"ln l S "' i Joscp " «>« Legislature ,ml the l',") 1 01 jowvyvd to Koton,« t by 1 8^1 / 7r- d 8 Hamilton, wher" uJ Zr W " S mi ' de welcomed by the ilnvm- / iK ' e1 ' 8 wer « ;y>.ow,rcilso;^rar^ro^ Government at tea in the i„ r i adjoining the station S ° baZauv

OOALiA'G THE I'LKET.

ti Auckland, Last KiMit .-."rfSErs.rirf",;: 1 y airivefl are now all alongside the not !i i« . C ? a,ln S "l'orationa will not, it is expected, be compl-etcd before the end of the week. The hospital relief ship arrivud from *an tfrancisco and bamoa tliis morning. The vessel is commanded by SijrgeoS C. V. Stokes liie s.s. Culgoa will probably sa il to morrow for Brisbane to lo,fd rozen meat for tli e llvet. H.M.S. Pw er f u leaves for Sydney nt « a.m. to-morrow m order to a«Ust at the welcome to the fleet at that port.

THE ALL WHITE FLEET.

AJIEIi ICA'S DR E ADXOUGHT. Formidable as.arc some of tlio la.tesi of the sixteen United States battleships which are at present in Auckland, their capacity iur destruction is apparently small com pa red with that of the North Dakota, one ol lour vessels which are nmv being built "to answer, on behalf ot the 'Stars and Stripes, Great Britain * challenge to all (lie world with the Dreadnought/' hi the North. Dakota the United States will luive, according to tile newspapers of the nation, "tli most terrible lighting engine afloat with a broadside .that could sink an\ thing on the sea/' She is being turnei out from tlie Fore Hiver Building Com pany's yard at (Juiucy, Massachusetts and her initial cost will be £2,000,001 But let this Americans tell their owi etorv. They say:—".Nothing floats to day that could stand nhe North Dakota' lire for live minutes, .She carries te ■l2in. guns—each one a peacemaker ,i: itself—and fourteen sin. rifles, the mos formidable heavy battery in-the worh' ■to say nothing of a. host of minor piece; This main battery of twenty-four gvea guns can launch at one -broadside 10,00' lb. of steel—five tons at one fire. Thi is 30001b. more than Dewey's whole flee could fire in Manila Bay on that event ful May morning ten years ago. Now this doesn't mean just the old-fashione round cannon ball that any furnac could turn out. The North Dakota fire the up-to-date, conical, soft-nose, et

plosive, armour-piercing .projectiles that are made us carefully as the guns themselves. It costs £240 to fire one of the great 12in. fellows, and £9O to lire om; of the Sin. boys, counting the depreciation in the gun afler each discharge. Iti other words, one broadside from the great gnns of Uncle Sam's newest peacemaker, the North Dakota, would, cost £3(100. And after two hours of continuous firing the guns Would be worn-out and useless! Take one of 'lie great 12-in. guns, for instance. Each one costs £13,000 to build, even when I'liele Sam builds them himself, as he does, down at the old Naval Yard,

1- Washington. The Sin. guns cost £2OOO e a-piece. In other words, there are £138,000 worth of guns alone on the g great North Dakota, not speaking about .. tlie minor pieces, which wiiuld carry the It total cost of her weapons of offence well over £IOO,OOO. Now, about the details ; of one of these big lOin. fellows of the J North Dakota. It shoots 2501b. .f 1 smokeless powder, which costs 3s 4d a pound. The projectile weighs 8501b., ami eosts £O2. .lust for powder and shot i alone, then, it costs £IOO to fire one gun one time, without estimating the deterioration, which is even more. The gun itself weighs 00 tons. It will hurl its huge projectile 20 miles. This will crash through 45 inches of wrought-iron as if it were paper, and it will pierce 10 inches of the toughest armour-plate. Shooting in concert it would take £SOOO a minute to feed the ponderous maws of the North Dakota's guns with powder and shot. Each gun generates an energy of 50,000 tons by the terrific force of its lire. As the shells leave the mouth of these groat guns, they are travelling at the rate of 2000 miles an hour. They I would whizz around the earth between ] sunrise and sunset if they could keep going, and reach the moon' in five days, J They go a mile, inside of 2sec. To man this £2,000,000 flouting fortress takes f !)00 officers and men—a full regiment. r To pay them and keep them in supplies and the sliip in repair eosts £200,000 a year. And twenty years from now, as naval experts figure it, the North p Dakota will be obsolete." I'

WAKSHI'PS OF THE WOULD. '"'"STRENGTH OF THE UNITED STATES. Some interesting statistics are givvn in the latest issue of the Naval Annual '' by the editor, the Hon. T. A. lirassey rt regarding the relative strengths of 'the great navies of the world. ''The elian»e.-. in the relative strength of navies during the year under review." savs the writer, "are not so important as' those chronicled in these, pages for the year 1000.-7, which witnessed the rise of'(lie United* Slates lo the position, liy a small .margin over Germany, of the second naval Power in the world. In battleship strength these two navies ,vo approximately equal, but in armored cruisers the United States has a verv I considerable superiority. , , . xhc J j United States now keeps in commission 1 a llect which, including armored cruisers is more powerful than that of Germanv' The main fleet, consisting of ]fi little-' j I ships, has been temporarily transferred to the Pacific." 1 The fleet of battleships referred to are ' Mu- present visitors. Of completed l battleships of alt descriptions Great F Britain Ran 54, compared with a total ' of 40 for Germany and tho United

The Auckland Herald, writing editorially on the Great White Fleet? says-. He regard always ail American w'arshin as representing a people kindred in language, religion, sense of freedom, and sense of law; and we are satisfied to know that though it may not light for m>, whatever happens, as will the lirilis'i 6 J"f r'f'-} ita Jacks, yet, it will •not fight against us and will always wish us veil. Had nothing unforeseen ■happened, our welcome to an American d'ieet taking- a trial trip round the world would havo been warmed by tint friendly attitude; but as tilings are onr welcome is more than friendly. For the American Fleet parades the Pacific with a design which diplomatists ma>smooth over but which people will not ignore. The million who swarmed into San Irnncisco; the quarter million who swarmed into Seattle; the tens of thousands who are swelling Auckland's welcome, and the hundreds of thousands who will join (he multitudes of Melbourne and Sydney—are at one. The hnglish-speiiking iStatos of the Pacific are to stay European, and not Asiatic. 'Whether Japan likes it or not; however China dissent; whatever CocliinChina, or Hindustan, or any other pan ot Asia, may attempt; the White Man's lands are for the White Man, and for none other. Upon this we are not divided by polities! lines, nor divorced by revolutions. \\ v welcome the American l'leefc with more tlian warmth, because we all realise that the English-speaki.i" peoples of the Pacific are moving simultaneously and spontaneously in a tacit understanding which Governments cannot but acknowledge -and recognise* ami that to-day the American Flee" not less than the British Kavy, stands' for the racial integrity of every EiHis 1speaking State in the Pacific.

States. Of modem battleships Grout lSiilnm l,„s 41 lls coinp,i led with n total „ f ,T imi * tlie United Statts. it will thus lie seen tliat at the present time Britain is just over the t«o-J ower standard" necessary for hi'r naval supremacy, but the editor points wit that, after I'JIO Britain's position VII rapidly deteriorate unless more ticrsnijis are laiii down, the full Strength of lighting vessels ut nil descriptions (built and buildinej, comprising the navies of the three 1 ovum's, is ua follows: Great Britain .. , j;;-, I'liited States .. , (jj Germany .. , t

AUUIIIAL yt'ifiUlty DESCIUBED. j w,t 1110 Mawk,! '» Bay Herald ■lib rlv Admiral Sperry; lie j 3 UJ , U(lul) man, wjth spectacles, hair' 'inning out at the top, *„<j B aort giey moustache. 1 believe lie is a inn theniatician and a master ot tactics, lint, whatever elsu he may be, lie cerIJiiuly is a humorist. U e u«es the past participle- "gotten," and tlliere is a merry twinkle in his uyc as lie breaks into the. conversation with a quaintly turned phrase, i'cs, he said, the welcome he had gotten that morning was remarkably enthusiastic. 'liiie people swilled very bright and cheerful, and \vJiafc crowds there were, "How many million people have you here?" he asked, abruptly. laughed, and begged to be excused from mm-sw-aring the question The Admiral said they had Jiad a very pleasant cruise, and that we •would iind his men a sober, steady lot Qnucli keener to get their faces beliind a good camera than the neck of a' 'bottle. They were, lie said, mostly young fellows from the region of tlhe -Mississippi, who lmd been through the •public schools. They were a better class than the ordinary sailor. The latter, said Admiral Sperry, had done good work in his day, "but 3ie couldn't run ■this show. We want men with more 'brains and nerve." For the rest ho said lie was glad to see New Zealand again. He had been in Wellington forty years ago, at the time of the Maori war, and he remembered .Sir George Grey as Governor.

TESTING THE FLEET. INTERESTING^XPEIiIMEXTS. RECOIU) IX LOXUUi.VIAXIE STEAMING. ■When it is declared on the authority of thy American oilic»rs that Uiis is the first time an American ileet bait ventured into thj wide ocean relyin" npou its own resources to keep up it's personal and mechanical etlicieiicy, inc important attached to the tour in the naval world can be realised. Eying in the calm waters ol tile Waitemata-are sixteen ships to all outward appearance are well equipped and in «s effective fighting trim a-s the Powerful, which slipped across i'ro Jn her base only fifteen . hundred miles away. There aiv, of course, signs of a long cruise, but the American engineers declare tJie ships are now in siuiply magnificent trim. It has been, they say, me nest thing in the world to gut fcheiu away, from the naval yards, for the staif has had to rely i.poii its own ingenuity to put tilings rigilit. They have taken every "kick" o"t of their vaginas, and the tost has not been I'ound wanting.| '•Ion see,'' explained one o: Wiem frankly, "they were nursed up a deal too, much by' tlie shipyards. To keep the men employed at the various naval yards wo ran in for the smallest repair. A rivet sprung, and away we went to the yard. Tlhe trip has been simply marvellous from the mechanical standpoint. If the fleet continues its round to tiiie cast coast it will be in much better shape than when it left Hampton Koads The ships are burning less coal than at any time oil the trip, and we have made a world's record for steaming power of .battleships," Last year the rule was made that the fleet must be kept intact instead of being broken up every ime something went wrong with a unit. Once a year the ships go into the yards for * six) weeks, and this is all they are expected to do, unless something very serious happens. I

KKAIAIUUBLIi fci'KAillNG I'OWKR. from Honolulu to Auckland is 3380 miles, and the fleet took seventeen days. On litteen days it went through ■ battle exercise for four hours, conducting tiic most complicated manoeuvres. TiiKiiig the average speed at which 'these manoeuvres were conducted, and tile time occupied in cruising oil' tile colirsu, the total log comes to 4000 miles per slliip. let of the big vessels of the ileet, tlie battleship Georgia, ran into Auckland witji coal enough to take her another IDSU miles. So wide a range of action has never been demonstrated before, und I such a quality is invaluable on the i'aeiliic, an ocean of big distances, where, in .tiie opinion o£ most people tlie navies of the future will iind themselves put to the test. The Georgia proved that she oould run from New York to Liverpool and back without coaling.—Times. FLEET JOTTINGS. A curious l'aet is that the sailors; who are Ainencttnts by birth mostly come from the inland States only a very small proportion having been drawn from the States that have a sea frontage. "Half of our men are good riders,' said an officer of one of the battleships on Tuesday. "They hire norses when they get a chance and ride the tails off t>hcm. The bluejackets in your navy don't know much about horses, but we can mata 0U( BMB UtO mounted cavalry if necessary. vVe did that one time and they just did all

right." Tlio Americans haul not demonstrated their riding capabilities in Auckland, but on 'Tuesday a number of

them got possession of two Jorge motor tuft and did wild tilings, | Tlie Americans have not painted Auckland a particularly bright rod, but they are having a pretty rowdy time, and the fact that tliore havo boon no disturbances is due largely to the efficacy ■ of patrols that are landed to assist the police. The procession of inebriated bluejackets back to the landing stages commences about an hour after a party has landed on leave, and some of the men are very drunk indeed.

The British bluejackets, in spite of ['expectations to the contrary, do not I room to fraternise with the Americans to unv great extent. Men from the two fleets are seldom seen together. On Tuesday night some bluejackets from one of the British cruisers tried to enter an hotel bar occupied by American sealiven. The police had .to interfere and close the bar on account of- the disturbances that resulted, There is a little danger in the fact that some of the Americans apart from the patrols carry revolvers