FOR WARSHIPS, £140,000,000.

Dunstan Times, Issue 2584, 15 May 1911, Page 8

FOR WARSHIPS, £140,000,000.

According to the returns compiled by Llovd’s Register of Shipping, the total number of worships now being built in the United Kingdom for the British Government is 59, the gate displacement being 280,665 tons. At the Government dockyards six warships are under construction for the Government (one battleship, one armored cruier, two third-class cruisers, and two submarines), with a total displacement of 56,880 tons. At private yards there are five battleships, three mored cruiser, two third-class cruisers, cruisers, 36 torpedo boat destroyers and five submarines under construction, with 223,785 tons total displacement. Statistics from another source show that the total number of battleships and armored cruisers now being built by the nations of the world is 70, with a tonnage of about 1,500,000, representing £140,000,000. This is exclusive of small craft. Germany is building 153,000 tons and fitting out 125,000 tons; the United States is building' 80,000 teim and fitting out 70,000 tons, and France is building 46,000 tons and fitting out 110.000 tons. The naval correspondent of the London Daily News has compiled a comparative table of battleships launched and completed by the Powers in 1910. Armored ships completed for service are taken first. Great Britain during the year got ready five armored ships. These wore the three battleships provided for in the 1907-08 estimates (St. Vincent, Colling wood and Vanguard), which have been passed into commission : the Neptune, which was commissioned for service to-day, and the armored cruiser Indefatigable, which has passed her trials but which will not be coinmissioned for a time. Against this total of five ships Germany can show three and Posen, battleships, and Von dor Tann, armored cruiser); France, none; United States, none; Japan, one (Satsurna, battleship); Italy, one (San Marco, armored cruiser): Brazil, two (Minas Geraes and Sao Paulo, battleships), and Austria, one (Erzherzog Franz Ferdinand, battleship). Groat Britain also took first place as regards the launching of ships. In the spring there were launched the Hercules and Colossus, battleships of 22,350 tons, each armed with ten Piinch guns: August saw the launch of the record-breaking Orion, displacing 22,680 tons and armed with ten of the new 13:5 guns; and also of the battle cruiser Lion, which is to displace 26,360 tons, to steam twenty-eight knots and to carry eight of these same powerful weapons. Germany launched two ships (Oldenburg, battleship, and Moltke, armored cruiser); France, the battleship Vergniaud, and the United States the battleship Florida. Japan, Austria and Greece also launched one armored ship (Kawaehi, Zrinyi and Giorgio Averoff respectively) ; no others were launched during the year. Lastly, as to ships laid down Great Britain* claims six— the battleships Thunderer, Conqueror, and Monarch and the armored cruisers Princess Royal, Australia and New Zealand. Germany has laid down four (Ersatz Aegir, Ersatz Hagen and Ersatz Odin, battleships, and the armored cruiser J). Two ships have been commenced for the United States (Wyoming and Arkansas, battleships), and two lor France (Joan Bart and Courbet, battleships). . , . , . . . The following is a brief statement of the Dreadnoughts now actually under construction or ordered for the leading Powers; — Ordered or on the Launched. Stocks. Total. Great Britain ... 4 11 15 Germany ... 5 1 United States ... 2 4 6 France ... 0 2 2 Japan ... 22 4 These are in addition to completed Dreadnoughts, of which Great Britain has twelve, Germany five, the I mted States four, France nil, and Japan one, , .. The super-Dreadnought Neptune, which was commissioned at Portsmouth, is the biggest battleship afloat in European waters. She was laid down at Portsmouth on January 19, 1909, and was launched on September 30 1909. She lias thus been completed for service in a week undet two years. In general details the Neptune is similar to Britain s cailiei Dreadnought battleships,' but her design embodies an important modification in respect of the disposition of the main armament. All British Dreadnoughts so far completed have ten 12-inch guns, and this is also the case with the Neptune; but whereas none of the earlier ships can fire more than eight guns on the broadside the Neptune can train all her big guns on either beam. She has three gun turrets on the centre line, one loiwaid and two aft; and the turrets on the beam are arranged diagonally, so that Miey can life on either broadside. Ascaiii the aftermost turret is on a lower level than that immediately behind it, so that the latter can fire over the former. The principal dimensions of the Neptune are; Length, 510 feet; beam. 85 feet; draught, 27 feet, weight of hull, 12,450 tons displacement, 19,900 tons; turbines, 20.000 horse-powpr / cost of armament, £140,500; total cost, excluding stores, £1,730,000. In addition to ten 12-inch guns ot the new 50-calihrc pattern, weighing 6o tons 17 hundred weight, and each filing a shell of 850 pounds, capable (at nuzzle range) of passing clean through a. steel plate 40 inches thick, the Neptune is furnished with sixteen 4-incli quick-tiruig guns for repelling torpedo attack, and with three 21-inch torpedo tubes which discharge automobile weapons that can travel 7000 yards under water, . .

It. has been reported that the British Admiralty was about to construct a motor Dreadnought. The only foundation for this report is the fact that the Admiralty has decided to experiment' with oil engines fitted to an obsolescent cruiser. It. is contrary to Admiralty practice, it is pointed out, to put into a first-class battleship engines of a type which have not been tested previously and found satisfactory in smaller vessels. Great Britain is about to introduce into her navy a new typo of despatch vessel capable of steaming between H8 and 10 knots an hour. Several of them will be laid down at an early date.

M. Spiridonoff, a wealthy Moscow merchant, who is about to celebrate his golden wedding, has sent out invitations engraved on thin sheets of gild, wort/i JL‘6 each, instead of the usual cards.