Hawaii Holomua, Volume I, Number 12, 30 September 1893 Edition 02 — The "Admiral Nachimoff." [ARTICLE]

The "Admiral Nachimoff."

Although we are not very near neighbors, or perhaps, for that very reason, Russia is sedulously cultivating our friendship. Her recent part in the Naval Review was not a mean one, yet she now adds to her representatives here

her finest armored cruisers. It was a happy circumstance that brought the Admiral Nachimoff to anchor on our nation’s birthday. She arrived about dawn, and her courteous commander, fearing to disturb the city s slumbers, reserved the thunder of his guns till eight o'clock, when the stars and stripes were run up to the main peak and the salute of twenty one guns was fired. The Nachimoff ranks with the Blake and the New York. though more heavily armored than either. She mounts eight 8-inch, 13 ton, breech-loading rifles; ten 6-inch, 6 ton, breech-loading rifles, four 3-pound rapid fire guns, six machine guns, and four light weight guns. She also has four torpedo tubes. She mounts two big turrets, one forward and one aft, each shielding two of the 8 inch guns, and she has eight armored barbettes. In addition to this, her sides are protected by a two-inch composite armor belt. All the guns and turrets are moved by electric power, the Nachimoff being the first warship to be thus equipped. The cruiser was launched in 1885. She is 330 feet long, 61 feet beam, and of 7,782 tons displacement. Her engines are of 8,000 indicated horse power. Her deck is protected by three inch steel plating. She is propelled by twin screws and has a recorded speed of 16 1/2 knots. She lies low in the water and is painted black. She has two squarerigged masts and a single white smokestack. In Russia, the Nachimoff is called an armored cruiser, but in our navy she would rank as a second-class battleship. The New York is more like her than any ship in our navy, but is much faster, making about five knots more per hour. The New York is also fifty feet longer than the Russian ship and has two military masts. The Nachimoff has more heavy guns. Tho crew of the Nachimoff numbers 600 men, including a dozen or two officers and one passenger, a Russian artist, Leonide Blinoff, who was commissioned by the Czar to paint a picture of the Naval Review. The ship has been on her way here since May 8, when she sailed from Croustadt, touching at Portland, England, on June 22, the day of the loss of the Victoria, the news of which met the Russians on their arrival here, as did also that of the loss of the Vladivostock, a ship very like the Rhynda. The officers of the Nachimoff are profited by their visit to New York by seeing all the beauties of the Hudson and the neighboring country.—The Ill. American.