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1904] MARINE REVIEW 51 FROM THE NEWPORT NEWS WORKS. Newport News, Va., Jan. 20.--The new protected cruiser Charleston will be launched at the yard of the Newport News: Ship Building & Dry Dock Co. Saturday and will be christened by the daughter of Mayor Rhett of the city after which the cruiser was named. Considerable interest is manifested in the event here and it is stated that-a large delegation from Charleston will come to witness the launching. The South and North Carolina delegations in Washington and the national capital colonies from both states will be largely represented in the launching party. A delegation of naval officers will come from Washington and another from the navy yard across Hampton Roads. This will be the first launch- ing of the year and will be followed some time in March by that of the monster battleship Virginia. The Virginia launching will probably be witnessed by the largest crowd that has ever assembled at a similar event in this country. Previous launchings here have been witnessed by as many as 30,000 on one occasion and 35,000 people on another, but both will be eclipsed by the Virginia crowd. It is confidently expected that there will be fully 50,000 people in the ship yard when the battleship named after this state is put gee Excursions will be run here from every section of the state. : The Charleston is relied upon as a guaranty that the possessor knew and could per- form his work, but in those days men made long voyages and were paid off in the home port after completing a period of service often extending over two or three years. Today the practice is changed and the sailor, in the majority of cases, makes passages between ports only. He is either discharged or deserts, becomes stranded in some seaport, and is at the mercy of the crimp and the board- ing-house keeper, who handles him as so much personal property. Consequent upon these conditions there is a continual interchange of discharges. The seaman who has been discharged for incom+ petency, or has deserted and has been ashore for some time, be- comes a drug on some boarding-house master's hand. To secure him a vessel, a discharge is procured from a seaman with good credentials, recently paid off, and the incompetent man then goes to sea with a document indicating that he possesses all the neces- sary qualifications. When seamen are in demand there is nothing to prevent a shore man from being substituted for a competent sailor, as these men are frequently put on board at the moment of sailing. It is manifest that the ship master has no opportunity of testing their ability until it is too late to make an exchange. Ship masters have one of three protected cruisers now building for the government, the others being the St. Louis and the Mil- waukee. The principal dimensions are: Length: on load water line, 424 ft; ex- treme breadth, 66 ft.; trial displacement, 9,- 700 fOnSs 2 mean draught at normal displacement, 23 ft. 6 in.; indicated horse power, 21,000; speed, 22 knots; normal coal supply, 550 tons; coal bunker capacity, 1,500 tons. The armament will consist of four- teen 6-in. rapid-fire guns;. eighteen 14- pounder rapid-fire guns; twelve 3- pounder rapid-fire guns;. four 1-pounder automatic guns; eight I-pounder rapid-fire guns; two 3-in. rapid- fire field guns; two 30-caliber machine guns and eight auto- matic 30-caliber guns. Detaiis of armor pro- THE D. G. KERR, A LAKE FREIGHTER, AT MODERN ORE UNLOADING PLANT. In this picture one of the largest freighters of the lakes is shown at an iron ore unloading dock with modern hoisting and convey- tection are as follows: ing machinery for the operation of grab buckets hanging over her. The steamer Kerr and her sister ships, J. H. Reed, D. M, Clemson Main side armor, 4 and nee H: Hoyt, broke several of the cargo records on the lakes in the season of 1903. The Reed leads all the grain carriers with 271,0 0 bu.. (8,180 tons) of wheat to her credit. The Clemson is next in the grain trade, having moved in one cargo 336,365 bu. (8,073 tons) ee lower casemate of barlev. The Kerr Jeads the soft coal carriers with 7,685 tons. The largest cargo of iron ore, 8,807 gross or 9,864 net tons, was moved armor, 4 1n.; Upper by the steamer Wm. Edenborn of the Steel Corporation fleet. casemate armor, 4 in.; 6-in. gun protection, : oo 4 in.; conning tower and shield, 5 in.; signal tower, 4 in.; splinter bulkheads, 2 in.; protective' deck, 2% inches. Twin-screw en- gines will be installed and there will be sixteen water-tubular boilers located in four watertight compartments. There will be four smokestacks towering 76 ft. 6 in. above the normal load water line. Accommodations will be provided for thirty-nine of- ficers and a crew of 525 men. : Local shipping men are elated over the excellent showing made by Newport News in the coastwise coal shipments for the eleven months ending with November. This port was third on the list and ranked just ahead of Baltimore. Newport News shipped 1,610,541 tons of coal coastwise and Baltimore shipped 1,603,457 tons. INCOMPETENT SEAMEN. (From United States Consul Goding, Newcastle, New South Wales.) One of the most important factors in the successful manage- ment of ships at sea is a crew of incompetent men. If the master is a reasonable man, supported by well-drilled and competent off- cers, together with a crew of well-trained seamen, a good vessel can weather almost any storm. At the present time ship owners find great difficulty, in many instances, in obtaining the services of each and all of these men who are qualified for their duties, although many are found in possession of good discharges. This is due, in a great degree, to ship masters, who frequently give able seamen's discharges to men who have spent but a brief period at sea. Frequently vessels reach this port the entire crew of which had never before seen salt water. They include laborers, doctors, lawyers, parsons, clerks, farmers, and coal miners. It is a fact that many men are shipped in foreign-going sailing ves- sels whose sea-going experience is of the most limited descrip- tion. In years gone™by_a long period of service was essential to gaining an able seaman's discharge, and such a document could be (Cut by courtesy of Acme White Lead and Color Works, Detrott.) : -informed me that they frequently find it difficult to secure three men out of the crew who could be trusted with the wheel in bad weather or to perform other duties pertaining to able seamanship, To this condition of affairs disaster, loss of property, and some- times loss of life can be traced. It matters not how staunch a ves- sel may be, or how well officered, there are times when an incom- petent crew may bring about her destruction. By long experience it has been found wise to employ competent sailors as petty offi- cers, but too often a preference is shown for a class of men whose chief qualification is a capacity to handle cargo and drive sailors, The prime cause of this condition of affairs is partly due to un- principled boarding-house masters, who supply crews to vessels, and partly to masters who give an able seaman's discharge to incompetent men--many times to get rid of them. This last cannot be too strongly condemned, as it is both unfair to brother shipmas- ters and to the public; the first should be inquired into by the au- thorities, _ Speaking for the ship owners, Alfred Windsor, president of the Boston Steamship and the Boston Towboat companies, said re- cently that subsidies granted to foreign vessels had driven them off the Atlantic ocean and they had transferred their ships to the Pacific, only to find that there they must compete with Japanese and English subsidies. He did not mind losing money for a year or two, he said, to build up a business, but the situation had now come to such a point that the American ships would either have to go out of commission or be transferred to foreign flags. "I'm through with it," he said. Blast furnaces, steel works and rolling mills use great quanti- ties of fire brick, fire clay, cement, etc., and this trade is looked after on a large scale by J. J. Shepard of Cleveland. The name Shepard has been familiar in this business line for néarly forty years. Large stocks, insuring prompt shipment, are carried by this Cleveland house.