1.
Casemate Publishers
–
Casemate Publishers, also known as Casemate, is a Philadelphia area based publishing company that specializes in producing printed military history books. They have published over 200 books on military history, many of their books are memoirs and historical overviews of specific military events. Casemate Publishers was established in 2001, when Combined Publishing‘s US operations were sold to Perseus Books Group, Casemate began distributing books in North America for publishers, specializing in military history. The company also began to publish its own military history books, as a result, Casemate UK became responsible for the sales, marketing and distribution of a number of military history and art book publishers. Oxbow was founded and is based in Oxford, UK in 1983. On January 1,2015 Casemate acquired IPM, International Publishers Marketing, from Books International and merged its Athena brand into a new division, with the acquisition of Oxbow Books, Casemate also acquired Oxbows North American distribution arm, The David Brown Company which was founded in 1991. In 2013 The David Brown Book Company was rebranded as Casemate Academic, Casemate Academic provides specialist sales, marketing and distribution to leading institutions and publishers from around the world in the US market. Casemate also has a specialist brand for selling and marketing art books, Casemate website Casemate UK website Casemate IPM website Casemate Art website Oxbow Books website Casemate Academic website
Casemate Publishers
–
Casemate Publishers and Book Distributors LLC
Casemate Publishers
2.
Walls of Dubrovnik
–
In 1979, the old city of Dubrovnik, which includes a substantial portion of the old walls of Dubrovnik, joined the UNESCO list of World Heritage Sites. The oldest systems of fortifications around the town were likely wooden palisades, todays intact city walls, constructed mainly during the 12th–17th centuries, mostly a double line, have long been a source of pride for Dubrovnik. The walls run a course of approximately 1,940 metres in length, encircling most of the old city. The bulk of the walls and fortifications were constructed during the 14th and 15th centuries. The walls were reinforced by three circular and 14 quadrangular towers, five bastions, two angular fortifications and the large St. Johns Fortress. Land walls were reinforced by one larger bastion and nine smaller semicircular ones, like the casemate Fort Bokar. The moat that ran around the section of the city walls. The construction of the first limestone forts around the city began in the Early Middle Ages, but, the old chronicles say that some sort of castle reliably existed on the Lave peninsula quite a long time prior to that. It is certain that the town on Laus Island was also surrounded by defensive walls. The fact that Dubrovnik managed to survive a fifteen-month-long invasion by the Saracens in the 9th century proves how well the city was fortified. The city first spread towards the eastern part of the islet. The name Pustijerna comes from the Latin statement post terra, which means outside the town, in the 9th and 10th centuries, the defensive wall enclosed the eastern portion of the city. During this same period, Dubrovnik and the surrounding area were described as a part of the Croatian entity. In his book Nuzhat al-Mushataq fi ikhtiraq al-afaq from 1154, he mentioned Dubrovnik as the southernmost city of the country of Croatia and Dalmatia, the basic city plan dates from 1292, when the port was rebuilt following a fire. The whole city was enclosed in the 13th century, except for the Dominican monastery. Being constructed very solidly, the walls were generally unaffected by an earthquake occurring in 1667. The city was also under latent danger of attack by the Venetians, for centuries the people of Dubrovnik were able to preserve their city-republic by skillful maneuvering between East and West. A strategic treaty with Turkey protracted Ragusa’s liberty and maintained the opportunity for a major trading role between the Ottoman Empire and Europe, the irregular parallelogram surrounding Dubrovnik consists of four strong fortresses at its most significant points
Walls of Dubrovnik
–
Walls of Dubrovnik with sight on Minčeta Tower
Walls of Dubrovnik
–
The present shape of the walls was defined in the 14th century.
Walls of Dubrovnik
–
Land Walls protected with an additional range of slanted supporting walls, as defense against artillery fire.
3.
Croatia
–
Croatia, officially the Republic of Croatia, is a sovereign state between Central Europe, Southeast Europe, and the Mediterranean. Its capital city is Zagreb, which one of the countrys primary subdivisions. Croatia covers 56,594 square kilometres and has diverse, mostly continental, Croatias Adriatic Sea coast contains more than a thousand islands. The countrys population is 4.28 million, most of whom are Croats, the Croats arrived in the area of present-day Croatia during the early part of the 7th century AD. They organised the state into two duchies by the 9th century, tomislav became the first king by 925, elevating Croatia to the status of a kingdom. The Kingdom of Croatia retained its sovereignty for nearly two centuries, reaching its peak during the rule of Kings Petar Krešimir IV and Dmitar Zvonimir, Croatia entered a personal union with Hungary in 1102. In 1527, faced with Ottoman conquest, the Croatian Parliament elected Ferdinand I of the House of Habsburg to the Croatian throne. In 1918, after World War I, Croatia was included in the unrecognized State of Slovenes, Croats and Serbs which seceded from Austria-Hungary, a fascist Croatian puppet state backed by Fascist Italy and Nazi Germany existed during World War II. After the war, Croatia became a member and a federal constituent of the Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia. On 25 June 1991 Croatia declared independence, which came wholly into effect on 8 October of the same year, the Croatian War of Independence was fought successfully during the four years following the declaration. A unitary state, Croatia is a republic governed under a parliamentary system, the International Monetary Fund classified Croatia as an emerging and developing economy, and the World Bank identified it as a high-income economy. Croatia is a member of the European Union, United Nations, the Council of Europe, NATO, the World Trade Organization, the service sector dominates Croatias economy, followed by the industrial sector and agriculture. Tourism is a significant source of revenue during the summer, with Croatia ranked the 18th most popular tourist destination in the world, the state controls a part of the economy, with substantial government expenditure. The European Union is Croatias most important trading partner, since 2000, the Croatian government constantly invests in infrastructure, especially transport routes and facilities along the Pan-European corridors. Internal sources produce a significant portion of energy in Croatia, the rest is imported, the origin of the name is uncertain, but is thought to be a Gothic or Indo-Aryan term assigned to a Slavic tribe. The oldest preserved record of the Croatian ethnonym *xъrvatъ is of variable stem, the first attestation of the Latin term is attributed to a charter of Duke Trpimir from the year 852. The original is lost, and just a 1568 copy is preserved—leading to doubts over the authenticity of the claim, the oldest preserved stone inscription is the 9th-century Branimir Inscription, where Duke Branimir is styled as Dux Cruatorvm. The inscription is not believed to be dated accurately, but is likely to be from during the period of 879–892, the area known as Croatia today was inhabited throughout the prehistoric period
Croatia
–
Branimir Inscription
Croatia
–
Flag
Croatia
–
Tanais Tablet B, name Khoroáthos highlighted
Croatia
–
The
walls of Dubrovnik helped to defend the city since
Middle Ages until the
1991–1992 siege.
4.
Kornwerderzand
–
Kornwerderzand is a settlement on the Afsluitdijk, a major dam in the Netherlands that links Friesland with North Holland. Kornwerderzand is located approximately 4 kilometers from the coast of Friesland, the settlement has a population of 22. It is part of the municipality of Wonseradeel, a second complex of sluices and locks is located at the other side of the Afsluitdijk, near Den Oever. The Afsluitdijk provides a link between the provinces of Friesland and North Holland. From 1931 onwards, fortifications consisting of seventeen casemates and three bunkers were constructed, the position was manned with approximately 220 troops in 1939. During the German invasion of the Netherlands in World War II, on May 13 and May 14,1940, the fortifications were attacked by the German first Cavalry Division, while the Luftwaffe attacked supporting Dutch naval units. The German troops, initially lacking support by artillery, were unable to take the position. The fortifications also withstood attacks by dive bombers, the next day the Dutch military in the Netherlands surrendered, and the battle ended with the surrender of the position. In 1943, the occupying German military improved the defenses by building three additional bunkers, nowadays, some of the fortifications can be visited as part of the Kazemattenmuseum. Breezanddijk Kazemattenmuseum - The museum located in the fortifications Pictures of the fortifications
Kornwerderzand
–
Kornwerderzand
5.
Afsluitdijk
–
It is a fundamental part of the larger Zuiderzee Works, damming off the Zuiderzee, a salt water inlet of the North Sea, and turning it into the fresh water lake of the IJsselmeer. The Afsluitdijk was the demonstration site for a 130 kilometres per hour speed limit in the Netherlands. Work started at four points, on sides of the mainland and on two specially made construction-islands along the line of the future dike. From these points, the dike slowly grew by ships depositing till into the sea until it breached the surface. The nascent dike was then strengthened from land by basalt rocks, the dike could then be finished off by raising it further with sand and finally clay for the surface of the dike, on which grass was planted. Construction progressed better than expected, at three points along the line of the dike there were deeper underwater trenches where the current was much stronger than elsewhere. These had been considered to be obstacles to completing the dike. On 28 May 1932, two earlier than initially thought, the Zuiderzee ceased to be, as the last tidal trench. The IJsselmeer was born, even though it was still salty at the time, the dike itself however was not finished yet as it still needed to be brought up to its required height and a road linking Friesland and North Holland also remained to be built. On 25 September 1933, the Afsluitdijk was officially opened, with a monument designed by architect Dudok marking the spot where the dike had been closed, the amount of material used is estimated at 23 million m3 of sand and 13. Beside the dike itself, there was also the construction of two complexes of shipping locks and discharge sluices at both ends of the dike. It is necessary to discharge water from the lake since it is continually fed by rivers and streams. In 2012, the State Secretary for Infrastructure and the Environment, Joop Atsma, a naviduct would have a high construction cost compared with standard locks and bridges, but would benefit the economy by reducing delays. After the cost–benefit analysis of all potential solutions was considered, a decision was made to strengthen the existing locks, however, it is quite possible that a naviduct will be built to replace the locks when they reach the end of their useful life in 2050. Provision for a line linking North Holland and Friesland had been included on the Afsluitdijk, in the form of a linear reservation. However, construction of the line was never undertaken by Dutch Railways, for reasons of cost, the reservation and abutments for the rail line were utilized instead for a second carriageway for the dikes two-lane highway in the 1970s, transforming the latter into todays four-lane A7 motorway. During the period 12–13 May 1940 it was the site of the Battle of the Afsluitdijk, icoon Afsluitdijk was a 2016 visual design project by Daan Roosegaarde and staff to enhance the Afsluitdijk with a variety of permanent and temporary features. The temporary features included energy-harvesting kites and a display of bioluminescent algae, the permanent features include Spiegelstenen—mirror stones—that memorialize workers on the original dyke and Gates of light—a highly reflective guard rail
Afsluitdijk
–
Afsluitdijk with the
Wadden Sea (a part of the North Sea) on the left and the
IJsselmeer on the right
6.
Battle of the Afsluitdijk
–
The Battle of the Afsluitdijk was an unsuccessful attempt by the German Army to seize the Afsluitdijk in May 1940, during World War II. If the Germans had taken the dam, they could have taken North Holland from its north, the Dutch troops were led by Captain Christiaan Boers and the Germans by General Kurt Feldt. Germany invaded the Netherlands on 10 May 1940 as part of plan Fall Gelb and they rapidly crossed two thin defence lines, the O-line and the Q-line, which the Dutch had built to defend their three northern provinces. The German 1st Cavalry Division—later reformed to the 24, panzerdivision—had taken the last Dutch defences in front of the Afsluitdijk on 12 May and was prepared for an assault to take the two lines of pillboxes or casemates of Fort Kornwerderzand. The eastern line was for defence eastward, while the line was just behind the first for threats from the rear. Altogether,17 casemates had been built and they were designed to withstand 210 mm rounds, and 280 mm rounds. The three main casemates were made of 3 m of reinforced concrete, the casemates sheltered 230 men, twenty-one 7.9 mm Schwarzlose machine guns, three 50 mm guns and a 50 mm shore-based naval gun. There were similar defences at the end of the dyke. Earlier in May 1940, two infantry men in all—were sent to the end of the dyke to prevent German landings beyond the vision of both fortresses. The Germans soon found out about these units, and seven Luftwaffe fighters strafed Dutch positions, one soldier and two civilians were killed, and 10 civilians wounded. After this, they were recalled to Kornwerderzand, until 12 May, the Germans had not tried to take Fort Kornwerderzand. However, that evening, three soldiers were sent to see if the fort had been abandoned and they were pinned down by machine gun fire. Two were killed, while the third escaped, the Germans decided to take the fortress. They planned to launch Luftwaffe strikes, then begin an artillery bombardment by howitzers. However, unknown to the Germans, three 20 mm anti-aircraft cannons and four heavy machine guns had arrived overnight at Kornwerderzand. The next day, pilots who had previously flown unchallenged were under fire, the Germans sent 62 planes to bomb the fort. The planes dropped five waves of bombs, four planes were shot down and crashed into the sea. The bombardment was followed by an hour of bombardment from the howitzers
Battle of the Afsluitdijk
–
Fort Kornwerderzand
Battle of the Afsluitdijk
–
One of the Dutch 20 mm (0.79 in)
anti-aircraft cannons.
7.
Ibrahim Pasha of Egypt
–
Ibrahim Pasha was the eldest son of Muhammad Ali, the Wāli and unrecognised Khedive of Egypt and Sudan. He served as a general in the Egyptian army that his father established during his reign, in the final year of his life, he succeeded his still living father as ruler of Egypt and Sudan, due to the latters ill health. His rule also extended over the dominions that his father had brought under Egyptian rule, namely Syria, Hejaz, Morea, Thasos. Ibrahim pre-deceased his father, dying 10 November 1848, only four months after acceding to the throne, upon his fathers death the following year, the Egyptian throne passed to Ibrahims nephew, Abbas. Ibrahim remains one of the most celebrated members of the Muhammad Ali dynasty, particularly for his military victories. Today, a statue of Ibrahim occupies a prominent position in Egypts capital and his Mother Emine of Nusretli was the Cousin to Muhammad Ali Pasha, born at Nusretli in 1770 and died in Cairo 1824. She was the widow of Ottoman Turk Ali Bey Serezli, and it is further known that he was born in the village of Nusratli, near the town of Drama, the Ottoman province of Rumelia, in what is now the western parts of Macedonian region in Greece. In 1805, during his fathers struggle to establish himself as ruler of Egypt, when Muhammad Ali went to Arabia to prosecute the war against the Ibn Saud in 1813, Ibrahim was left in command of Upper Egypt. He continued the war with the power of the Mameluks. In 1816, he succeeded his brother Tusun Pasha in command of the Egyptian forces in Arabia, the campaign lasted two years, and ended in the destruction of the House of Saud as a political power. Muhammad Ali landed at Yanbu, the port of Medina, on 1813, the holy cities had been recovered from the Saudis, and Ibrahims task was to follow them into the desert of Nejd and destroy their fortresses. Such training as the Egyptian troops had received, and their artillery, but the difficulty of crossing the desert to the Saudis stronghold of Diriyah, some 400 miles east of Medina made the conquest a very arduous one. Ibrahim displayed great energy and tenacity, sharing all the hardships of his army, by the end of September 1818, he had forced the Saudi leader to surrender, and had taken Diriyah, which he sacked. On December 11,1819 he made an entry into Cairo. After his return Ibrahim gave effective support to the Frenchman, Colonel Sève, Ibrahim set an example by submitting to be drilled as a recruit. In 1824, Muhammad Ali was appointed governor of the Morea by Ottoman Sultan Mahmud II, Ibrahim was sent to the Peloponnese with a squadron and an army of 17,000 men. The expedition sailed on July 4,1824, but was for some months unable to do more than come, the fear of the Greek fire ships stopped his way to the Morea. When the Greek sailors mutinied from want of pay, Ibrahim was able to land at Modon on February 26,1825 and he remained in the Morea until the capitulation of October 1,1828 was forced on him by the intervention of the Western powers
Ibrahim Pasha of Egypt
–
Wāli of
Egypt,
Sudan,
Palestine,
Syria,
Hejaz,
Morea,
Thasos,
Crete
Ibrahim Pasha of Egypt
–
Ibrahim Pasha attacks
Missolonghi in the year 1826, (by Giuseppe Pietro Mazzola).
Ibrahim Pasha of Egypt
–
Ibrahim Pasha, with father
Muhammad Ali Pasha and Colonel Sève (
Suleiman Pasha, right).
8.
Ottomans
–
After 1354, the Ottomans crossed into Europe, and with the conquest of the Balkans the Ottoman Beylik was transformed into a transcontinental empire. The Ottomans ended the Byzantine Empire with the 1453 conquest of Constantinople by Mehmed the Conqueror, at the beginning of the 17th century the empire contained 32 provinces and numerous vassal states. Some of these were later absorbed into the Ottoman Empire, while others were granted various types of autonomy during the course of centuries. With Constantinople as its capital and control of lands around the Mediterranean basin, while the empire was once thought to have entered a period of decline following the death of Suleiman the Magnificent, this view is no longer supported by the majority of academic historians. The empire continued to maintain a flexible and strong economy, society, however, during a long period of peace from 1740 to 1768, the Ottoman military system fell behind that of their European rivals, the Habsburg and Russian Empires. While the Empire was able to hold its own during the conflict, it was struggling with internal dissent. Starting before World War I, but growing increasingly common and violent during it, major atrocities were committed by the Ottoman government against the Armenians, Assyrians and Pontic Greeks. The word Ottoman is an anglicisation of the name of Osman I. Osmans name in turn was the Turkish form of the Arabic name ʿUthmān, in Ottoman Turkish, the empire was referred to as Devlet-i ʿAlīye-yi ʿOsmānīye, or alternatively ʿOsmānlı Devleti. In Modern Turkish, it is known as Osmanlı İmparatorluğu or Osmanlı Devleti, the Turkish word for Ottoman originally referred to the tribal followers of Osman in the fourteenth century, and subsequently came to be used to refer to the empires military-administrative elite. In contrast, the term Turk was used to refer to the Anatolian peasant and tribal population, the term Rūmī was also used to refer to Turkish-speakers by the other Muslim peoples of the empire and beyond. In Western Europe, the two names Ottoman Empire and Turkey were often used interchangeably, with Turkey being increasingly favored both in formal and informal situations and this dichotomy was officially ended in 1920–23, when the newly established Ankara-based Turkish government chose Turkey as the sole official name. Most scholarly historians avoid the terms Turkey, Turks, and Turkish when referring to the Ottomans, as the power of the Seljuk Sultanate of Rum declined in the 13th century, Anatolia was divided into a patchwork of independent Turkish principalities known as the Anatolian Beyliks. One of these beyliks, in the region of Bithynia on the frontier of the Byzantine Empire, was led by the Turkish tribal leader Osman, osmans early followers consisted both of Turkish tribal groups and Byzantine renegades, many but not all converts to Islam. Osman extended the control of his principality by conquering Byzantine towns along the Sakarya River and it is not well understood how the early Ottomans came to dominate their neighbours, due to the scarcity of the sources which survive from this period. One school of thought which was popular during the twentieth century argued that the Ottomans achieved success by rallying religious warriors to fight for them in the name of Islam, in the century after the death of Osman I, Ottoman rule began to extend over Anatolia and the Balkans. Osmans son, Orhan, captured the northwestern Anatolian city of Bursa in 1326 and this conquest meant the loss of Byzantine control over northwestern Anatolia. The important city of Thessaloniki was captured from the Venetians in 1387, the Ottoman victory at Kosovo in 1389 effectively marked the end of Serbian power in the region, paving the way for Ottoman expansion into Europe
Ottomans
–
Battle of Nicopolis in 1396. Painting from 1523.
Ottomans
–
Flag (1844–1923)
Ottomans
–
Battle of Mohács in 1526
Ottomans
–
Barbarossa Hayreddin Pasha defeats the
Holy League of
Charles V under the command of
Andrea Doria at the
Battle of Preveza in 1538.
9.
Fortress
–
Fortifications are military constructions or buildings designed for the defense of territories in warfare, and also used to solidify rule in a region during peace time. Humans have constructed defensive works for many thousands of years, in a variety of increasingly complex designs, the term is derived from the Latin fortis and facere. From very early history to modern times, walls have been a necessity for cities to survive in a changing world of invasion. Some settlements in the Indus Valley Civilization were the first small cities to be fortified, in ancient Greece, large stone walls had been built in Mycenaean Greece, such as the ancient site of Mycenae. A Greek Phrourion was a collection of buildings used as a military garrison. These construction mainly served the purpose of a tower, to guard certain roads, passes. Though smaller than a fortress, they acted as a border guard rather than a real strongpoint to watch. The art of setting out a camp or constructing a fortification traditionally has been called castramentation since the time of the Roman legions. Fortification is usually divided into two branches, permanent fortification and field fortification, there is also an intermediate branch known as semi-permanent fortification. Castles are fortifications which are regarded as being distinct from the fort or fortress in that they are a residence of a monarch or noble. Roman forts and hill forts were the antecedents of castles in Europe. The Early Middle Ages saw the creation of towns built around castles. Medieval-style fortifications were made obsolete by the arrival of cannons in the 14th century. Fortifications in the age of black powder evolved into much lower structures with greater use of ditches and earth ramparts that would absorb, Walls exposed to direct cannon fire were very vulnerable, so were sunk into ditches fronted by earth slopes. The arrival of explosive shells in the 19th century led to yet another stage in the evolution of fortification, steel-and-concrete fortifications were common during the 19th and early 20th centuries. However the advances in warfare since World War I have made large-scale fortifications obsolete in most situations. Demilitarized zones along borders are arguably another type of fortification, although a passive kind, many military installations are known as forts, although they are not always fortified. Larger forts may be called fortresses, smaller ones were known as fortalices
Fortress
–
Krak des Chevaliers is one of the best-preserved Crusader
castles.
Fortress
–
Bourtange star fort, restored to 1750 situation,
Groningen (province),
Netherlands.
Fortress
–
The well preserved
Bulgarian medieval fort
Baba Vida.
Fortress
–
Fortifications on the Iraq-Iran Border, viewed from the
ISS, 2014
10.
Armoured fighting vehicle
–
An armoured fighting vehicle is a combat vehicle, protected by strong armour and generally armed with weapons, which combines operational mobility, tactical offensive, and defensive capabilities. AFVs can be wheeled or tracked and it is not uncommon for AFVs to be simply referred to as armour. Armoured fighting vehicles are classified according to their role on the battlefield. This classification is not absolute, at different times different countries will classify the vehicle in different roles. For example, armoured carriers were generally replaced by infantry fighting vehicles in a similar role. Modern armoured fighting vehicles are the realization of an ancient concept, War machines with rudimentary armour have been used in battle for millennia. These designs historically struggled between the paradox of exposed-mobility, effective-firepower and cumbersome-protection, Siege engines, such as battering rams and trebuchets, would often be armoured in order to protect the crews from the defenders. Very large movable siege towers, helepolis were developed by Polyidus of Thessaly, the idea of a vehicle with a tortoise like cover has been known since antiquity. Frequently cited is Leonardo da Vincis 15th century sketch of a mobile, protected gun platform, the machine was to be mounted on four wheels which would be turned by the crew through a system of hand cranks and cage gears. Leonardo quoted I will build armored wagons which will be safe, there will be no obstacle which it cannot overcome. Modern replicas have demonstrated that the crew would have been able to move it over only short distances. The war wagon were medieval weapon-platforms developmed during the Hussite Wars around 1420 by Hussite forces rebelling in Bohemia. These heavy wagon were given protective sides with firing slits and heavy firepower from either a cannon or a force of hand-gunners and crossbowmen, supported by infantry using pikes, heavy arquebuses mounted on wagons were called arquebus à croc. These carried a ball of about 3.5 ounces, the first modern AFVs were armed cars, dating back virtually to the invention of the motor car. The Motor Scout was designed and built by British inventor F. R. Simms in 1898 and it was the first armed petrol engine powered vehicle ever built. The vehicle was a De Dion-Bouton quadricycle with a mounted Maxim machine gun on the front bar, an iron shield offered some protection for the driver from the front, but it lacked all-around protective armour. The armoured car was the first modern fully armoured fighting vehicle, the first of these was the Simms Motor War Car, designed by Simms and built by Vickers, Sons & Maxim in 1899. The vehicle had Vickers armour 6 mm thick and was powered by a four-cylinder 3. 3-litre 16 hp Cannstatt Daimler engine giving it a speed of around 9 miles per hour
Armoured fighting vehicle
–
A
M1128 Mobile Gun System firing its 105 mm cannon
Armoured fighting vehicle
–
An
MRAP Cougar HE in testing with land mines set off around it
Armoured fighting vehicle
–
Model of a vehicle sketched by
Leonardo da Vinci
Armoured fighting vehicle
–
Hittite chariot (drawing of an
Egyptian relief)
11.
Hut
–
A hut is a primitive dwelling, which may be constructed of various local materials. A hut is a shape of a lower quality than a house, huts exist in practically all nomadic cultures. Some huts are transportable and can stand most conditions of weather, the designs in tropical and sub-tropical areas favour high airflow configurations built from non-conducting materials, which allow heat dissipation. The term house or home is considered by some to be more appropriate, in the Western world the word hut is often used for a wooden shed. The term has also adopted by climbers and backpackers to refer to a more solid. These vary from simple bothies – which are more than very basic shelters – to mountain huts that are far more luxurious. Apparently first in English as a military word, old Saxon hutta, Danish hytte, Swedish hytta, Frisian and Middle Dutch hutte, Dutch hut are from High German. Huts are used by shepherds when moving livestock between seasonal grazing areas such as mountainous and lowland pastures and they are also commonly used by backpackers and other travelers in rural areas. Some displaced populations of people use throughout the world during a diaspora. For example, temporary collectors in the agricultural workers at plantations in the Amazon jungle. Huts have been built for other than as a dwelling such as storage, workshops. Balok – A Siberian wilderness hut made of logs, usually communal, used by hunters, fishermen, some baloks are mobile and mounted on sleds. Bothy – Originally a one-room hut for men farm workers in the United Kingdom, burdei or bordei – a dugout or pit-house with a sod roof in Ukraine, Canada Cabana – an open shelter Chozo also spelled chozo – Spanish for hut, term also used in Mexico. Designed 1940 for barrack accommodation Lodge is a term for a hut or cabin such as a log cabin or cottage. Lodge is used to refer to a tipi, sweat lodge, and hunting, fishing, skiing, and safari lodge. Mitato – A small, dry stone hut in Greece Orri – A French dry stone, rondavel – Central and South Africa Sheiling – Originally a temporary shelter or hut for shepherds, now may be a stone building. Sod house – A pioneer house type on the American Plains where wood was scarce, construction often does not require specialized tools or knowledge. Hut is used to name commercial stores, companies, and concepts, the name implies a small, casual venue, often with a fun and friendly atmosphere
Hut
–
Drawings of petroglpyhs from the Tagar Culture, 1st millennium BC in
Krasnoyarsk Krai, Russia.
Hut
–
Huts and a larger building in the form of burial urns at the museum at the
Baths of Diocletian in Rome, Italy. Image: Sailko
Hut
–
Chozo in
Extremadura, Spain.
Hut
–
Pine cone hut in the
Yatsugatake Mountains,
Japan
12.
Latin
–
Latin is a classical language belonging to the Italic branch of the Indo-European languages. The Latin alphabet is derived from the Etruscan and Greek alphabets, Latin was originally spoken in Latium, in the Italian Peninsula. Through the power of the Roman Republic, it became the dominant language, Vulgar Latin developed into the Romance languages, such as Italian, Portuguese, Spanish, French, and Romanian. Latin, Italian and French have contributed many words to the English language, Latin and Ancient Greek roots are used in theology, biology, and medicine. By the late Roman Republic, Old Latin had been standardised into Classical Latin, Vulgar Latin was the colloquial form spoken during the same time and attested in inscriptions and the works of comic playwrights like Plautus and Terence. Late Latin is the language from the 3rd century. Later, Early Modern Latin and Modern Latin evolved, Latin was used as the language of international communication, scholarship, and science until well into the 18th century, when it began to be supplanted by vernaculars. Ecclesiastical Latin remains the language of the Holy See and the Roman Rite of the Catholic Church. Today, many students, scholars and members of the Catholic clergy speak Latin fluently and it is taught in primary, secondary and postsecondary educational institutions around the world. The language has been passed down through various forms, some inscriptions have been published in an internationally agreed, monumental, multivolume series, the Corpus Inscriptionum Latinarum. Authors and publishers vary, but the format is about the same, volumes detailing inscriptions with a critical apparatus stating the provenance, the reading and interpretation of these inscriptions is the subject matter of the field of epigraphy. The works of several hundred ancient authors who wrote in Latin have survived in whole or in part and they are in part the subject matter of the field of classics. The Cat in the Hat, and a book of fairy tales, additional resources include phrasebooks and resources for rendering everyday phrases and concepts into Latin, such as Meissners Latin Phrasebook. The Latin influence in English has been significant at all stages of its insular development. From the 16th to the 18th centuries, English writers cobbled together huge numbers of new words from Latin and Greek words, dubbed inkhorn terms, as if they had spilled from a pot of ink. Many of these words were used once by the author and then forgotten, many of the most common polysyllabic English words are of Latin origin through the medium of Old French. Romance words make respectively 59%, 20% and 14% of English, German and those figures can rise dramatically when only non-compound and non-derived words are included. Accordingly, Romance words make roughly 35% of the vocabulary of Dutch, Roman engineering had the same effect on scientific terminology as a whole
Latin
–
Latin inscription, in the
Colosseum
Latin
–
Julius Caesar 's
Commentarii de Bello Gallico is one of the most famous classical Latin texts of the Golden Age of Latin. The unvarnished, journalistic style of this
patrician general has long been taught as a model of the urbane Latin officially spoken and written in the floruit of the
Roman republic.
Latin
–
A multi-volume Latin dictionary in the
University Library of Graz
Latin
–
Latin and Ancient Greek Language - Culture - Linguistics at
Duke University in 2014.
13.
Defensive wall
–
A defensive wall is a fortification used to protect a city, town or other settlement from potential aggressors. In ancient to modern times, they were used to enclose settlements, beyond their defensive utility, many walls also had important symbolic functions – representing the status and independence of the communities they embraced. Existing ancient walls are almost always masonry structures, although brick, depending on the topography of the area surrounding the city or the settlement the wall is intended to protect, elements of the terrain may be incorporated in order to make the wall more effective. Walls may only be crossed by entering the city gate and are often supplemented with towers. Simpler defensive walls of earth or stone, thrown up around hillforts, ringworks, early castles, from very early history to modern times, walls have been a near necessity for every city. Uruk in ancient Sumer is one of the worlds oldest known walled cities, before that, the city of Jericho in what is now the West Bank had a wall surrounding it as early as the 8th millennium BC. The Assyrians deployed large labour forces to build new palaces, temples, some settlements in the Indus Valley Civilization were also fortified. By about 3500 B. C. hundreds of small farming villages dotted the Indus floodplain, many of these settlements had fortifications and planned streets. Mundigak in present-day south-east Afghanistan has defensive walls and square bastions of sun dried bricks, babylon was one of the most famous cities of the ancient world, especially as a result of the building program of Nebuchadnezzar, who expanded the walls and built the Ishtar Gate. Exceptions were few — notably, ancient Sparta and ancient Rome did not have walls for a long time, initially, these fortifications were simple constructions of wood and earth, which were later replaced by mixed constructions of stones piled on top of each other without mortar. In Central Europe, the Celts built large fortified settlements which the Romans called oppida, the fortifications were continuously expanded and improved. In ancient Greece, large stone walls had been built in Mycenaean Greece, in classical era Greece, the city of Athens built a long set of parallel stone walls called the Long Walls that reached their guarded seaport at Piraeus. Large tempered earth walls were built in ancient China since the Shang Dynasty, although stone walls were built in China during the Warring States, mass conversion to stone architecture did not begin in earnest until the Tang Dynasty. The large walls of Pingyao serve as one example, likewise, the famous walls of the Forbidden City in Beijing were established in the early 15th century by the Yongle Emperor. The Romans fortified their cities with massive, mortar-bound stone walls, the most famous of these are the largely extant Aurelian Walls of Rome and the Theodosian Walls of Constantinople, together with partial remains elsewhere. These are mostly city gates, like the Porta Nigra in Trier or Newport Arch in Lincoln, apart from these, the early Middle Ages also saw the creation of some towns built around castles. These cities were only protected by simple stone walls and more usually by a combination of both walls and ditches. From the 12th century AD hundreds of settlements of all sizes were founded all across Europe and these cities are easy to recognise due to their regular layout and large market spaces
Defensive wall
–
Part of the
Great Wall of China, a
UNESCO World Heritage Site
Defensive wall
Defensive wall
Defensive wall
14.
Embrasure
–
In military architecture, an embrasure is the opening in a crenellation or battlement between the two raised solid portions or merlons, sometimes called a crenel or crenelle. In domestic architecture this refers to the outward splay of a window or arrow slit on the inside, a loophole, arrow loop or arrowslit passes through a solid wall and was originally for use by archers. The purpose of embrasures is to allow weapons to be fired out from the fortification while the remains under cover. The splay of the wall on the inside provides room for the soldier and his equipment, excellent examples of deep embrasures with arrow slits are to be seen at Aigues-Mortes and Château de Coucy, both in France. The etymology of embrasure expresses widening, the invention of the arrowslit is attributed to Archimedes during the siege of Syracuse in 214–212 BC. From Polybiuss The Histories, Archimedes had had the walls pierced with large numbers of loopholes at the height of a man, however, the invention was later forgotten until reintroduced in the 12th century. By the 19th century, a distinction was made between embrasures being used for cannon, and loopholes being used for musketry, in both cases, the opening was normally made wider on the inside of the wall than the outside. A distinction was made between horizontal and vertical embrasures or loopholes, depending on the orientation of the formed in the outside wall. Vertical loopholes—which are much more common—allow the weapon to be raised and lowered in elevation so as to cover a variety of ranges easily. However to sweep from side to side the weapon must bodily move from side to side to pivot around the muzzle, horizontal loopholes, on the other hand, facilitate quick sweeping across the arc in front, but make large adjustments in elevation very difficult. They were usually used in circumstances where the range was very restricted anyway, another variation had both horizontal and vertical slits arranged in the form of a cross, and was called a crosslet loop or an arbalestina since it was principally intended for arbalestiers. A series of perpendicular steps tapering to the gun port ensured that any incoming fire would be stopped by a vertical impact, arrowslit This article incorporates text from a publication now in the public domain, Chisholm, Hugh, ed. article name needed
Embrasure
–
A loophole or inverted keyhole embrasure, allowing both arrow fire (through the
arrow slit at the top) and small
cannon fire through the circular opening,
Château de Caen, France
Embrasure
–
Pillbox stepped embrasure,
Taunton Stop Line, England
Embrasure
–
Embrasure of Chinese wall
Embrasure
–
Embrasures at
Mdina,
Malta
15.
Scarp (fortification)
–
A scarp and a counterscarp are the inner and outer sides of a ditch or moat used in fortifications. Attackers must descend the counterscarp and ascend the scarp, in permanent fortifications the scarp and counterscarp may be encased in stone. In less permanent fortifications, the counterscarp may be lined with paling fence set at an angle so as to no cover to the attackers. These are tunnels or galleries that have been built behind the wall inside the moat or ditch. Each gallery is pierced with loopholes for musketry, so that forces that enter the moat can be directly fired upon. Counterscarp galleries were built into the angles of the ditch to give the widest field of fire. Occasionally, casemated artillery batteries were built into the counterscarp, the galleries were usually connected to the main body of the fort by a tunnel which passed under the ditch, or by a caponier, a gallery built across the floor of the ditch. Cobham Brewer 1810–1897 Dictionary of Phrase and Fable,1898, Counterscarp Attribution This article incorporates text from a publication now in the public domain, Chisholm, Hugh, ed. Counterscarp. Jean Lafitte Historic Resource Study, Jacksons line at Rodriguez Canal
Scarp (fortification)
–
Counterscarp of a Napoleon era
polygonal fort (
Fort Napoleon, Ostend). Counterscarps had become vertical by this time. The housing at the bottom of the ditch is a
caponier from where the defenders could fire on attackers that managed to climb down into the ditch, while being protected from cannon fire themselves.
Scarp (fortification)
–
The counterscarp gallery at
Southsea Castle in
Portsmouth, England.
16.
Coastal artillery
–
Coastal artillery is the branch of the armed forces concerned with operating anti-ship artillery or fixed gun batteries in coastal fortifications. The advent of 20th-century technologies, especially aviation, naval aviation, jet aircraft, and guided missiles, reduced the primacy of cannon, battleships. In countries where coastal artillery has not been disbanded, these forces have acquired amphibious capabilities, in littoral warfare, mobile coastal artillery armed with surface-to-surface missiles still can be used to deny the use of sea lanes. Land-based guns also benefited in most cases from the protection of walls or earth mounds. The Martello tower is an excellent example of a widely used coastal fort which mounted defensive artillery, during the 19th century China also built hundreds of coastal fortresses in an attempt to counter Western naval threats. Coastal artillery could be part of the Navy, or part of the Army, in English-speaking countries, certain coastal artillery positions were sometimes referred to as Land Batteries, distinguishing this form of artillery battery from for example floating batteries. In the United Kingdom, in the later 19th and earlier 20th Centuries, then, following the Spanish–American War and the report of the Endicott Board, U. S. harbor defenses were greatly strengthened and provided with new, rifled artillery and minefield defenses. Shortly thereafter, in 1907, Congress split the field artillery, the first decade of the 20th Century, the United States Marine Corps established the Advanced Base Force. The force was used for setting up and defending advanced bases, during the Siege of Port Arthur, Japanese forces had captured the vantage point on 203 Meter Hill overlooking Port Arthur harbor. The battleship Sevastopol, although hit 5 times by 11-inch shells, after 3 weeks, the Sevastopol was still afloat, having survived 124 torpedoes fired at her while sinking two Japanese destroyers and damaging six other vessels. The Japanese had meanwhile lost the cruiser Takasago to a mine outside the harbor, the Blücher had entered the narrow waters of the Oslofjord, carrying 1,000 soldiers and leading a German invasion fleet. The first salvo from the Norwegian defenders, fired from Oscarsborg Fortress about 1 mile distant, disabled Blüchers main battery, fire from the smaller guns swept her decks and disabled her steering, and she received several torpedo hits before the fires reached her magazines and doomed her. Singapore was defended by its famous large-caliber coastal guns, which included one battery of three 15-inch guns and one with two 15-inch guns, AP shells were designed to penetrate the hulls of heavily armoured warships and were ineffective against personnel. The Japanese defended the island of Betio in the Tarawa atoll with numerous 203 mm coastal guns, in 1943, these were knocked out early in the battle with a combined USN naval and aerial bombardment. Nazi Germany fortified its conquered territories with the Atlantic Wall, the intent was to destroy the Allied landing craft before they could unload. During the Normandy Landings in 1944, shore bombardment was given a high importance, using ships from battleships to destroyers, for example, the Canadians at Juno beach had fire support many times greater than they had had for the Dieppe Raid in 1942. In addition, there were modified landing-craft, eight Landing Craft Gun, twenty-four Landing Craft Tank carried Priest self-propelled howitzers which also fired while they were on the run-in to the beach. Similar arrangements existed at other beaches, on June 25,1944 the American battleship Texas engaged German shore batteries on the Cotentin Peninsula
Coastal artillery
–
The
Castle Islands Fortifications, in
Bermuda. Construction beginning in 1612, these were the first stone fortifications, with the first coastal artillery batteries, built by
England in the
New World.
Coastal artillery
–
The effect of thirty years evolution in the design of coastal fortifications, between the 1790s and 1822, can be discerned between Ferry Island Fort (in the foreground), with multiple guns arrayed to cover the water westward, and the
Martello tower in the background, which used a single gun with 360° traverse to cover all of the surrounding area.
Ferry Reach, Bermuda, 2011.
Coastal artillery
–
19th-century coastal artillery guns preserved in
Suomenlinna fortress in
Helsinki.
Coastal artillery
–
50-pounder Model 1811
Columbiad (7.25 inch or 184 mm bore) and center-pivot mounting designed by
George Bomford as an experimental coastal defense gun. This gun was built in 1811 as a component of the
Second System of US fortifications.
17.
Bastille (Grenoble)
–
The Bastille is the name of a fortress culminating at 476 m above sea level, located at the south end of the Chartreuse mountain range and overlooking the city of Grenoble, France. The Bastille, which gives its name to the hill, is the main tourist site of the Grenoble area with 600000 visitors per year. The fortress lies on the promontory of Mount Rachais, a narrow mountain that is the most southerly of the Chartreuse range. The plateau of the main fortifications is situated 264 metres above a singularly flat valley floor which is glacial in origin. The melting of the Isère glacier approximately 25,000 years ago led to the formation of a vast lake stretching from Voiron to Albertville, the filling-in of this lake by alluvial deposits created the perfectly flat valley floors that are in evidence today. Requests to fortify this hill had been made by Francis I in 1538 and by Charles IX in 1566, in December 1590 Lesdiguières, head of the Huguenots in the Dauphiné, took control of the city of Grenoble which had been until then under Roman Catholic control. This took place during the eighth and last Wars of Religion, there was a single canon positioned on the slopes of Mount Rachais because this rocky spur was thought to be enough of a natural barrier to deter the advance of hostile forces. But in spite of a permanent state of alert and 24 watch points in the city, in 1591, having become governor of Grenoble, Lesdiguières immediately ordered the construction of two new defensive elements for the city. First, a fortified citadel around the Tour de lIsle so as to have a safe place to withdraw to in case the city was attacked. Second, a fortress on the summit of the hill so that no enemy could approach the city from the Chartreuse without being challenged and this fortress, or bastille, which would give its name to the hill, was completed the following year in 1592. Comprising a tower and a series of bastions, and with a building to lodge the troops. At the same time as these works were taking place, the Roman city wall,13 centuries old, new defensive walls were built, equipped with six bastions and two half-bastions capable of resisting artillery assault. The works encompassed the suburbs that had grown up around the original Roman city walls, thereby increasing the area of the city by 21 hectares. In the first few years Lesdiguières used the Piedmont architect Ercole Negro, then later, from 1611, the Porte Saint Laurent upstream on the Savoy side of Grenoble was finished in 1615, and the Porte de France downstream was finished in 1620. For the first time, a cut in the rocks along the banks of the Isère meant that it was no longer necessary to cross the rocky spur by the Montée de Chalemont to get from one gate to the other. These monumental gates still exist today, but as for the fortifications there remain only the vestiges of three bartizans and a staircase in the form of a tower in the Jardin des Dauphins and these works on the two branches of fortifications were completed in July 1619. Only a few terraces and two magazines were built. Many projects developed by engineers and surveyors between 1741 and 1787 were plans to divert waters of the south of the city
Bastille (Grenoble)
–
Hill and fortress of the Bastille
Bastille (Grenoble)
–
Rabot Citadel, 15th century
Bastille (Grenoble)
–
Porte de France (1620)
Bastille (Grenoble)
–
Porte Saint Laurent (1615)
18.
Grenoble
–
Grenoble is a city in southeastern France, at the foot of the French Alps where the river Drac joins the Isère. Located in the Auvergne-Rhône-Alpes region, Grenoble is the capital of the department of Isère, the city advertises itself as the Capital of the Alps, due to its size and its proximity to the mountains. Grenobles history goes back more than 2,000 years, to a time when it was a small Gallic village, industrial development increased the prominence of Grenoble, through several periods of economic expansion over the last three centuries. The city has grown to be one of Europes most important research, technology, the population of the city of Grenoble was 160,215 at the 2013 census, while the population of the Grenoble metropolitan area was 664,832. The residents of the city are called Grenoblois, the many communes that make up the metropolitan area include three suburbs with populations exceeding 20,000, Saint-Martin-dHères, Échirolles, and Fontaine. For the ecclesiastical history, see Bishopric of Grenoble, the first references to Grenoble date back to 43 BC. Cularo was at time a little Gallic village founded by the Allobroges tribe near a bridge across the Isère River. Three centuries later and with insecurity rising in the late Roman empire, the Emperor Gratian visited Cularo and, touched by the peoples welcome, made the village a Roman city. In honour of this, Cularo was renamed Gratianopolis in 381, Christianity spread to the region during the 4th century, and the diocese of Grenoble was founded in 377 AD. From that time on, the bishops exercised significant political power over the city, until the French Revolution, they styled themselves the bishops and princes of Grenoble. Arletian rule was interrupted between 942 and 970 due to Arabic rule based in Fraxinet, Grenoble grew significantly in the 11th century when the Counts of Albon chose the city as the capital of their territories. At the time, their possessions were a patchwork of several territories sprawled across the region, the central position of Grenoble allowed the Counts to strengthen their authority. When they later took the title of Dauphins, Grenoble became the capital of the State of Dauphiné, despite their status, the Counts had to share authority over the city with the Bishop of Grenoble. One of the most famous of those was Saint Hugh, under his rule, the citys bridge was rebuilt, and both a regular hospital and a leper one were built. The inhabitants of Grenoble took advantage of the conflicts between the Counts and the bishops and obtained the recognition of a Charter of Customs that guaranteed their rights and that charter was confirmed by Kings Louis XI in 1447 and Francis I in 1541. In 1336 the last Dauphin Humbert II founded a court of justice, the Conseil delphinal and he also established the University of Grenoble in 1339. Aging and heirless, Humbert sold his state to France in 1349, the first one, the future Charles V, spent nine months in Grenoble. The city remained the capital of the Dauphiné, henceforth a province of France, the only Dauphin who really governed his province was Louis XI, whose reign lasted from 1447 to 1456
Grenoble
–
Remnants of the Roman Walls
Grenoble
–
From upper left: Panorama of the city,
Grenoble’s cable cars, place Saint-André, jardin de ville, banks of the Isère river
Grenoble
–
François de Bonne, duc de Lesdiguières
Grenoble
–
The
day of the Tiles
19.
Fort Amherst
–
Fort Amherst is now open as a visitor attraction throughout the year with tours provided through the tunnel complex. The primary purpose of all the Medway fortifications was the defence of the Naval Dockyard and this was largely the result of the Raid on the Medway in 1667 when the Dutch fleet inflicted heavy damages on the dockyard. Defences were planned for the dockyard from 1708 and land was acquired by two Acts of Parliament in 1708 and 1709. The land was surveyed in 1715 by the Duke of Marlborough, the first plan of defences was an enceinte, from Gun Wharf, Chatham, to north of the village of Brompton. In 1755, the Prince of Wales Bastion, Prince Williams Bastion, Kings Bastion, Prince Edwards Bastion, Prince Henrys Bastion and these and the ditches, built during the Seven Years War, became known as the Chatham lines and were entered by four gateways with bridges. The fortifications were designed in 1755 by Captain John Peter Desmaretze of the Board of Ordnance and consisted of a 9-metre-wide earthwork ditch, in 1757, an infantry barracks was built to man the defences. During the American Revolutionary War, the lines were enhanced and strengthened, the strongpoint of the design were two Redoubts - Amherst and Townsend. Amherst Redoubt later became Fort Amherst, each was equipped with 14 42-pounders,10 9-pounders,8 6-pounders and 2 4-pounder guns. In 1779, during the construction, workmen found an existing foundation of a Roman building, several finds, including pieces of Roman brick and tile, were made. Roman coins were found, including one of the Empress Faustina. During the Napoleonic Wars the Chatham defences were enlarged and considerably strengthened, further batteries were added and the ditches revetted, to the plans of General Hugh Debbrieg, chief engineer for Lord Amherst. Debbrieg had originally helped in the Cumberland Lines planning with Capt. Desmaretze and his plan for the Chatham lines, drawn by Joseph Heath and dated 1755, is kept at the British Museum. More than 50 smooth-bore cannon were also mounted, the last building works were completed in about 1820. A maze of tunnels, used to move ammunition around the fort, were dug into the chalk cliffs, a second gun battery, Townsend Redoubt, was built at the northeastern corner of the dockyard at the same time as Fort Amherst. Both forts were inside the 1756 brick-lined earthwork bastions known as the Cumberland Lines and these have now been built over. Fort Clarence in Rochester and Fort Pitt, on the Rochester-Chatham borders, were built in 1805–15 to protect the southern approaches, although the Lines were never put to the test, their design would have made a formidable defence against any invasion force. In 1820, because of improvements in equipment and greater firing ranges. The entire fortified area was used as a training-ground during the Victorian era
Fort Amherst
–
The fort's outer defensive walls, as seen from
Fort Pitt
Fort Amherst
–
Dry ditch beneath the Lower Cornwallis Battery.
20.
Chatham, Kent
–
Chatham is one of the Medway towns located within the Medway unitary authority, in North Kent, in South East England. Chatham Dockyard closed in 1984, but major naval buildings remain as the focus for a flourishing tourist industry, Chatham also has military connections, several Army barracks were located here, together with 19th-century forts which provided a defensive shield for the dockyard. Brompton Barracks, located in the town, remains the headquarters of the Corps of Royal Engineers, the town has important road links and the railway and bus stations are the main interchanges for the area. It is the headquarters of Medway unitary authority, as well as its principal shopping centre. The name Chatham was first recorded as Cetham in 880, the Domesday Book records the place as Ceteham. Most books explain this name as a British root ceto plus Old English ham, however, the river-valley situation of Chatham is more consistent with cet being an Old English survival of the element catu that was common in Roman-era names and meant basin or valley. Chatham stands on the A2 road along the line of the ancient Celtic route, which was paved by the Romans, among finds have been the remains of a Roman cemetery. It was established as a Royal Dockyard by Queen Elizabeth I in 1568, initially a refitting base, it became a shipbuilding yard, from then until the late 19th century, further expansion of the yard took place. In its time, many thousands of men were employed at the dockyard, after World War I many submarines were also built in Chatham Dockyard. In addition to the dockyard itself, defensive fortifications were built to protect it from attack, upnor Castle had been built in 1567, but had proved ineffectual, the Dutch Raid on the Medway in 1667 showed that more was required. The threat of a attack from the south during the 19th century led to the construction of even more forts. The second phase of fort-building included Fort Pitt, the 1859 Royal Commission on the Defence of the United Kingdom ordered, inter alia, a third outer ring of forts, these included Fort Luton, Fort Bridgewood, and Fort Borstal. These fortifications all required military personnel to man them and Army barracks to house those men and these included Kitchener Barracks, the Royal Marine Barracks, Brompton Artillery Barracks and Melville Barracks. In response to the manpower needs, the village of Chatham and other nearby villages. Trams, and later buses, linked those places to bring in the workforce, the area between the High Street and Luton village illustrates part of that growth, with its many streets of Victorian terraces. The importance of Chatham dockyard gradually declined as Britains naval resources were reduced or moved to other locations, the dockyard buildings were preserved as the historic site Chatham Historic Dockyard, which was under consideration as a World Heritage Site the site is being used for other purposes. Part of the St Marys Island section is now used as a marina, under the most recent change, in 1998, and with the addition of the Borough of Gillingham, the Borough of Medway became a unitary authority area, administratively separate from Kent. It remains part of the county of Kent for ceremonial purposes, Medway Council has recently relocated its main administration building to Gun Wharf, the site of the earliest part of the Dockyard, a former Lloyds office building
Chatham, Kent
–
Chatham Riverside from Sun Pier
Chatham, Kent
–
The Old Town Hall (opened in 1900) now serves as a theatre.
21.
Fort Point, San Francisco
–
Fort Point is a masonry seacoast fortification located at the southern side of the Golden Gate at the entrance to San Francisco Bay. This fort was completed just before the American Civil War by the United States Army, the fort is now protected as Fort Point National Historic Site, a United States National Historic Site administered by the National Park Service as a unit of the Golden Gate National Recreation Area. In 1769 Spain occupied the San Francisco area and by 1776 had established the areas first European settlement, with a mission and a presidio. To protect against encroachment by the British and Russians, Spain fortified the high white cliff at the narrowest part of the bays entrance, the Castillo de San Joaquin, built in 1794, was an adobe structure housing nine to thirteen cannons. Mexico won independence from Spain in 1821, gaining control of the region and the fort, following the United States victory in 1848, California was annexed by the U. S. and became a state in 1850. The gold rush of 1849 had caused rapid settlement of the area, military officials soon recommended a series of fortifications to secure San Francisco Bay. Coastal defenses were built at Alcatraz Island, Fort Mason, the U. S. Army Corps of Engineers began work on Fort Point in 1853. Plans specified that the lowest tier of artillery be as close as possible to water level so cannonballs could ricochet across the surface to hit enemy ships at the water-line. Workers blasted the 90-foot cliff down to 15 feet above sea level, the structure featured seven-foot-thick walls and multi-tiered casemated construction typical of Third System forts. It was sited to defend the maximum amount of harbor area, while there were more than 30 such forts on the East Coast, Fort Point was the only one on the West Coast. In 1854 Inspector General Joseph K. Mansfield declared this point as the key to the whole Pacific Coast. a crew of 200, many unemployed miners, labored for eight years on the fort. In 1861, with war looming, the army mounted the forts first cannon, colonel Albert Sidney Johnston, commander of the Department of the Pacific, prepared Bay Area defenses and ordered in the first troops to the fort. Kentucky-born Johnston then resigned his commission to join the Confederate Army, throughout the Civil War, artillerymen at Fort Point stood guard for an enemy that never came. Troops soon moved out of Fort Point, and it was never again occupied by the army. The fort was important enough to receive protection from the elements. In 1869 a granite seawall was completed, the following year, some of the forts cannon were moved to Battery East on the bluffs nearby, where they were more protected. In 1882 Fort Point was officially named Fort Winfield Scott after the hero from the war against Mexico. The name never caught on and was applied to an artillery post at the Presidio
Fort Point, San Francisco
–
Fort Point beneath Golden Gate Bridge
Fort Point, San Francisco
–
Fort Point in mid-1800s
Fort Point, San Francisco
–
Fort Point in 1934, Golden Gate Bridge under construction
Fort Point, San Francisco
–
View from under bridge.
22.
Rastatt Fortress
–
Rastatt Fortress was built from 1842 to 1852. The construction of this fortress was one of the few projects that the German Confederation was able to complete. The fortress site covered the Baden town of Rastatt and, in 1849 and it was abandoned in 1890 and most of it was eventually demolished. Whilst Austria wanted to extend Ulm, Prussia and the south German states nearer to France favoured the construction of a fortress in Rastatt, in October 1836 the king of Württemberg, William I, proposed a compromise which was to build or extend both towns into fortresses. In 1838/39 Bavaria and Austria were won over, Rastatt was designated as a linking and border fortress, as well as an armoury for the VIII Army Corps. The Grand Duchy of Baden was given the right to appoint the governor, the commandant and the chief of artillery, the chief of engineers was to be appointed by Austria. Work on the fortress of Rastatt began on 15 November 1842 although its foundation stone was not laid until 18 October 1844. This included the purchase of parcels of land or their requisition in return for compensation, in addition, to municipal and royal land, the properties of 345 private individuals were bought or requisitioned for the fortress. The construction of the resulted in an enormous economic upturn for the town. The Austrian lieutenant colonel, Georg Eberle was appointed as the fortress construction engineer. In the quarry 400-1200 workers were employed, for whom a special hutted camp was built, in addition to locals, there were workers from Württemberg, Austria, South Tyrol and Italy. It was planned to complete the construction in 1849, but this did not come to due to financial problems. In 1848 the fortress was opened with the appointment of its first governor, following its interruption by the Baden Revolution in 1849, work restarted in 1850, but came to a provisional halt in 1852. Rastatt Fortress was abandoned in 1890, because it had lost its position on the border, the site was mostly sold in 1892 to the town of Rastatt as a source of construction material. The Interallied Military Control Commission also laid down which remains of the abandoned Rastatt Fortress still had to be demolished, the casemates are accessible and guided tours are offered. In the eastern part of the old Leopold Fortress 500 metres of passageway may be visited, bürgerkrieg in Baden, Chronik einer verlorenen Revolution. VEB Deutscher Verlag der Wissenschaften, Berlin,1976, albert Neininger, Rastatt als Residenz, Garnison und Festung. Carl Schurz, Flucht aus der Festung Rastatt, mit einer Einführung von Helmut Bender
Rastatt Fortress
–
Plan of the fortress in 1849
Rastatt Fortress
–
Fortress quarry on the Eichelberg
Rastatt Fortress
–
Karlsruhe Gate
Rastatt Fortress
–
Kehl Gate
23.
Rodman gun
–
The Rodman gun is any of a series of American Civil War–era columbiads designed by Union artilleryman Thomas Jackson Rodman. The guns were designed to fire shot and shell. These heavy guns were intended to be mounted in seacoast fortifications and they were built in 8-inch, 10-inch, 13-inch, 15-inch, and 20-inch bore. Other than size, the guns were all identical in design, with a curving bottle shape. Rodman guns were true guns that did not have a powder chamber. Rodman guns differed from all previous artillery because they were hollow cast, guns had been traditionally cast solid and the bore was bored out of the solid metal. With this traditional method, the gun cooled from the outside inward, as each succeeding layer cooled it contracted, pulling away from the still molten metal in the center, creating voids and tension cracks. Drilling out the bore removed the voids, but the tensions in the metal were still toward the outside, Rodman devised a method of hollow casting where the gun cooled from the inside out, so that as cooling occurred, it created compression rather than tension. This resulted in a stronger gun. With Rodmans method of casting, a cooling core was placed in the mold before casting and this core consisted of a watertight cast iron tube, closed at the lower end. A second, smaller tube, open at the bottom was inserted into the first, as the molten iron was poured into the mold, water was pumped through the smaller tube to the bottom of the larger tube. The water rose through the space between the two tubes and flowed out at the top, the water continued flowing as the metal cooled. To further ensure that the gun cooled from the inside out, for an 8-inch Rodman columbiad, the core was removed 25 hours after casting and the flow of water continued through the space left by the core for another 40 hours. Over 50,000 gallons of water was used in the process, for larger guns, the cooling periods were longer and more water was used. After cooling the gun the machining process began, the bore was bored out to proper size, the exterior was turned smooth, the trunnions were turned on a trunnion lathe, and a vent was drilled. Columbiads were not the only guns cast using Rodmans method, dalgren XV-inch shell guns for the U. S. Navy were also hollow cast. A 20-inch hollow cast gun, which may not have been identical to the two guns supplied to the U. S. Army, was sold to Peru. Rodman guns were cast at the Fort Pitt Foundry, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, boston, Massachusetts, and the West Point Foundry, Cold Spring, New York
Rodman gun
–
Engraving showing a gun being cast using Rodman’s hollow casting technique. The engraving shows the gun mold in the casting pit. The outer iron flask, the fire built outside the flask, and the cooling core are also shown.
Rodman gun
–
Drawing comparing Model1844 8-inch columbiad and Model 1861 10-inch "Rodman" columbiad. The powder chamber on the older columbiad is highlighted by the red box.
Rodman gun
–
Photograph of the 15-inch Rodman gun at
Battery Rodgers, Alexandria, VA.
Rodman gun
–
Another photograph of the 15-inch Rodman gun at Battery Rodgers. This photograph gives an excellent view of the elevation mechanism and the center-pintle carriage.
24.
Fort Knox (Maine)
–
Fort Knox, now Fort Knox State Park or Fort Knox State Historic Site, is located on the western bank of the Penobscot River in the town of Prospect, Maine, about 5 miles from the mouth of the river. Built between 1844 and 1869, it was the first fort in Maine built entirely of granite, most previous forts used wood, earth, the fort was designated a National Historic Landmark in 1970, as a virtually intact example of a mid-19th century granite coastal fortification. Fort Knox also serves as the site for the observation tower of the Penobscot Narrows Bridge that opened to the public on 19 May 2007. Local memory of the humiliation of Maine at the hands of the British during the American Revolution, the Penobscot Expedition of 1779 aimed to force the British from Castine, but ended in a debacle. The Americans lost 43 ships and suffered approximately 500 casualties in the worst naval defeat for the United States prior to the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor. Then in autumn 1814, during the War of 1812, a British naval force and soldiers sailed up the Penobscot, the British followed their victory by looting both Hampden and Bangor. The American defeat contributed to the movement for Maines statehood. The Aroostook War of 1838-1839 revived anti-British feeling and concern over the vulnerability of the region to another attack like that of 1814, also, the Penobscot valley and Bangor were major sources of shipbuilding lumber. The response was the inclusion of the Penobscot in the Third System of coastal fortifications, and the construction of Fort Knox, a large, expensive, granite fort at the mouth of the Penobscot River. Construction began in 1844 and continued until all masonry fort funding was withdrawn in 1869, funding from Congress was intermittent, and the forts design was never fully completed despite an expenditure of $1,000,000. Granite was quarried five miles upriver from Mount Waldo in Frankfort, the forts overall design was by Joseph G. Totten, the foremost fortification engineer of the Army Corps of Engineers in his day. Notable engineer officers supervising construction included Isaac Ingalls Stevens and Thomas L. Casey and these furnaces became obsolete with the adoption of ironclad warships. Fort Knox never saw battle, though it was manned during times of war, during the American Civil War volunteers from Maine, mostly recruits in training before assignment to active duty, manned the fort. Thomas Lincoln Casey supervised work on the fort, including adapting the batteries to use the recently invented Rodman cannon, a regiment from Connecticut manned Fort Knox during the Spanish–American War. A plaque at the fort describes the laying of a minefield in the river during this war. The garrison was reduced to one man, the Keeper of the Fort or caretaker with the rank of ordnance sergeant, the keeper attended to the condition and maintenance of the fort, and reported to Fort Preble in South Portland. In 1900 the fort received a permanent torpedo storehouse for storing naval mines that is now the Visitors Center, in 1923, the federal government declared the fort excess property and put its 125-acre grounds up for sale. The state of Maine bought it for $2,121 and it is now a Maine state historic site and was declared a U. S. National Historic Landmark on December 30,1970
Fort Knox (Maine)
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Fort Knox
Fort Knox (Maine)
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Sally Port -entrance to the fort
Fort Knox (Maine)
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Parade Ground, storage vault covers
Fort Knox (Maine)
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Terreplein - never armed
25.
Prospect, Maine
–
Prospect is a town in Waldo County, Maine, United States. The population was 709 at the 2010 census, the most prominent landmark in Prospect is Fort Knox, a large 19th-century fort. It is now a major tourist attraction, as is the Penobscot Narrows Bridge, originally part of Frankfort, it was settled in 1759 when Fort Pownall was completed at Fort Point on Cape Jellison. Prospect was set off and incorporated in 1794, land was then set off from Prospect in 1845 to form part of Searsport. Stockton was set off and incorporated in 1857, by 1859, the town had one gristmill, three sawmills and a shingle mill. Construction on Fort Knox began in 1844, using granite from Mount Waldo in Frankfort and it was built to defend the Penobscot River and the lumber port of Bangor during the Aroostook War. Although never fully completed, work on the defense stopped in 1869. According to the United States Census Bureau, the town has an area of 20.20 square miles. Drained by the branch of the Marsh River, Prospect is situated along the west bank of the Penobscot River. The town is crossed by U. S. Route 1, U. S. Route 1A, Maine State Route 3, as of the census of 2010, there were 709 people,291 households, and 197 families residing in the town. The population density was 39.2 inhabitants per square mile, there were 337 housing units at an average density of 18.6 per square mile. The racial makeup of the town was 98. 4% White,0. 3% African American,0. 4% Native American,0. 1% Asian, hispanic or Latino of any race were 0. 3% of the population. 23. 7% of all households were made up of individuals and 6. 9% had someone living alone who was 65 years of age or older, the average household size was 2.44 and the average family size was 2.84. The median age in the town was 44.3 years. 21. 7% of residents were under the age of 18,6. 3% were between the ages of 18 and 24,23. 1% were from 25 to 44, 36% were from 45 to 64, and 12. 8% were 65 years of age or older. The gender makeup of the town was 51. 6% male and 48. 4% female, as of the census of 2000, there were 642 people,253 households, and 190 families residing in the town. The population density was 35.5 people per square mile, there were 286 housing units at an average density of 15.8 per square mile. The racial makeup of the town was 98. 60% White,0. 16% Native American, hispanic or Latino of any race were 0. 16% of the population
Prospect, Maine
–
Fort Knox c. 1910
26.
Fort Bovisand
–
Fort Bovisand is a fort in Devon, England near the beach of Bovisand. It was built on the mainland to defend the entrance of Plymouth Sound, the fort is beside Bovisand harbour. 1816, A stone jetty and slip were built for boats from sailing warships anchored in Plymouth Sound to collect water from the nearby reservoir. 1845, The first fort at the site, named Staddon Height Battery, was started,1861, As part of the recommendations of the Royal Commission on the Defence of the United Kingdom, work started on the main part of the fort. Originally intended to have two stories of casemates like Fort Picklecombe, the design was altered during construction to a single storey of 23 granite casemates with armoured shields. They were arranged in an arc and initially housed 22 9-inch Rifled Muzzle Loaders and one 10-inch RML gun,1880, By then the armament included 14 10-inch and nine 9-inch RML guns. Underground there are large deep tunnels to store artillery ammunition safe from enemy gunfire,1898, Six 12-pounder quick-firing guns were installed. Early 1900s, The original guns were removed, 1939-1945, World War II, -1942, The remaining four 12-pounders were replaced by two twin 6-pounders, to combat E-boats. 1943, A Bofors 40mm anti-aircraft gun was installed,1956, The Ministry of Defence abandoned the fort. Early 1970s, The fort was converted into a commercial diving school. About the mid-1970s to at least the early 1990s, The fort at the top of the headland was used as an outdoor activity centre. The upper forts magazine and various buildings were converted to be used as basic bunk houses, kitchen. The cottage was used as a toilet and shower block and a lounge,2000, By then the main leaseholder Fort Bovisand Underwater Centre had liquidated, but other diving services continued trading. Months of argument continued about the status of the leases and viability of existing businesses based there, december 2000, Marine Contractors Ltd went into receivership. As a result, the owners decided it was no longer possible to keep the site functioning,2003, Discovery Divers was set up. Mid 2008, Fort Bovisand was home to Discovery Divers,2011, After examining a number of options, the Fort Bovisand Trust was formed to take forward proposals for a heritage attraction and a bid to the Heritage Lottery Fund. Proposal were for a scheme of the heritage centre, diving business. 2013, The Fort Bovisand Trust gained award of a development grant from the Heritage Lottery Fund to progress plans for a visitor attraction
Fort Bovisand
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Fort Bovisand from the south
27.
Plymouth
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Plymouths early history extends to the Bronze Age, when a first settlement emerged at Mount Batten. This settlement continued as a trading post for the Roman Empire, until it was surpassed by the prosperous village of Sutton founded in the ninth century. In 1620, the Pilgrim Fathers departed Plymouth for the New World, during the English Civil War the town was held by the Parliamentarians and was besieged between 1642 and 1646. The combined town took the name of Plymouth which, in 1928, the citys naval importance later led to its targeting and partial destruction during World War II, an act known as the Plymouth Blitz. After the war the city centre was rebuilt and subsequent expansion led to the incorporation of Plympton. The city is home to 262,700 people, making it the 30th most populous area in the United Kingdom. It is governed locally by Plymouth City Council and is represented nationally by three MPs, Plymouths economy remains strongly influenced by shipbuilding and seafaring including ferry links to Brittany and Spain, but has tended toward a service-based economy since the 1990s. It has the largest operational base in Western Europe – HMNB Devonport and is home to Plymouth University. An unidentified settlement named TAMARI OSTIA is listed in Ptolemys Geographia and is presumed to be located in the area of the modern city, at the time this village was called Sutton, meaning south town in Old English. The name Plym Mouth, meaning mouth of the River Plym was first mentioned in a Pipe Roll of 1211, the name Plymouth first officially replaced Sutton in a charter of King Henry VI in 1440. See Plympton for the derivation of the name Plym, during the Hundred Years War a French attack burned a manor house and took some prisoners, but failed to get into the town. In 1403 the town was burned by Breton raiders, on 12 November,1439, the English Parliament made Plymouth the first town incorporated. The castle served to protect Sutton Pool, which is where the fleet was based in Plymouth prior to the establishment of Plymouth Dockyard. In 1512 an Act of Parliament was passed for further fortifying Plymouth, defences on St Nicholas Island also date from this time, and a string of six artillery blockhouses were built, including one on Fishers Nose at the south-eastern corner of the Hoe. This location was further strengthened by the building of a fort in 1596, during the 16th century locally produced wool was the major export commodity. According to legend, Drake insisted on completing his game of bowls on the Hoe before engaging the Spanish Armada in 1588. In 1620 the Pilgrim Fathers set sail for the New World from Plymouth, during the English Civil War Plymouth sided with the Parliamentarians and was besieged for almost four years by the Royalists. The last major attack by the Royalist was by Sir Richard Grenville leading thousands of soldiers towards Plymouth, the civil war ended as a Parliamentary win, but monarchy was restored by King Charles II in 1660, who imprisoned many of the Parliamentary heroes on Drakes Island
Plymouth
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Plymouth Hoe viewed from
Mount Batten
Plymouth
Plymouth
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Prysten House, Finewell Street, 1498, is the oldest surviving house in Plymouth, and built from local Plymouth Limestone and
Dartmoor granite
Plymouth
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John Foulston 's Town Hall, Column and Library in
Devonport
28.
Newhaven Fort
–
Newhaven Fort is a Palmerston fort built in the 19th century to defend the harbour at Newhaven, on the south coast of England. It was the largest defence work ever built in Sussex and is now open as a museum, a new fort to defend the port of Newhaven was a recommendation of the 1859 Royal Commission on the Defence of the United Kingdom, during the administration of Lord Palmerston. The design of the fort commenced in 1862 and was overseen by 22-year-old Anglo-Irish Lieutenant John Charles Ardagh, the site selected was on cliffs overlooking the harbour called Castle Hill, which was already occupied by a battery which originated in the mid-16th century. Instead of levelling the site, as was customary, Ardagh designed the fort to conform to the existing contours. A40 foot wide moat protected the northern and western sides of the fort, which were lined with concrete, the junction of the northern and western arms of the moat was protected by a counterscarp gallery and a sally port. The eastern side overlooking the harbour was protected by a wet moat. A caponier at the foot of the cliffs was reached by a tunnel from within the fort. The garrison was to be housed in casemated barracks built into the northern and western ramparts, the main entrance at the north east angle was accessed by an Equilibrium Bridge designed and patented by Ardagh himself. Work commenced in 1864, with a workforce of 250 men, shingle for the concrete was taken from the beach and clay for the six million bricks required was found nearby. Work was completed in the summer of 1871 and the guns were emplaced in 1873, the fort proper was originally armed on the eastern side in the 1870s with two 9-inch rifled muzzle-loading guns on Moncrieff disappearing carriages, the only such arrangement in the UK. From about 1906 the armament consisted of two modern 6-inch Mark VII breechloading naval guns, and two modern light QF 12-pounder guns for defence against torpedo boats. The main 6-inch Mark VII guns were replaced in 1941 by a battery of BL 6-inch Mk 24 coastal guns, the army vacated the fort in 1962. Restoration began in 1982 following a commercial redevelopment venture. The fort is preserved and maintained by Lewes District Council as Newhaven Fort, in 2015 the forts network of tunnels was featured extensively in the British horror film, The Cutting Room. In the BBC TV programme Great British Railway Journeys, Michael Portillo visited Newhaven Fort
Newhaven Fort
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Newhaven Fort - the casemates and the eastern rampart overlooking the harbour
Newhaven Fort
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5.5-inch field gun from World War II outside the tearoom
Newhaven Fort
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6-inch Mk VII gun which was installed in the 1980s to replace a previously removed gun
Newhaven Fort
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QF 12-pounder gun at the fort
29.
Newhaven, East Sussex
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Newhaven is a town in the Lewes District of East Sussex in England. It lies at the mouth of the River Ouse, on the English Channel coast and it was formerly known as Meeching. Newhaven lies at the mouth of the River Ouse, in the valley the river has cut through the South Downs, over the centuries the river has migrated between Newhaven and Seaford in response to the growth and decay of a shingle spit at its mouth. There was a Bronze Age fort on what is now Castle Hill, in about 480 AD, the Saxon people established a village near where Newhaven now stands, which they named Meeching. Throughout the Middle Ages, the outlet and port of the Ouse was at Seaford. The growth of the shingle spit hindered the outflow of the river, therefore, a channel through the shingle spit was cut in the mid-16th century below Castle Hill, creating access to a sheltered harbour, better than that at Seaford. This was the origin of modern Newhaven, however, shingle continued to accumulate and so the mouth of the Ouse began to migrate eastwards again. Under the Ouse Navigation Act, a breakwater was constructed to arrest longshore drift. A new outlet was built on the present course, below Castle Hill. At that time the settlement began to be known as the new haven, the present breakwater was built in 1890. It was part of the Holmstrow hundred until the abolition of hundreds in the 19th century, although there are some signs of the derelict facilities that serviced the former train ferry operations, the port still sees a great deal of freight and passengers movement. International ferries run to the French port of Dieppe, Seine-Maritime, currently there are two outbound sailings per day, one in the morning and one in the evening, using the 18,654 GT ro-ro ferry MS Côte DAlbâtre. The port is the main landside site for E. ONs development of the offshore-Rampion Wind Farm. The village was of little importance until the opening of the railway line to Lewes in 1847. The London Brighton and South Coast Railway constructed their own wharf and facilities on the east side of the river, the harbour was officially recognised as The Port of Newhaven in 1882. Imports then included French farm products and manufactures, timber, granite, the port and harbour facilities, rail sidings and warehousing were greatly enlarged at this time and electric lighting installed to allow for 24-hour operation. During World War II, large numbers of Canadian troops were stationed at Newhaven, the Newhaven Lifeboat, the first of which was commissioned in 1803, is among the oldest in Britain, and was established some 20 years before the Royal National Lifeboat Institution. The town established the rescue lifeboat in response to the wreck of HMS Brazen in January 1800 when only one man of her crew of some 105 men could be saved
Newhaven, East Sussex
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From the air
Newhaven, East Sussex
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View of Newhaven marina & ferry port
Newhaven, East Sussex
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Newhaven fort
Newhaven, East Sussex
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King & McGaw Warehouse in Newhaven
30.
World War II
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World War II, also known as the Second World War, was a global war that lasted from 1939 to 1945, although related conflicts began earlier. It involved the vast majority of the worlds countries—including all of the great powers—eventually forming two opposing alliances, the Allies and the Axis. It was the most widespread war in history, and directly involved more than 100 million people from over 30 countries. Marked by mass deaths of civilians, including the Holocaust and the bombing of industrial and population centres. These made World War II the deadliest conflict in human history, from late 1939 to early 1941, in a series of campaigns and treaties, Germany conquered or controlled much of continental Europe, and formed the Axis alliance with Italy and Japan. Under the Molotov–Ribbentrop Pact of August 1939, Germany and the Soviet Union partitioned and annexed territories of their European neighbours, Poland, Finland, Romania and the Baltic states. In December 1941, Japan attacked the United States and European colonies in the Pacific Ocean, and quickly conquered much of the Western Pacific. The Axis advance halted in 1942 when Japan lost the critical Battle of Midway, near Hawaii, in 1944, the Western Allies invaded German-occupied France, while the Soviet Union regained all of its territorial losses and invaded Germany and its allies. During 1944 and 1945 the Japanese suffered major reverses in mainland Asia in South Central China and Burma, while the Allies crippled the Japanese Navy, thus ended the war in Asia, cementing the total victory of the Allies. World War II altered the political alignment and social structure of the world, the United Nations was established to foster international co-operation and prevent future conflicts. The victorious great powers—the United States, the Soviet Union, China, the United Kingdom, the Soviet Union and the United States emerged as rival superpowers, setting the stage for the Cold War, which lasted for the next 46 years. Meanwhile, the influence of European great powers waned, while the decolonisation of Asia, most countries whose industries had been damaged moved towards economic recovery. Political integration, especially in Europe, emerged as an effort to end pre-war enmities, the start of the war in Europe is generally held to be 1 September 1939, beginning with the German invasion of Poland, Britain and France declared war on Germany two days later. The dates for the beginning of war in the Pacific include the start of the Second Sino-Japanese War on 7 July 1937, or even the Japanese invasion of Manchuria on 19 September 1931. Others follow the British historian A. J. P. Taylor, who held that the Sino-Japanese War and war in Europe and its colonies occurred simultaneously and this article uses the conventional dating. Other starting dates sometimes used for World War II include the Italian invasion of Abyssinia on 3 October 1935. The British historian Antony Beevor views the beginning of World War II as the Battles of Khalkhin Gol fought between Japan and the forces of Mongolia and the Soviet Union from May to September 1939, the exact date of the wars end is also not universally agreed upon. It was generally accepted at the time that the war ended with the armistice of 14 August 1945, rather than the formal surrender of Japan
World War II
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Clockwise from top left: Chinese forces in the
Battle of Wanjialing, Australian
25-pounder guns during the
First Battle of El Alamein, German
Stuka dive bombers on the
Eastern Front in December 1943, a U.S. naval force in the
Lingayen Gulf,
Wilhelm Keitel signing the
German Instrument of Surrender, Soviet troops in the
Battle of Stalingrad
World War II
–
The
League of Nations assembly, held in
Geneva,
Switzerland, 1930
World War II
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Adolf Hitler at a German
National Socialist political rally in
Weimar, October 1930
World War II
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Italian soldiers recruited in 1935, on their way to fight the
Second Italo-Abyssinian War
31.
15 cm SK L/45
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The 15 cm SK L/45 was a German naval gun used in World War I and World War II. The 15 cm SK L/45 was a widely used naval gun on many classes of World War I Dreadnoughts and it was constructed of an A tube and two layers of hoops with a Krupp horizontal sliding wedge breech block. During World War I a few pre-war cruisers that were armed with 10.5 cm guns were rearmed with these weapons, in World War II the 15 cm SK L/45 was widely used as Coastal artillery and as primary armament on German Auxiliary Cruisers. Ship classes that carried the 15 cm SK L/45 include, Ammunition was of separate loading quick fire type, the projectiles were 61 cm long with a single bagged charge which weighed 13–14 kg. One example was 3. /Marine-Artillerie Abteilung 604 in Jersey and they show it using 44 kilograms shells with a range of 18,000 metres It was also used as a railroad gun during World War I. BL6 inch Mk XII naval gun British equivalent Notes Citations Gander, Terry, Chamberlain, Weapons of the Third Reich, An Encyclopedic Survey of All Small Arms, Artillery and Special Weapons of the German Land Forces 1939–1945. Naval Weapons of World War Two, naval Weapons of World War One. Conways All the Worlds Fighting Ships, 1906–1921, the 15cm SK L/45 on NavWeaps
15 cm SK L/45
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Gun salvaged from
SMS Bremse, at the
Scapa Flow Visitor Centre,
Hoy,
Orkney
15 cm SK L/45
–
15 cm SK L/45 coastal artillery gun at Nordarnøy,
Gildeskål, Norway
15 cm SK L/45
–
v
32.
Frederikshavn
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Frederikshavn is a Danish town in Frederikshavn municipality, Region Nordjylland, on the northeast coast of the Jutland peninsula in northern Denmark. Its name translates to Frederiks harbour, the town has a population of 23,156, and is an important traffic portal with its ferry connections to Sweden and Norway. The town is known for fishing, and its fishing. The Danish term frederikshavner is used to denote a quality plaice, frederikshavns oldest building, Fiskerklyngen, is originally from the mid-16th century, but the houses now there are from 18th–19th centuries. Frederikshavn was originally called Fladstrand, until 1818 when it received status as a merchant town under the name of Frederikshavn, due to its advantageous proximity to the entrance to the Baltic Sea, Frederikshavn has historically been a naval base of some strategic importance. Peter Tordenskjold barricaded himself here in the fortress that German troops had built in the 17th century. During the Great Northern War the Battle of Fladstrand was fought in the sea between Swedish and Danish naval forces. The only old military installations remaining to this day are the Gunpowder Tower, constructed in 1688, the Gunpowder Tower has been preserved, and is incorporated in the municipalitys coat-of-arms. Bangsbo Museum Frederikshavn Art Museum Frederikshavn Shipyard Historical Society Tordenskiold Festival, Frederikshavn, like the rest of North Jutland, was hit with hard unemployment. The towns largest workplace, the shipyard Danyard, closed in the late 1990s and this resulted in more than 2,000 workers being unemployed. Today there is activity at the large ship building area. In summer 2008, the unemployment rate, like the rest of Denmark, as with many provincial municipalities around the world, some of its young people leave to large urban cities. However, the municipality is engaged in many innovative projects which are attracting tourists. The process is expected to be completed by 2015, Frederikshavn is served by Frederikshavn railway station. It is the train station of the Vendsyssel and Skagen railway lines and offers direct InterCity services to Copenhagen, regional train services to Aalborg. Former footballer Allan Olsen, musician Lucas Bjerregaard, Danish golfer EUC Nord - a technical school located partly in Frederikshavn
Frederikshavn
Frederikshavn
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Krudttårnet.
Frederikshavn
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A view over Frederikshavn
Frederikshavn
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The Palm Beach
33.
Denmark
–
Denmark, officially the Kingdom of Denmark, is a Scandinavian country in Europe and a sovereign state. The southernmost and smallest of the Nordic countries, it is south-west of Sweden and south of Norway, Denmark also comprises two autonomous constituent countries in the North Atlantic Ocean, the Faroe Islands and Greenland. Denmark has an area of 42,924 square kilometres. The country consists of a peninsula, Jutland, and an archipelago of 443 named islands, with the largest being Zealand, the islands are characterised by flat, arable land and sandy coasts, low elevation and a temperate climate. The unified kingdom of Denmark emerged in the 10th century as a proficient seafaring nation in the struggle for control of the Baltic Sea, Denmark, Sweden and Norway were ruled together under the Kalmar Union, established in 1397 and ending with Swedish secession in 1523. Denmark and Norway remained under the monarch until outside forces dissolved the union in 1814. The union with Norway made it possible for Denmark to inherit the Faroe Islands, Iceland, beginning in the 17th century, there were several cessions of territory to Sweden. In the 19th century there was a surge of nationalist movements, Denmark remained neutral during World War I. In April 1940, a German invasion saw brief military skirmishes while the Danish resistance movement was active from 1943 until the German surrender in May 1945, the Constitution of Denmark was signed on 5 June 1849, ending the absolute monarchy which had begun in 1660. It establishes a constitutional monarchy organised as a parliamentary democracy, the government and national parliament are seated in Copenhagen, the nations capital, largest city and main commercial centre. Denmark exercises hegemonic influence in the Danish Realm, devolving powers to handle internal affairs, Home rule was established in the Faroe Islands in 1948, in Greenland home rule was established in 1979 and further autonomy in 2009. Denmark became a member of the European Economic Community in 1973, maintaining certain opt-outs, it retains its own currency, the krone. It is among the members of NATO, the Nordic Council, the OECD, OSCE. The etymology of the word Denmark, and especially the relationship between Danes and Denmark and the unifying of Denmark as a kingdom, is a subject which attracts debate. This is centred primarily on the prefix Dan and whether it refers to the Dani or a historical person Dan and the exact meaning of the -mark ending. Most handbooks derive the first part of the word, and the name of the people, from a word meaning land, related to German Tenne threshing floor. The -mark is believed to mean woodland or borderland, with references to the border forests in south Schleswig. The first recorded use of the word Danmark within Denmark itself is found on the two Jelling stones, which are believed to have been erected by Gorm the Old and Harald Bluetooth
Denmark
–
The gilded side of the
Trundholm sun chariot dating from the Nordic Bronze Age.
Denmark
–
Flag
Denmark
–
The
Ladby ship, the largest ship burial found in Denmark.
Denmark
–
Larger of the two Jelling stones, raised by
Harald Bluetooth.
34.
Omaha Beach
–
Omaha Beach was the code name for one of the five sectors of the Allied invasion of German-occupied France in the Normandy landings on 6 June 1944, during World War II. On D-Day, the untested 29th Infantry Division, along with nine companies of U. S. Army Rangers redirected from Pointe du Hoc, were to assault the western half of the beach, the battle-hardened 1st Infantry Division was given the eastern half. The initial assault waves, consisting of tanks, infantry, and combat forces, were carefully planned to reduce the coastal defenses. Opposing the landings was the German 352nd Infantry Division, of the 12,020 men of the division,6,800 were experienced combat troops, detailed to defend a 53-kilometer front. The Germans were largely deployed in strongpoints along the coast—the German strategy was based on defeating any seaborne assault at the water line, very little went as planned during the landing at Omaha. Difficulties in navigation caused the majority of landing craft to miss their targets throughout the day, the defenses were unexpectedly strong, and inflicted heavy casualties on landing U. S. troops. Under heavy fire, the engineers struggled to clear the beach obstacles, weakened by the casualties taken just in landing, the surviving assault troops could not clear the heavily defended exits off the beach. This caused further problems and consequent delays for later landings, small penetrations were eventually achieved by groups of survivors making improvised assaults, scaling the bluffs between the most heavily defended points. Omaha was bounded at either end by large rocky cliffs, the crescent-shaped beach presented a gently sloping tidal area averaging 300 m between low and high-water marks. Above the tide line was a bank of shingle 2.5 m high, at the western end, the shingle bank rested against a stone sea wall which ranged from 1. 5–4 m in height. For the remaining two thirds of the beach after the seawall ended, the shingle lay against a low sand embankment, the German defensive preparations and the lack of any defense in depth indicated that their plan was to stop the invasion at the beaches. Four lines of obstacles were constructed in the intertidal zone,30 meters behind these was a continuous line of logs driven into the sand pointing seaward, every third one capped with an anti-tank mine. The final line of obstacles was a line of hedgehogs 150 meters from the shoreline. The area between the bank and the bluffs was both wired and mined, and mines were also scattered on the bluff slopes. Positions within each strongpoint were interconnected by trenches and tunnels, as well as the basic weaponry of rifles and machine guns, more than 60 light artillery pieces were deployed at these strongpoints. The heaviest pieces were located in eight gun casemates and four open positions while the guns were housed in 35 pillboxes. A further 18 anti-tank guns completed the disposition of artillery targeting the beach, areas between the strongpoints were lightly manned with occasional trenches, rifle pits, and 85 machine-gun emplacements. No area of the beach was left uncovered, and the disposition of weapons meant that flanking fire could be brought to bear anywhere along the beach, Allied intelligence had identified the coastal defenders as a reinforced battalion of the 716th Infantry Division
Omaha Beach
–
Into the Jaws of Death: Troops from the
1st Infantry Division landing on Omaha – photograph by
Robert F. Sargent
Omaha Beach
–
D-Day assault map of the
Normandy region and the north-western coast of France.
Utah and Omaha are separated by the
Douve River, whose mouth is clear in the coastline notch (or "corner") of the map.
Omaha Beach
–
German
Panzer IV 'Panzerstellung' turret mounted on a Tobruk at Widerstandnester 68, June 1944
Omaha Beach
–
A German
casemate at Omaha
35.
Normandy
–
Normandy is one of the regions of France, roughly corresponding to the historical Duchy of Normandy. Administratively, Normandy is divided into five departments, Calvados, Eure, Manche, Orne and it covers 30,627 km², forming roughly 5% of the territory of France. Its population of 3.37 million accounts for around 5% of the population of France, Normans is the name given to the inhabitants of Normandy, and the region is the homeland of the Norman language. The historical region of Normandy comprised the region of Normandy, as well as small areas now part of the départements, or departments of Mayenne. For a century and a following the Norman conquest of England in 1066, Normandy and England were linked by Norman. Archaeological finds, such as paintings, prove that humans were present in the region in prehistoric times. Celts invaded Normandy in successive waves from the 4th to the 3rd century BC, when Julius Caesar invaded Gaul, there were nine different Celtic tribes living in Normandy. The Romanisation of Normandy was achieved by the methods, Roman roads. Classicists have knowledge of many Gallo-Roman villas in Normandy, in the late 3rd century, barbarian raids devastated Normandy. Coastal settlements were raided by Saxon pirates, Christianity also began to enter the area during this period. In 406, Germanic tribes began invading from the east, while the Saxons subjugated the Norman coast, the Roman Emperor withdrew from most of Normandy. As early as 487, the area between the River Somme and the River Loire came under the control of the Frankish lord Clovis, the Vikings started to raid the Seine Valley during the middle of the 9th century. As early as 841, a Viking fleet appeared at the mouth of the Seine, after attacking and destroying monasteries, including one at Jumièges, they took advantage of the power vacuum created by the disintegration of Charlemagnes empire to take northern France. The fiefdom of Normandy was created for the Norwegian Viking leader Hrólfr Ragnvaldsson, Rollo had besieged Paris but in 911 entered vassalage to the king of the West Franks, Charles the Simple, through the Treaty of Saint-Clair-sur-Epte. In exchange for his homage and fealty, Rollo legally gained the territory which he, the name Normandy reflects Rollos Viking origins. The descendants of Rollo and his followers adopted the local Gallo-Romance language and they became the Normans – a Norman-speaking mixture of Saxons and indigenous Franks and Celts. Besides the Norman conquest of England and the subsequent conquests of Wales and Ireland, Norman families, such as that of Tancred of Hauteville, Rainulf Drengot and Guimond de Moulins played important parts in the Norman conquest of southern Italy and Crusades. They also carved out a place for themselves and their descendants in the Crusader states of Asia Minor, the 14th century Norman explorer Jean de Béthencourt established a kingdom in the Canary Islands
Normandy
–
Roman theatre in
Lillebonne
Normandy
Normandy
–
Allied invasion of Normandy,
D-Day, 1944
Normandy
–
A typical northeastern Norman village
36.
American Civil War
–
The American Civil War was an internal conflict fought in the United States from 1861 to 1865. The Union faced secessionists in eleven Southern states grouped together as the Confederate States of America, the Union won the war, which remains the bloodiest in U. S. history. Among the 34 U. S. states in February 1861, War broke out in April 1861 when Confederates attacked the U. S. fortress of Fort Sumter. The Confederacy grew to eleven states, it claimed two more states, the Indian Territory, and the southern portions of the western territories of Arizona. The Confederacy was never recognized by the United States government nor by any foreign country. The states that remained loyal, including border states where slavery was legal, were known as the Union or the North, the war ended with the surrender of all the Confederate armies and the dissolution of the Confederate government in the spring of 1865. The war had its origin in the issue of slavery. The Confederacy collapsed and 4 million slaves were freed, but before his inauguration, seven slave states with cotton-based economies formed the Confederacy. The first six to declare secession had the highest proportions of slaves in their populations, the first seven with state legislatures to resolve for secession included split majorities for unionists Douglas and Bell in Georgia with 51% and Louisiana with 55%. Alabama had voted 46% for those unionists, Mississippi with 40%, Florida with 38%, Texas with 25%, of these, only Texas held a referendum on secession. Eight remaining slave states continued to reject calls for secession, outgoing Democratic President James Buchanan and the incoming Republicans rejected secession as illegal. Lincolns March 4,1861 inaugural address declared that his administration would not initiate a civil war, speaking directly to the Southern States, he reaffirmed, I have no purpose, directly or indirectly to interfere with the institution of slavery in the United States where it exists. I believe I have no right to do so, and I have no inclination to do so. After Confederate forces seized numerous federal forts within territory claimed by the Confederacy, efforts at compromise failed, the Confederates assumed that European countries were so dependent on King Cotton that they would intervene, but none did, and none recognized the new Confederate States of America. Hostilities began on April 12,1861, when Confederate forces fired upon Fort Sumter, while in the Western Theater the Union made significant permanent gains, in the Eastern Theater, the battle was inconclusive in 1861–62. The autumn 1862 Confederate campaigns into Maryland and Kentucky failed, dissuading British intervention, Lincoln issued the Emancipation Proclamation, which made ending slavery a war goal. To the west, by summer 1862 the Union destroyed the Confederate river navy, then much of their western armies, the 1863 Union siege of Vicksburg split the Confederacy in two at the Mississippi River. In 1863, Robert E. Lees Confederate incursion north ended at the Battle of Gettysburg, Western successes led to Ulysses S. Grants command of all Union armies in 1864
American Civil War
–
New Orleans the largest cotton exporting port for New England and Great Britain textile mills, shipping Mississippi River Valley goods from North, South and Border states.
American Civil War
–
Clockwise from top:
Battle of Gettysburg,
Union Captain John Tidball's artillery,
Confederate prisoners,
ironclad USS Atlanta, ruins of
Richmond, Virginia,
Battle of Franklin
American Civil War
–
Sen. Stephen Douglas, author of the
Kansas–Nebraska Act of 1854
American Civil War
–
Sen. John J. Crittenden, of the 1860
Crittenden Compromise
37.
Ironclads
–
An ironclad is a steam-propelled warship protected by iron or steel armor plates used in the early part of the second half of the 19th century. The ironclad was developed as a result of the vulnerability of warships to explosive or incendiary shells. The first ironclad battleship, Gloire, was launched by the French Navy in November 1859 and this type of ship would come to be very successful in the American Civil War. Ironclads were designed for several roles, including as high seas battleships, coastal defense ships and this change was pushed forward by the development of heavier naval guns, more sophisticated steam engines, and advances in metallurgy which made steel shipbuilding possible. The quick pace of change meant that ships were obsolete as soon as they were finished. Many ironclads were built to use of the ram or the torpedo. There is no end to the ironclad period, but towards the end of the 1890s the term ironclad dropped out of use. New ships were constructed to a standard pattern and designated battleships or armored cruisers. The ironclad became technically feasible and tactically necessary because of developments in shipbuilding in the first half of the 19th century. According to naval historian J. Richard Hill, The had three characteristics, a metal-skinned hull, steam propulsion and a main armament of guns capable of firing explosive shells. It is only when all three characteristics are present that a ship can properly be called an ironclad. Each of these developments was introduced separately in the decade before the first ironclads, in the 18th and early 19th centuries fleets had relied on two types of major warship, the ship of the line and the frigate. The first major change to these types was the introduction of power for propulsion. While paddle steamer warships had been used from the 1830s onwards, steam-powered screw frigates were built in the mid-1840s, and at the end of the decade the French Navy introduced steam power to its line of battle. The desire for change came from the ambition of Napoleon III to gain influence in Europe. The first purpose-built steam battleship was the 90-gun Napoléon in 1850, the introduction of the steam ship-of-the-line led to a building competition between France and Britain. Eight sister ships to Napoléon were built in France over a period of ten years, altogether, France built ten new wooden steam battleships and converted 28 from older ships of the line, while the United Kingdom built 18 and converted 41. The era of the wooden steam ship-of-the-line was brief, because of new, in the 1820s and 1830s, warships began to mount increasingly heavy guns, replacing 18- and 24-pounder guns with 32-pounders on sailing ships-of-the-line and introducing 68-pounders on steamers
Ironclads
–
The first battle between ironclads:
CSS Virginia (left) vs.
USS Monitor, in the March 1862
Battle of Hampton Roads
Ironclads
–
Napoléon (1850), the first steam battleship
Ironclads
–
A
Paixhans naval
shell gun. 1860 engraving.
Ironclads
–
French Navy ironclad floating battery
Lave, 1854. This ironclad, together with the similar Tonnante and Dévastation, vanquished Russian land batteries at the
Battle of Kinburn (1855).
38.
Freeboard (nautical)
–
In sailing and boating, a vessels freeboard is the distance from the waterline to the upper deck level, measured at the lowest point of sheer where water can enter the boat or ship. In commercial vessels, the latter criterion measured relative to the load line. In yachts, a low freeboard is often found on racing boats, for drag/weight reduction, a higher freeboard will give more room in the cabin, but will increase weight and drag, compromising speed. A higher freeboard also helps weather waves and reduce the likelihood of being washed over by water waves on the weather deck. A low-freeboard boat is susceptible to taking in water in rough seas, freighter ships and warships use high freeboard designs to increase internal volume which also allows them to satisfy IMO damage stability regulations due to increased reserved buoyancy. Keever, John M. American Merchant Seamans Manual, turpin, Edward A. McEwen, William A
Freeboard (nautical)
–
A graphical representation of the dimensions used to describe a ship. f is the free board.
39.
Confederate States of America
–
The Confederate States, officially the Confederate States of America, commonly referred to as the Confederacy, was a breakaway country of 11 secessionist slave states existing from 1861 to 1865. It was never recognized as an Independent country, although it achieved belligerent status by Britain. A new Confederate government was established in February 1861 before Lincoln took office in March, after the Civil War began in April, four slave states of the Upper South – Virginia, Arkansas, Tennessee, and North Carolina – also declared their secession and joined the Confederacy. The government of the United States rejected the claims of secession, the Civil War began with the April 12,1861, Confederate attack upon Fort Sumter, a Union fort in the harbor of Charleston, South Carolina. In spring 1865, after four years of fighting which led to an estimated 620,000 military deaths, all the Confederate forces surrendered. Jefferson Davis later lamented that the Confederacy had disappeared in 1865, Missouri and Kentucky were represented by partisan factions from those states, while the legitimate governments of those two states retained formal adherence to the Union. Also fighting for the Confederacy were two of the Five Civilized Tribes located in Indian Territory and a new, but uncontrolled, Confederate Territory of Arizona. Efforts by certain factions in Maryland to secede were halted by federal imposition of law, while Delaware, though of divided loyalty. A Unionist government in parts of Virginia organized the new state of West Virginia. With the Emancipation Proclamation on January 1,1863, the Union made abolition of slavery a war goal, as Union forces moved southward, large numbers of plantation slaves were freed. Many joined the Union lines, enrolling in service as soldiers, teamsters and laborers, the most notable advance was Shermans March to the Sea in late 1864. Much of the Confederacys infrastructure was destroyed, including telegraphs, railroads, plantations in the path of Shermans forces were severely damaged. Internal movement became increasingly difficult for Southerners, weakening the economy and these losses created an insurmountable disadvantage in men, materiel, and finance. Public support for Confederate President Jefferson Daviss administration eroded over time due to repeated military reverses, economic hardships, after four years of campaigning, Richmond was captured by Union forces in April 1865. Shortly afterward, Confederate General Robert E. Lee surrendered to Union General Ulysses S. Grant, President Davis was captured on May 10,1865, and jailed in preparation for a treason trial that was ultimately never held. The U. S. government began a process known as Reconstruction which attempted to resolve the political and constitutional issues of the Civil War. By 1877, the Compromise of 1877 ended Reconstruction in the former Confederate states, Confederate veterans had been temporarily disenfranchised by Reconstruction policy. The prewar South had many areas, the war left the entire region economically devastated by military action, ruined infrastructure
Confederate States of America
–
Alexander Stephens CSA Vice President; old Whig friend of Lincoln; author of 'Cornerstone Speech'
Confederate States of America
–
Flag (1861–1863)
Confederate States of America
–
William L. Yancey, Alabama Fire-Eater, "The Orator of Secession".
Confederate States of America
–
William Henry Gist, Governor of South Carolina, called the Secessionist Convention.
40.
Monitor (warship)
–
A monitor was a relatively small warship which was neither fast nor strongly armoured but carried disproportionately large guns. They were used by some navies from the 1860s, during the First World War, during the Vietnam War they were used by the United States Navy. The Brazilian Navys Parnaíba is the last monitor in service, the original monitor was designed by John Ericsson in 1861 who named it USS Monitor. They were designed for waters and served as coastal ships. The term monitor also encompassed more flexible breastwork monitors, and was used as a generic term for any turreted ship. The term monitor also encompasses the strongest of riverine warcraft, known as river monitors, the Lord Clive vessels were scrapped in the 1920s. In Latin, a monitor is someone who admonishes—that is, reminds others of their duties—which is how USS Monitor was given its name. She was designed by John Ericsson for emergency service in the Federal navy during the American Civil War to blockade the Confederate States from supply at sea. Ericsson designed her to operate in water and to present as small a target as possible. Nathaniel Hawthorne described Monitor thus, At no great distance from the Minnesota lay the strangest-looking craft I ever saw, going on board, we were surprised at the extent and convenience of her interior accommodations. Forward, or aft, the crew are relatively quite as well provided for as the officers and it was like finding a palace, with all its conveniences, under the sea. A storm of cannon-shot damages them no more than a handful of dried peas, nothing, however, can exceed the confidence of the officers in this new craft. Yet even this will not long be the last and most terrible improvement in the science of war, the Battle of Hampton Roads, between Monitor and CSS Virginia, was the first engagement between ironclad vessels. Several such battles took place during the course of the American Civil War, however, fortification bombardment was another critical role that the early monitors played, though one that these early designs were much less capable in performing. She was followed by 14 more monitors, one of them, Kanonbåten Sölve, served until 1922 and is today preserved at the Maritiman marine museum in Gothenburg. Ericsson and others experimented greatly during the years of the American Civil War, vessels constructed included a triple-turreted monitor, a class of paddlewheel-propelled monitors, a class of semi-submersible monitors, and a class of monitors armed with spar torpedoes. In the 1860s and 1870s several nations built monitors that were used for coastal defense and those that were directly modelled on Monitor were low-freeboard, mastless, steam-powered vessels with one or two rotating, armoured turrets. The low freeboard meant that ships were unsuitable for ocean-going duties and were always at risk of swamping, flooding
Monitor (warship)
–
HMS Marshal Ney. The large gun turret is typical of a monitor type warship
Monitor (warship)
–
Officers of a Union monitor, probably
USS Patapsco, photographed during the
American Civil War
Monitor (warship)
–
USS Monitor, the first monitor (1861)
Monitor (warship)
–
Huáscar anchored in the harbour at
Talcahuano
41.
Battle of Hampton Roads
–
The battle was a part of the effort of the Confederacy to break the Union blockade, which had cut off Virginias largest cities, Norfolk and Richmond, from international trade. The major significance of the battle is that it was the first meeting in combat of ironclad warships, i. e. the USS Monitor, the Confederate fleet consisted of the ironclad ram Virginia and several supporting vessels. On the first day of battle, they were opposed by several conventional, on that day, Virginia was able to destroy two ships of the Federal flotilla, USS Congress and USS Cumberland, and was about to attack a third, USS Minnesota, which had run aground. Determined to complete the destruction of Minnesota, Catesby ap Roger Jones, acting as captain in Buchanans absence, returned the ship to the fray the next morning, during the night, however, the ironclad Monitor had arrived and had taken a position to defend Minnesota. When Virginia approached, Monitor intercepted her, the two ironclads fought for about three hours, with neither being able to inflict significant damage on the other. The duel ended indecisively, Virginia returning to her home at the Gosport Navy Yard for repairs and strengthening, the ships did not fight again, and the blockade remained in place. The battle received worldwide attention, and it had immediate effects on navies around the world, the preeminent naval powers, Great Britain and France, halted further construction of wooden-hulled ships, and others followed suit. A new type of warship, monitor, was produced based on the principle of the original. The use of a number of very heavy guns, mounted so that they could fire in all directions was first demonstrated by Monitor. Shipbuilders also incorporated rams into the designs of warship hulls for the rest of the century, on April 19,1861, shortly after the outbreak of hostilities at Charleston Harbor, US President Abraham Lincoln proclaimed a blockade of ports in the seceded states. On April 27, after Virginia and North Carolina had also passed ordinances of secession, even before the extension, local troops seized the Norfolk area and threatened the Gosport Navy Yard in Portsmouth. Merrimack burned only to the waterline, however, and her engines were more or less intact, the destruction of the navy yard was mostly ineffective, in particular, the large drydock there was relatively undamaged and soon could be restored. Without firing a shot, the advocates of secession had gained for the South its largest navy yard, as well as the hull and they had also seized more than a thousand heavy guns, plus gun carriages and large quantities of gunpowder. With Norfolk and its yard in Portsmouth, the Confederacy controlled the southern side of Hampton Roads. To prevent Union warships from attacking the yard, the Confederates set up batteries at Sewells Point and Craney Island, the Union retained possession of Fort Monroe, at Old Point Comfort on the Virginia Peninsula. They also held a small island known as the Rip Raps, on the far side of the channel opposite Fort Monroe. With Fort Monroe went control of the lower Peninsula as far as Newport News, forts Monroe and Wool gave the Union forces control of the entrance to Hampton Roads. The blockade, initiated on April 30,1861, cut off Norfolk, to further the blockade, the Union Navy stationed some of its most powerful warships in the roadstead
Battle of Hampton Roads
–
Chromolithograph depicting the Battle of Hampton Roads
Battle of Hampton Roads
–
CSS Virginia (ex-USS Merrimack)
Battle of Hampton Roads
–
USS Monitor
Battle of Hampton Roads
–
The heart of battle, from an 1871 wood engraving published by A.S. Barnes & Co.
42.
Union (American Civil War)
–
The Union was opposed by 11 southern slave states that formed the Confederate States, or the Confederacy. All of the Unions states provided soldiers for the U. S. Army, the Border states played a major role as a supply base for the Union invasion of the Confederacy. The Northeast provided the resources for a mechanized war producing large quantities of munitions and supplies. The Midwest provided soldiers, food, horses, financial support, Army hospitals were set up across the Union. Most states had Republican governors who energetically supported the war effort, the Democratic Party strongly supported the war in 1861 but in 1862 was split between the War Democrats and the anti-war element led by the Copperheads. The Democrats made major gains in 1862 in state elections. They lost ground in 1863, especially in Ohio, in 1864 the Republicans campaigned under the National Union Party banner, which attracted many War Democrats and soldiers and scored a landslide victory for Lincoln and his entire ticket. The war years were quite prosperous except where serious fighting and guerrilla warfare took place along the southern border, prosperity was stimulated by heavy government spending and the creation of an entirely new national banking system. The Union states invested a great deal of money and effort in organizing psychological and social support for soldiers wives, widows, orphans, and for the soldiers themselves. Most soldiers were volunteers, although after 1862 many volunteered to escape the draft, Draft resistance was notable in some larger cities, especially New York City with its massive anti-draft riots of 1863 and in some remote districts such as the coal mining areas of Pennsylvania. In the context of the American Civil War, the Union is sometimes referred to as the North, both then and now, as opposed to the Confederacy, which was the South. The Union never recognized the legitimacy of the Confederacys secession and maintained at all times that it remained entirely a part of the United States of America, in foreign affairs the Union was the only side recognized by all other nations, none of which officially recognized the Confederate government. The term Union occurs in the first governing document of the United States, the subsequent Constitution of 1787 was issued and ratified in the name not of the states, but of We the People of the United States, in Order to form a more perfect Union. Union, for the United States of America, is repeated in such clauses as the Admission to the Union clause in Article IV. Even before the war started, the preserve the Union was commonplace. Using the term Union to apply to the non-secessionist side carried a connotation of legitimacy as the continuation of the political entity. In comparison to the Confederacy, the Union had a large industrialized and urbanized area, additionally, the Union states had a manpower advantage of 5 to 2 at the start of the war. Year by year, the Confederacy shrank and lost control of increasing quantities of resources, meanwhile, the Union turned its growing potential advantage into a much stronger military force
Union (American Civil War)
–
Charleston Mercury Secession Broadside, 1860 - "The Union" had been a way to refer to the American Republic
Union (American Civil War)
–
Map of the division of the states during the American Civil War. Blue (the U.S. Army's uniform color) indicates the Union states; light blue represents Union states which permitted slavery (
border states). Red represents states in rebellion, also known as the
Confederate states. Unshaded areas were U.S. territories.
Union (American Civil War)
–
The Union had large advantages in men and resources at the start of the war; the ratio grew steadily in favor of the Union. In the chart, "cauc men" means white men.
Union (American Civil War)
–
An anti-Lincoln Copperhead pamphlet from 1864
43.
USS Monitor
–
USS Monitor was an iron-hulled steamship. Built during the American Civil War, she was the first ironclad warship commissioned by the Union Navy, the unique design of the ship, distinguished by its revolving turret which was designed by American inventor Theodore Timby, was quickly duplicated and established the monitor type of warship. The remainder of the ship was designed by the Swedish-born engineer and inventor John Ericsson, before Monitor could reach Hampton Roads, the Confederate ironclad had destroyed the sail frigates USS Cumberland and USS Congress and had run the steam frigate USS Minnesota aground. A four-hour battle ensued, both ships pounding the other with cannon fire, although neither ship could destroy or seriously damage the other. This was the battle fought between two armored warships and marked a turning point in naval warfare. After the Confederates were forced to destroy Virginia as they withdrew in early May, on her way there she foundered while under tow, during a storm off Cape Hatteras on the last day of the year. Monitors wreck was discovered in 1973 and has been partially salvaged and her guns, gun turret, engine and other relics are on display at the Mariners Museum in Newport News, Virginia. The use of iron plating on the sides of warships was not practical until steam propulsion matured enough to carry its great weight. Developments in gun technology had progressed by the 1840s so that no practical thickness of wood could withstand the power of a shell, since there was no pressing need for such a ship at the time, there was little demand to continue work on the unfinished vessel. It was France that introduced the first operational armored ships as well as the first shell guns, the French followed those ships with the first ocean-going ironclad, the armored frigate Gloire in 1859, and the British responded with HMS Warrior. Northern newspapers published accounts of the Confederates progress in converting the Merrimack to an ironclad. Concealed in her dress was a message from a Union sympathizer who worked in the Navy Yard warning that the former Merrimack, convinced by the papers Mary was carrying he had production of Monitor sped up. Welles later recorded in his memoirs that Mrs. Louveste encountered no small risk in bringing this information, after the United States received word of the construction of Virginia, Congress appropriated $1.5 million on 3 August 1861 to build one or more armored steamships. It also ordered the creation of a board to inquire into the various designs proposed for armored ships, the Union Navy advertised for proposals for iron-clad steam vessels of war on 7 August and Welles appointed three senior officers as the Ironclad Board the following day. Their task was to examine plans for the completion of iron-clad vessels, the two first met on 9 September and again on the following day, after Ericsson had time to evaluate Galenas design. During this second meeting Ericsson showed Bushnell a model of his own design, Bushnell got Ericssons permission to show the model to Welles, who told Bushnell to show it to the board. Upon review of Ericssons unusual design, the board was skeptical, concerned that such a vessel would not float, especially in rough seas, President Lincoln, who had also examined the design, overruled them. Ericsson assured the board his ship would float exclaiming, The sea shall ride over her, on 15 September, after further deliberations, the board accepted Ericssons proposal
USS Monitor
–
Model of USS Monitor
USS Monitor
–
Statue of John Ericsson in
Battery Park, New York City, with model of Monitor in hand
USS Monitor
–
Inboard plans of USS Monitor
See also: Outboard plans
USS Monitor
–
Transverse hull section through the turret
44.
Casemate ironclad
–
The casemate ironclad is a type of iron or iron-armored gunboat briefly used in the American Civil War. In its general appearance, a casemate ironclad consisted of a hull with little freeboard. This casemate housed anywhere from 2 to 15 cannons, most of them in positions as in classical warships. The casemate was heavily armored over heavy wood backing and was sloped to deflect direct hits, armor was also applied to the part of the hull above the waterline. The casemate was often box-shaped, with octagon shapes appearing in the stages of the war. From the top of the casemate protruded an armored lookout structure that served as a pilothouse, inside the casemate, the guns were housed in one continuous deck. Unlike with turret ironclads, the guns had to fire through fixed gunports and therefore aiming was done by moving the gun relative to the gunport. This was labor-intensive and often up to 20 men were needed to load, aim, fire, and clean a gun, and even with this manpower the firing rate was no better than one shot per five minutes. Although the Union successfully used a fleet of casemate ironclad riverboats in their Mississippi and Red River Campaigns. In their specific outer appearances, i. e, british examples were among others HMS Bellerophon and HMS Hercules. French examples included Brasil and Redoutable, as a result, by 1910 no navy had any casemate warship left in service. Union Navy Confederate States Navy Baxter, James Phinney, 3rd, the Introduction of the Ironclad Warship. War at Sea in the Ironclad Age, hampton Roads 1862, First Clash of the Ironclads. South Brunswick, New Jersey, Thomas Yoseloff Ltd. p.319, Sea Power, A Modern Illustrated Military History. New York City, New York, Exeter Books, History of the Confederate States navy from its organization to the surrender of its last vessel. Joseph McDonough, Albany, N. Y. p.824
Casemate ironclad
–
Casemate Ironclad
USS Cairo on a contemporary photograph.
Casemate ironclad
–
CSS Palmetto State, the archetypical casemate ironclad. Note the sloped deck and the low waterline.
Casemate ironclad
–
Detail of the remains of
USS Cairo as a museum ship today. The sloped casemate deck is clearly visible.
45.
CSS Virginia
–
Virginia was one of the participants in the Battle of Hampton Roads, opposing the Unions USS Monitor in March 1862. The battle is significant in naval history as the first battle between ironclads. When the Commonwealth of Virginia seceded from the Union in 1861, one of the important federal military bases threatened was Gosport Navy Yard in Portsmouth, accordingly, orders were sent to destroy the base rather than allow it to fall into Confederate hands. On the afternoon of 17 April, the day Virginia seceded, however, the previous night secessionists had sunk lightboats between Craney Island and Sewells Point, blocking the channel. On 20 April, before evacuating the Navy Yard, the U. S. Navy burned Merrimack to the waterline and sank her to preclude capture. When the Confederate government took possession of the fully provisioned yard and this was completed by May 30, and she was towed into the shipyards only graving dock, where the burned structures were removed. The wreck was surveyed and her hull and machinery were discovered to be undamaged. Stephen Mallory, Secretary of the Navy decided to convert the Merrimack into an ironclad, preliminary sketch designs were submitted by Lieutenants John Mercer Brooke and John L. Porter, each of whom envisaged the ship as a casemate ironclad. Brookes general design showed the bow and stern portions submerged, the detailed design work would be completed by Porter, who was a trained naval constructor. The hulls burned timbers were cut down past the original waterline, leaving just enough clearance to accommodate her large. A new fantail and armored casemate were built atop a new deck, and a v-shaped breakwater was added to her bow. This forward and aft deck and fantail were designed to stay submerged and were covered in 4-inch-thick iron plate. It was decided to equip their ironclad with a ram, an anachronism on a 19th century warship, merrimacks steam engines, now part of Virginia, were in poor working order, they had been slated for replacement when the decision was made to abandon the Norfolk naval yard. There were four gun ports on each broadside, their protective iron shutters remained uninstalled during both days of the Battle of Hampton Roads, Virginias battery consisted of four muzzle-loading single-banded Brooke rifles and six smoothbore 9-inch Dahlgren guns salvaged from the old Merrimack. Two of the rifles, the bow and stern guns, were 7-inch caliber. The other two were 6. 4-inch cannon of about 9,100 pounds, one on each broadside. The 9-inch Dahlgrens were mounted three to a side, each weighed approximately 9,200 pounds and could fire a 72. 5-pound shell up to a range of 3,357 yards at an elevation of 15°. Both amidship Dahlgrens nearest the boiler furnaces were fitted-out to fire heated shot, on her upper casemate deck were positioned two anti-boarding/personnel 12-pounder Howitzers
CSS Virginia
–
CSS Virginia. The image is captioned Merrimac; see
below.
CSS Virginia
–
Cut away view showing the 4 inches (102 mm) of iron armor and 24 inches (610 mm) of wood backing it
CSS Virginia
–
Chromolithograph depicting the Battle of Hampton Roads
CSS Virginia
–
Anchor of the CSS Virginia at the Museum of the Confederacy
46.
USS Merrimack (1855)
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USS Merrimack, also improperly Merrimac, was a frigate, best known as the hull upon which the ironclad warship CSS Virginia was constructed during the American Civil War. The CSS Virginia then took part in the Battle of Hampton Roads in the first engagement between ironclad warships, Merrimack was the first of six screw frigates begun in 1854. Like others of her class, she was named after the eponymous river, in Massachusetts, the Merrimack River flows through the town of Merrimac, often considered an older spelling which has sometimes caused confusion of the name. Merrimack was launched by the Boston Navy Yard 15 June 1855, sponsored by Miss Mary E. Simmons and she was the second ship of the Navy to be named for the Merrimack River. Shakedown took the new frigate to the Caribbean and to Western Europe. Merrimack visited Southampton, Brest, Lisbon, and Toulon before returning to Boston, recommissioning 1 September 1857, Merrimack got underway from Boston Harbor 17 October as flagship for the Pacific Squadron. She rounded Cape Horn and cruised the Pacific coast of South, upon returning to Norfolk, she decommissioned 16 February 1860. Merrimack was still in ordinary during the crisis preceding Lincolns inauguration, soon after becoming Secretary of the Navy, Gideon Welles took action to prepare the frigate for sea, planning to move her to Philadelphia. The day before the firing on Fort Sumter, Welles directed that great vigilance be exercised in guarding and protecting Norfolk Navy Yard and her ships. On the 20 April, before evacuating the Navy Yard, the U. S. Navy burned Merrimack to the waterline and sank her to preclude capture. The Confederacy, in desperate need of ships, raised Merrimack and rebuilt her as a ram, according to a design prepared by Lt. John Mercer Brooke. The entry can be found here, the Old Steam Navy, Frigates, Slops and Gunboats, 1815–1882. Chesneau, Roger, Kolesnik, Eugene M. eds, conways All the Worlds Fighting Ships 1860–1905. Dictionary of American Naval Fighting Ships, olmstead, Edwin, Stark, Wayne E. Tucker, Spencer C. The Big Guns, Civil War Siege, Seacoast, and Naval Cannon, alexandria Bay, New York, Museum Restoration Service. Silverstone, Paul H. Civil War Navies 1855–1883, the Reign of Iron, The Story of the First Battling Ironclads, the Monitor and the Merrimack
USS Merrimack (1855)
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USS Merrimack; Engraving by L.H. Bradford & Co., after a drawing by G.G. Pook.
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Central battery ship
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One of the participants was the Confederate casemate ironclad CSS Virginia, essentially a central battery ship herself, albeit a low-freeboard one. The central battery ships had their main guns concentrated in the middle of the ship in an armoured citadel, the concentration of armament amidships meant the ship could be shorter and handier than a broadside type like previous warships. In this manner the design could maximize the thickness of armour in an area while still carrying a significant broadside. These ships meant the end of the frigates with their full-length gun decks. In the UK, the man behind the design was the newly appointed Chief Constructor of the Royal Navy, Edward James Reed. The previous Royal Navy ironclad designs, represented by HMS Warrior, had proven to be seaworthy, fast under power and sail, the first central battery ship was HMS Bellerophon of 1865. Great Britain built a total of 18 central battery ships before turrets became common on ships in the 1880s. The second British central battery ship, HMS Hercules, served as model for the Austrian navy, starting with their first design SMS Lissa designed by Josef von Romako and launched in 1871. The Austrian SMS Kaiser—not to be confused with German Kaiser—was built along a similar design, although the hull had been converted from a wooden ship, three older broadside ironclads of the Kaiser Max class were also officially converted to casemate design, although they were mostly built from scratch. The largest design yet was Tegetthoff, later renamed to Mars when the new dreadnought battleship Tegetthoff was commissioned, the Austrian records distinguish between the category of older broadside ironclads and the newer designs using the words Panzerfregatten and respectively Casemattschiffe. The German navy had two large ships of the Kaiser class built in UK shipyards. The first ironclad of the Greek navy, Vasilefs Georgios, was built in the UK, at 1700 tons. The Italians had three ships built, Venezia, converted from broadside during construction, and the two Principe Amedeo-class ironclads. The disadvantage of the centre-battery was that, while more flexible than the broadside, each gun still had a restricted field of fire. The centre-battery ships were succeeded by turreted warships. Box battery Brown, David K. RCNC, Warrior to Dreadnought, Warship Design 1860–1905, London, Chatham,1997 ISBN 1-84067-529-2 Sondhaus, Lawrence. The Naval Policy of Austria-Hungary, 1867–1918, Navalism, Industrial Development, gardiner, Robert, ed. Conways All the Worlds Fighting Ships 1860–1905
Central battery ship
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24cm gun model 1884 in an ironclad
48.
HMS Alexandra (1875)
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HMS Alexandra was a central battery ironclad of the Victorian Royal Navy, whose seagoing career was from 1877 to 1900. She spent much of her career as a flagship, and took part in operations to deter Russian aggression against Turkey in 1878 and this minority succeeded in convincing the Board to design Alexandra as a rigged broadside vessel. Built at Chatham Dockyard and engined by Messers Humphreys and Tennant and her armament was disposed in a central box battery, with heavy guns deployed both on the main and on the upper deck. Alexandra was the last British battleship to carry her main armament wholly below decks, twelve boilers were set back to back on either side of a longitudinal bulkhead, each engine drove an outward rotating screw of some 21 feet in diameter. A pair of engines, each of 600 indicated horsepower, were fitted to turn the screws while the ship was proceeding under sail. These engines could, if required, propel the ship at a speed of 14.5 knots, at the time of her completion Alexandra was the fastest battleship afloat. It had been intended to call the ship HMS Superb, but the name was changed at her launching, which was undertaken by Her Royal Highness the Princess of Wales, who was later Queen Alexandra. She was the first British ironclad to be launched by a member of the Royal Family, the Duke and Duchess of Edinburgh, the Duke and Duchess of Teck and the Duke of Cambridge were also present. She was commissioned at Chatham on 2 January 1877 as flagship, Mediterranean Fleet and she was the flagship of Admiral Hornby in his passage through the Dardanelles during the Russian war scare of 1878. She ran aground in bad weather at the narrowest part of the strait and she was present at the bombardment of Alexandria in 1882, in this action the Admirals flag was shifted to HMS Invincible, as she was of shallower draught and could sail closer to shore. During this action on 11 July 1882, Gunner Israel Harding flung a live 10-inch shell overboard, in 1886, the Duke of Edinburgh hoisted his flag on board, and Prince George of Wales, later King George V, joined as a lieutenant. She paid off in 1889 for modernisation, in 1891, she was flagship of the Admiral Superintendent of Naval Reserves at Portsmouth, and remained so until 1901. Alexandra was featured in the first volume of the Navy and Army Illustrated in early c, at this time, she had a complement of 408 officers and men and was commanded by Captain W. H. Pigott. Her last sea-time was as flagship of the B fleet in the manoeuvres of 1900, in 1903 she became a mechanical training ship, and she was sold in 1908. Oscar Parkes British Battleships ISBN 0-85052-604-3 Conway All the Worlds Fighting Ships ISBN 0-85177-133-5
HMS Alexandra (1875)
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HMS Alexandra
HMS Alexandra (1875)
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HMS Alexandra under sail
HMS Alexandra (1875)
49.
USS North Dakota (BB-29)
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USS North Dakota was a dreadnought battleship of the United States Navy, the second member of the Delaware class, her only sister ship being Delaware. North Dakota was laid down at the Fore River Shipyard in December 1907, was launched in November 1908 and she was armed with a main battery of ten 12-inch guns and was capable of a top speed of 21 kn. North Dakota was the first vessel of the US Navy to be named after the 39th state, North Dakota had a peaceful career, she was present during the United States occupation of Veracruz in 1914, but did not see action. After the United States entered World War I in April 1917, North Dakota remained in the US, training crewmen for the expanding wartime Navy. She served in capacity until 1930, when she was replaced in that role by Utah. In 1931, she was sold for scrapping and thereafter dismantled, North Dakota was 518 ft 9 in long overall and had a beam of 85 ft 3 in and a draft of 27 ft 3 in. She displaced 20,380 long tons as designed and up to 22,400 long tons at combat load. The ship was powered by two-shaft Curtis steam turbines and fourteen coal-fired Babcock & Wilcox boilers, the ship had a cruising range of 6,500 nautical miles at a speed of 12 kn. She had a crew of 933 officers and men and her bow had an early example of bulbous forefoot. The ship was armed with a battery of ten 12-inch /45 Mark 5 guns in five twin Mark 7 gun turrets on the centerline. The other three turrets were placed aft of the superstructure, the secondary battery consisted of twenty-one 5-inch /50 Mark 6 guns mounted on Mark 9 and Mark 12 pedestal mounts in casemates along the side of the hull. As was standard for ships of the period, she carried a pair of 21-inch torpedo tubes. The main armored belt was 11 in thick, while the deck was 2 in thick. The gun turrets had 12 in thick faces and the tower had 11.5 in thick sides. North Dakota was laid down at the Fore River Shipyard in Quincy and she was launched on 10 November 1908, and completed on 11 April 1910. On 8 September 1910, the ship suffered an oil-tank explosion, six men—Chief Watertenders August Holtz and Patrick Reid, Chief Machinists Mates Thomas Stanton and Karl Westa, Machinists Mate First Class Charles C. Roberts, and Watertender Harry Lipscomb—each received the Medal of Honor for extraordinary heroism in the line of his profession during the fire, on 2 November 1910, she crossed the Atlantic for the first time, on a good-will visit to Britain and France. Fleet maneuvers followed in the Caribbean the next spring, midshipmen training cruises for cadets from the Naval Academy occupied North Dakotas time in the summers of 1912 and 1913
USS North Dakota (BB-29)
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North Dakota underway, circa 1912
USS North Dakota (BB-29)
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North Dakota at her launching
USS North Dakota (BB-29)
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North Dakota firing a broadside
USS North Dakota (BB-29)
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North Dakota in
Malta in 1919
50.
Japanese battleship Haruna
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Haruna, named after Mount Haruna, was a warship of the Imperial Japanese Navy during World War I and World War II. Designed by the British naval engineer George Thurston, she was the fourth and last battlecruiser of the Kongō class, laid down in 1912 at the Kawasaki Shipyards in Kobe, Haruna was formally commissioned in 1915 on the same day as her sister ship, Kirishima. Haruna patrolled off the Chinese coast during World War I, during gunnery drills in 1920, an explosion destroyed one of her guns, damaged the gun turret, and killed seven men. During her career, Haruna underwent two major reconstructions, beginning in 1926, the Imperial Japanese Navy rebuilt her as a battleship, strengthening her armor and improving her speed and power capabilities. In 1933, her superstructure was rebuilt, her speed was increased. Now fast enough to accompany Japans growing carrier fleet, Haruna was reclassified as a fast battleship, during the Second Sino-Japanese War, Haruna transported Imperial Japanese Army troops to mainland China before being redeployed to the Third Battleship Division in 1941. On the eve of the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor, she sailed as part of the Southern Force in preparation for the Battle of Singapore, Haruna fought in almost every major naval action of the Pacific Theater during World War II. She covered the Japanese landings in Malaya and the Dutch East Indies in 1942 before engaging American forces at the Battle of Midway, Haruna participated in the Battle of the Philippine Sea and the Battle of Leyte Gulf in 1944, engaging American vessels in the latter. In 1945, Haruna was transferred to Kure Naval Base, where she was sunk by aircraft of Task Force 38 on 28 July 1945. Haruna was the fourth and last of the Imperial Japanese Navys Kongō-class battlecruisers, the class was ordered in 1910 in the Japanese Emergency Naval Expansion Bill after the commissioning of HMS Invincible in 1908. Their heavy armament and armor protection were greatly superior to those of any other Japanese capital ship afloat at the time, the keel of Haruna was laid down at Kobe by Kawasaki on 16 March 1912, with most of the parts used in her construction manufactured in Japan. Due to a shortage of available slipways, Haruna and her sister ship Kirishima were the first two ships of the Imperial Japanese Navy to be built in private shipyards. Launched on 14 December 1913, Harunas fitting-out began in early 1914 and she was completed on 19 April 1915. Harunas main battery consisted of eight 14 in heavy-caliber main guns in four twin turrets, the turrets were noted by the U. S. Office of Naval Intelligence to be similar to the British 15-inch turrets, with improvements made in flash-tightness. Each of her guns could fire high-explosive or armor-piercing shells a maximum of 38,770 yd at a firing rate of two shells per minute. In keeping with the Japanese doctrine of deploying more powerful vessels before their opponents, Haruna, the main guns carried ammunition for 90 salvoes, and had an approximate barrel life of 250 to 280 rounds. In 1941, separate dyes were introduced for the shells of the four Kongo-class battleships. Her secondary battery was originally sixteen 6 in 50-caliber medium guns in casemates, eight 3 in guns
Japanese battleship Haruna
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Haruna in 1934, following her second reconstruction
Japanese battleship Haruna
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Haruna 's fitting-out at Kôbe in October 1914
Japanese battleship Haruna
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Haruna at Kōbe on 24 April 1915
Japanese battleship Haruna
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Haruna at sea.
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