Lima class cruiser (1880)

Lima was the lead ship a planned two-ship unprotected cruisers class of the Armada do Peru (Peruvian Navy) but she ended its sole member as her sister was old to Japan and ended in the USN. Original name was Socrates. She was laid down as German merchant ship, purchased on stock to have guns installed, as Peru face the War of the Pacific. She was to be armed in Britain through a subterfuge to avoid embargoes as she was a belligerent. But she was eventually completed after the war. She however became the largest vessel in the Peruvian fleet and had originally two 6 in (152 mm) guns. In 1901 she had new 4-inches (102 mm) and she patrolled during the quasi-war of 1910 with Ecuador. In 1920 she was refitted in Panama, back to a transport and submarine depot, pressed again in service for the Colombia–Peru War in 1933 as floating battery, and decommissioned in 1937.

Development

On 14 February 1879 the Chilean Navy sent its fulcrum, the ironclads Almirante Cochrane and Blanco Encalada. By entering Antofagasta, they started the War of the Pacific with a Bolivian–Peruvian alliance. The port city, now Chilean, was long contested, see the Atacama border dispute between Bolivia and Chile between 1825 and 1879. In 1873, Bolivia signed a secret treaty of defensive alliance with Peru. Chile used it a few years later as an argument to start the War of the Pacific.
At that stage, the Peruvian Navy was in dire straits. Her Navy was dwarved by Argentina and the Bolivian Navy was also a midget. The Peruvians could count on the monitor Atahualpa (1861), as the central battery ship Indipendencia (1865) blew up in 1879, and Husacar, its most valuable turret ironclad was captured by Chile also in 1879.There were also the antiquated (1850) 34-gun Frigate Apurimac, the corvettes America and Union. Two 3-rd rank torpedo boats were also purchased in Germany at Herreschoff, launched 1879.

The Peruvian government due to the embargo could not purchase warhips, at least to the great powers with shipyard’s capacity for those, UL, France, Germany or Italy. There was an attempt to source new warships via other ways, ie. finding a valuable hull and them have it armed. In this new approach, the Peruvian commission found in Germany, at Howaldtswere Yard, two suitable merchant vessels under construction, for a Portuguese client. To murky the water, the commission found an intermediary that claimed these ships were for the Greek Government. Suspicion at the yard that these may have come from Peru, the German government detained these.

The Peruvian authorities attempted to have them purchased through Henry Lambert in London, this time officially for the French government. But once again, foul play was suspected and the sell was not accepted. At the end of the war, lost, the Peruvian government was bankrupt and could no longer afford these. The frirst was originally called Socrates and the second Diogenes. The latter was sold to finance the other, completed this time officially as Lima. Diogenes was to have been named originally Callao. She was sold to Japan, and eventually in 1898, ended as the US Navy gunboat USS Topeka (see below).

Design of the class

Hull and general design

As completed, Lima was a unprotected “cruiser” built of iron with a straight bow. She was peculiar as there were not large, but rather small holds but extensive accomodations, unusual for civilian ships, to have a company of marine infantry and gun crews. There was however no protection whatsoever, which would have aroused suspicion, but the usual partial double hull and some underwater compartimentation. The final ships had a straight bow, clipper poop, forecastle and poop deck, and a battery deck amidships with very tall bulwarks that covered all the way between the two levels, creating the illusion of a flush deck ship.

Lima displacing 1,700 tonnes (1,700 long tons; 1,900 short tons), for an overall length of 77.7 m (254 ft 11 in) and a beam of 10.67 m (35 ft) at the waterline making for a 7.2 ratio. Draught was 4.2 m (13 ft 9 in) forward, 4.8 m (15 ft 9 in) aft and mean draught 4.7 m (15 ft 5 in) when deeply loaded. The ship had to simple pole masts with a schooner type rigging (apparently optional but never mounted) a relatively tall bridge and two tall raked funnels aft of it, close together. The intended guns were mounted in UK, fore and aft. The complement was 150 sailors, much more than a civilian crew.

Powerplant

The ships had two propeller shaft, driven by two compound marine steam engines, with horizontally-mounted cylinders, fed by two double-ended and two single-ended Scotch boilers, coal burning, rated at 1,800 indicated horsepower (1,300 kW). The boilers vented through two funnels. There was a total of 335 tonnes (330 long tons or 369 short tons) of coal onboard, which could be extended. These engines were prowerful enough to give them a top speed of 16.2 knots (30.0 km/h; 18.6 mph). The two-masted schooner rig as seen above, was planned, but originally the rig was that of a brig, with taller composite masts.

Armament

Early armament

Lima was completed as a cruiser after the war ended, in UK. The armament comprised two single 6 in (152 mm) 26 caliber Armstrong rifled breech loading guns. This was completed by three single 47 mm (1.9 in) 04 caliber Nordenfelt 3-pounder guns. It’s unclear where the latter were placed, but the main guns were on the forecastle and poop deck fore and aft, both single mounts and behind shields. These were heavy however and the ships were rearmed in 1920 at Panama, see below.

Armament Upgrade

The main armament was replaced by four Vickers 4 in (102 mm) quick-firing guns: Two fire and aft replacing the 6-in armstrong and two more in sponsons on the battery deck amidships, protected by bulwarks. There were additionally five 3-pounder guns. The 4-in Each weighed 1.7 tonnes (1.7 long tons; 1.9 short tons) and fired a 31 lb (14 kg) shell at 2,950 ft/s (900 m/s). She was still armed this way when becoming a training ship.

conways profile

Career

Lima was constructed at Howaldts of Kiel as a merchant ship under the name Socrates, laid down in 1879, launched in December 1880, purchased on the stocks by the Chilean government in 1881. She was to be converted as a gunboat but the company, which was willing to complete her as such as blocked by the German government, due to restrictions placed on Peru as belligerent nation in this war. This dragged on and both ships could not be delivered. In 1882, the Japanese government approached the Chilean government for their purchase for 1,2287,160 Japanese yen. This was turned down and the Peruvian still tried to find a strategeme to have them delivered still. They were transferred to Britain, this time no longer for France prospectively, but for Peru as the war has ended on 20 October 1883. Conversion to a cruiser was completed by Thames Ironworks in 1885. Financial constraints however were suich for Peru, financially broken by this war, that there was not budget to pay her our. She was retained, her sister sold to Japan, which retracted (see below). Lima was only entering service in 1889.

On commissioning, she became the navy’s flagship, a navy that had been gutted and she was its only sizeable and moden warship. She remained the largest ship in the navy for more than twenty years, based in Callao. She was the core of the Escuadra, Callao Maritime Department. Her career was not made only of peaceful training cruises though.

As war theaten to flare up again, this time with Ecuador on 4 April 1910, the cruiser was mobilised. But conflict was avoided and she saw no action. In 1911 she was modernized with wireless telegraphy at Guillermo Wiese de Osma. In November 1919, the Navy pressed the government to have her modernized. She was sent to Balboa, Panama Canal Zone, which had US facilities to repair and maintined USN ships. There, with the right budgets, she had new boilers, new wireless telegraph installed, and a new, modern artillery. This work was completed on 8 March 1920. She sailed back to Callao but later used as a transport and allegedly a minelayer, and ultimately as submarine depot ship for the new Peruvian R class submarines.

In May 1933, she was reclassified as a gunboat again and deployed as the Colombia–Peru War flare up. She as escorted duing her deployments by the old destroyer Teniente Rodriguez, sailing through the Panama Canal, then up the Amazon River to Iquitos, used there for support for troops, as floating battery. This was her longest and last trip, but it was useful. The “Leticia War” was mostly a land affair, the result of dissatisfaction with the Salomón–Lozano Treaty and imposition of heavy tariffs on sugar. Colombia and Peru met in Rio de Janeiro to sign the Rio de Janeiro Protocol in 1934 and Lima returned to Callao. She was stricken in 1937 and sold for BU in 1940, surviving USS Topeka by ten years (see below), not in 1950 as seen in some sources.

USS Topeka (PG-35)
As sister ship of “Socrates”, “Diogenes” would have been completed by Peru as Callo if finances would be sufficient when the war ended, but this was not the case. After the failed bid by Japan to purchase both “cruisers” in 1895 (prospective names not known), Diogenes remained incomplete in Britain till 1898. She was was then sold to the USA as Topeca as tensions flared up in Cuba. As USS Topeka, she was overhauled at New York Navy Yard over two months to receive a standard US armament and prepared for the Cuban blockade. In US service she had six 4 inches (100 mm) gun, six 3-pounder guns, two 1-pounder guns and one M1895 Colt–Browning machine gun. She also could carry and land a Marine company. In WWI she became a prison ship and later a raceiving ship, then TS and in 1921 the utility hull IX-35, then TS for reserve forces in 1923, and final decommission in 1929, stricken 1930, sold for BU.

Read More/Src

Books

Arnold, Anthony J. (2000). Iron Shipbuilding on the Thames, 1832–1915: An Economic and Business History. Aldershot: Ashgate.
Brassey, Thomas, ed. (1897). “Part II: British and Foreign Armoured and Unarmoured Ships”. The Naval Annual 1897.
English, Adrian J. (1984). Armed Forces of Latin America: Their Histories, Development, Present Strength, and Military Potential. London: Jane’s.
Friedman, Norman (2011). Naval Weapons of World War One: Guns, Torpedoes, Mines and ASW Weapons of All Nations. Barnsley: Seaforth Publishing.
Grant, Jonathan A. (2007). Rulers, Guns, and Money: The Global Arms Trade in the Age of Imperialism. Harvard Univ. Press.
Lyon, Huge (1979). “Minor Navies: Morocco, Paraguay, Persia, Peru”. In Chesneau, Roger & Kolesnik, Eugene M. (eds.). Conway’s All the World’s Fighting Ships 1860–1905.
Faura Gaig, Guillermo. El último viaje del crucero Lima.
Rodríguez Asti, John. Buques de la Marina de Guerra del Perú desde 1884: Cruceros. Dirección de Intereses Marítimos 2000.
Milanovich, Kathrin (2004). “Naniwa and Takachiho: Elswick-built Protected Cruisers of the Imperial Japanese Navy”. Preston, Antony (ed.). Warship 2004.
Noel, John Vavasour (April 1910). “The Clash Between Peru and Ecuador”. Peru To-day.
Noel, John Vavasour (March 1911). “Callao Correspondence”. Peru To-day. III.
Particulars of the War Ships of the World (10 ed.). London: Lloyds Register 1892.
“Repairs to the Peruvian cruiser “Lima””. The Panama Canal Record. XIII (30).
Rodríguez Asti, John (2000). Buques de la Marina de Guerra del Perú desde 1884: Cruceros. Dirección de Intereses Marítimos, Fondo de Publicaciones.
Scheina, Robert L. (1987). Latin America: A Naval History, 1810–1987. Shrewsbury: Tri-Service Press.
Silverstone, Paul H. (2013). The New Navy 1883–1922. Florence: Taylor and Francis.
Sondhaus, Lawrence (2004). Navies in Modern World History. London: Reaktion Books.
Stoker, Donald; McMaster, Michael T. (2017). Naval Advising and Assistance: History, Challenges and Analysis. Helion & Company.

Links

on navypedia.org
es.wikipedia.org BAP_Lima
en.wikipedia.org Peruvian_cruiser_Lima
en.wikipedia.org War_of_the_Pacific
en.wikipedia.org Antofagasta
foros.aceroyfuego.com
ecured.cu Crucero_Lima
facebook.com Lima class
navsource.org on topeka
ibiblio.org on pg35
geocities.ws crucero-lima.html
laststandonzombieisland.com/ bap-lima/
babel.hathitrust.org/
babel.hathitrust.org/