US-Italian comparative naval capabilities in 1891?

raharris1973

Gone Fishin'
Donor
Monthly Donor
What were the relative naval strengths of the two countries in 1891. I'm thinking of what each side had to work with if the New Orleans lynching of Italians had resulted in an Italian declaration of war on the US.

Looking in particular for any responses from LordKalvert, LukeDalton or LordKalvan as posters who are either Italian or opine a lot on Italian matters, and in LordKalvert's case, on naval matters.

I think in the early 1890s, Italy was the third biggest European naval power in terms of either tonnage or armored tonnage, behind Britain and France but ahead of Germany and Russia.
 
In 1891 USN was just beginning to consider expanding/steel navy. Another issue is that in 1891, even more so than in WWI/WWII the Italian navy was not building ships with significant range capability to say nothing of accommodations for crew for trans-Atlantic voyages/world cruising. The needs of the Italian navy and the needs of the US navy were quite different.

Comparing numbers, tonnage is only a valid comparison if you are comparing navies with similar missions.
 
Sloreck hit the nail on the head. The US has only recently begun rebuilding its fleet so, on paper, the Regia Marina is superior. However, it was designed to fight effectively in the Med, not on the other side of the world. Likewise, the US navy was mostly made up of older ships, though there was a core of modern ones with more in the works.

Also, it's a LONG way from Italy to the US. Naples to New York is 4200 nm.

A few sources that you might find useful:
http://www.navypedia.org/ships/italy/it_index.htm
http://www.hazegray.org
 
Last edited:

TFSmith121

Banned
1891 is interesting, actually...

According to Kennedy's Rise and Fall of the Great Powers, in 1890, USN tonnage was 240,000; Italy's was 242,000.

Britain was first, France second; quirkily enough, Italy was actually third in the world - didn't last long, but still.;)

Part of that were the four large ships of the Duilio and Italia classes, which totalled about 50,000 tons of the above; they also were heavily armed, but lightly protected, and were very much out of the mainstream of capital ship design, even at the time. They were designed, essentially, to fend off the more numerous but smaller French capital ships in any attack on the Italian coastline, not to cross the Atlantic.

There were a variety of older capital ships of various designs, some dating back two decades or more, plus a fairly varied group of cruisers, gunboats, etc, and again, almost all designed for the Mediterranean.

The USN had eight modern cruisers in commission, all built within the past eight years, as well as two of the six modern monitors (the other four had all been launched); Maine, the first steel navy battleship, had been launched, but was still being finished.

Basically, neither navy is in a position to do much.

Best,
 
Last edited:
Commerce Raiding

Both fleets can raid effectively, or quickly build ships that can. Also, by 1891, a long war that the United States takes seriously will result in the emerging American industry flooding the seas with battleships. But--any war involving European nations has a potential to get other nations involved...
 
Both fleets can raid effectively, or quickly build ships that can. Also, by 1891, a long war that the United States takes seriously will result in the emerging American industry flooding the seas with battleships. But--any war involving European nations has a potential to get other nations involved...

Cruisers rather than battleships and even then not a flood, more like your washing machine leaking. Still would be damned annoying for the Italians.

The key choke points in battleship construction are guns and armour. Basically from an engineering point of view the big guns that characterise the battleship are more difficult and time consuming to make than the rest of it, less expensive because they need less stuff but that stuff needs very high precision casting, cutting and polishing and exacting metallurgy. The same to a lesser extent is true of armour, you simply need big rollers to make the thick and very plates that battleships need and again it is not a fast process because if you cool the metal too fast it is brittle and that defeats the object of using it for armour.

Also it might be worth noting but the US lacked a dry dock sufficient for their Indiana class battleships when they first commissioned and would have needed to borrow the resources of Halifax which was a sore point at the time.

It probably takes about twenty years to build the infrastructure for a battleship navy certainly by 1904 America had something like a dozen each of battleships and armoured cruisers (which were as big as contemporary battleships but lacked the guns and armour) on the go but it took time to get there.

Still I do agree it is far and away easier for the US to build a cruiser fleet that can give Italy's merchant marine a bad than vice versa.
 

Deleted member 43582

There is the issue of Britain stepping in, closing the Strait of Gibraltar and saying "nope".
 

TFSmith121

Banned
Here's Indiana in 1898 at Brooklyn NY:

Also it might be worth noting but the US lacked a dry dock sufficient for their Indiana class battleships when they first commissioned and would have needed to borrow the resources of Halifax which was a sore point at the time.

It probably takes about twenty years to build the infrastructure for a battleship navy certainly by 1904 America had something like a dozen each of battleships and armoured cruisers (which were as big as contemporary battleships but lacked the guns and armour) on the go but it took time to get there.

Here's Indiana in 1898 at Brooklyn NY - what's your source on the drydock comment?

1421863253212.jpg


By 1904 (FWIW), the USN had 11 battleships (Indiana, BB 1 to Missouri, BB 11) in commission, plus Texas, as well as two armored cruisers (New York and Brooklyn), and 17 protected cruisers of one type or another, all commissioned since the mid-1880s; in addition, all ten of the "New Navy" monitors were in commission.

Tonnage comparison in 1900 (closest date in Kennedy) was 333,000 for the USN (fourth world-wide, after UK, France, and Russia) and 245,000 for Italy (sixth, after Germany in fifth place with 285,000).

There is a trend here.;)

Best,
 
Last edited:
Can't see any reason the US & Italian navies would line upon opposite sides in 1890's early 1900's (or even later). US vessels could transit to the Med nonstop easily, though would need to refuel when they got there, Italian ships not so much. Also I question how the Italian ships would handle Atlantic conditions.
 
Here's Indiana in 1898 at Brooklyn NY - what's your source on the drydock comment?

By 1904 (FWIW), the USN had 11 battleships ( Indiana, BB 1 to Missouri, BB 11) in commission, plus Texas, as well as two armored cruisers (New York and Brooklyn), and 17 protected cruisers of one type or another, all commissioned since the mid-1880s; in addition, all ten of the "New Navy" monitors were in commission.

Tonnage comparison in 1900 (closest date in Kennedy) was 333,000 for the USN (fourth world-wide, after UK, France, and Russia) and 245,000 for Italy (sixth, after Germany in fifth place with 285,000).

There is a trend here.;)

Best,

The Defence of the Undefended Border, Richard A.Preston. You might note the Indiana's were commissioned in 1896. As I noted above the US also in addition to the ships in commission had a significant number of battleships and armoured cruisers under construction in 1904.

The trajectory towards America becoming ultimately the greatest naval power was clear however at the date in question there was a long way to go. Actually as of 1904 there was still a long way to go but America had already accelerated out of Italy's league. In 1891 this might not have been quite as apparent to some observers but still should have been to most.
 
The Defence of the Undefended Border, Richard A.Preston. You might note the Indiana's were commissioned in 1896.
I'm not sure if that was a misreading on his part. As he correctly points out, the US did need to send their ships to Halifax for dry-docking: however, according to the 15 August 1897 edition of the Chicago Tribune, that was because the dry dock at Brooklyn was out of action because of defects in the foundation. The second dock at Port Royal, South Carolina was both inconveniently located and "probably not in condition to receive so large a vessel as the Indiana to advantage".

In either case, the British are absolutely not going to breach neutrality by allowing an enemy warship to use their dry docks: nor, however, are they going to block passage through the Gibraltar straits. They would also follow the American Civil War example of heavily restricting sales of coal, which will make the life of any American cruising warship extremely difficult. Particularly so, now that the telegraph makes it much easier for British colonies to inform others about which ships they've allowed to resupply: no stocking up in one port and moving on to the next, as was done during the American Civil War. Not that the Italians have a vast amount of transoceanic trade to attack, of course.
 
I really like the discussion on battleships but i dont think that there was any chance of a serious war between the 2 powers mentioned. And even if there was there is the problem that a lot of non participants (GBR, FRA) would hate the idea of american ships in the mediterranean sea. And you need someone backing you to have some coaling stations. I dont think the USA could fight a war in Europe without an european partner/supporter.
 

raharris1973

Gone Fishin'
Donor
Monthly Donor
I dont think the USA could fight a war in Europe without an european partner/supporter.

I can't think of why any Mediterranean power would want see being America's good graces as being more important than being in America's good graces.

If any great power had a motive to tilt pro-US, it would have been the British with their major western hemisphere presence, but robcraufurd pointed out that such a tilt is unrealistic. It seems to me that Italy is more relevant to German, French, Austrian and Ottoman security than America is, so I don't see them helping the US either.

Especially because any such Italo-American fighting at this would be motivated by a miscarriage of justice in America, and would be in the nature of a punitive raid and not realistically aimed at empire-building or anything so ambitious.
 

TFSmith121

Banned
There's the minor point, of course, that

Especially because any such Italo-American fighting at this would be motivated by a miscarriage of justice in America, and would be in the nature of a punitive raid and not realistically aimed at empire-building or anything so ambitious.

There's the minor point, of course, that Italy had a few things a lot closer to home to worry about in the 1890s...like:

France
Austria-Hungary
The Ottoman Empire

Although the Europeans - notably the British, French, and the Germans played "the endangered German" from time to time (see Agadir) - they rarely if ever did so with other industrialized powers.

Interesting pattern, that.

Best,
 

LordKalvert

Banned
Neither the US or Italy really had much to get at each other in 1890. Such a conflict would probably be limited to armed merchantmen raiding shipping until both sides get tired. Its a long way to Italy from the US and neither had bases near each other.

Italy's navy really deteriorates after Adowa dropping from 3rd place to about sixth or seventh by 1900

Italian ship designs are interesting and some are very innovative. The main problem is lack of funding leading to prolonged building times.

Ships of around 1890 suffered from massive gun disease- the guns were huge but had little rate of fire. Might not have mattered all that much since smokeless powder wasn't in use very much

Of course we should remember in the era, weapons were sold on the open market. Buying warships and merchant vessels that can be transformed into auxillary cruisers would have been the way both parties go

What allies you could scrounge up would be important but doubt if anyone would get involved. There's nothing the US or Italy had that anyone would want
 

LordKalvert

Banned
Main SHips of the Italians in 1891:

Duilio Class (Duilio and Dnadolo)

11,000 tons
4 17.7 inch muzzle loaders
3 torpedo tubes

15 knots
4330 mile range

Italia Class (Italia and Lepanto)

14,000 tons
4 17 inch guns Muzzle Loaders
8 6 inch
4 4.7 inch
18 knots
8700 mile range

Ruggiero di Lauria class (Di lauria, Francesco Morosini, Andrea Doria)

10,000 tons
4 17 inch guns
2 6 inch guns
17 knots
3,200 milerange

The Americans don't have anything that could be called a capital ship until 1895 with the Texas and Maine. They have some cruisers but nothing of any great value

The guns are awful- they have little range, took about an hour to load for the big guns (thats what the Japanese get at the battle of the Yalu for their big guns) and its almost impossible to actually hit anything with them especially if it moves. There are no range finders, telescopic lenses and they don't have smokeless powder so no one can see anything

There are no major battle with ships from this era so its hard to gauge exactly how they would have worked but really can't see these two fleets even finding each other
 

raharris1973

Gone Fishin'
Donor
Monthly Donor
Fleets tend to find each other not in open seas but in sight of land-

Using its own and commercially available colliers, could any of the Italian ships make a trip to New Orleans or other Gulf or East coast ships for a bombardment?

Did the Italians have any patrols going on in the Pacific at this point, possibly using it to attack American ships cruising around Hong Kong, or Samoa?
 

LordKalvert

Banned
Italy could get some of their battleships to the US recoaling at sea. They could mount a minor bombardment that would do little damage if any.

Don't know of any Italian patrols in the Pacific they were very Mediterranean oriented. Just can't really see how these two are getting at each other.

Even commerce raiding is going to be hard on them as little of their trade is carried on their own ships
 
Top