Chilean ironclad Blanco Encalada

Blanco Encalada was an Almirante Cochrane–class central battery ship built by Earle's Shipbuilding in Hull, England, and commissioned into the Chilean Navy in 1875. Nicknamed El Blanco, she served prominently during the War of the Pacific. She participated in the capture of the Peruvian monitor Huáscar during the Battle of Angamos.

You can help expand this article with text translated from the corresponding article in Spanish. (December 2009) Click [show] for important translation instructions.

View a machine-translated version of the Spanish article.
Machine translation, like DeepL or Google Translate, is a useful starting point for translations, but translators must revise errors as necessary and confirm that the translation is accurate, rather than simply copy-pasting machine-translated text into the English Wikipedia.
Do not translate text that appears unreliable or low-quality. If possible, verify the text with references provided in the foreign-language article.
You must provide copyright attribution in the edit summary accompanying your translation by providing an interlanguage link to the source of your translation. A model attribution edit summary is Content in this edit is translated from the existing Spanish Wikipedia article at [[:es:Blanco Encalada (fragata blindada)]]; see its history for attribution.
You may also add the template {{Translated|es|Blanco Encalada (fragata blindada)}} to the talk page.
For more guidance, see Wikipedia:Translation.

Quick facts History, Chile ...

Blanco Encalada
History
Chile
Name	Valparaíso
Namesake	Manuel Blanco Encalada
Builder	Earle's Shipbuilding Co., Hull
Laid down	1873
Launched	8 May 1875
Completed	1875
Renamed	Blanco Encalada (1876)
Fate	Sunk by torpedo, 23 April 1891
General characteristics
Class & type	Almirante Cochrane-class central battery ship
Displacement	3,480 long tons (3,540 t)
Length	210 ft (64.0 m)
Beam	46 ft 9 in (14.2 m)
Draught	19 ft 8 in (6.0 m)
Installed power	3,000 ihp (2,200 kW)
Propulsion	2 shafts, 2 Trunk steam engines 6 cylindrical boilers
Sail plan	Barque rig
Speed	12 knots (22 km/h; 14 mph)
Range	1,200 nmi (2,200 km; 1,400 mi) at 10 knots (19 km/h; 12 mph)
Complement	300
Armament	6 × 9 in (229 mm) muzzle-loading rifles 1 × 20-pounder gun 1 × 9-pounder gun 1 × 7-pounder gun
Armour	Belt: 4.5–9 in (114–229 mm) Battery: 6–8 in (152–203 mm) Deck: 2–3 in (51–76 mm) Conning tower: 4.5 in (114 mm) Bulkheads: 6 in (152 mm)

Blanco Encalada formed part of the congressional forces that brought down President José Manuel Balmaceda in the Chilean Civil War of 1891. She was sunk during that conflict on 23 April 1891, becoming the first ironclad warship to be sunk by a self-propelled torpedo.^[1]^[2]

Background

In 1871 the president of Chile, Federico Errázuriz Zañartu, sent the Congress a bill to authorize the executive to acquire two armored warships. The bill, which was approved only by a vote of no confidence,^{[clarification needed]} stipulated that both vessels would be mid-sized frigates and would not cost more than 2 million pesos.^{[citation needed]}

Construction and commissioning

Ambassador Alberto Blest Gana oversaw the project and engaged former British Admiralty naval architect Edward James Reed as technical advisor. Blest Gana contracted Earle's Shipbuilding Co. in Hull, Yorkshire to carry out the construction.

The two ships were named Cochrane and Valparaíso but later, upon arrival at port on 24 January 1876, Valparaíso was renamed Blanco Encalada by the decree of the Minister of War and Navy on 15 September 1876. This was in honor of the admiral and first president of the Republic of Chile, Manuel Blanco Encalada. The construction of Blanco Encalada started in April 1872 and the ship was launched in 1875.

In January 1878, President Aníbal Pinto ordered the ambassador to Europe, Alberto Blest Gana, to put the ships up for sale as soon as the dispute with Argentina was resolved to help alleviate the economic crises that prevailed in Chile. On behalf of Blest Gana, Reed offered the United Kingdom Cochrane for 220,000 pounds sterling, but the British were not interested. He then attempted to sell the ships to Russia with the same result.

Remove ads

Operational service

Summarize

Perspective

This section needs expansion. You can help by adding to it. (September 2014)

Being the flagship of the Chilean armada, Blanco Encalada actively participated in the War of the Pacific. The frigate's first actions, under the command of Admiral Juan Williams Rebolledo, consisted of taking part in the blockade of Iquique and in the failed expedition to the port of Callao.

Afterward, Blanco Encalada tried, unsuccessfully, to hunt the Peruvian monitor Huáscar. Williams’ inability to put an end to what became known as the "Huáscar Raids" finally motivated him to resign his command. The failure of a decisive victory against the monitor was primarily owed to the bad state of the engines and boilers of Blanco Encalada and the skill of the commander of the Peruvian ship, Miguel Grau Seminario.

Command passed to Commander‐in‐Chief Galvarino Riveros Cárdenas, who ordered the fleet to regroup and carry out repairs on Blanco Encalada and her consorts. For this purpose, Blanco Encalada was anchored in Mejillones to make repairs to the engine using the workshops of the Salitres de Antofagasta Company. The hull was cleaned using divers brought from Valparaíso. The success of the repairs, which were finished at the end of September, was limited however. The ship could achieve, in a test voyage, a speed of only 9 knots (17 km/h; 10 mph). After the repairs, Blanco Enclada participated in the Battle of Angamos where the Chilean fleet finally captured Huáscar on 8 October 1879. The last action in which Blanco Encalada participated was the capture, in the close quarters of Mollendo, of the gunboat Pilcomayo on 18 November.

Chilean ironclad Blanco Encalada

Background

Construction and commissioning

Operational service

Sinking

Commanders of Blanco Encalada

Notes

References

Wikiwand - on