Commemorative Ship Mikasa

The oldest surviving steel battleship in the world, Mikasa was built in 1902 at the Vickers Shipyard in England and is preserved and displayed in Mikasa Park in Yokosuka Harbor.

The battleship has been in service since 1904, and was the historical setting for the “Battle of the Sea of Japan” during the Russo-Japanese War, in which Commander-in-Chief Heihachiro Togo took command and won the battle against the Russian Baltic Fleet.

This battle attracted worldwide attention as the first instance of an Asian nation winning a victory over a Western nation.

Inside the battleship, a number of dioramas, memorabilia, relics, memoirs, medals, and other valuable historical materials from the period are on display, making it a place that makes visitors think about history and war.

The memorial ship Mikasa is also recognized as a constituent cultural property of the Japanese Heritage.

Battleship Mikasa

Mikasa was a battleship of the Imperial Japanese Navy and served as the flagship of the Allied Fleet in the Battle of the Sea of Japan during the Russo-Japanese War.

Today, Mikasa is preserved and open to the public in Yokosuka City, Kanagawa Prefecture, and is considered one of the three most important memorial ships in Japan.

The warship Mikasa was the fourth of the Shikishima class battleships, built by the British Vickers Company and completed in 1902. Its naming comes from Mount Mikasa (Kasuga) in Nara Prefecture.

The ship’s port of registry is Maizuru Port in Maizuru City, Kyoto Prefecture, and other ships of the same type are Shikishima, Hatsuse, and Asahi. During the Russo-Japanese War, the ship was used as the flagship of the Allied Fleet from 1904, and General Heihachiro Togo and other leaders of the Allied Fleet served aboard.

In 1912, there was a fire accident in the forward powder magazine.

In the Taisho era (1912-1926), she was engaged in northern security operations such as the Siberian Invasion, and in 1921 was classified as a naval defense ship, and in 1923 she was sunk in Yokosuka military port after the Great Kanto Earthquake.

Due to the Washington Naval Disarmament Treaty, she was discharged and became a memorial ship in Yokosuka. It is now under the control of the Ministry of Defense and is preserved in Mikasa Park in Yokosuka, Kanagawa Prefecture.

History:

Construction

After the Sino-Japanese War, the Imperial Japanese Navy expanded its forces to counter the Russian Empire. As part of the plan, the “Sixty-sixth Fleet Project” was implemented, and the “Mikasa” was ordered from Vickers of England and built as the final ship of the project.

The groundbreaking at Barrow-in-Furness Shipyard took place on January 24, 1899, and the ship was launched on November 8, 1900. The cost of construction was 880,000 pounds for the hull and 320,000 pounds for the ordnance.

She left Plymouth, England, on March 13 and arrived at Yokosuka on May 18 via the Suez Canal. The first captain was Colonel Gengo Hayasaki. After undergoing maintenance in Yokosuka, she departed on June 23 and arrived at her home port of Maizuru on July 17.

Military History:

On July 24, 1903, King Hakuhyo Fushiminomiya assumed command of the rear turret of the Mikasa, which became the flagship of the Allied Fleet on December 28.

From February 6, 1904, she participated in the Russo-Japanese War, taking part in the attack on the Port of Arushun and the operation to close the Port of Arushun.

On August 10, she participated in the Battle of the Yellow Sea and was heavily hit. During the battle, an explosion occurred in the rear turret, resulting in one death and 16 wounded. This battle marked the beginning of his close relationship with Heihachiro Togo, Kanji Kato, and King Hakuhyo of Fushimi Palace.

On December 28, the ship arrived at Kure for repairs, but the cause of the 膅fire was never determined and remained unsettled.

On February 14, 1905, the ship departed Kure and entered Jinhae Bay on the Korean Peninsula. Thereafter, she used the area as a base for training and engaged Russia’s Baltic Fleet in the Battle of the Sea of Japan on May 27 and 28. The Baltic Fleet was destroyed in the battle, and Japan was victorious, but the Mikasa itself suffered 113 casualties.

On September 11, 1905, shortly after the end of the Russo-Japanese War, Mikasa sank in Sasebo harbor due to an explosion in her rear ammunition magazines. The accident resulted in 339 fatalities. There are various theories as to the cause of the accident, but it is believed to have been caused by the overturning of a lit washbasin and the alteration of the Shimose gunpowder.

Heihachiro Togo was ashore and safe at the time of the accident, and on October 3, 1912, a fire broke out in the forward powder magazine, but the ship was saved from exploding and sinking by water injection.

She was later repaired and entered World War I in 1914, and in 1921, she was damaged in a stranding accident in the Ascord Strait, but made emergency repairs and returned to Maizuru.

The ship was scrapped:

In the interwar period, the Washington Disarmament Treaty decreed that the Mikasa was to be scrapped, and on September 1, 1923, she was struck by the Great Kanto Earthquake, resulting in heavy flooding off Vladivostok, where she was grounded.

The Mikasa’s sister ships, Shikishima and Asahi, were disarmed and repurposed as training ships.

The “Mikasa” was scheduled to be dismantled, but a public campaign for her preservation led to special permission for her to be preserved in a condition that would preclude her return to active service.

In January 1925, it was decided that the ship would be preserved in Yokosuka as a memorial ship, and work was undertaken to preserve it. The bow was pointed toward the Imperial Palace, sand was poured around the perimeter of the hull, and concrete was poured on the lower deck. The Mikasa was then anchored to the seabed so that the height of the deck would not change with the ebb and flow of the tide.

No restoration of armament was done during the preservation, but wooden dummies were attached to the turrets.

On November 12, 1926, a ceremony was held to commemorate the preservation of Mikasa. The ceremony was attended by members of the Imperial family, Admirals, and former crew members of the Mikasa.

During the Pacific War, Asahi participated in the Southern Campaign as an experimental ship and sank on May 25, 1942. Shikishima” served as a training ship, and “Mikasa” spent the war years as a preserved ship.

During the Doolittle Air Raid, bombing raids were carried out from above the Mikasa, hitting the “OHEI” (Ryuho), which was undergoing conversion at the Yokosuka Naval Arsenal, but the “Mikasa” was not damaged.

At the end of the war, on July 18, 1945, there was an air raid on Yokosuka Military Port, and the training ships Fuji and Kasuga were damaged and landed on the bottom, but the Mikasa was undamaged.

Subsequent devastation:

After the war, while Japan was occupied by the Allied Forces, Mikasa received a request from the Soviet Union, the successor state to the Russian Empire, to be dismantled. However, thanks to the efforts of patriot Rear Admiral Charles Willoughby of the U.S. Army and Admiral Chester Nimitz of the U.S. Navy, the ship was spared that fate.

As of April 1946, just one year after the end of the war, Japanese thieves used gas burners to steal metal parts that could be cut, and teak wood from the deck was stolen for fuel and building materials.

As a result, the “Mikasa” rapidly fell into disrepair. When U.S. Navy Admiral Chester Nimitz learned of this devastation, he was outraged and deployed marines to protect the “Mikasa.

However, when the U.S. forces under the command of the Allied Forces seized Yokosuka Harbor, entertainment facilities were set up and “Cabaret Togo” was held on the ship. Later an aquarium was installed at the location of the aft main turret.

In response to this state of disrepair, Englishman John S. Rubin wrote a letter to the English-language newspaper “The Japan Times,” which received a great deal of publicity.

In addition, General Chester Nimitz, a great admirer of Heihachiro Togo, was so concerned about the condition of Mikasa that he donated a portion of the proceeds from the sales of his books to the Society for the Preservation of Mikasa and the Rebuilding of Togo Shrine. As a result, the movement for restoration and preservation gradually gained momentum in Japan and abroad.

At the time, the debate in Japan was divided between those who favored restoration and preservation and those who favored complete removal. The complete removal camp argued that there was no precedent for designating a warship as an important cultural property and that the Mikasa was already in disrepair, making designation difficult.

Furthermore, it was also during the period of high economic growth, and some argued that the ship’s hull should be sold to obtain funds to build a commemorative museum.

The Maritime Self-Defense Force was also unable to raise funds for maintenance costs, and the opinion was expressed that “we cannot take back a ship that is not working. However, the budget was approved and restoration work began in 1959, and on June 27 of the same year, jurisdiction was transferred from the Ministry of Finance to the Defense Agency (now the Ministry of Defense). The work was completed in 1961, and a ceremony was held on May 27 of the same year to commemorate the restoration.

In restoring the building, the items that had been removed by the U.S. military, such as the table in the Secretary’s office, were returned in almost complete form. However, items that were taken by unknown persons have not yet been returned.

In 1958, the Chilean Navy battleship Almirante Latorre was dismantled, and parts were donated to Japan.

Present:

The Mikasa is now preserved as a museum ship. The surrounding area has been developed as Mikasa Park.

The Mikasa is the world’s only surviving IJN class battleship. Due to the devastation after World War II, only a few parts of the ship have been preserved in their original state.

The turret, chimney, and mast are reproductions. The main gun is made of steel, integrated with the turret, and supported from below the barrel by a prop. A large part of the deck was also restored by welding.

The lower deck preserves the officer’s quarters used by Fushiminomiya, but the rest of the ship is used as the office and reference room of the “Mikasa Preservation Society” and is not open to the public.

The area below the lower deck has been filled with concrete and earth in accordance with the Washington Disarmament Treaty.

Currently, the interior of the Mikasa can be viewed only on the upper deck and part of the middle deck, where an exhibition room and a screening room have been set up as a museum where visitors can imagine what the warship might have looked like.

Some parts of the deck still have teak wood as it was when the ship was an active warship, tile floors in the toilet room, an anchor and chain that miraculously escaped theft, and an anchor crane.

The riveted structure around the communications room is a relic of the period, with the exception of a section that was repaired by welding after World War II. The chrysanthemum crest on the bow was preserved in its original state until 1987, but has since been replaced by a restored version, and the main body of the crest is openly preserved on board.

The actual owner is the Ministry of Defense of Japan, and the facility is registered as a facility of the Yokosuka Regional Admiralty of the Maritime Self-Defense Force.

Inspection and repair costs are allocated from the defense budget. Although not a defense facility, it is treated as a “vessel” under the Ministry of Defense regulations, and contractors who perform inspections and repairs must meet Ministry of Defense standards. The assessed value of the vessel is 2 yen, and the assessed value of the land is approximately 250 million yen.

Self-Defense Force personnel visit the ship for training tours as part of the “Mikasa Training Program” for petty officer candidates from the Yokosuka Education Corps, and cleanup activities are also conducted by volunteer Self-Defense Force personnel.

Due to budget constraints, the budget for the “Mikasa” is limited. In 2009, crew members from the U.S. Navy aircraft carrier USS Nimitz volunteered to paint the hull of the “Mikasa.

Inside the museum, visitors can experience the Battle of the Sea of Japan using VR goggles in the ship-handling simulator and in the exhibition area.

Abbreviated Chronology:

1898: The Japanese government orders the ship to be built by Vickers of England.
January 24, 1899: Construction began.
March 1, 1902: Completed.
1904: Participated in the Russo-Japanese War. Joined the 1st Squadron of the 1st Fleet.
February 9: Participates in the attack on Port Arthur and the blockade of Port Arthur.
August 10: Participates in the Battle of the Yellow Sea.
May 27 - May 28, 1905: Serves as flagship of the Combined Fleet during the Battle of the Sea of Japan, with Heihachiro Togo, Commander-in-Chief of the Combined Fleet, on board.
September 11, 1905: Sank in an explosion in Sasebo Harbor.
1906: Uplift and repairs begin.
October 3, 1912: An explosion in a powder magazine accompanies a crew member’s suicide.
1923: The Washington Disarmament Treaty decides to scrap the ship.
1923 (Sept. 20): Decommissioned.
1925: Cabinet decides to preserve the Mikasa in Yokosuka as a memorial ship. The Mikasa Preservation Society is established.
November 12, 1926: A ceremony is held to commemorate the preservation of Mikasa, which is named “Commemorative Ship Mikasa.
1945: The Mikasa Preservation Society is disbanded after the ship is seized by the Allied Forces. The ship is subsequently razed to the ground.
1958: The Mikasa Preservation Society is rebuilt and a fundraising campaign is launched to restore the ship.
1959-1961: Restoration and maintenance work begins.
June 27: The Ministry of Finance transfers jurisdiction of the building to the Defense Agency.
May 27, 1961: A ceremony was held to commemorate the restoration of the Mikasa.
1992: Received the Maritime Heritage Award from the World Ship Foundation.