MAINE, The. A battleship of the United States navy, mysteriously destroyed by explo sion in Havana Harbor, Cuba, on the night of 15 Feb. 1898. The revolt of the Cubans in 1895 against Spanish misrule had brought the island in 1897-98 to the verge of ruin. General Wey ler had been recalled and General Blanco was sent as governor-general to endeavor to bring order out of chaos, but his plans failed and January 1898 witnessed serious disturbances. The American government, believing the lives and property of American citizens in Havana in danger, the Maine, which had been for some time at Key West, was ordered to Havana and arrived at that port 24 Jan. 1898. She was piloted into the harbor by an official pilot of the Spanish government and was moored to a government buoy. The usual official and inter national calls and salutations were exchanged between the Spanish authorities and the com mander of the Maine, Capt. Charles D. Sigsbee, and outwardly there was no evidence of the impending disaster. The Maine carried 26 of ficers and 328 men, all of whom were on hoard when the explosion took place, except an assist ant engineer, two naval cadets and a gunner. Two officers and 250 men were killed at once and 8 men died afterward in hospital. Only 16 of the crew wholly escaped injury. Of the dead, 166 were buried in Colon Cemetery, and 25 at Key West. In 1899 the dead buried at Colon Cemetery were brought to the United States and buried at Arlington with military and naval ceremonies. A court of inquiry, Capt. W. T. Sampson presiding, was instituted and after a month's investigation expressed the opinion that the vessel was destroyed by the explosion of a submarine mine, but respon sibility could not be fixed upon any person or persons. Shortly afterward war was declared.
(See UNITED STATES-THE WAR WITH SPAIN).
There was a very general demand through out the United States that the Maine should be raised, and on 9 May 1910 Congress author ized operations and the matter was placed in charge of the War Department, and assigned specifically to the engineer corps of the army. An elliptical coffer-dam, composed of a series of huge contracted cylinders that were construc ted of interlocking steel piles and filled with mud and stone, was placed around the wreck. It %was a wonderful piece of engineering, re flecting great credit on every army engineer connected with its inception and execution. The coffer-dam was completed 5 June 1911, and the entire wreck exposed 2 November following. Ajoint army and navy board, of which Rear Admiral Charles E. Vreeland was president, was then sent to Havana to reinvestigate the wreck. It reported 15 Dec. 1911, confirming the verdict of the Sampson court except in the non-essential detail that the centre of the explosion was a little farther aft than was re ported by that court. The after half of the hull, all that was not shattered, was floated 13 Feb. 1912, 14 years, lacking two days, after the Maine's destruction. On 16 March 1912 this relic of the once powerful battleship was towed to sea, with attendant ceremonies, afloat and ashore, and sunk in 600 fathoms of water. Concurrently 34 coffins, estimated to contain the bones of 64 of the Maine's dead, were placed on board an American war vessel and dis patched to Arlington, where, on 23 March, they were buried in the Maine plot.