Italian cruiser Giovanni Bausan

Giovanni Bausan was a protected cruiser of the Regia Marina (the Royal Italian Navy) that was designed and built by Sir W G Armstrong Mitchell & Co.'s Elswick Works in England in the mid-1880s. One of the first ships of her type, Bausan was intended for use as a "battleship destroyer", but the low rate of fire of her guns and her lack of steadiness as a gun platform made her ineffective in this role. Seeing service in both the conquest of Eritrea and the Italo-Turkish War, she had been relegated to auxiliary roles by the outbreak of the First World War, and was sold for scrapping soon after the conclusion of that conflict.

Design
The design of Giovanni Bausan was based on that of Elswick's earlier Esmeralda, built for Chile, and was the first modern light cruiser constructed for the Italian Navy. Referred to by some as a torpedo ram, she was equipped with a ram bow and initially fitted with rigging as a schooner. She was fitted with an armoured deck 1.5 in in thickness, and had an 'armor' belt of cork at her waterline, which was intended to swell through water absorption after being hit. This proved to be unsuccessful as hits would result in the destruction of the cork.

Armament was heavy for her size, with the main armament consisting of a pair of 10 in, 30-50-caliber, breech-loading guns in barbettes fore and aft, capable of training up to 30 degrees abaft of the beam. Six 5.9 in, 26-caliber secondary guns were mounted in casemates three to a beam, while 14 in torpedo tubes were mounted in the bow underwater and one on each beam above water with 50 degrees of train.

The three Etna-class protected cruisers were half-sisters of Bausan, built to a modified, slightly enlarged design.

Operational history
After her commissioning on 9 May 1885, she departed from England on 21 May to join the Squada Permamente (Permanent Squadron), and in 1887–1888 she participated in the conquest of Eritrea, where she acted as the flagship of the Italian Red Sea Squadron.

Following the conclusion of the Eritrean campaign, Bausan would spend much of her time in service overseas, particularly in the Americas. During this service, she made a port visit to New York City in 1892, during which she was the first foreign warship to be repaired at the Brooklyn Navy Yard in 15 years. By 1905 she had been designated for use as a training ship, and served as such until the outbreak of the Italo-Turkish War in 1912. Returning to active duty as Flagship Cyrenaica, she served in the shore bombardment role until the end of the war, when she was again returned to second-line service as a distilling ship. Fitted with four distillers and capable of producing 200 tons of fresh water every 24 hours, she was operating in this role at the start of the First World War.

Because of the pressing need for artillery for service with the army, Bausan was disarmed during the war, and was reassigned for service as a seaplane depot ship at Brindisi. Decommissioned in 1919, she was sold for scrap in 1920 and broken up soon after.