Posting this because I thought it was interesting. My connection is through Martha McCann Donahue`s husband Timothy.

The Bridgeport Telegram, Saturday, November 6 1954
AROUND-ABOUT BRIDGEPORT
by William Lamale
(see photo accompanying article: A proud possession of Mrs. Martha Donahue of 4141 Main street, is this copy of one of few photos of the U.S.S. Connecticut, the battleship which was a unit of the U.S. Navy from 1904 to 1923.)
Slightly more than 50 years ago, on September 29 1904, the U.S.S. Connecticut, one of the world's great battleships then, was launched at the Brooklyn Navy yard amidst an "intense feeling of suspense" that sabotage might be committed during the ceremony. But nothing happened to the 17-700 ton 450-foot vessel, and she slid down the ways a moment after champagne was splashed on her bow by Miss Alice Welles, granddaughter of President Lincoln's Secretary of State Governor Chamberlain of Connecticut was among the official onlookers. It was the first vessel of such a size to be constructed in the yard since the Maine, ill-fated battleship that blew up in Havana harbor. The Connecticut remained in active service until 1923, when she
was decommissioned and scuttled.
Her proud figurehead which breasted the waves in sea lanes around the globe as the connecticut led the "Great White Fleet" a battleship squadron, is on display in the lobby of the State Capitol. A model of the ship itself is exhibited in Memorial Hall in the State Library. A copy of one of the few remaining photos of the ship is owned by Mrs. Martha Donahue of 4141 Main street. The photo was made under circumstances that nearly cost the cameraman his life. It was the gift of her brother-in-law serving as Chief Boatswain aboard the craft, the late Percy Hatch Bierce, who in later sadder days helped supervise the dismantling of the stately sea veteran. The ship was the third to bear the name "Connecticut". One had been built in Middletown in 1789 and another, a side-wheeler purchased for $200,000 was used during the Civil War. Her construction for $4,212,000 was authorized in 1902 by act of Congress. She was to be the most powerful ship in the
Navy and work proceeded apace after the keel was laid March
10, 1903. Armament alone totaled 3,992 tons. The main turrets were eight inches thick with 12 inch faces, the barbettes were ten-inch steel and her conning tower had nine inches of armor plate. She carried four 12-inch breech loading guns, eight eight-inch guns mounted in pairs in four turrets in the superstructure and her main deck battery consisted of 12 seven-inch rapid fire guns. Also mounted in the Connecticut were 12 14-pounders and 12 three-pounders. Her engines developed a maximum of 16,500 horsepower and could drive the Connecticut through the water at 18 knows. Fueled with 2,200 tons of bunker coal, she could steam 7,000 miles at 11 knots or 2,500 miles at full speed. She was outfitted as flagship of the Atlantic Fleet with a complement of 42 officers and 761 men. In 1906, Chief Boatswain Bierce was assigned aboard, the
only Bridgeporter on the ship at that time. He wrote home
that the officers' quarters were cramped but that the
Connecticut was superbly equipped and disciplined.
It was during a test run in Penobscot Bay Maine that the
historic photograph was made. Copies of it hung in President Theodore Roosevelt's study in the White House and in the stateroom of the German Imperial yacht "Hohenzollern".
Admiral Ronley D. Evans, in command of the three-mile test, ordered forced speed and the three funnels of the huge vessel belched black smoke as stokers fired her boilers with select Welsh coal sprinkled with oil. Waiting at the end of the course was a steam launch with an official photographer, Enrique Muller, aboard. The plan was that the launch should swerve across the bow of the onrushing battleship to provide the photographer with a head-on view. As the Connecticut passed the buoy at the two-mile mark, the commander of the launch set his course accordingly. It traveled slower at an angle that would bring it directly into the path of the battleship. As planned, the launch steamed up to the path of the Connecticut and the pilot swung his wheel so violently to
swerve the ship that he jammed the steering gear. Admiral
Evans closed his eyes in horror. With fantastic calm, Muller snapped the shutter and a moment later was struggling the water.Two exposed plates he had made of the approaching battleship were lost but the third, kept in the camera held aloft by Muller, was intact. From it came the epic photograph which once decorated many walls and which, Mrs. Donahue notes, stirred pride in all families with men aboard the Connecticut.