Portuguese ironclad Vasco da Gama armored belt that was thick on either end and thick amidships. The main battery guns were protected by thick barbettes. "Vasco da Gama" was laid down at the Thames Iron Works shipyard in London, Britain in 1875, and was launched on 1 December 1876. The ship was completed in 1878. She served as part of the coastal defense force that protected Lisbon, the Portuguese capital, and the mouth of the river Tagus. On 26 June 1897, "Vasco da Gama" participated in the Fleet Review at Spithead celebrating Queen Victoria's Diamond Jubilee. At the time, the ship was commanded by Captain
Vasco da Gama Fernandes Vasco da Gama Fernandes Vasco da Gama Fernandes (4 November 1908 - 9 September 1991), was a Portuguese lawyer and politician. He was named after his most remote relative Vasco da Gama. Vasco da Gama Fernandes was licensee in Law, from the faculty of Law of the University of Lisbon, and became a lawyer and politician. Distinguished as an oppositioner to "Estado Novo", being arrested for several times by the political police (PIDE), he joined the Aliança Republicana e Socialista (ARS) and later to the Movimento de Unidade Nacional Antifascista (MUNAF). In 1945, he was one of the founders of