Here at LSOZI, we are going to take out every Wednesday for a look at the old steam/diesel navies of the 1859-1946 time period and will profile a different ship each week. – Christopher Eger
Warship Wednesday, Feb 19, The Wandering Island of Luzon
(click to embiggen)
Here we see the spic and span US gunboat USS Isla de Luzon resting quietly at anchor with her 1900s issue white and buff paint scheme. Her life before this moment was a little different. Ordered by the Spanish government for the Armada Española, she was billed as a second-class “protected cruiser” by her government. In actuality, she was, even when new, considered smaller than most other cruisers, not to mention slow and ineffective.
In Spanish service, the cruiser had a green and black paint scheme with buff-to-white superstructures
Laid down on 25 February 1886 in the UK, she was built by Elswick (Armstrong, Whitworth) at Newcastle upon Tyne. She was completed and commissioned in late 1887. Just over 1000-tons, she was 184-feet in length. Beamy at nearly 30 feet, she had a length-to-beam ratio of 1:6 and tended to wallow in heavy seas. She also didn’t have enough ass to push her through the waves, her 2-shaft horizontal triple-expansion engines fed by 2 cylindrical boilers could generate about 14 knots, 15 if she was light. Very lightly armored, she was also lightly armed with a half-dozen 4.7-inch guns as well as some smaller QFs and MGs but her deadliest weapon was a triple set of 14-inch torpedo tubes.
Delivered to the Armada in 1887, she served first in Europe and even dropped some shells on the Rif in Morocco from time to time, practicing true gunboat diplomacy.
Today her size and armament would make her a corvette or offshore patrol vessel. In her time, cruisers were meant to be the fast eyes of the fleet, able to reach out over the horizon, find targets, and alert the main fleet of other vessels. The Isla de Luzon was too slow for that, and she soon found herself in colonial service in the Philippines. There she could visit far-flung Pacific islands and enforce the crown’s law against the locals without too much problem. She was part of the Spanish Pacific Squadron under Admiral Patricio Montojo, which consisted of seven cruisers (of which Isla de Luzon was one of the best) and a few gunboats.
Then came the Spanish-American War.
Dewey in the USS Olympia drops it like it’s hot on the moored Spanish fleet. Isla de Luzon would be in the background closer to the shore
On 1 May 1898, Commodore Dewey steamed his Asiatic Squadron into Cañacao Bay under the lee of the Cavite Peninsula east of Sangley Point, Luzon– coincidentally the island she was named after. The resulting Battle of Manila Bay, the first major engagement of the Spanish-American War, left most Spanish ships sunk while Dewey suffered less than forty casualties by the worst estimate.
Isla de Luzon was hit three times by US shells, then was scuttled in shallow water by her crew when the battle was in its final stages. She only had a half-dozen casualties. Bluejackets from the gunboat Petrel swarmed over her stricken hull, looted what they could, and set her alight.
Raised after the war, she was rebuilt, rearmed with US-pattern guns, painted white, and commissioned USS Isla de Luzon on 11 April 1900.
Former Spanish cruiser Isla de Luzon soon after capture, seen in Pensacola, FL. Note she is wearing an American shield on her bow
Note twin stacks in US service after 1911
She then served as a gunboat, sailing through the Indian and Atlantic oceans to reach her new homeland in 1903, serving as a station ship in Pensacola until 1907 when she was loaned to the Louisiana Naval Militia on 6 December 1907 and later to the Illinois Naval Militia on the Great Lakes as a training ship. She spent WWI as a torpedo tender in Narragansett Bay, instructing new gunners mates and TMs.
In 1911 she was given a new power plant and two skinny funnels. Here she is as a training ship after that date in a hazed grey scheme
Decommed and truck 23 July 1919, she was sold the next year to the Bahama & West Indies Trading Co to work as a coastal trading ship in the shallow waters there under the name SS Reviver. Her 1911-installed Babcocks boilers couldn’t handle the strain and she was soon sold to Bahama Salvors, Ltd. of Nassau and scrapped in 1931 at age 44.
The only remnant of her that remains today dates back to 1902. “Following long custom, when she visited Muscat’s picturesque harbor, members of her crew painted “Isla de Luzon” on the steep entrance cliff; in later years this was periodically refurbished by visiting ships of the U.S. Navy Middle East Force Command.”
Her name can still be seen there today.
Her only sistership, the cruiser Isla de Cuba, was also sunk at the Battle of Manila Bay, also salvaged and commissioned into the US Navy with the unimaginative name of USS Isla de Cuba, paid off in 1912, then picked up by the Venezuelans who used her as the training ship Mariscal Sucre until 1940.
Specs:
You can best see her Spanish scheme in this line drawing
(As-built)
Displacement: 1,030 tons
Length: 184 ft 10 in (56.34 m)
Beam: 29 ft 11 in (9.12 m)
Draft: 12 ft 6 in (3.81 m) maximum
Installed power: 1,897 hp (natural draft)
2,627 hp (forced draft)
Propulsion: 2-shaft horizontal triple-expansion, 2 cylindrical boilers
Speed: 14.2 knots (natural draft)
15.9 knots (forced draft)
Complement: 164 officers and enlisted
Armament: 6 × 4.7 in (120 mm) guns
8 × 6 pdr quick-firing guns
4 × machine guns
3 × 14 in (356 mm) torpedo tubes
Armor: Deck 2.5 in (64 mm)-1 in (25 mm); conning tower 2 in (51 mm)
(1900)
Displacement: 950 long tons (965 t)
Length: 195 ft (59 m)
Beam: 30 ft (9.1 m)
Draft: 11 ft 4.75 in (3.4735 m) (mean)
Propulsion: 2-shaft horizontal triple expansion engine, 535 hp (399 kW)
2-cylinder boilers
160 tons coal
Speed: 11.2 knots (20.7 km/h; 12.9 mph)
Complement: 137 officers and enlisted (1900-07), after 1907 just a small cadre of regular officers and CPOs backed by up to 200 naval militia and trainees.
Armament: Four 4″ mounts and three torpedo tubes
1905 – Four 4″ mounts, four 6-pounder,s and four .30 cal. machine guns
1911 – Four 4″/40 rapid fire mounts, four 6-pounder rapid fire mounts, two 1-pounder rapid fire mounts, and added two temporary 3-pounder rapid fire mounts
Armor: Deck: 1–2.5 in (25–64 mm), scortched
If you liked this column, please consider joining the International Naval Research Organization (INRO), Publishers of Warship International
They are possibly one of the best sources of naval study, images, and fellowship you can find http://www.warship.org/
The International Naval Research Organization is a non-profit corporation dedicated to encouraging the study of naval vessels and their histories, principally in the era of iron and steel warships (about 1860 to date). Its purpose is to provide information and a means of contact for those interested in warships.
Nearing their 50th Anniversary, Warship International, the written tome of the INRO has published hundreds of articles, most of which are unique in their sweep and subject.
I’m a member, so should you be!
