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Warship Wednesday, June 11, 2025: Germans to the front!

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Here at LSOZI, we take off every Wednesday for a look at the old steam/diesel navies of the 1833-1954 period and will profile a different ship each week. These ships have a life, a tale all their own, which sometimes takes them to the strangest places.- Christopher Eger

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Warship Wednesday, June 11, 2025: Germans to the front!

Naval History and Heritage Command photograph NH 48215

Above we see S.M. kleiner kreuzer Gefion, part of the German Imperial Navy’s East Asia Squadron in 1899, anchored off Hankou (now Wuhan) after her nearly 600-mile voyage up the Yangtze River to protect the Kaiser’s interests in China– with Willy’s brother aboard.

The unique little cruiser would play a gunboat role in Chinese diplomacy some 125 yeas ago this month before shipping back home for the rest of her career.

Meet Gefion

Our subject was the second warship to carry the name of a Nordic sea goddess (the fourth goddess of Æsir following Frigg, the wife of Odin) to serve in the German Navy. The first was a 48-gun sail frigate (segelfregatte) built for the Royal Danish Navy in 1843 and captured during the war with her southern neighbors in 1849.

The former Danish frigate Gefion under German service. The Germans used the trophy ship as a training ship under her original name until 1880 and then as a coal hulk until 1891. Her bell, figurehead, anchors, and many other relics dot Eckernförde and Kiel.

The second Gefion was originally deemed a Kreuzerkorvette (cruiser corvette) J when designed in the early 1890s, an early attempt by the Kaiserliche Marine to create a cruiser suitable for both reconnaissance and fleet duties, as well as an overseas colonial service ship on independent duty.

Some 362 feet overall with a 43-foot beam, she sported a dagger-like 8.4:1 length-to-beam ratio. Lightly built, she had 0.98 inches of nickel-steel armor over her deck and equivalent armor on her conning tower. A second 0.6-inch steel plate cap was over her engine cylinder heads, backed by 5.9 inches of wood. She had a 4-inch cellulose belt at the waterline.

Steel hulled and using both transverse and longitudinal steel frames, she was sheathed below the water line with wood and copper, held with brass fittings, to help with fouling, especially when in colonial service.

Originally to carry six new 15 cm/35 (5.9″) SK L/35 guns in single mounts, with 810 shells in her magazine, this was later changed to 10 equally new but lighter 10.5 cm/40 (4.1″) SK L/40 mounts with as many as 1,500 shells at the ready. They were arranged two forward, two aft, and eight amidships in broadside, all protected by a thin armored shield. Her secondary battery was a half dozen 5 cm/40 (1.97″) SK L/40 rapid-fire (10 rounds per minute) torpedo boat guns with another 1,500 rounds in the magazine.

She also had a pair of 17-inch above-deck torpedo tubes (down from a planned six). Eight Maxim guns were arranged in her two spotting/fighting tops, they could be dismounted for use ashore. Likewise, almost a third of a 300-man crew could be issued small arms carried aboard and sent ashore. A small 6cm boat gun could back them up.

Gefion, Janes 1914

With six cylindrical two-sided boilers exhausting through a trio of stacks, driving two VTE engines, her plant was good for 9,800 shp. Extensively fitted for electric lights and hoists, she carried three 67-volt, 40-kW dynamos. Designed for 19 knots, on trials she made 20.53 knots at full power on forced draft. Loaded with 900 tons of good coal, she could theoretically steam 6,850nm at 11 knots, or 2,730nm at 18 knots on natural draft, the first German cruiser capable of such a range. This could be extended by rigging a cruising canvas from her two masts and rigging. It turned out that her decks vibrated extensively at full power, she struggled in tough seas, and she had insufficient ventilation below decks.

How she stacked up against contemporary cruisers, from the circa 1900 Professional Notes in the United States Naval Institute Proceedings:

Built for a cost of 5.171 million marks, she was ordered from Ferdinand Schichau’s new Danzig yard, as hull No. 486, and laid down on 28 March 1892. Launched 31 May 1893, she commissioned 27 June 1894.

This made her the forerunner of the 41 later kleiner kreuzers of the Gazelle, Bremen, Konigsberg, Dresden, Kolberg, Magdeburg, Karlsruhe, Graudenz, Pillau, Wiesbaden, Brummer, and Coln classes constructed between 1897 and 1918, all of which carried 4.1 inch guns on similar hulls along with torpedo tubes. The first four classes even carried the same model 4.1-inch SK L/40s as Gefion.

Geifon with her glad rags flying about 1895 IWM (Q 22323)

SMS Gefion was photographed sometime early in her career, between her commissioning date, 27 June 1894, and the receipt of this photo by the U.S. Navy Office of Naval Intelligence, 28 June 1895. NH 88636

Her first skipper was Korvettenkapitän Hans Oelrichs, an 1860s veteran of the old Norddeutsche Marine. Gefion’s first assignments were to escort the Royal yacht Hohenzollern to Norway in the autumn of 1894 and attend the inauguration ceremony of the Kaiser Wilhelm Canal (Nord-Ostsee-Kanal) the following year when the double locks at Brunsbüttel and Holtenau were opened.

A white-liveried SMS Gefion photographed early in her career, possibly during her 1894-1897 service in home waters. The Levensau Bridge over the Kiel Canal appears in the background; the Canal opened in 1895. NH 88634

Gefion spent the next couple of years as a guardship at Wilhelmshaven while the larger second-class cruiser Kaiserin Augusta did the same at Kiel. During the winter and spring, they served as training grounds for the fleet’s new stokers and artificers. During the summer and fall, they clocked in on fleet maneuvers, performing scouting services for the main battle line, taking breaks to escort Hohenzollern.

In April 1897, Gefion escorted the Swedish passenger ship Rex on the inaugural voyage of the mail steamer line from Sassnitz to Trelleborg. She counted among her wardroom Prince Henry (Heinrich) of Prussia, the Kaiser’s younger brother and a career naval officer, who on at least one occasion hosted Willy and his sons aboard.

Sent abroad

With Gefion’s newness wearing off and new light cruisers joining the German fleet, she was put in overhaul in the summer of 1897, made ready for overseas service, upgrading her smaller generators with a trio of 110-volt, 58-kW sets.

Her new skipper was FKpt Max Heinrich Ludwig Rollmann, a career sailor who joined the German Navy in 1873 as a cadet. A skilled officer and torpedo expert, he was part of the so-called “Torpedobande” (torpedo gang) which influenced Tirpitz and others to warm to the weapons.

Originally to be sent to intervene in the ongoing dispute between Haiti and Germany, Gefion was instead selected to strengthen the Ostasiatischen Kreuzerdivision in the Far East.

Gefion, NH 48216

In December 1897, just ahead of the first winter ice, she left in company with the old 7,000-ton armored cruiser Deutschland and Kaiserin Augusta in a squadron commanded by Prince Henry. When Deutschland broke down in Hong Kong in April 1898 while heading to China, Henry switched his flag to Gefion and proceeded to the German fleet’s Pacific treaty homeport at Tsingtao.

It was with the German East Asian Squadron that Gefion kept tabs on Dewey’s squadron as it smashed the Spanish in Manila later that summer, steamed to Samoa to serve as a station ship in early 1899, and then steam nearly 600 miles up the Yangtze to Hankou (now Wuhan) where she landed 130 armed crew on 28 April to guard the new 103-acre German Concession (Deutsche Konzession) in that river city and escort Prince Henry, then head of the squadron.

Henry was received by the Governor-General of Huguang, Zhang Zhidong, along with the assorted foreign expatriates, and even the British and French Concessions in the city flew the German flag.

Zhang Zhidong entertains Prince Heinrich. The VanDyke-clad FKpt Max Rollman, Gefion’s skipper, is to the far left. After the reception, the Germans toured the local military academy and watched the drills of the Hubei New Army, which included several German officers as instructors, notably Lieutenants Carl Fuchs and Albrecht Welzel, a Sergeant A. Seydel, and a Rittmaster (cavalry master) named Behrensdorf.

Henry laid the cornerstone for the new German bund in Hankou on 30 April, flanked by Gefion’s officers and crew.

War!

After a second tour in Samoa in early 1900, Gefion, now reclassified as a Kreuzer III. Klasse, and the rest of the German Far East Squadron, now under VADM Felix von Bendemann, massed at Tsingtao as trouble rumbled with the anti-Western Boxers in China, who were mounting attacks on churches.

The German force at the time, besides Gefion, included two new 6,700-ton Victoria Louise-class protected cruisers (with 477-member crews), SMS Hansa and SMS Hertha, the Kaiserin Augusta, the light cruisers SMS Irene, Geier, Seeadler, Bussard, and Schwalbe, along with the gunboat Itis.

Die Gartenlaube, by Willy Stower, showing the German cruisers in the Far East, circa 1898. These include Arkona. Prinzeß Wilhelm. Kaiserin Augusta, Kaiser, (Flaggschiff der I. Division) along with. Kormoran, Irene, Gefion, and Deutschland, (Flaggschiff der II. Division)

On 30 May, the Chinese government allowed a force of 400 assorted troops from eight Western nations to land at Tientsin and head to Peking to protect the Legation Quarter there. However, the situation continued to deteriorate as the Boxers cut the rail line between the two cities on 5 June, and a week later, a Japanese diplomat was killed by Chinese regulars.

Cruiser SMS Gefion at Tsingtao, circa 1900

Joining an international task force that included British, Russian, French, and Japanese warships, the combined squadron on 17 June moved to seize the five Chinese forts at Taku (Dagukou) at the mouth of the Hai (Pei-Ho) River, which barred the way to Tientsin (Tianjin), some 40 miles downstream, and Peking (Beijing), 110 miles inland.

The combat was sharp but one-sided, with the forts falling after a six-hour bombardment and short action ashore by naval landing parties.

S.M. Kanonenboot ILTIS im Gefecht mit den Takuforts am 17. Juni 1900 Willy Stöwer, DMM 2000-014-001

Ersturmung von taku by Fritz Neumann, Anne S. K. Brown Military Collection

The Taku forts would remain garrisoned by the Eight Nations through 1902. Looking down the Peiho River toward North Port and Bay, from Northwest Fort, Taku, China. Underwood & Underwood, Publishers, 1901. LC-DIG-stereo-1s48075

The allied fleet also captured the Chinese government’s Dagu shipyard, complete with a gunboat that went to the Japanese and four new German-built Hai Lung class torpedo boats that were split between the British, Russian, French, and Germans.

Chinese Hai-Lung class torpedo boats captured at Taku, June 1900. Some 193 feet oal, these four German-made boats could make 32 knots and carried six Sk 4.7 cm L/35s while two 17-inch torpedo tubes weren’t fitted. Hai-Lung, yard number 608, became the German SMS Taku and was decommissioned after grounding on 30 December 1913. Hai-Ch’ing, yard number 609, became the French Takou and was written off after being grounded on the coast of Vietnam. Hai-Hoa, hull number 610, became the Russian Таку (Taku), and was sunk on 26 July 1904 off Port Arthur by Japanese forces. Hai-Hsi, yard number 611, became HMS Taku and was sold for scrap on 26 October 1916.

A Chinese second-class cruiser (Hai-Chi?) flying an Admiral’s flag was detained outside Taku by Gefion, who was ordered to release the vessel.

This triggered the start of the outright 55-day siege of the Legation Quarter in Peking, with some 900 Western troops and civilians, along with 2,800 Chinese Christians, holding out until relieved. The German minister, Baron von Ketteler, was killed by a Manchu officer escorted by Chinese lancers the same day while on his way to negotiate a solution to the incident, which was rapidly spiraling out of control.

A force that had tried to reinforce Peking before the siege was led by British VADM Sir Edward Hobart Seymour, who took the lead and scratched together a column of some 2,127 men drawn from the assorted ships crowding under the Taku forts, with the idea to force the way to Peking via Tientsin. His chief of staff was the young future admiral, Capt. John Jellicoe.

Seymour was able to muster 915 straw-hatted jack-tars and Royal Marines to spearhead the detachment. The Germans chipped in 511. Smaller contingents from allied fleets included 312 Russians, 158 French, 112 Americans, 54 Japanese, 40 Italians, and 25 Austrians.

Seymour Expedition, 1900, USN 901030

As detailed in Die Kaiserliche Marine während der Wirren in China, 1900-1901. Berlin: Mittler und Sohn, 1903. The German force was seriously ad hoc.

The German contingent, which consisted of 22 officers, two surgeons, and 487 enlisted men, was organized into two companies and two large platoons, armed with Gewehr 88 bolt-action rifles, single-action M1879 Reichsrevolvers, and four Maxim machine guns. Commanded overall by Kapitän zur See Guido von Usedom, the skipper of the Hertha, the four ships that coughed up landing forces contributed the following, each in turn led by the respective ship’s executive officer:

  • Hertha: 7 officers, 175 men under KL (CDR) Hecht
  • Hansa: 7 officers, 153 men, under KKpt (LCDR) Paul Schlieser
  • Kaiserin Augusta: 5 officers, 85 men, 1 doctor under KKpt Oltmann Buchholz
  • Gefion: 3 officers, 74 men, 1 doctor under KKpt Otto Weniger

Of course, Seymour thought he was just opposing a rabble of Boxer bandits, not 30,000 Imperial Qing Army regulars (Kansu Braves) who ultimately came out against him. These units consisted of Muslims from the remote Gansu Province, situated between the Qilian Mountains and the Gobi Desert, men renowned for their discipline and loyalty to the empire.

Flying long scarlet and black banners, the Gansu Army wore traditional uniforms but was well-trained and armed with Mauser M.71 repeater rifles and modern breechloading field artillery.

Chinese soldiers in 1899–1901. Left: three infantrymen of the New Imperial Army. Front: drum major of the regular army. Seated on the trunk: field artilleryman. Right: Boxers. Via Leipziger illustrirte Zeitung 1900

With this, the so-called Seymour Expedition was seriously outnumbered and fighting in a foreign land.

They left out for Peking from Tientsin on 10 June– a week before the Taku forts were seized– via five commandeered trains and by 14 June had suffered their first losses, among the Italian contingent. By the 18th, a pitched battle was fought against a key Western position, held by men largely drawn from Gefion.

As detailed in “The Boxer Rebellion: Bluejackets and Marines in China, 1900–1901” by Emily Abdow (NHHC, 2023):

A German garrison was at a coal depot near Langfang, christened “Fort Gefion” for their ship. Chinese Colonel Yao Wang [of Gen. Dong Fuxiang’s Gansu Army] and Boxer leader Ni Zanqing determined Fort Gefion was the weak point and amassed about 3,000 Qing soldiers and 2,000 Boxers for an attack. On 18 June, Boxers charged at Fort Gefion, teenagers and old men alike barreling into heavy allied fire in never-ending waves. When the Boxers fell, Colonel Yao’s soldiers attacked. Armed with modern weapons, they nearly forced the Germans’ right flank to retreat. British and French sailors reinforced the Germans, driving back the Chinese forces. At the end of the battle, the allied casualties were 10 dead and 50 wounded. The Chinese death toll was 400, over half of the casualties Qing soldiers.

With no hope of reaching Peking, Seymour’s force burned their trains and fought a slow, foot-borne retreat back to Tientsin for the next four days.

Coming upon the Chinese government’s Fort Xigu, the Great Hsi-Ku Arsenal (also seen in Western sources as Fort Hsiku/Osiku), eight miles northwest of Tientsin in the pre-dawn of 22 June, it made sense to occupy the works and wait for relief from the sea.

The problem was that the local Chinese garrison approached 1,500 troops, and the fort, with 16-foot-high mud walls protected by Krupp field guns, was a tough nut to crack.

With the Royal Marines tasked with an attempt to take the complex from the rear, Seymour passed the order, “Germans to the front.”

Leading the German column into the attack was KKpt Oltmann Buchholz, XO of the Kaiserin Augusta, with the men from the Hansa, Hertha, and Gefion behind him. The assault was quick and sharp, with the Germans battering down the front doors, then sweeping through and clearing the complex, turning the good Krupp guns around on their former owners. Inside were found, besides munitions, enough rations and supplies to revitalize the force along with a well-stocked medical clinic.

Buchholz was killed in the effort.

German artist Carl Röchling celebrated the event with his painting “Die Deutschen an der Front” (“The Germans to the front”).

The attack occurred at 0222. Roechling takes a bit of liberty with the amount of sunlight.

Seymour Expedition, 1900, likely at the Great Hsi-Ku Arsenal. USN 901028

A relief column of 2,000 fresh Western troops under Capt. (later RADM of Battle of Coronel fame) Christopher Cradock, RN, and Major (later MG) Littleton Tazewell “Tony” Waller, USMC, relieved Seymour near Fort Hsiku on 25 June, allowing his column to fully withdraw back to Tientsin. Seymour’s international column suffered at least 62 dead and 232 wounded, a casualty rate of about 1:6, during its fortnight in the Chinese countryside.

The German sailors and marines on the Seymour expedition ashore in June 1900 lost 16 killed and 60 wounded, including two young officers from Gefion (LT z. S. Hane v. Krohn from Wilhelmähoven and Frang Bustig from Hanover, both on 22 June in the assault on Fort Hsiku). The bombardment of the Taku forts on 17 June cost the Germans seven killed and 11 wounded, all on the gunboat SMS Itis (including her skipper, who caught 25 shrapnel wounds yet remained on the bridge, earning the Blue Max). Subsequent fighting in and around Tientsin cost the German force another 12 dead and 41 wounded, including three sailors from Gefion’s naval infantry (Wilhelm Wachsmund from Goblenz, on 27 June, along with Heinrich Hamm from Grünendeich and Emil Bonk from Raschang on 13 July). Of note, Hansa’s company suffered the greatest casualties of the German naval contingents during the Boxer rebellion (13 dead and 24 wounded).

Besieged Peking would ultimately be relieved in mid-August by the 20,000-strong force under British Maj. Gen. Alfred Gaselee (although fully half of the force were Japanese troops under Lt. Gen. Yamaguchi Motomi, a general senior in both grade and experience to Gaselee).

The 51 German marines (the fourth largest contingent in the Quarter) of III. Seebataillon under Oberleutnant Graf von Soden, holding out at Peking in the Legation, suffered 12 killed and 14 wounded during the siege, holding their line along the Quarter’s old Tartar Wall shoulder-to-shoulder with the 53 U.S. Marines and bluejackets landed from the USS Oregon and Newark.

German marines Peking 1900, AWM A05904

Peace

Following the arrival of more ships and troops rushed to China from Germany, Gefion was recalled home in September 1901.

Arriving back in German waters in time for Christmas, she was placed in ordinary and sent to Kaiserliche Werft in Wilhelmshaven for a drawn-out three-year overhaul. This saw her armament retained but relocated for both stability and protection purposes.

Emerging from overhaul in 1905, she was placed in reserve, the German fleet having much better cruisers to choose from at that point.

It was from these mothballs that she was recalled in 1914, but, with no crews available to man her, she was moved to Danzig for use as a barracks ship, her usable equipment and weapons cannibalized for other uses.

At the end of the war, the victorious allies elected not to claim the hulked Gefion as a war trophy, and she was stricken from the German naval list on 5 November 1919.

Ex-Gefion was purchased by the salvage concern of Norddeutsche Tiefbaugesellschaft along with her old Far East buddy Kaiserin Augusta, the cruiser Victoria Louise, several incomplete submarines, and the obsolete (circa 1890) battlewagon Brandenburg. While most of the company’s new assets were soon scrapped in Danzig, Gefion and Victoria Louise were sold to the shipping firm of Danziger Hoch- und Tiefbau GmbH (Behnke & Sieg), along with the four still-crated 1,200 hp MAN four-stroke diesel engines for the unfinished SM U-115 and U-116.

Most of the superstructure and the machinery from Gefion and Victoria Louise were removed, and two cranes and their associated stowage space were installed. Their old coal-fired boilers and VTE engines removed, each picked up a pair of former U-boat diesels. They entered service with DHT in 1920 as the cargo vessels (frachtdampfer) SS Adolf Sommerfeld and Flora Sommerfeld, respectively.

Seen in the 1922 Lloyds Steamers list as SS Adolf Summerfeld (sic). The ex-SMS Victoria Louise is listed in the same volume correctly as Flora Sommerfeld.

However, the Baltic timber route they served had shallow draft harbors, and the thin-waisted former cruisers drew too much water to make the venture successful. By 1923, both were scrapped in Danzig, and their still-young diesels were sold to an electric company.

Epilogue

The German Navy never used the name Gefion again, however, her bell has been spotted a few times since WWII and may be in circulation in private collections.

Several pieces of period maritime art, primarily German postcards, endure.

1902 lithograph of Gefion by Hugo Graf

An exquisite 1:100 scale model of the cruiser in her white overseas livery is on display under glass at the Internationales Maritimes Museum in Hamburg.

Speaking of models, Combrig has a 1:700 scale kit available. 

As for Gefion’s China-era (1898-1901) skipper, FKpt Max Rollmann returned to Germany, became the captain of the battleship SMS Kaiser Wilhelm der Grosse, and commanded the 1st Squadron of the High Seas Fleet as a commodore, then the III Squadron as a vice admiral in 1910. Retiring in 1913 after 40 years with the colors, he was made a full admiral on the retired list, decorated with both the Prussian Order of the Red Eagle and the Order of the Crown. Eschewing his pension and returning to work in the admiralty as a civilian during the Great War, he passed in 1942 in Berlin, aged 85. His son, KKpt Max Rollmann, had passed the previous year while serving as the duty officer (Rollenoffizier) aboard the Bismarck.

Charakterisierter Admiral Max Rollmann. As part of his service in China, he carried top-level decorations and honors, including the Russian Order of Saint Stanislaus, the Grand Officer’s Cross of the Order of the Crown of Thailand, and the Commander’s Cross of the Japanese Order of the Sacred Treasure.

Kapitan zur See Guido von Usedom, the skipper of the cruiser Hertha that led the overall German naval infantry battalion under Seymour, was given a Blue Max and made an ADC to the Kaiser following the campaign. Quick with exotic anecdotes from the Orient to entertain Willy’s guests, he was given command of the imperial yacht Hohenzollern for a couple of years, followed by comfortable desk jobs until he retired in 1910 as a vice admiral after 39 years in the service, promoted to full Admiral on the retirement rolls.

Like Rollman, Von Usedom volunteered his services to the Kaiser once again in 1914 and soon found himself wearing a fez as an admiral in the Ottoman Navy in command of Sonderkommando Türkei. He strengthened the Dardanelles Straits until they became virtually impregnable from the sea in 1915, forcing the disastrous land Gallipoli campaign and earning a set of oak leaves for his 1900 Blue Max. He remained in Turkish service until 1918, when he retired a second time on the outbreak of peace.

Charakterisierter Admiral Guido von Usedom passed in 1925, aged 70. And yes, the center image is him showing a Mameluke-carrying Willy around the Dardanelles in 1915.

Albert Wilhelm Heinrich, Prinz von Preußen, was very much seen as the “Sailor Prince” of the Hohenzollern dynasty. Entering the German Navy at the age of 16 in 1878, he was a professional officer and earned his Großadmiral shoulder boards for sure, having spent decades on sea-going duty. During the Great War, he ably commanded the Imperial German Baltic Sea Fleet (Oberbefehlshaber der Ostseestreitkräfte) in operations against the Russians. He passed in 1929, aged 66.

The German treaty port at Tsingtao fell to an Anglo-Japanese force in 1914, and the Hankou Concession was retrograded by the Chinese in 1917, with the remaining German merchants closing up shop altogether in 1945. The old baroque German consulate in the Hankou Bund, where Prince Henry laid the cornerstone after a trip on Gefion in 1899, survives today on Yanjing Avenue as a Wuhan municipal office building, a red banner flying from its mast.

Meminisse est ad Vivificandum – To Remember is to Keep Alive

***

Ships are more than steel
and wood
And heart of burning coal,
For those who sail upon
them know
That some ships have a
soul.

***

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Send up the Kromuskit!

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It happened 80 years ago today.

Official period caption: “A gun crew of the 383rd Infantry Regiment, 96th Infantry Division, loads a shell into the new 57mm recoilless rifle to fire against Japanese pillboxes and caves on Okinawa, 10 June 1945.”

Photographer not credited. Photo Source: U.S. National Archives. Digitized by Signal Corps Archive. SC 208846

The M18 (T15E3) recoilless rifle seen above was new indeed.

Fielded in 1945, it was light, at “just” 44 pounds, and used the same tripod as the water-cooled Browning M1917 machine gun, or could be bipod-launched to save weight. It could be fired from the shoulder like the much smaller bazooka in a pinch. Later models used the M26 direct-fire sight.

Developed at the U.S. Army’s Infantry Section with cues from loaned British and captured German designs by two engineers, named Kroger and Musser, the gun was initially termed the “Kromuskit” after its daddies.

The Army ultimately fielded seven rounds for the cute little guy:

Three 5.3-pound 57mm shells for the M18 could be carried in the already fielded M6 rocket bag (designed for the 2.36-in bazooka rockets).

For use by airborne troops, it could be dropped in a M10 Paracrate complete with 14 rounds of ammo. The follow-on M12 Paracrate could carry 14 rounds of ammo as well as an M1917 tripod.

This “pocket artillery” was first used in combat in the Pacific in Okinawa, where its HE and WP shells proved particularly adept at handling dug-in pockets of Japanese.

It remained in use in Korea and with U.S. allies (and enemies, such as the unlicensed Communist Chinese Type 36) throughout the Cold War.

A GI with an M18 recoilless rifle in Korea – May 1951. While ineffective against T-34s, it was still a lifesaver firing 133-slug canister shot at incoming waves of Chinese “Volunteers” and in zapping lightly dug-in positions with HE and WP. LIFE Magazine Archives – Michael Rougier Photographer.

Austrian Tiroler Jägerbataillon with M18 recoilless rifle, circa late 1950s. Bestanddeelnr 254-4382

The M18 was replaced in American service by the larger and more effective M20 75mm, M67 90mm, and M40 105mm RRs, and those, by the 1980s, by more modern guided anti-tank weapons.

Bluejackets taking in the sights

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It happened 80 years ago this week. Wesermünde (Bremerhaven), Germany. 11 June 1945.

Official caption: “Two members of the USN security guard aboard [redacted] inspect the surrounding harbor together with two members of the party directing the re-fitting.”

Photographer: Pvt. Gedge, 3908 Bremen. SC 364338 Photo Source: U.S. National Archives. Digitized by Signal Corps Archive.

(L-R) Leslie Graber, Momm 2/CL, Canton, Ohio; Jack Beach, MM 1/CL, Flint, Mich.; Grover Bradford, MM3 3/CL, Newman, Ill., and Ollin Donohue, Momm 1/CL, Wichita Falls, Tex.

The men are likely on the seized 49,000-ton Norddeutsche Lloyd liner SS Europa, which survived the war largely intact. Commissioned as USS Europa (AP-177), she was used as a U.S. Navy troop transport until May 1946, when she was handed over to France in compensation for the loss of the SS Normandie during the war, and became the CGT liner SS Liberté.

The dazzle-camouflaged German passenger liner, SS Europa, moves out of drydock at Bremerhaven, Germany, 18 July 1945, while being reactivated. She soon became USS Europa (AP-177) and made two Southampton to New York troop-carrying voyages under U.S. control. Note U-boat hull sections on shore at left. SC 209687

As agreed by the Allied governments in February 1945, immediately following the German surrender in May 1945, the U.S. Navy assumed command of and took part in mine-clearing operations at the wrecked ports of Bremen and Wesermünde (now Bremerhaven) to clear the vital harbors for use. As such, the USAAF and RAF leveled 79 percent of the surrounding town but spared most of the port infrastructure itself.

Sending in roadborne recon teams on 29 May, the “Bremen Enclave,” under RADM Arthur Granville Robinson (USNA 1913), remained under U.S. Navy control through June 1946 before they were turned over to local authorities, albeit with American oversight. The Army sent in the 487th Port Bn and the 330th Harbor Craft Co for support, and it soon became the major German port complex used to support the Western Allies’ occupation. The curious part of this was that this USN-run enclave was inside the British zone of occupation.

U.S. Navy in Germany, 1945. Members of the U.S. Navy advance reconnaissance patrol keep a wary eye out for Nazi snipers as they rumble through the debris-lined streets of Bremen, en-route to the dock area. Photograph release May 29, 1945. Official U.S. Navy photograph, now in the collections of the U.S. Navy. 80-G-49286

Note the extensive presence of side arms and knives. U.S. Navy in Germany, 1945. Transported 400 miles across Europe by the U.S. Army, a force of Naval Officers and men took over the administration of the port activities of Bremen, Germany. Damaged but readily repairable facilities are inspected by the command staff of the U.S. Navy. Captain V.H. Coufrey points out salient features of Europe Hafen Docks to Rear Admiral Arthur G. Robinson. Photograph released May 29, 1945. Official U.S. Navy photograph, now in the collections of the U.S. Navy. 80-G-49281

The first American ships to unload in the harbor, post-war, were the freighters SS St. Thomas and SS Black Warrior on 22 June, with 22,000 tons of cargo discharged at the port by the end of the month.

By July 1945, this rose to 162,000 tons.

Busted Jeep Carrier

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Here we see the Kaiser-built Casablanca-class escort carrier USS Windham Bay (CVE-92) looking worse for wear in Guam in June 1945 after a brush with the same typhoon off Okinawa that Indiana was shown inside yesterday.

“Taken at Guam about 11th of June, 1945, after going through typhoon of off Okinawa, June 5th 1945” Bruce A. Blegen Collection Photo # UA 460.16.01 via NHHC.

As detailed by DANFS:

On 4-5 June 1945, while steaming with the logistics group in support of TF 38 and the strikes on Okinawa, Windham Bay encountered a typhoon. The heavy storm damage included the collapse of 20 feet of flight deck onto the foc’sle, a warped and ruptured catapult, as well as lost and damaged planes. On 16 June, she cleared the Marianas en route to Oahu. The warship reached Pearl Harbor on the 25th but departed again two days later. She entered port at San Diego on 11 July and immediately began repairs to correct the typhoon damage she had suffered earlier in the month. Those repairs lasted through late August, so that she missed the final weeks of the war.

Still, she earned three battle stars for her yeoman service in hauling Marine and Navy carrier aircraft (as many as 76 at a time) and squadrons across the Pacific for 12 solid months between June 1944 and June 1945.

Post-war, she conducted “Magic Carpet” rides bringing troops home from overseas and was placed in the Reserve Fleet out of commission on 23 August 1946.

When Korea broke out in 1950, she was dusted off for assignment to the Military Sea Transportation Service and, with a civil crew, served as an aircraft ferry (T-CVE-92, later T-CVU-92) for the next eight years shelping tactical aircraft to Japan from the West Coast along with loads of F8F Bearcats to the French in Indochina.

USS Windham Bay (T-CVU-92) passes under the Golden Gate Bridge, San Francisco, California, with a cargo of aircraft on her flight deck, 1958. Planes visible are mainly U.S. Air Force F-86D fighters, with a few U.S. Navy F9F and F2H fighters parked near and forward of the ship’s island. Courtesy of Robert M. Cieri, 1982. NH 94307

Decommissioned in January 1959, she was sold to the Hugo Neu Steel Products Corp and scrapped, ironically, in Japan in February 1961.

Army set to Close Almost Half of its Museums

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I get it, the Army is looking to save money everywhere to do more important things like fund new weapon systems that will eventually turn into a boondogle and upgrade military housing to almost habitable levels, but this sucks.

Young Joes need to be able to go to their on-base museum and learn about their heritage and history, coming face to face with the heroes of the past.

Plus, in many cases, the base museum is the only place where new soldiers can take their visiting family members to “show” them what they do. I recently visited the Infantry Museum at Benning on a Sunday morning, and most of those touring the exhibits were young E-1/2/3s walking their parents around with pride. A sense of picking up the torch going back to 1775.

This is a mistake.

From the CMH:

In support of Army transformation and a focus on directing resources toward readiness and lethality, the Center of Military History has begun a consolidation and reduction of Army museums, a process that will continue through Fiscal Year 2029.

The Army Museum Enterprise (AME) will reduce from 41 museum activities at 29 locations to 12 field museums and four training support facilities at 12 locations.

In the current AME, a substantial maintenance backlog and insufficient staffing prevent our museums from reaching their fullest potential as educational and historical resources. These challenges also pose significant risk to our ability to care for the Army’s priceless artifact collection, which is one of the world’s largest.

The future Army Museum Enterprise is designed to best support Soldier training and public education within our available budget and professional staff. The consolidation plan ensures the widest possible access to the highest quality museums within available Army resources.

Specific closure dates and procedures have not been determined. CMH is committed to maintaining communications with affected local communities and commands, and to addressing stakeholder concerns.

As soon as a timeline of closures and consolidations of specific museums is set, we will provide the information.

Bases and facilities where the Army is proposing to keep museums open, according to a draft proposal obtained by Task & Purpose, are:

  • Fort Cavazos, Texas
  • Fort Leonard Wood, Missouri
  • Fort Campbell, Kentucky
  • Fort Jackson, South Carolina
  • Fort Benning, Georgia
  • Fort Novosel, Alabama
  • Fort Sam Houston, Texas
  • Fort Sill, Oklahoma

Those set to be closed include museums on the following bases:

Rainy Day on the Mighty I

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It happened 80 years ago today.

The South Dakota-class battleship USS Indiana (BB-58), seen taking water over the bow, while steaming through a typhoon in the Okinawa area, circa 5 June 1945.

Official U.S. Navy photograph, now in the collections of the National Archives. 80-G-342732

The storm was bad enough to claim one of her floatplanes. From her deck log that day:

The “Hoosier Houseboat” earned nine battlestars for her WWII service and entered the Pacific Reserve Fleet’s Bremerton Group in 1946 alongside her sister, Alabama, and decommissioned the following year for mothballs.

While “Big Al” got a ticket home to Mobile for museum ship service in 1960, Indiana instead went to the scrapyard, although lots of her relics are on display in her home state.

Indiana War Memorial in Indianapolis (Photo: Chris Eger)

Warship Wednesday, June 4, 2025: Tiny Hull, Heart of Oak

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Here at LSOZI, we take off every Wednesday for a look at the old steam/diesel navies of the 1833-1954 period and will profile a different ship each week. These ships have a life, a tale all their own, which sometimes takes them to the strangest places.- Christopher Eger

If you enjoy my always ad-free Warship Wednesday content, you can support it by buying me a cup of joe at https://buymeacoffee.com/lsozi As Henk says: “Warship Coffee – no sugar, just a pinch of salt!”

Warship Wednesday, June 4, 2025: Tiny Hull, Heart of Oak

“Goliath Wins,” painting by former RN FAA veteran and well-known marine and aviation artist, the late Jim Rae.

Above we see the Tree-class Admiralty type minesweeping trawler, HMT Juniper (T123), as she engages in a one-sided artillery duel with the German heavy cruiser Admiral Hipper in the Norwegian Sea on 8 June 1940, some 85 years ago this week.

The Trees

The British, with thousands of hardy blue water fishing boats and generations of crews along their coast in the 20th Century, were quickly able to mobilize these home-grown assets as sort of a “pirate fleet” with little effort, much akin to how the USCG almost overnight was able to deploy their 2,000-boat so-called Hooligan Navy or Corsair Fleet during WWII.

The Brits already had volumes of experience with such transformation in the Great War, ordering 609 “Admiralty” military type steel hulled trawlers specifically for naval use, along with another 1,400 boats taken up from trade. 

Trawlers on patrol at Halifax, 1918, CWM

The concept in the Great War was simple: take a boat, add a deck gun, radio set, and searchlight; crew it largely with experienced trawlermen in uniform led by a reserve officer or two, and then specialize it into either anti-submarine work with listening gear and depth charges or minesweeping with sweep gear, sort said “battle trawlers” into flotillas, and turn them loose.

When 1935’s Italian invasion of Ethiopia, followed by Hitler’s abrogation of the terms of the Treaty of Versailles with the reoccupation of the Rhineland by German troops and rearmament to include U-boats, signaled a new war on the horizon, the Royal Navy dusted off its trawler plan as a quick way to boost coastal forces.

This led to the prototype for the British ASW/minesweeping trawlers of the next decade, with HMT Basset (T68) built by Robb in Leith, being launched before the end of 1935.

Coal-burning with a single boiler and VTE engine good for a humble 12.5 knots, Basset ran 160 feet oal, could float in just 10 feet of seawater, and displaced 521 tons. Armament was a 3″/40 12pdr 12cwt QF Mk I/II/V taken from a WWI-era destroyer and mounted on a “bandstand” on the bow, along with weight and space saved for as many as 30 depth charges and mechanical minesweeping gear.

Basset led to a series of nearly two dozen vessels for the Royal Indian Navy and a few for the Canadians, while the design was tweaked for the follow-on Gem and Tree classes.

The first WWII-era Admiralty standard minesweeping trawler type was the 20-member Tree class, so dubbed as all its members were named after trees. These were just barely larger than the Basset (Dog) class, hitting 545 tons standard (770 full) and running some 164 feet long.

Armament, like Basset, relied on a single old 12-pounder forward, a twin 50-cal Vickers rear (sometimes replaced with a second 12-pounder) a pair of Vickers .303s, two depth charge throwers and two depth charge racks with provision for 30 ash cans, along with the novel new Oropesa Mk II mechanical mine sweep or LL-type magnetic mine sweep.

A trawler’s gun crew manning the 12-pounder on the fo’castle. Photographer LT FA Hudson IWM (A 17176)

A trawler’s crew manning a 12-pounder. Photographer LT FA Davies IWM (A 12317)

Ordered from nine small yards around Britain, all were laid down on the eve of the war, augmented by 67 other trawlers purchased from trade.

HMT Birch, a Tree-class trawler

British Tree class naval trawler HMT Rowan, Pennant No T119 FL18332

British Tree-class naval trawler HMT Walnut, Pennant No T103

British Tree class naval trawler HMT Acacia, Pennant No T02, IWM FL 46

HMT Bay, Tree class Trawler, IWM A 6694

HM Trawler Pine – a “Tree” class minesweeper, she was torpedoed and sunk off Beachy Head by a Kriegsmarine Schnellboot with the loss of 10 of her crew.

HMT Walnut, Tree tree-class trawler

Crews were up to 40 souls, but typically more like 35, relying on a skipper and two junior officers, a couple of ratings from the RN or RNR, and the rest members of the newly stood up Royal Naval Patrol Service (RNPS).

Trained at the “stone frigate” HMS Europa, the commandeered Sparrows Nest Gardens in Lowestoft, Suffolk, the ad-hoc nature of the enterprise soon led to the force being known as “Harry Tate’s Navy” after a popular comedian of the era who had problems getting his car started and soon found it falling apart all around him but carried on with confidence nonetheless. In short, something akin to the “Rodney Dangerfield Navy.”

Meet Juniper

Our subject was the second warship to carry the name in the Royal Navy, with the first being an 8-gun Napoleonic-era Shamrock-class schooner that distinguished herself on Sir Arthur Wellesley’s campaigns in Portugal and Spain.

Ordered along with her future sister, HMT Mangrove from Ferguson Brothers (now Ferguson Marine) in Glasgow, Juniper was laid down as Yard No. 344 in August 1939 while Mangrove, built side-by-side, was No. 345. Their hull numbers would be T123 and T112, characteristically out of sequence, a class trait.

Juniper launched on 15 December 1939, as the Germans were digesting newly conquered western Poland, and commissioned in March 1940, as they prepped to turn West. She was modified while under construction and fitted with a more comprehensive AAA suite: three 20mm Oerlikons in place of the twin .50 cal Vickers.

20mm Oerlikon mounting on a British trawler. LT FA Davies IWM (A 12318)

Juniper’s first (and only) skipper was 42-year-old LCDR (Emergency) Geoffrey Seymour Grenfell, RN. An 18-year-old midshipman of impeccable background during the Great War (grandson of ADM John Pascoe Grenfell, grandnephew of Field Marshal Francis Grenfell, and the nephew of a VC holder killed with the 9th Lancers in 1914) he fought at Jutland on the famous HMS Warspite, a vessel holed 150 times in the sea clash by five German battleships. Leaving active service in 1920 as a lieutenant, after nine years with the colors, he was moved to the Emergency List, where he was made a LCDR in 1928 and remained there until activated in 1939.

Grenfell was a little bit famous at the time, having married the high-profile Countess of Carnarvon in 1938, an American heiress and descendant of the Lee Family of Virginia who had just divorced the 6th Earl of Carnarvon, leaving her son to inherit the title. Of note, the family home was the real Victorian Highclere Castle, the setting of the fictional Downton Abbey. Grenfell and the Countess’s marriage was important enough to be carried across the Atlantic in the NYT’s society pages.

The rest of Juniper’s tiny wardroom was made up of Probationary Temporary (Acting) Sub-Lieutenant Neville L. Smith, RNVR, and Probationary Temporary Lieutenant Ronald Campbell Blair Arnold Daniel, RNVR. Daniel, 40, was an architect in the Richmond practice of Partridge and a proud member of the Petersham Horticultural Society, having just joined the colors in April 1940.

War!

Rushed northward in June 1940 to take part in Operation Alphabet, the Allied evacuation of Norway, on the morning of 8 June, having departed Tromso the day before as the sole escort for the Aberdeen-bound 5,600-ton tanker SS Oil Pioneer, Juniper spotted a large cruiser on the horizon off Harstad.

It turned out to be the 14,000-ton Admiral Hipper, which at the time flew the signals of the British cruiser HMS Southampton.

Hipper off Norway, 1940

Realizing the ruse too late and being too slow to make a getaway, Juniper put the “battle” in battle trawler and made ready for a surface action. Signaling her merchantmen to evade as best they could, she began a cat-and-mouse artillery action with Hipper.

Some reports state that it took 90 minutes. Others are just 15. No matter how long it took to play out, the outcome was certain, and Juniper was smashed below the waves by Hipper’s secondary 4.1-inch SK C/33 battery, the bruiser saving its big 8-inch guns for more worthy prey. Any of Hipper’s four escorting destroyers, Z7 Hermann Schoemann, Z10 Hans Lody, Z15 Erich Steinbrinck, and Z20 Karl Galster, would have been more than a match for our trawler.

An on-board camera crew captured the event.

Shortly after, the nearby KM Gneisenau caught Oil Pioneer and sank her with a combination of gunfire and a torpedo from the destroyer Schoemann, leaving one reported survivor.

The bulk of Juniper’s crew were listed simply as missing or “Missing Presumed Killed” (MPK).

ALEXANDER, Ivor, Ordinary Seaman, LT/JX 179311, MPK
AUSTWICK, Clarence H, Engineman, RNR (PS), LT/X 59952 ES, missing
BARGEWELL, Arthur, Stoker, RNPS, LT/KX 106123, missing
BROWNJOHN, Denis E, Telegraphist, C/WRX 1246, missing
CHAPMAN, Charles, Seaman, RNR (PS), LT/X 20188 A, missing
COOPER, Robert, Ordinary Seaman, RNPS, LT/JX 183134, MPK
DANIEL, Ronald C B A, Py/Ty/Lieutenant, RNVR, MPK
GEORGE, William, Stoker 2c, RNPS, LT/KX 104599, MPK
GRENFELL, Geoffrey S, Lieutenant Commander, MPK
HIND, Wilson K, Leading Seaman, RNR, D/X 10320 B, missing
JILLINGS, Henry A, Seaman, RNPS, LT/JX 177687, missing
MARSHALL, William D, Stoker, RNPS, LT/KX 104048, missing
NEWELL, George W, Ordinary Seaman, RNPS, LT/JX 172789, MPK
PENTON, Thomas S, Ordinary Seaman, RNPS, LT/JX 176379, missing
PERKINS, James K, Seaman, RNPS, LT/JX 177711, missing
PHILLIPS, Peter R S, Ordinary Seaman, RNPS, LT/JX 183136, MPK
SAWKINS, Eric W, Ordinary Signalman, RNVR, P/SDX 1535, missing
SEABROOK, William H, Telegraphist, RNW(W)R, C/WRX 124, missing
SMITH, Neville L, Py/Ty/Act/Sub Lieutenant, RNVR, MPK
SUMMERS, George, Engineman, RNR (PS), LT/X 318 EU, missing
TIMMS, Ernest S, Seaman, RNPS, LT/JX 180470, missing
VENTRY, Vincent, Seaman Cook, RNPS, LT/JX 185635, missing
WEAVER, Edgar A, 2nd Hand, RNPS, LT/KX 181715, missing

Those survivors picked up by the Germans were taken to Trondheim and eventually made their way to the Stalag IID Stargard in Pomerania. One of these survivors, Telegraphist Charles Roy Batchelor (499/X4624), though grievously wounded, survived the war and left a detailed account of his post-Juniper experience. He was repatriated home in October 1943 due to his wounds and would endure a series of skin and bone grafts for another 18 months. He went on to make a life for himself in to the 1980s and had a family, but walked with a limp, carried facial scars, and had difficulty chewing until the very end.

Soon after sending Juniper and Oil Pioneer to the bottom, Hipper found the empty troopship SS Orama (19,840 GRT) and made it a hat-trick.

German destroyer Z10 Hans Lody picking up survivors from British troop transport SS Orama, June 8, 1940

On the same afternoon as Juniper was lost and only a few miles away, the German battleships Gneisenau and Scharnhorst would meet up and sink the carrier HMS Glorious, including her defending destroyers HMS Acasta and Ardent, with the loss of over 1,500 lives. That much larger disaster overshadowed our trawler’s ride to Valhalla.

Epilogue

Despite the heroic charge of Juniper, I cannot find where the vessel or her crew were decorated. British LCDR Gerard Broadmead Roope, skipper of the G-class destroyer, HMS Glowworm, sunk by Hipper under very similar circumstances in April 1940, earned a VC.

The only post-war mention I can find of the good LCDR Grenfell is a notice of the settlement of his estate, published in October 1941.

His wife, the former Countess of Carnarvon, mourned for a decade before taking her third husband in 1950, and passed in 1977.

The Trees had a tough war. Besides Juniper, five of her 19 sisters were lost in action: HMT Almond (T 14), Ash (T 39), Chestnut (T 110), Hickory (T 116), and Pine (T 101).

The British lost an amazing 122 minesweeping trawlers during the war.

The Royal Naval Patrol Service numbered some 66,000 men during WWII, manning 6,000 assorted small vessels. At least 14,500 of these “Sparrows” lost their lives, and no less than 2,385 RNPS seamen “have no known grave but the sea.”

Today, the Lowestoft War Memorial Museum at Sparrow’s Nest remembers their sacrifices. Bronze panels at the Museum hold the names of the 2,385 MPK, including those lost on Juniper, recorded on Panels No. 1 and No. 2.

“Harry Tate’s Navy” echoes into eternity. 

Meminisse est ad Vivificandum – To Remember is to Keep Alive

***

Ships are more than steel
and wood
And heart of burning coal,
For those who sail upon
them know
That some ships have a
soul.

***

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Shooting Stars over Italy

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It happened 80 years ago this month.

Official period caption, June 1945: “Italy — Historic meeting at Vesuvius; crusty old jet looks down on bright new jets during the Lockheed P-80s’ visit to Italy.”

U.S. Army Air Force Photo Number 57638AC. Print received June 1945 from Publications Section, AC/AS Intelligence. Used in an issue of “Impact”, June 1945. Copied 12 June 1945. CONFIDENTIAL Classification cancelled by WD Circular #24, para. National Archives Identifier 204908286

Equipped with a General Electric I-40/J33 engine, the P-80 Shooting Star became the first U.S. aircraft to exceed 500 miles per hour in level flight, and was the best Allied jet fighter of WWII, albeit it only came into it at the very end. Note that the above aircraft lack the type’s iconic “tip tanks.”

Two of the aircraft shown in the above image have visible tail numbers: 44-83028 (MSN 080-1007) and 44-83029 (MSN 080-1008), denoting them as among the first 13 YP-80A test aircraft. They were from a group of just four aircraft that were rushed to Europe as part of Project Extraversion.

The Lockheed YP-80A Shooting Star, one of just two in Italy, had a nose packing six 50 cals. “Print received June 1945 from Publications Section, AC/AS Intelligence. Used in an issue of “IMPACT”, June 1945. Copied 12 June 1945. CONFIDENTIAL. Classification cancelled by WD Circular #24, Para. USAAF 57639AC”

Flown by Wright Field test personnel, they were the first “combat” Shooting Stars, assigned to the 1st Fighter Group at Lesina Airfield in December 1944, from where they reportedly were tasked with shooting down passing Luftwaffe Arado Ar 234 reconnaissance jet aircraft. Returned stateside after the war, 44-83028 became a drone while 44-83029 crashed on 2 August 1945 near Brandenburg, Kentucky, taking her pilot with her.

Two other early YP-80s had been sent to Britain at the same time, where one, 44-83026, killed test pilot Major Frederic Borsodi in a crash at RAF Burtonwood. The second YP-80A sent to England, 44-83027, was transferred to Rolls-Royce and fitted with a prototype Rolls-Royce RB.41 Nene engine, then cracked up on 14 November 1945.

The first 20 or so production P-80As, starting with serial 44-84992, were shipped to the USAAF’s 31st FS (412th FG) (4th AF) at March Field and Muroc Field (now Edwards AFB), California, starting in mid-1945, replacing the troubled Bell P-59 Airacomet jet fighter.

The Tsar’s Finest

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It happened 110 years ago today.

Here we see the submarine Bars (Snow Leopard), the first of a class of 24 planned boats for the Imperial Russian Navy, after being launched on 2 June 1915 at the Baltic Shipyard in St. Petersburg (then Petrograd).

Note her Romanov eagle bow crest and four port topside “drop collar” torpedo launcher positions. Designed by a Polish-Russian submarine engineer, Prof. Stefan Karlovich Dzhevetskiy, the launchers were a cost-effective and easy way of carrying torpedoes and were used by both the French and Tsarist navies. However, the design proved an issue in winter months, especially in ice, and greatly shortened the lifespan of the weapons carried. 

On 25 July 1915, the boat, under the command of LT V. F. Dudkin, entered service and became part of the 1st Division of the Baltic Sea Submarine Force, and would be operational for the next 22 months.

Russia. Baltic. Submarine Bars 1915-1917. Note: torpedoes carried in the Dzhevetsky drop collars

Designed by Maj. Gen. (Russian admiralty officers in non-line billets were listed as colonels and generals, not admirals) Ivan Grigorievich Bubnov, the head of the GUK (Main Directorate of Shipbuilding), the Bars class was probably the most advanced and effective Russian submarines until the late mid-1930s when the Malyutka (type M) class boats began entering service.

Russian submarines Volk and Bars (center), iced in over a Baltic Winter. 1915-1917.

At 223-feet oal, they had a displacement of 650 tons (780 submerged) and could operate down to 300 feet. This made them almost ideal for the Baltic. Keep in mind that today’s Sweden’s Blekinge (A26)-class SSKs under construction right now run just 216 feet overall.

Bars class submarine, via Spassky

Diesel electric (with German Krupp or Russian Ludwig Nobel Kolomna plant diesels, later augmented by some American-made engines sent from New London) powering twin screws, they could make 9 knots submerged (13 on the surface) and carried enough fuel and food for 14 days of operations.

Heavily armed, they had eight 18-inch torpedos carried on the deck in Dzhevetsky drop collar trapeeze systems, and another eight fish in fore and aft torpedo rooms with two tubes in each. A small deck gun or two and a light machine gun were added. Mines could also be carried.

The Russians were able to complete 20 Bars-type boats, of which four were lost during the Great War (including Bars) while three others sank in peacetime operations. Four, as well as two of the unfinished hulls, were captured by the Germans in 1917-18. Post-war, the Soviets kept a dozen of the class in operation into the 1930s, with at least two surviving until the 1950s in use as training ships and battery charging barges.

The Soviets considered them the first “modern” submarines in Russian service.

Evolution of Soviet subs from 1914-1955 with Bars-class at top

In 1993, in the Baltic Sea, in the area of ​​Gotska Sandön Island, the Swedish minesweeper Landsort discovered a Bars-type submarine (most likely Bars herself, which went missing in May 1917) at a depth of 127 meters.

Cap ribbon and model of the Russian submarine Bars at Vladivostok

As for her father, designer Bubnov died of typhus during the Russian Civil War in 1919, aged just 47.

MG Bubnov, in front of the building Tsarist submarine Akula, in happier days

It’s official: CVN-65 headed to Mobile for final cruise

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Operation Sea Orbit: On 31 July 1964, USS Enterprise (CVAN-65) (bottom), USS Long Beach (CGN-9) (center) and USS Bainbridge (DLGN-25) (top) formed “Task Force One,” the first nuclear-powered task force, and sailed 26,540 nmi (49,190 km) around the world in 65 days. Accomplished without a single refueling or replenishment, “Operation Sea Orbit” demonstrated the capability of nuclear-powered surface ships.

The world’s first nuclear powered flattop and the longest carrier ever constructed (at 1,088 feet oal, later pushed to 1,123 feet, some 31 feet longer than a Nimitz and 17 feet longer than a Ford) will be deconstructed slowly in Mobile Bay through the end of the decade, under the oversight of the Nuclear Regulatory Commission. She will disappear while docked at Modern American Recycling and Radiological Services, LLC (MARRS), where the former SS United States is now tied up.

The ex-USS Enterprise (CVN-65), formerly CVA(N)-65, was ordered on 15 November 1957 during the Eisenhower administration and commissioned on 25 November 1961, somehow just four years later. She left on her inaugural deployment just seven months later in June 1962. In all, she would complete 25 overseas deployments in her career.

Keep that in mind when you note that Ford took nine years from ordering (2008) through commissioning (2017) and only deployed for the first time six years later (2023).

Big E’s original cost, in 1961 dollars, was $451.3 million. Her recycling, after over 55 years of service, will be more expensive until you consider inflation.

Per DOD’s contract announcements last Friday:

NorthStar Maritime Dismantlement Services LLC, Vernon, Vermont, is awarded a $536,749,731 firm-fixed-price contract (N00024-25-C-4135) for the dismantling, recycling, and disposal of Ex-Enterprise (CVN 65). Under this contract CVN 65 will be dismantled in its entirety, and all resulting materials will be properly recycled or disposed of. Specifically, hazardous materials, including low-level radioactive waste, will be packaged and safely transported for disposal at authorized licensed sites. Work will be performed in Mobile, Alabama, and is expected to be completed by November 2029. Fiscal 2025 operations and maintenance (Navy) funds in the amount of $533,749,731 will be obligated at the time of award, all of which will expire at the end of the current fiscal year. This contract was competitively procured via the Procurement Integrated Enterprise Environment solicitation module, with three offers received. The Naval Sea Systems Command, Washington, D.C., is the contracting activity.

 

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