Category Archives: military history

Hat Trick

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80 years ago this week. At the tail end of Operation Varsity near Wesel, Germany, the British 2nd Army and American 9th Army links up with Allied paras and glider troops that had been airmailed to the area three days prior.

Official wartime caption: “Airborne force leap the Rhine. The link-up is complete. 26 March 1945. An Achilles tank destroyer [a U.S. M10 with a QF 17-pounder] on the east bank of the Rhine moves up to link with airborne forces whose abandoned gliders can be seen in the background.”

The glider appears to be a British Hadrian model while the barbed wire could be for an EPOW bullpen, which makes sense as the British 6th Airborne bagged something like 1,500 “Jerries” during the operation. Photo by Christie (Sergeant), No. 5 Army Film and Photo Section, Army Film and Photographic Unit, IWM BU 2396

Early in the morning of 24 March 1945, 1,500 American aircraft and gliders carrying two Airborne divisions, one American (9,650 men of the 17th Airborne) and one British (7,220 men of the 6th Airborne including the 1st Canadian Parachute Battalion), flew over the Rhine River, completing the hattrick started by the Market Garden and Overlord/Tonga drops in 1944.

17th Airborne Glider Troops wait to board their glider on 24 March 1945 for Operation VARSITY, note the M1919, M1 Garand, and Carbine

Operation Varsity glider troops, note bandage on helmet

Operation Varsity 1945 M1A1 paratrooper folding stocked carbine. Note the bayonet on his leg

As the Normandy and Market Garden drops had been spaced out across several geographic locations, while the Varsity drop was more tightly focused at Hamminkeln-Wesel, it is considered the largest airborne operation ever conducted on a single day and in one location.

It was no walkover, with 49 C-46/47 transports, many packed with men of the 17th, lost to German flak and other casualties across a three-day fight which left 1,346 casualties among the American Sky soldiers while the Brits and Canadians logged at least 1,078.

Sadly, except for a one-minute mention in Band of Brothers, the jump is largely forgotten.

Warship Wednesday, March 26, 2025: First of 65

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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, March 26, 2025: First of 65

Photographed by Noggle. Naval History and Heritage Command Collection: NH 63259

Above we see the USS F-4 (Submarine No. 23) along with her three sisters, USS F-2 (SS-21), USS F-3 (SS-22), and USS F-1 (SS-20), proud and flying their “fish” flags and 13-star “boat” ensigns with their crackerjacks waiting either for a division inspection or shore leave– or both.

Taken in Pearl Harbor in 1914, these early boats were the first based in Hawaii, predating the construction of the submarine base, and as such were simply docked at Pier 5 at the end of Richards Street in Honolulu near where the Aloha Tower is today.

Less than a year later, on 25 March 1915– some 110 years ago this week– F-4 would take her final dive and a lot of those brave young men on her deck would vanish.

The F-class boats

The story of early American submarines was one of John Philip Holland’s Torpedo Boat Company which became the Electric Boat company in 1899.

Holland and his company would provide the Navy’s first steel boat, the 53-foot USS Holland (Submarine Torpedo Boat #1) in 1900, followed by the seven 63-foot USS Plunger (SS-2) or A-class boats, and three 82-foot B-class boats– all very small, basically midget submarines. EB’s five follow-on C-class boats, designed by Lawrence York Spear after Holland’s death, were steadily larger, at 105 feet, and used twin engines and twin motors, giving them a measure of reliability. Nonetheless, all these early boats, and those that immediately followed, were known as “pig boats” due to their downright foul living quarters and unusual and downright unship-like hull shapes, which tended to wallow and hog on the surface.

Then, as now, the U.S. Submarine arm is all-volunteer.

Spear’s D-class boats– the first American boats to run four torpedo tubes, were subcontracted out to Fore River and were the largest yet, at 134 feet. Spindle shaped and single-hulled with short sails, they would become the basis for Navy sub hull forms for the next decade.

“U.S. Submarines awaiting Orders,” halftone reproduction, printed on a postal card, of a photograph of five submarines nested together prior to World War I. The three boats on the right are (from center to right): USS D-2 (Submarine # 18); USS D-1 (Submarine # 17); and USS D-3 (Submarine # 19). The two left are probably (in no order) USS E-1 (Submarine # 24) and USS E-2 (Submarine # 25). Courtesy of Commander Donald J. Robinson, USN (Medical Service Corps), 1973. NH 78926

By 1909, less than a decade after the first Holland boat was bought by the Navy, Fore River began construction of a more modern pair of boats, dubbed the E-class, that were roughly the same size as the D-class that preceded them but, importantly, ditched the dangerous gasoline engines of the previous designs for a pair of NELSECO diesels. Importantly for maneuverability while diving, they were also the first U.S. submarines to have bow planes.

Further, they incorporated both a search and attack periscope along with a narrow-windowed conning tower, complete with deadlights.

USS E-1 (Submarine # 24) underway in New York Harbor during the October 1912 naval review. Note her diving planes and “chariot” style canvas and tubing open sea running platform erected over the narrow conning tower. NH 41946

This gives us the F-class, which are just improved Es, and were only the second group of American designed and built diesel-electric submarines.

F-class boats were the first U.S. Navy submarines built on the West Coast, with the first two, F-1 and F-2, constructed by Union Iron Works in San Francisco as Yard No. 94 and 95 using NELSECO diesels. The second pair, F-3 and F-4, were the first subs launched into Puget Sound, built as Yard No. 55 and 56 by The Moran Company, which soon after became Seattle Construction and Drydock Co. The latter pair used Craig diesels.

The D, E, and F classes were the first American submarines (and some of the first anywhere) to have permanently installed radios, and the latter class used telescoping aerials as well.

An improved version of the E-class subs, Fore River provided the design sheets to Union and Moran, which each respective company used in building their first submarines.

General plans prepared by the Fore River Shipbuilding Company, Quincy, Massachusetts, 18 June 1910. This sheet features inboard and outboard profile drawings. These submarines were constructed by the Union Iron Works, San Francisco, California. Initially named Carp (Submarine # 20), Barracuda (Submarine # 21), Pickerel (Submarine # 22), and Skate (Submarine # 23), they were renamed F-1 through F-4 in November 1911 while under construction. NH 84383

Same as the above. Note the three divided sections, fore, middle, and stern. NH 84382

Running some 142 feet overall and able to float on the surface in just 12 feet of water, the F-class were still designed more for coastal and harbor defense than blue water patrols. Just 330 tons when surfaced, they used two small 390 hp NELSECO or Craig diesels to make 13.5 knots on trials. Submerged, at 400 tons, they used a pair of 120 kW Electro Dynamic electric motors fed by two 60-cell steel-jar batteries to make 11.5 knots, a speed they could only maintain for about an hour or so before the batteries were drained.

Overall, they were designed for patrols lasting no more than a week and only carried 33 tons of diesel oil- enough to allow for a 2,300nm range at 11 knots.

Constructed of mild steel, riveted in place and depermed, they had a test dept of 200 feet and could submerge in just 45 feet– although the aerials would still betray them. While on trials in 1913, F-1 dived to 283 feet in tests, but after her hull groaned and she started taking on water within ten minutes, she quickly made it to the surface.

Armament was a four-pack of 18-inch torpedo tubes in the bow behind a rotating torpedo tube muzzle cap– a main battery pioneered just a few years earlier in the D-class– with one set of reloads, allowing for eight fish maximum if all spots were filled. There was no provision for a deck gun and the fairwater or conning tower was short and thin, prone to spray and wash while underway.

The F-class were, to be blunt, just an evolutionary step for the Navy, who soon after would order larger and more sophisticated G, H, K, L, and M-class boats– all before entering the Great War, accumulating 51 commissioned submarines by 1917.

American submarines, 1914 Janes

Meet F-4

Laid down on 21 August 1909 at Moran as the future USS Skate (Submarine No. 23)– the first American warship to carry that later storied name- our subject was renamed a more generic USS F-4 on 17 November 1911. Launched on 6 January 1912, sponsored by the wife of a shipyard executive, she was commissioned 3on  May 1913.

F-4. Note the tiny conning tower with the trunk between the two periscopes. It was thought the conning tower was the most likely part of the boat to be struck during a collision while submerged or carried away by a wave on the surface, so it was made as a separate watertight compartment that could, at least in theory, be wrenched off without breaking the integrity of the hull, provided the hatch was dogged tight. However, it was so small that it could not be used for much, and the skipper and XO had their duty stations, even in an attack run, standing by the diving controls and steering stations. First periscope for the skipper, the second for a lookout. NH 108789

USS F-4 (SS-23) Photographed between 1913-15. Courtesy of Donald M. McPherson, 1972. NH 74736

F4 via Bowfin museum. Note her diving planes

The four F-boats were assigned to the First Submarine Group, Pacific Torpedo Flotilla, based at San Pedro and operated on the West Coast as such until August 1914.

F-Class Submarines at the Mare Island Navy Yard, California, before World War I. This view shows the bows of USS F-1 (Submarine # 20), USS F-2 (Submarine # 21), and USS F-3 (Submarine # 22). Collection of Thomas P. Naughton, 1973. NH 92187

F Class Submarines and tender USS Alert (AS 4) in Dry Dock 2 at Mare Island, California 21 January 1913. Note the extensive awnings erected on the conning towers and the open torpedo cap on F1 to the right

Tender USS Alert and four F boats, San Diego, 1914. Alert, an iron-hulled steam sloop that entered the fleet in 1875, had been decommissioned in 1907 and lent to the California Naval Militia. The Navy recalled her in 1912 specifically for use as a submarine tender for the F-class. 

Then, with war in Europe and a German cruiser squadron roaming the Pacific pursued by British and Japanese fleets, our little F-boats were towed to Hawaii behind armored cruisers to provide presence in the islands.

The Final Dive

The early days of submarining were highlighted by the tendency for these submersibles to claim the lives of their crews. After all, the infamous Hunley sank three times during her seven-month career, on each occasion with a total loss of her complement.

The U.S. Navy was lucky for a time, while European powers and Japan suffered no less than 21 fatal submarine losses between 1903 and 1914, claiming over 200 lives. That luck ran out on the morning of 25 March 1915 when an accident occurred on F-4 while she was off Oahu on maneuvers, sinking to the sea floor 306 feet below with two officers and 19 enlisted aboard.

She had left her tender, the old gunboat USS Alert, at 0900 for a submerged run at a maximum depth of 30 fathoms (180 feet) for target runs but failed to return to the surface by noon. While her emergency buoy was not seen, a sheen of diesel oil appeared on the surface some 1.5 miles off Fort Armstrong between Diamond Head and Barber’s Point, about a mile and a quarter from the channel entrance.

As described by the Submarine Force Museum:

When the F-4 was at a depth of something less than 60 feet, chlorine gas began seeping into the middle, or control, compartment of the boat, indicating that somehow salt water had reached the batteries. F-4’s commanding officer, LT(JG) Alfred Ede, ordered the boat to return to the surface but soon the engines, straining to lift the weight of the sub plus tons of added seawater from what was obviously a substantial leak, overheated and quit. Before the Sailors in the control section retreated to the engine room—several already having passed out after breathing too much of the chlorine gas—they tripped the system that blew air from the high-pressure tank into the main ballast tanks.

But it was too late; water was pouring into the boat faster than the air could blow it out and soon the F-4 came to rest on the bottom, 300 feet below the surface, about 100 feet greater than her test depth. The pressure of the surrounding water soon overcame the rivets that held the torpedo hatch in place and the two forward compartments flooded quickly. Although the crew had secured the hatch behind them when they moved back to the engine room, the bulkhead around it couldn’t hold out against the weight of water and collapsed.

Rescue…turns to recovery

For two days, the Navy combed the waters near where F-4 had been lost and, using drags followed up by divers, was able to approximate her position on the sea bottom. Two Navy hard hat salvage divers attached from the submarine flotilla, GMCs John “Jack” Agraz and John Evans, descended rapidly to 190 feet without seeing the sub. Agraz attempted again and made it to 215 feet- a record at the time for open ocean work- in an unsuccessful attempt to reach the bubbling sub.

A hairy-chested hero, Agraz did the bounce under helmet only with no suit to save time, and somehow never suffered from the bends.

Divers working over the wreck of F-4 in March 1915

An experimental 54-inch diving bell owned by the Hawaiian Dredging Company was sent for, to be rented for $750 per diem.

On 27 March, two days after F4’s dive to the bottom, as the Alert stood by some 500 feet from the lost submarine in water just 160 feet deep, the tugs USS Navajo and Intrepid, accompanied by the 150-ton derrick dredge California, the latter towed by the steamer SS Claudine, arrived on scene with a plan to use a cable loop to lift F-4 and shift her close enough to the tender for divers to attach chains to her and bring her slowly to the surface via crane. The equipment involved amounted to two 110-fathom wire hawsers, with 45 fathoms of chain in the middle.

Heartache came as the clock ticked past 55 hours with F-4 submerged and the cable loop, which had reportedly managed to lift the boat from the bottom, slipped and the submarine careened back to the floor, bow first. The sweep brought to the surface a piece of brass from the submarine’s fairwater, believed to be a section of one of her periscopes.

With the desperate rescue making headlines across the country, SECNAV Josephus Daniels ordered a Navy-wide task force to head to Hawaii and join the effort. From the New York (Brooklyn) Navy Yard, one of the first dive medicine experts, Passed Asst. Surgeon George Reuben Williamson French, USN, (UPenn ’08) was dispatched by express train to Mare Island. French brought five of the Navy’s most experienced divers: Warrant Gunner George D. Stillson and GMCs Stephen J. Drellishak, Frank Crilley, Frederick Nielson, and William Loughman.

The men had spent the past 28 months in a program to evaluate diving tables based on English Dr. John S. Haldane’s theories on staged decompression. The divers had previously reached the amazing depth of 274 feet in experimental tests from the destroyer USS Walke (DD 34) in the relatively sheltered waters of Long Island Sound, developing the first U.S. Navy Diving Manual (the 252-page “Report on Deep Diving Tests”) in the process.

The team had developed a three-wire telephone connection for the divers to remain in constant contact topside the entire dive. It was dubbed the Stillson Phone for years.

USS Walke (Destroyer # 34) Diving support activities on the ship’s deck, while Gunner George D. Stillson, USN, was on the bottom, during deep diving tests conducted in Long Island Sound in late October and early November 1914. This photo may have been taken during Stillson’s 23 October dive, in which he reached the bottom in 88 1/2 feet of water. Note Chief Petty Officer holding diver’s air line, Passed Assistant Surgeon George R.W. French (wearing communications headset and microphone) talking to the diver by telephone, and recompression chamber (with hatch closed) in the background. GMC Frank Crilley is hatless to the left, looking at the camera. Courtesy of Jim Kazalis, 1981. NH 99832

Oh, yeah, and they also helped vet and design the iconic Mark V diving rig, adopted in 1916, based on the British Siebe-Gorman 6-bolt diving helmet but with significant improvements. Air was supplied to the divers from charged torpedo flasks, with pressure controlled through a reducing valve and by throttling.

Chief Gunner’s Mate Stephen J. Drellishak on the deck of USS Walke (DD 34) after making a record dive to 274 feet on November 3, 1914. U.S. Naval Undersea Museum photo

Crew members of the destroyer USS Walke (DD 34) pose with a diving helmet, diving boots, and a recompression chamber installed on the ship’s deck to support deep diving tests in Long Island Sound in the fall of 1914. U.S. Naval Undersea Museum photo

Diver preparing to go over the side of Walke on 3 March 1914. Note the airline attached to the back of his helmet. NH 99836, courtesy of Jim Kazalis, 1981. Chief Gunner’s Mate Stephen J. Drellishak ascending unassisted from a ten-foot stage at the end of his record 274-foot dive from Walke to the sea floor on 3 November 1914. His ascent from the bottom occupied 1 hour and 20 minutes. This dive was one of a series of deep diving tests conducted in Long Island Sound in late October and early November 1914. NH 99838

The dive team traveled with 10,756 pounds of specialized equipment in 27 crates, including a large recompression tank and 1,450 feet of air hose. Another 700 feet of hose was rushed from Norfolk. Mare Island was able to scrounge an additional 500 feet. Daniels dutifully told the press in Washington that, using “special appliances,” he was confident they could reach F-4. This would be their first practical test of their experimental diving techniques and what could be accomplished under service conditions.

Still, Daniels noted, “The Department fears there is not room to hope for the lives of the crew but is determined to do all that is humanly possible to raise the vessel and is undertaking to send the Navy divers to an unprecedented depth if necessary to accomplish this.”

Arriving at Mare Island, they boarded the armored cruiser USS Maryland (ACR-8), which in the meantime had been filled with six lifting pontoons- capable of lifting 520 tons- to be used in the salvage attempt.

New York Navy Yard’s Recompression Chamber No. 1 used during the salvage of F-4 (SS-23). The chamber was shipped to Mare Island and then put aboard Maryland (ACR-8) for the trip to Pearl Harbor. Photo courtesy of Darryl L. Baker via Navsource.

View of the stern of Maryland (ACR-8) with salvage pontoons loaded at Mare Island Navy Yard. Maryland was in dry dock at the time. Photo courtesy of Darryl L. Baker via Navsource.

The cruiser, the experimental dive team, and their accumulation of gear arrived in Hawaii on 12 April, sadly 18 days after F-4 was lost.

In the meantime, back at Pearl, RADM Charles B. T. Moore (commandant of the naval station), LT. Charles E. Smith (1st SubGrp skipper) and Naval Constructor Julius “Dutchie” Furer had been working on a series of mechanical lifts and sweeps to try to secure F-4, with the tugs Navajo and Intrepid joined by the dredge Gaylord.

On 7 April, with the experimental dive team still a week away, dragging continued with the tugs Navajo and Intrepid.

Furer acquired two mud scows from the Hawaiian Dredging Company, each some 104 feet long by 36 feet beam by 13 feet deep, and rigged them with four slings “made from the heaviest cables procurable” attached to purpose-built windlasses on each vessel. The windlass drums were made from 16-inch diameter sugar mill shafts and spooled with 2.5-inch galvanized steel cables obtained from the Pacific Mail Steamship Company with the 10-inch by 14-inch steam engine, geared to 6 drums, on the dredge used to reel.

With the dive team from Brooklyn arriving on the scene on 14 April, GMC Frank Crilley was the first diver to reach the submarine, dropping to a new record of 288 feet of seawater, and walked along the boat’s upper deck. He found F-4 on a smooth sandy bottom with no coral growth to impede hoisting operations, and her bow pointed shoreward. He noted two parted lines from previous snagging and recovery efforts attached to the craft. The dive took two hours, with a five-minute descent, 12 minutes on the bottom, and the balance on the slow rise to the surface to decompress.

Stillson, following immediately after, reported the superstructure was caved in, and the hull under it was filled with water.

Salvage of USS F-4 (SS-23), April-August 1915. A hard hat diver descending to the sunken submarine. Purportedly photographed 90 feet below the surface via a sealed glass bottomed box. F-4 had sunk on 25 March 1915 off Honolulu, Hawaii, in over 300 feet of water. Courtesy of Donald M. McPherson, 1972. NH 74731

The salvage equipment devised and employed by Furer to lift F-4 to the surface was slowly attached to the vessel over the next several days, with the divers only able to work 15-20 minutes per dive due to the exertion of working at such depth and the prerequisite decompression time. At least 13 dives went past 275 feet in depth, with five reaching the sea floor at 306 feet, struggling with 10 atmospheres of pressure (130-140 pounds per sq. inch).

To say this was dangerous for the divers was an understatement.

On 17 April, one of the men, Loughman, almost perished, adding his soul to the 21 already lost on the submarine. Entangled in lines on his ascent, he was trapped more than 250 feet down and helpless. Chief Crilley, who had already dived that day, volunteered to don a helmet and return to the deep to help his shipmate return to the surface.

Loughman, who spent more four hours at depths over 200 feet, was brought to the surface in semi-conscious conditions and had to spend nine hours in the recompression chamber, then was waylaid for two weeks with severe pneumonia and Caisson’s disease (the Bends). He was only released from Mare Island Naval Hospital at the end of June.

Dr. French on Loughman, via the 1916 Naval Medical Bulletin:

Crilley would later (in 1929!) receive a rare peacetime MoH for his actions.

Medal of Honor citation of Chief Gunner’s Mate Frank W. Crilley (as printed in the official publication “Medal of Honor, 1861-1949, The Navy”, page 106):

“For display of extraordinary heroism in the line of his profession above and beyond the call of duty during the diving operations in connection with the sinking in a depth of water 304 feet, of the U.S.S. F-4 with all on board, as a result of loss of depth control, which occurred off Honolulu, T.H., on 25 March 1915. On 17 April 1915, William F. Loughman, chief gunner’s mate, United States Navy, who had descended to the wreck and had examined one of the wire hawsers attached to it, upon starting his ascent, and when at a depth of 250 feet beneath the surface of the water, had his life line and air hose so badly fouled by this hawser that he was unable to free himself; he could neither ascend nor descend. On account of the length of time that Loughman had already been subjected to the great pressure due to the depth of water, and the uncertainty of the additional time he would have to be subjected to this pressure before he could be brought to the surface, it was imperative that steps be taken at once to clear him. Instantly, realizing the desperate case of his comrade, Crilley volunteered to go to his aid, immediately donned a diving suit, and descended. After a lapse of time of 2 hours and 11 minutes, Crilley was brought to the surface, having by a superb exhibition of skill, coolness, endurance and fortitude, untangled the snarl of lines and cleared his imperiled comrade, so that he was brought, still alive, to the surface.”

Slowly, using manila reeving line, by 18 April, all four lifting hawsers had been placed and transferred to the scows, but F-4 remained stubbornly on the bottom, drawn closer to shore into a shallower 275 feet depth.

Re-rigging the lifting hawsers with lengths of Maryland’s 2⅝-inch stud-link anchor chain for extra strength and reinstalling them, the next lift was tried on 20 May. Over the next four days, through a complicated series of lifts and tows, with the tugs, scows, pontoons, and dredge all working together day and night, F-4 had been lifted to a depth of just 84 feet by 24 May and 50 feet by 25 May. The plan was to bring her into a flooded dry dock that allowed a depth of 25.5 feet.

Then came a three-day storm that buffeted the lifting vessels and translated down the hawsers to the suspended water-filled submarine below as diving and salvage operations were suspended. When Furer sent divers down on 29 May after the waters calmed, it was found that the top of the sub was caved in and torn almost halfway through to the keel.

With F-4 upside down, suspended 46 feet under the water by hawsers, it was decided to transfer the rest of the lift to the six submergible pontoons and bring the submarine to the surface before transfer to a dry dock. Twenty charged torpedo air flasks were installed on a coal barge, then linked by pipe and a dozen 150-foot lengths of hose to the pontoons to bring them to the surface, with F-4 along for the ride. This took until 29 August to set up.

Valve manifold and hose leads to submerged pontoons, on board a salvage vessel off Honolulu, Hawaii, in August 1915. Halftone photograph, copied from Transactions of the Society of Naval Architects and Marine Engineers, Volume 24, 1916, Figure 11. The tug in the left distance is probably the USS Navajo. NH 43497

Then the lift started, with the flasks charging the pontoons and F-4 rising slowly. Importantly for diving history, this segment saw one of the first uses of several divers connected to the surface via telephone line for communication to coordinate the careful rise as one pontoon, rising too slow or too fast or at the wrong angle, could upend the whole operation.

Bow salvage pontoons emerging from the depths, off Honolulu, Hawaii, circa 29 August 1915, during the final lifting of the sunken submarine. Halftone photograph, copied from Transactions of the Society of Naval Architects and Marine Engineers, Volume 24, 1916, Figure 12. NH 43498

All salvage pontoons on the surface, off Honolulu, Hawaii, circa 29 August 1915, with preparations under way to tow the sunken submarine into Honolulu Harbor. Halftone photograph, copied from Transactions of the Society of Naval Architects and Marine Engineers, Volume 24, 1916, Figure 13. The tug in the center is probably the USS Navajo. NH 43499

Salvage pontoons on the surface, off Honolulu, Hawaii, circa 29 August 1915, after the final lifting of the sunken submarine in preparation for towing her into Honolulu harbor. Note the wooden protective sheathing around the pontoons. The tug on the right is probably the USS Navajo. Courtesy of Donald M. McPherson, 1972. NH 74732

Towed into port with the pontoons surfaced, F-4 was finally transferred to the dry dock of the Island Steam Navigation Company at the Quarantine Station dock.

From Beneath the Surface: World War I Submarines Built in Seattle and Vancouver by Bill Lightfoot. Photo from Kerrick, Military & Naval America, via Navsource.

F-4 in drydock at Honolulu, Hawaii, on 1 September 1915, after she had been raised from over 300 feet of water and towed into port. Note the large implosion hole in her port side and the salvage pontoons used to support her during the final lift. This view shows the F-4’s port bow. She is upside down, rolled to starboard approximately 120 degrees from the vertical. Photographed by Kodagraph, Honolulu. Courtesy of Donald M. McPherson, 1972. NH 74733

Naval personnel examine the large implosion hole in F-4’s port side, in drydock at Honolulu, Hawaii, circa late August or early September 1915. She had been raised from over 300 feet of water and towed into port. This view was taken from off the port bow, showing the submarine’s port side diving plane in the center. She is upside down, rolled to starboard approximately 120 degrees from the vertical. Courtesy of Donald M. McPherson, 1972. NH 74734

View of F-4’s port side name plate, taken in drydock at Honolulu, Hawaii, circa late August or early September 1915, after she had been raised from over 300 feet of water and towed into port. These figures are mounted on the submarine’s port bow and are shown upside down, as she was drydocked rolled to starboard approximately 120 degrees from the vertical. Courtesy of Donald M. McPherson, 1972. NH 74735

It was determined that the loss occurred due to leaking battery acid that corroded F-4’s hull rivets in the port wall of the battery steel tank at Frame 51, which allowed progressive flooding, chlorine off gassing due to salt water interaction with the battery jars, loss of depth control, and eventual catastrophic hull failure. This led to design changes in future submarine classes.

The salvage of F-4 is well covered in more detail at PigBoats.com. 

Epilogue

Of the 21 members of F-4’s crew that went on her last dive, 18 were recovered from her wreckage.

A team of physicians assembled from the Maryland’s medical department led by Surgeon H. Curl and Asst. Dental Surgeon Halleck, joined by Asst Surgeon WW Cress of the Alert, and Surgeons Trotter and Seaman of the Marine Hospital in Honolulu combed through the wreckage for remains.

The interior of the submarine, having been submerged for six months in the tropics, was in bad shape.

Detailed by Seaman in the 1916 Naval Medical Bulletin:

Four sets of remains were found in the middle compartment of F-4, while the rest were found in the stern engine compartment. Of the four recovered that were identifiable, two, Ashcroft and Herzog, were identified due to dental records, while the other two, Wells and Mahan, were identified due to the contents of their pockets. The remains were wrapped in cotton, surrounded by oakum, and placed in caskets.

The four who were able to be identified were repatriated to their families for interment, sent to California, Utah, and Virginia.

The 14 unidentified sets of remains were arranged in four sealed metal coffins, marched in a somber funeral parade through Honolulu to the California-bound USS Supply, and were eventually buried with honors at Arlington.

The modern marker for the F-4 crew includes the 14 men buried and three missing

Her crew is remembered as the first of the American submarines listed on Eternal Patrol and appear on markers and monuments as such across the country.

She is the first of 65 still on Eternal Patrol. (Photo: Chris Eger)

Following the investigation of her doom and the removal of remains, the wreckage of F-4 was refloated on 15 September 1915– the dry dock was rented after all– and towed under the pontoons by Navajo into Magazine Loch until she grounded in the shallow inlet. There she sat in the shallows until 1940 when the area was turned into the Sierra submarine piers. She was rolled into a trench by the pier and buried.

In 1999, a magnetometer survey near pier Sierra 13/14 detected a large object, some 80 feet from the pier, under some 20 feet of sediment. A sign has since been erected to note this resting place.

Meanwhile, the small original headstone for her 17 crew members buried at Arlington was installed at the USS Bowfin Museum at Pearl.

USS Bowfin Executive Director Jerry Hofwolt and Richard Mendelson (Submarine Veterans) during F4 Headstone dedication to USS Bowfin Submarine Museum and Park, 2000.

Some of her construction notes endure in the National Archives. 

In November 1915, Dutchie Furer, who directed the recovery of F-4, largely with improvised equipment, submitted an extremely detailed article on the salvage operation to Proceedings. A 1901 Annapolis grad who fought against the Spanish in 1898 while still a midshipman, he was a proponent of small craft operations and campaigned successfully for the 110-foot subchasers in the Great War. Earning a Navy Cross, he later helped supervise the modernization of the battleships USS Pennsylvania and New Mexico in the 1930s and, still on duty in 1941, became Chief of Navy Research and helped coordinate new technology into the fleet in WWII. He retired in November 1945.

RADM Julius Augustus Furer, USNA ’01, passed in 1963, aged 82, and is buried at Arlington.

Likewise, Dr. French would publish “Diving Operations in Connection with the Salvage of the USS ‘F-4″ in the Naval Medical Bulletin in 1916. He retired from the navy as a commander in 1937, then returned to the colors during WWII, later passing at the Oakland Navy Hospital in May 1955. He is regarded as the Navy’s first Diving Medical Officer. 

The hard hat divers of the experimental team that set and repeatedly broke their own deep-sea records also kept at it.

When there was another accident in 1927, when the USS S-4 (SS-109) became disabled and was lost with all hands, a familiar face hit the news again, with now-Ensign Grilley again earning a peacetime decoration for bravery.

“Naval divers who worked hard and faithfully at the difficult task of raising the submarine S-4” (quoted from the original 1928 caption). Probably photographed at the Boston Navy Yard, Charlestown, Massachusetts, circa 19-20 March 1928, shortly after the salvaged S-4 entered dry dock there. Those present are identified in the original caption as (standing, left to right): Michaels, Eadie, Wilson, Carr, and Eissn. (Kneeling, left to right): Grilley, Mattox and Doherty. Michaels may be Chief Torpedoman Michels. Eadie is Chief Gunner’s Mate. Thomas Eadie, who was awarded the Medal of Honor for rescuing Michaels during salvage work. Grilley is probably Ensign Frank W. Crilley. NH 41836

Navy Cross citation of Ensign Frank W. Crilley (as printed in his official biography):

“For extraordinary heroism and fearless devotion to duty during the diving operations in connection with the salvage of the USS S-4, sunk as a result of a collision off Provincetown, Massachusetts, 17 December 1927. During the period 17 December 1927 to 17 March 1928, on which latter date the ill-fated vessel was raised, Crilley, under the most adverse weather conditions, at the risk of his life, descended many times into the icy waters and displayed throughout that period fortitude, skill, determination and courage which characterizes conduct above and beyond the call of duty.”

Ensign Frank William Crilley, who earned both the Navy Cross and MoH, the latter only presented in 1929 by Coolidge some 14 years after the fact, retired from the service at least twice and was called back to help salvage lost subs. He passed in 1947, aged 64, on dry land. He is buried at Arlington.

The current Navy Experimental Diving Unit was formally established in 1927 at the Washington Navy Yard and the equipment and procedures developed at NEDU, including the McCann Rescue Chamber and mixed gas diving, were essential to the rescue of the crewmen who survived the initial sinking of the submarine USS Squalus on the bottom off the Isle of Shoals near Portsmouth in 1939.

The disabled Squalus was located on the sea floor at a depth of 240 feet in 29°F water, and a rescue ship with a diving chamber came to the site. The 33 crew in the non-flooded compartments were transferred to the surface within 40 hours via four trips of the diving chamber.

Now moving towards its 100th year in operation, the NEDU, still under SUPSALV, continues its research to save lives in the worst-case scenario.

They retain the Mark V on their insignia.

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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Crusader at 70

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The F8U (after 1962, F-8) Crusader first flew on 25 March 1955.  To salue the “Gunfighter,” how about this great laydown image.

A Vought F-8D Crusader with all of its possible armament: In the center in front of the aircraft lies an AGM-12C Bullpup missile, next to it are Mk 83 1,000 lb ordnance, AGM-12As, and Mk 82 500 lb ordnance. To the right and left of the F-8D are four AIM-9B Sidewinder missiles and two multiple ejector racks. Six LAU-3/A rocket launchers are carried on the underwing pylons, and four 5-inch “Zuni” rockets are fitted to the fuselage launch rails.

And, of course, you can’t have an awesome Cold War laydown image without looping in the back of Pink Floyd’s Ummagumma album!

Uncle Chester Shuffles out for One Last Go

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Named in honor of the fleet admiral that oversaw the Pacific War, the USS Nimitz (CVAN/CVN-68) was ordered on 31 March 1967 and commissioned just over eight years later on 11 April 1975.

USS Nimitz (CVN-68) replenishes from USS Mount Baker (AE-34) during UNREP training on her shakedowns in Guantanamo Operations Area, Caribbean, 31 July 1975. At the time, her wing, CVW-8, had two F-4J Phantom squadrons (VF-31 and VMFA-333), two A-7E Corsair units (VA-82, VA-86), an A-6E Intruder squadron (VA-35), and assorted EA-6B, E-2B, and SH-3H dets. She has outlasted all of these types. NHHC K-109941

Even new math shows that her 50th anniversary is coming up in a few weeks, and she will celebrate it haze gray and underway on her 30th deployment- and that’s not even counting almost smashing the Kido Butai!

The Nimitz Carrier Strike Group (NIMCSG) departed Naval Base Kitsap in Bremerton, Washington, for a regularly scheduled deployment to the Western Pacific on 21 March, with an all-DDG escort as the carrier has outlasted almost every U.S. cruiser that would have traditionally accompanied her.

Sailors man the rails on the flight deck of the aircraft carrier USS Nimitz (CVN 68) in the Puget Sound after getting underway for a regularly scheduled Indo-Pacific deployment, March 21, 2025. An integral part of the U.S. Pacific Fleet, the U.S. 3rd Fleet operates naval forces in the Indo-Pacific and provides realistic and relevant training to ensure the readiness necessary to execute the U.S. Navy’s timeless role across the full spectrum of military operations. (U.S. Navy photo 250321-N-QV399-1053 by Mass Communication Specialist Seaman Japeth Carter)

As noted by 3rd Fleet PAO:

NIMCSG consists of the Nimitz-class aircraft carrier USS Nimitz (CVN 68), Carrier Air Wing (CVW) 17, and Destroyer Squadron (DESRON) 9.

The embarked air wing consists of nine squadrons flying F/A-18C/E/F Super Hornets, EA-18G Growler, E-2D Hawkeyes, C-2A Greyhounds, and MH-60R/S Sea Hawks; Squadrons are the “Fighting Redcocks” of Strike Fighter Squadron (VFA) 22, “Mighty Shrikes” of VFA-94, “Kestrels” of VFA-137, “Blue Diamonds” of Strike Fighter Squadron (VFA) 146, “Cougars” of VAQ-139, “Indians” of Helicopter Sea Combat Squadron (HSC) 6, “Bluetails” of Carrier Airborne Early Warning Squadron (VAW) 121, “BattleCats” of Helicopter Maritime Strike Squadron (HSM) 73, and the “Rawhides” of Fleet Logistics Support Squadron (VRC) 40.

DESRON 9 consists of the Arleigh Burke-class guided-missile destroyers, USS Curtis Wilbur (DDG 54), USS Gridley (DDG 101), USS Wayne E. Meyer (DDG 108), and USS Lenah Sutcliffe Higbee (DDG 123).

Maskinpistolen!

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From the collection of the Danish Resistance Museum comes this amazing poster made just after the post-WWII Liberation.

Translation:

“The machine gun: Making STEN-Gun. The working drawings are exported and sent to several companies that each performed their part. Only 5 trusted men knew and worked at the ASSEMBLY SITE!!”

At least three Danish resistance groups (Ringen, BOPA, and Holder-Danske) were known to have manufactured Sten locally, with each giving the gun its own little tweaks, largely due to the materials available. Plumbers and bicycle shop owners proved particularly adept.

Making Holger Danske STEN guns Denmark Danish FHM-286695

Danish underground STEN workshop on Niels Finsens Allé in Søborg FHM-182982

Danish sten making workshop on Niels Finsens Allé, Søborg FHM-182978

Danish STEN BOPA’s workshop on Kongevejen in Holte FHM-182895

Danish homemade STEN BOPA workshop in Holte FHM-182924

They had a wild collection of differences, with each group setting up a thriving cottage industry, in many cases only dependent on the magazines (originals dropped from England or Suomi magazines smuggled from Sweden).

As detailed by the SADJ:

There were several variations of the Sten made by the different resistance organizations, of available materials. Producing barrels was a problem, largely solved by boring and re-rifling old rifle barrels. One Danish Sten copy was designed to use Suomi magazines. The Ringen Sten was a Danish design produced in small workshops using a number of aluminum castings.

Danish Resistance Sten Gun (Ringen type); butt, trigger housing and magazine housing are of aluminum alloy construction; lacks magazine. Height 195 mm., Length 910 mm., Width 100 mm. IWM (FIR 6156)

Same as above

Suomi quad mag Danish STEN Tøjhusmuseet in Copenhagen

Homemade Danish Sten in Freedom Museum FHM-261175

Danish Freedom Museum STEN collection FHM-316233

Danish homemade STEN coat gun FHM-153217

Danish homemade STEN. Note it is set up to accept an over-barrel suppressor. FHM-286723

Of course, there were some weapons dropped to the Danes via the efforts of the SOE and Free Danish forces in London.

Danish Resistance members process an SOE para-dropped weapon container at Søholt (Røgbølle Sø) on Lolland in March 1945. The picture was taken by the light from the headlights of the truck brought along. Note the M1 Carbines. FHM-200342 and 200349

Danish resistance STEN guns dropped via canister. Also note Mills bombs, explosives, and detonators. 

The assorted Danish Resistance groups counted some 90,110 members during the war, and while most of these were involved in passive resistance and intelligence gathering, they were very active when it came to rubbing out collaborators and informers, with Likvidering (liquidation) units assassinated upwards of 400 alone in 1943-1944 ala Flame & Citron.

The Resistance also helped spirit over 7,000 Danish Jews out of the country to nearby Sweden, helped hide Danish police and military personnel, ratline downed Allied aircrews back to Freedom, and kept British intelligence very well informed of German movements.

It was only after August 1944 (!) that the British SOE began dropping weapons to the Danes, totaling just 600 tons of munitions and supplies by March 1945, and followed that up with 53 SOE agents.

And when the order to take back the country came in May 1945, most areas of Denmark were self-liberated. The now in the open Resistance, wearing identification armbands, typically met the British as they arrived, the situation already in hand and, in many cases, the local German garrisons isolated and waiting to hand over their guns.

Danish Resistance, 1945, World War II sten mausers k98 m1 carbine stg44

Danish Freedom fighters in Vejle May 1945 STEN FHM-238868

Danish STEN guns at the Liberation

Danish STEN resistance Godthåbsvej, in Frederiksberg 1945 FHM-244069

Danish STEN resistance Godthåbsvej, in Frederiksberg 1945 FHM-244064

At least 850 members of the Danish Resistance would perish in the war, with 102 of those executed.

However, no one doubts that a few STENs haven’t been set back for a rainy day in Danish communities. They often show up at police stations, are found in attics, and handed quietly down with grandpa’s old things.

Turned in to a Danish police station in 2024: Mausers, Berthiers, STENs and a MP40

Lucked into a RIA NM 1911

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Well, as you may remember from my previous posts, I wound up in Round 4 of the CMP 1911’s program. After sending in my packet in the summer of 2023, I pulled Random Generated Number (RGN) 46295 in the lottery on 10 October 2023.

Then, I waited.

And waited.

Finally, on 25 February 2025, I got the magic call and was told all four grades were available. As I already have a pretty neat Service Grade that I lucked into during Round 2, I went “Range Grade” which typically have aftermarket parts installed and were usually either A) late-use guns issued out to SF units in the 1990s and early 2000s, or B) guns used by the military marksmanship teams in target completion.

Requesting a Colt (if possible), my gun shipped the next day and I recently managed to break free and swing by my local FFL to pick it up.

And here we are:

Delving into it piece by piece, the frame is that of a Colt Military Model M1911A1, SN# 824784, which was made in 1942.

CMP Forums books notes: It shipped to Springfield between September 18 and October 22, 1942 probably destined for Europe with the Army. For example, SN 823189 went from Colt to Springfield on 10/02/42 and from Springfield to the NY Port of Embarkation on 10/13/42. The very closest SN is 824446 was with the 6th Army on 07/09/46.

The rest of the gun quickly points to that fact that it was subsequently selected for upgrade to a National Match competition-grade pistol in 1968 at Rock Island Arsenal (RIA and NM marked on right side of frame) with a Colt NM 7791435 marked slide including 1/8” .358 high front sight, a Colt NM 7791414 marked barrel, NM7267718 barrel bushing, large U.S. marked Kensight rear sight, aluminum trigger, milled front strap, straight mainspring housing, checkered thumb safety, and black checkered grips. The right side is marked: Colts PT. F.A. Mfg. Co. Hartford, Conn. U.S.A. Lightly scratched into the rear of right slide is “WC.”

It was likely issued out to a division, post, regional, Army, state, or other-level Marksmanship Training Unit post-1968 until finding its way to Anniston Army Depot and the CMP. It has a UID label (an animal only introduced in 2005) on the dust cover, a clue that, along with the more modern grips, may mean that it was still in use with a team until very recently.

I have a FOIA request for its history and will update you guys with what I find out.

How it Started vs How it Ended, Vickers Edition

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Two WWII images, five years apart to the day, bookended by the same weapon system.

Vickers water-cooled .303 machine guns of the 7th Battalion Cheshire Regiment, 1st Division, at Aubigny-au-Bac, 23 March 1940. This was just six weeks before the end of the Phoney War and the beginning of a very different one.

Note the immaculate Pattern 37 gear and uniforms. Capt. Len Puttnam, war photographer, IWM F 3273

“Crossing the Rhine, 23 March 1945: British commandos of the 1st Commando Brigade man two Vickers water-cooled .303 machine guns machine guns in the shattered outskirts of Wesel. The 1st Commandos had formed the spearhead of the British assault by making a surprise crossing in assault craft on the night of 23 – 24 March under a barrage of 1,500 guns.” This was just six weeks before VE-Day.

Meanwhile, the Commandos look much more comfortable. By Sgt. Norris, No. 5 Army Film and Photo Section, Army Film and Photographic Unit, IWM BU 2329

Of course, the Vickers, which first entered service by virtue of List of Changes No.16217 in November 1912 and remained in inventory until 30 March 1968 when it was replaced by the L7 variant of the FN MAG 58

The best single-volume work on the gun is the 860-page Vickers Machine Gun: Pride of the Emma Gees, edited by Dolf Goldsmith, Richard Fisher, Robert G. Segel, and Dan Shea.

I got mine personally from Mr. Shea– who is a gentleman and a scholar of the first kind– when I bumped into him in Germany last year.

Zippo Monitor, in Vivid Color!

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Early 1969 U.S. Navy images from the National Archives, show a “Zippo” flamethrower installed on a 56-foot Armored Troop Carrier monitor– an armored LCM (6) landing craft–  in testing along an unnamed river in the Republic of Vietnam.

Note the camo “duck hunter” jungle hat, worn slouch style. DN-SC-82-03010

DN-SC-82-03009

DN-SC-82-03008

As detailed in War in the Shallows: U.S. Navy Coastal & Riverine Warfare in Vietnam, 1965-68 by John Sherwood page 178:

In the summer of 1967, when the Viet Cong constructed bunkers capable of withstanding 40mm rounds, RIVFLOT 1 began exploring the idea of deploying flamethrowers on riverboats as a potential bunker buster. On 4 October, the M132A1, an Army flamethrower, was shoehorned into an ATC. Commanders hoped the M132A1’s 32-second burst and 150-yard range would not only neutralize enemy bunkers but also deter river ambushes. Tests proved satisfactory, but the M132A1, weighing 23,000 pounds, was too heavy for the Navy’s needs. Instead, lighter M10-8 flamethrowers were installed on six monitors delivered in May of 1968.

Nicknamed “Zippo” after the popular cigarette lighter, these monitors mounted two M10-8 flamethrowers, each with an effective range of 200–300 yards. With 1,350 gallons of napalm fuel, the M10-8 could lay down a sheet of flame for 225 seconds. Sailors would make napalm by mixing a powder consisting of the coprecipitated aluminum salts of naphthenic and palmitic acids with gasoline. Compressed air propelled the napalm through the flamethrower, and a gasoline lighter acted as the trigger.

“You had to be careful to get the right jelly consistency when making it,” explained Gunner’s Mate 3rd Class Joseph Lacapruccia, “but firing the weapon was not dangerous. No one was ever burned. It was much safer than the 20mm, and napalm was effective against the VC because it could travel into spider holes and deplete oxygen.”

Zippo Monitor of Task Force 117 using dual flamethrowers to reduce possible enemy ambush sites along riverbank Mekong Delta, May 3, 1968, USN 1135595.

Renegade Gunfighter

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Some 50 years ago, a spectacular image of a Vought F-8J Crusader of VF-24, the “Fighting Renegades,” in flight, 1975.

U.S. Navy National Museum of Naval Aviation photo No. 1996.253.7337.016

Assigned to Carrier Air Wing 21 (CVW-21) aboard the Essex-class fleet carrier USS Hancock (CVA-19), the Renegades deployed to the West Pac on “Hannah” from March 18 to October 20, 1975, a period that included the Fall of Saigon (Operation Frequent Wind).

Notably, it was the last of nine Vietnam deployments for Hancock, which was headed to mothballs, and the final Crusader deployment for VF-24, a type they had flown since 1956.

Upon return to San Diego, VF-24 on 9 December 1975 received its first F-14A and soon after updated its name to the “Red Checkertails,” one they would carry through 1996 when they were disestablished.

Warship Wednesday, March 19, 2025: Bucoup Malchanceuse

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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, March 19, 2025: Bucoup Malchanceuse

Naval History and Heritage Command, NH 64442

Above, we see the unique cuirasse d’escadre Bouvet of the French Marine Nationale sitting quietly at anchor, likely in the Mediterranean in the 1900s. More a floating castle than a man-o-war, this tumblehome-hulled battlewagon would find herself very unlucky in the Dardanelles some 110 years ago this week.

The “Sample Fleet”

While France and Britain were at peace since 1815, there was still enough lingering animosity between the two traditional enemies that, when the Royal Navy began work on a series of eight new 1st rate warships that would become the Royal Sovereign-class battleship in 1888– vessels that hit 14,000 tons, carried four 13.5-inch guns, and were clad in as much as 18 inches of armor but could still make 17 knots or better– the French knew they needed a response.

This led the French naval ministry to order four, and later a fifth, new and experimental battleship around a series of mandatory specs: 14,000 tons or less, a “diamond” gun arrangement with turreted 12-inch guns fore and aft and 10.8-inch guns amidships, an armor plate topping out at 18 inches, and a speed of at least 17 knots. Dubbed the “flotte d’échantillons” (sample fleet), the idea would be that the ministry would pick and choose what worked best from these one-off prototypes and come up with the best design moving forward.

The first four ships were all designed by four different esteemed French naval architects and built at four different domestic yards at roughly the same time to cut down on the suspense:

  • Charles Martel, designed by Charles Ernest Huin, built at Arsenal de Brest 1891-1896
  • Jauréguiberry, designed by Amable Lagane, built by F et C de la Méditerranée, La Seyne-sur-Mer 1891-96
  • Carnot, designed by Victor Saglio, built at Arsenal de Toulon 1891-1896
  • Masséna, designed by Louis de Bussy, built at A et C de la Loire, Saint-Nazaire 1891-1897

French pre-dreadnought battleship Masséna, alongside one of her sisters

Before any of the above Echantillons had entered service, Charles Ernest Huin received the singular honor of drafting a fifth design that would begin construction at Arsenal de Lorient in January 1893. Regarded as a bit of a genius by the French, the 57-year-old Huin had graduated from the École Polytechnique during the Crimean War, sat on the Gavres Commission on artillery development, and became general director of the Gironde Shipyards in Lorient in 1881 where he designed the early battleships Hoche, Brennus, and Marceau before his Charles Martel design, picked as first of the Echantillons to be laid down, drew interest.

Hoche, seen operating in relatively flat waters along France’s Atlantic coast in 1890, was one of Huin’s babies

Huin’s swansong is our subject.

Meet Bouvet

Although a continuation of the sample fleet concept, our Bouvet would be a testbed for several new technologies. Whereas the other four Echantillons used Lagreafel d’Allest boilers, Bouvet would carry 32 (!) more modern Indret-Bellville boilers arranged on three engines driving three shafts (three of the four sample ships were twin shafters). She went a bit heavier than the preceding battleships, but with 15,000 shp available, she was designed to make 18 knots in theory and could steam 4,000nm on 10 knots with 980 tons of good coal in her bunkers.

While she carried a similar armor plan, Bouvet’s was improved Harvey nickel steel face-hardened armor with a higher tensile strength against incoming projectiles than that used on previous French ships. Further, while she had roughly the same hull type, it was not cut down to the main deck at the stem, and she carried a downsized superstructure with a pair of smaller military masts compared to the previous Echantillons, all of which suffered from dramatic stability issues in any sort of seas.

Her drawings on paper seem elegant.

She also had more modern guns, albeit of the same caliber as the four prior sample ships. Rather than two single Canon de 305 mm/45 (12″) Model 1887s as on Charles Martel, she had updated 305 mm/40 (12″) Model 1893s as her main armament. Capable of firing 770-pound AP shells to 13,000 yards at about one round per minute, these guns would later be mounted in two twin-gun turrets on the follow on the Gaulois, Iena, Suffren, Republique, and Liberte battleship classes.

Bouvet, bow shot, showing off her forward 12-inch gun

Note all the light guns in her superstructure

The secondary battery was a pair of 274 mm/45 (10.8″) Model 1887/1893s in amidship single gun turrets, an experimental model only carried on Bouvet and the sample ship Massena. Her sloping tumblehome hull form was largely to allow these “wing” guns a wider field of fire.

Battleship Bouvet beam turrets.

The tertiary armament was downright wild, with eight single 5.5″/45 M1891s, another eight 3.9″/45 M1891s, a dozen single 47mm/40 M1885 3-pounders, five single 37mm/20 M1885 1-pounders, and a pair of Hotchkiss 37mm 5-barreled Gatling-style guns. This was deemed more than enough to tackle incoming waves of enemy torpedo boats.

Bouvet, Janes 1914

Speaking of torpedoes, she maintained four separate 17.7-inch torpedo stations, two amidships above water with single tubes on trainable turnstiles, and another two submerged forward with fixed tubes that simply fired 90 degrees outward from the beam. Each station had its own magazine, and Bouvet could carry a dozen M1892 Whitehead-type fish, which had a 1,100-yard range and carried 220 pounds of guncotton.

Modern, she carried four dynamos that allowed for force ventilation belowdecks, electrical lighting, and six high-output searchlights. Heady stuff for 1892.

The Salad Days

Bouvet was ordered 8 April 1892 from Lorient Arsenal at a cost of £1.2 million, or 21 million French francs. Laid down to a completed design by Huin on 16 January 1893, she was launched 27 April 1896, her hull decorated with trees.

Named for the trio of famed 18th/19th century French navigator/admirals Bouvet, our battleship was at least the third to carry the name under the Tricolor, preceded by a steam aviso famously sunk off Haiti in 1871 in a storm just after she fought the German gunboat SMS Meteor off Havana (see: Warship Wednesday, Nov. 4, 2020: A German and a Frenchman walk into a Cuban bar…).

Bouvet fitting out

Bouvet was completed and was commissioned in June 1898, amid the spectacular naval developments of the Spanish-American War.

Bouvet circa 1900, Symond & Co photograph, IWM Q 22256

She joined the Mediterranean squadron and visited the Italian sovereigns in 1900, before becoming flagship of the entire French fleet for a couple of years. She then participated in several diplomatic voyages to Spain, Italy, Greece, the exotic Ottoman ports, and other spots in the region before taking part in numerous maneuvers and exercises in the Med.

For a time, she was a favorite subject of naval postcards.

Notably, she participated in the large French naval review at Cherbourg in July 1900, suffered a minor collision with the battleship Gaulois in 1903, and assisted in the international response to the 1906 eruption of Mount Vesuvius in Italy.

It was a quiet life.

By 1907, she was given an overhaul that included deleting her above-deck torpedo tubes and other minor efforts to help trim her top-heavy design. By the summer of 1908, with better battleships taking their place in the fleet’s 1st and 2nd Battleship Divisions, Bouvet was downgraded an assignment in the 3rd.

In and out of ordinary, her roles increasingly took on a more auxiliary tasking outside of the spotlight, no longer the proud flagship of her early career.

Battleship Bouvet in Toulon harbour 1912, BNF image

By 1913, the French Navy had a surplus of steel-sheathed, steel-hulled battlewagons, each class generally better than the last in an evolutionary sense, and all more advanced than Bouvet. Going past the Echantillons, they had three 11,000 ton Charlemagnes, the one-off 9,000-ton Henri IV, the 12,725-ton Suffren, two 15,000-ton Republiques, three 14,000-ton Democraties, six 18,000-ton “semi-dreadnought” Dantons, four modern 23,000-ton Courbets mounting a full dozen 12″/50 guns, three brand-new 24,000-ton Bretagnes with ten 13.5″/45s, and a class of five 25,000-ton Normandie class dreadnoughts under construction. With all that– including 13 legit dreadnoughts and six semi-dreadnoughts for the battle line and 10 still functional pre-dreadnoughts for expeditionary use– the need to keep the cranky and grossly obsolete Echantillons on the Navy List any longer was fading.

The four earlier sample ships were soon withdrawn. Charles Martel was placed in reserve in 1912 before being decommissioned outright in early 1914, permanently disarmed to become a floating barracks hulk at Brest. Carnot was placed in reserve in January 1913 and, disarmed, was used as an accommodation ship at Toulon. Massena, suffering an explosion in 1913, was withdrawn from service and hulked, pending scrapping.

Jaureguiberry and Bouvet were transferred to the Division de complément (Supplementary Division) and assigned to fire control development and gunnery training, respectively, surely the last stop before being laid up. These two ships were reportedly left in poor condition, with maintenance funds diverted to newer and more capable battleforce elements. After all, why waste money on ships earmarked for disposal?

War!

The Great War saved Bouvet and fellow sample battleship Jaureguiberry from the scrappers. Ordered to arm up and make ready for combat– with German and Austrian ally Italy thought ready to enter the conflict at any moment and German RADM Souchon’s Mediterranean Squadron at large– the two dated but still useful warships were soon escorting troopships in the Med. These included both French colonial troops heading to the Metropolitan Republic and British/Indian troops likewise headed to the Western Front.

Bouvet, May 1914, BNF

Once Souchon’s squadron, the battlecruiser SMS Goeben and the cruiser Breslau, had fled to the Dardanelles under the protection of Ottoman guns, and Italy gave assurances they had no immediate intention of honoring their pact with Berlin and Vienna, Bouvet soon shifted to Greek waters to join the force gathering there should the German ships attempt to break back out into the Med.

This force soon made the logical transition to supporting the doomed Franco-British Gallipoli campaign in 1915 once the Turks found themselves in the war. By late February 1915, a force of 16 British battleships under VADM John de Robeck and four French ones (Suffren, Bouvet, Charlemagne, and Gaulors) under RADM Emile Guepratte, augmented by a host of cruisers (including a random Russian) and destroyers, began to try to force the straits.

Among the 230 artillery pieces that supported the Dardanelles, defenses were at least 10 aging Krupp 24 cm (9.4-inch) K L/35 fortress guns from a batch of 30 pieces shipped to the country in 1889. They could heave a 474-pound shell via bagged charges out to a range of 8.1 miles.

Ottoman 24 cm artillery at the Rumeli Medjidieh battery Bouvet. That shell hoist would dramatically fail on 18 March 1915

Relatively obsolete by the Great War, they could still be deadly should an enemy ship obligingly get close enough to find out. Four of these were installed in the masonry fort at Rumeli Mecidiye Tabyası (Fort No. 13) on the European shore of the peninsula, backing up a pair of larger but less capable 28cm L/22s.

Ottoman 24 cm artillery at the Rumeli Medjidieh battery, 1915. Shown are the battery commander, Captain Mehmet Hilmi (Şanlıtop) Bey, and 2LT Fahri Bey.

Beyond the guns, the Turks had sown almost 400 mines in 10 fields, most laid by the humble little Ottoman minelayer Nusret.

Turkish Minelayer Nusrat

On the morning of 18 March 1915, a three-part attack was launched to reduce the Ottoman’s central forts, with the four most powerful British battlewagons (HMS Queen Elizabeth, Lord Nelson, Agamemnon, and Inflexible) kicking off the assault with a heavy two-hour bombardment from 8 miles out, followed by a second prong– the four French ships– boldly sailing to within just 5,000 yards to destroy the fortifications at point blank range, relying on their heavy armor to shrug off any remaining Turkish guns. Meanwhile, the 12 remaining British battleships would line up in a third division in three groups to provide covering fire and then follow the French in.

The problem with that plan was that the first bombardment was nowhere near as effective as the British thought it would be, and Nusret had crept in to sow an 11th minefield that the British and French didn’t know about.

The day would prove very bad for the Allied forces.

Inflexible, Queen Elizabeth, and Agamemnon in the British first line, along with Irresistible and Ocean in the second line, started taking hits, most from the little Rumeli Mecidiye battery but also other guns at Dardanos and Sogandare.

The French, drawn point blank with the forts, got the worst of it, with Suffren, flagship of RADM Guepratte, receiving 14 hits in 14 minutes and set ablaze, effectively out of the fight. Gaulois was hit twice, with one lucky shell plunging and penetrating her hull under the waterline, forcing her to retreat and beach on Tavsan in the Rabbit Islands to keep from sinking, the wounded Charlemagne at her side.

Bouvet received at least eight hits from Rumeli Medjidieh’s 9.4-inch guns, riddling her masts and funnels and putting her forward turret out of action. Not grievously injured, she answered the signal to withdraw and promptly stumbled into one of Nusret’s mines at 13:58 just under her starboard 10.8-inch mount.

Never having an abundance of stability, she quickly started to roll and, with water pouring down her funnels, turned turtle and sank in less than a minute, taking a stunning 660 of her 710 crew down with her.

Bouvet sinking after being mined 18 March 1915. Note how close to shore she is. Photo via the Surgeon Parkes collection. IWM SP 682A

A handful of waterlogged and shocked survivors were plucked from the water by the battle-damaged Agamemnon.

Survivors from the French battleship Bouvet coming on board the battleship HMS Agamemnon on 18 March 1915 during the Anglo-French naval attempt to force the Dardanelles. The Bouvet struck a Turkish mine and sank with the loss of over 600 of her crew. IWM HU 103301

With Roebuck ordering his ships to withdraw from the failed effort to reduce the forts, Irresistible and Ocean likewise struck Turkish mines and quickly sank within sight of Bouvet’s watery grave. Irresistible sank with the loss of only 12 of her 780 crew and had her survivors rescued by Ocean then, following the holing by that ship, she slowly sank and the combined crews were taken off by the destroyers HMS Jed, Colne, and Chelmer which were able to come alongside. Of note, the British battleships, while similarly dated, were not tumblehome designs, and Ocean only lost a single crewman in the battle.

Epilogue

Both at the time of the sinking and in modern Turkey, the loss of Bouvet was widely celebrated and remembered.

Le Bouvet aux Dardanelles

Illustrated First World War, Sinking of Bouvet

German wartime postcard depicting the sinking of Bouvet

Sinking of Bouvet

“Bouvet’nin Çanakkale’de Batışı (The Sinking of Battleship Bouvet at the Dardanelles)” by Turkish maritime artist Diyarbakırlı Tahsin Bey

“Bouvet’nin Çanakkale’de Batışı (The Sinking of Battleship Bouvet at the Dardanelles)” by Turkish maritime artist Diyarbakırlı Tahsin Bey

Charles Huin didn’t live long enough to see his penultimate battleship fail so spectacularly. Retiring from the French navy in 1902 after almost 50 years of service as a Commandeur de la Légion d’Honneur, he was struck by a car and killed on a Paris street at age 76 in December 1912 while on his way to collect his pension from the Ministry.

Charles Ernest Huin

RADM Guepratte, who commanded the French force on the fateful day that Bouvet was lost, was relegated to a desk job at Bizerte for the rest of the war and then retired. He passed in November 1939, gratefully missing out on the twin humiliations of Mers-el-Kebir in July 1940 and Toulon in November 1942. Post-war, historians rehabilitated his record and came to the conclusion he got a bad rap, and he is generally seen as a naval hero of sorts today in France, with a destroyer (D632) and frigate (F714) named after him. After all, he was ordered by Roebuck and Carden to take his four obsolete battleships right down the Turks’ throat and by all means should have lost all four.

The French Navy went on to recycle the Bouvet name twice- for a Free French auxiliary in WWII and a Cold War era Surcouf-class destroyer (D624) in operation between 1952 and 1981.

For years, it was believed that Bouvet sank only due to the 9.4-inch coastal artillery hits.

The Ottoman battery commander who landed the hits on Bouvet and several of the other ships, Capt. Mehmet Hilmi Şanlıtop, despite winning a series of decorations, including the Iron Cross, was cashiered post-war in the aftermath of the end of the empire. Welcomed into the ranks of the newly formed Turkish Army in 1920, he eventually retired as a colonel of artillery. He wrote a book about his service and passed in 1946. A statue of him stands near the location of the battery today, which is now a museum.

The Rumeli Medjidieh site, disarmed in 1919, today contains a single 9.4-inch Krupp fortress gun, albeit one moved from another fort. The site has bronze statues of Capt. Şanlıtop and his XO, along with Corporal Seyit Ali Cabuk, who famously hand-carried three 474-pound shells up to one of the 9.4s from the magazine to the breech after the shell hoist failed during the latter stages of the Allied attempt to force the Dardanelles on 18 March 1915, the rounds credited with hitting Ocean.

The story of Bouvet’s ultimate loss by mine strike caught up to the public.

The Ottoman minelayer Nusret, retired from naval service in 1955, was sold to commercial concerns and, derelict, sank in 1989.

Raised in 2002, she has been reconstructed on land at the Tarsus Çanakkale Park.

Nusrat Tarsus Çanakkale Park wiki commons

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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