Category Archives: warship wednesday

Warship Wednesday, January 9, 2013

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Here at LSOZI, we are going to take out every Wednesday for a look at the old steam/diesel navies of the 1859-1946 time period and will profile a different ship each week.

– Christopher Eger

Warship Wednesday,  January 9, 2013

Last_Jutland_warship_to_be_preserved_for_the_nation_2
Here we see the old “C-class” light cruiser HMS Caroline steaming with a bone in her mouth.

The Caroline, at 4700-tons when fully loaded and some 446-feet overall length is about the size of today’s Oliver Hazard Perry Class frigates, but when she was designed in the 1900s, she was a pretty fierce fast cruiser. Capable of over 28-knots, her pair of 6-inch guns and 8 smaller 4-inchers could make mincemeat of attacking destroyers and torpedo boats of the day. Her job was to keep these wolverines at bay from the battleships of the line while being available for scouting and shadowing the bad guy’s battle line. Detached from fleet service she was also capable of showing the flag round the world anywhere the water was more than 16-feet deep.

1305974875.18574142

Commissioned just four months after the start of WWI, Caroline served with the  4th Light Cruiser Squadron and famously led a torpedo attack during the Battle of Jutland. After the war she was sent to the East Indies Station based at Colombo where she patrolled the Indian coastline. In 1924 she became a drill ship for the Royal Navy Volunteer Reserve in April 1924 at  Alexandra Dock, Belfast. There she remained as a dockside trainer and depot ship. Still officially in commission but never leaving port, she still had a reserve ‘crew’ as late as 2009. Not bad when you consider she was built in less than nine months.

In India post WWI

In India post WWI

Of her class of 28 cruisers, one was sunk in 1918 by a mine, six were lost during WWII, and the remainder were all broken up by 1948, leaving Caroline in Irish waters as the sole survivor of her group.

Finally, with her hull right at 98-years old, HMS Caroline was decommissioned on 31 March 2011. Her ensign was laid up in St Anne’s Cathedral in Belfast. It is envisioned that she, the last survivor of Jutland and the last WWI-era Royal Navy cruiser afloat, will become a museum.

Today, disarmed, decommed, but still proud

Today, disarmed, decommed, but still proud

The Brits sure got a lot of use out of her.

Specs:

Displacement:     Nominal: 3,750 tons
Loaded: 4,219 tons
Deep: 4,733 tons
Length:     420 ft (128.0 m) (446 ft (135.9 m) overall)
Beam:     41.5 ft (12.6 m)
Draught:     16 ft (5 m) maximum
Propulsion:     4 shaft Parsons turbines
Power: 40,000 shp
Speed:     28.5 knots (53 km/h) (largely immobile after 1924)
Range:     carried 405 tons (772 tons maximum) of fuel oil
Complement:     325
Armament:     As built:

2 × BL 6 in (152 mm) /45 Mk XII guns (2 × 1),
8 × QF 4 in (102 mm) /45 Mk V guns[1]
1 × 6 pounder,
4 × 21 in (533 mm) torpedo tubes

Later:

4 × 6 in (152 mm) /45 Mk XII
2 × 3 in (76 mm) anti-aircraft
4 × 21 in (533 mm) torpedo tubes.

Today: None

Armour:     Belt: 3 to 1 in
Decks: 1 inch

If you liked this column, please consider joining the International Naval Research Organization (INRO)

They have one of the largest collections of ships photos from avid martial art enthusiasts around the world, many never before seen. Some of the collection online is at http://www.warship.org/ship.htm

The International Naval Research Organization is a non-profit corporation dedicated to the encouragement of the study of naval vessels and their histories, principally in the era of iron and steel warships (about 1860 to date). Its purpose is to provide information and a means of contact for those interested in warships.

Nearing their 50th Anniversary, Warship International, the written tome of the INRO has published hundreds of articles, most of which are unique in their sweep and subject.

I’m a member, so should you be!

Warship Wednesday, January 2, 2013 (Happy NEW Year)

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Here at LSOZI, we are going to take out every Wednesday for a look at the old steam/diesel navies of the 1859-1946 time period and will profile a different ship each week.
– Christopher Eger
Warship Wednesday,  January 2, 2013 (Happy NEW Year)

Turner,_J._M._W._-_The_Fighting_Téméraire_tugged_to_her_last_Berth_to_be_broken
Here we see the HMS Temeraire tugged to her last berth to be broken up in 1838.

While normally we cover steel ships, powered by coal, oil, diesel, or some other fossil fuel, the Temeraire deserves a special mention. Ordered in 1790, she spent 8-years in the stocks being constructed at the Chatham Dockyard before entering service during the Napoleonic Wars in 1799. Built as a Neptune-class ship of the line, she was a huge 2120-ton 185-foot long battleship of the sail era and as such carried an amazing 98 cannon arrayed on four decks. With each of these guns requiring a 5-7 man crew, the ship when fully manned carried over 700 sailors, officers, and marines.

She helped blockade both Spain and then France before having her moment of glory at the famous Battle of Trafalgar. It was there, in 1805, that she earned her reputation. Coming to the aide of Nelson in the HMS Victory, the Temeraire fought off the  112-gun Spanish ship Santa Ana, 74-gun French ship redoubtable, and 74-gun French ship Fougueux. This fighting was done at close quarters, usually within a football field and often involved ramming and lashing together. She had more than 125 casualties, all of her sails and masts yards shot or burned away, and her starboard hull and rudder head staved in. The battle ended with both Fougueux and the Redoubtable striking their colors and captured by Temeraire.

The_Battle_of_Trafalgar_by_William_Clarkson_Stanfield

Trafalgar: The damaged French Redoubtable caught between the Victory (the large ship in the foreground center) and the Temeraire (seen bow on). The Fougueux, coming up on Temeraire’s starboard side, has just received a broadside. 1836 oil on canvas by Clarkson Frederick Stanfield.

Repaired but never the same again, she continued to serve for another decade of the Napoleonic wars, seeing combat against Danish and French ships. By 1812, no longer needed in the line and with her wood in decay, she was placed in reserve. Her guns were landed, her crews dispersed, and she was pressed into use as a first a prison ship, then a receiving ship, victualing ship, and finally as a guard ship, before her old but still majestic hulk was sold to the breakers in 1838.

“”The flag which braved the battle and the breeze, No longer owns her.”

The famous painting of the proud but stricken vessel being towed to scrap “The Fighting Temeraire tugged to her last berth to be broken up, 1838″ by J. M. W. Turner,  has sat at the National Gallery in London since 1851. In 2005, The Fighting Temeraire was voted the greatest painting in a British art gallery and an aging RN Commander James “Shaken, not stirred” Bond admired her in last year’s Skyfall movie. Her name went on to grace a steam-powered warship, a  Bellerophon class battleship in World War One, but has not been on the ocean since 1921. Today HMS Temeraire is the name of the shore side Directorate of Naval Physical Training and Sport (DNPTS) in Portsmouth.

Specs:

Tons burthen:     2,12058⁄94 (bm)
Length:     185 ft (56 m) (gundeck)
152 ft 8 in (46.53 m) (keel)
Beam:     51 ft 2 in (15.60 m)
Depth of hold:     21 ft 6 in (6.55 m)
Sail plan:     Full-rigged ship
Complement:     738
Armament:    98 guns:
Gundeck: 28 × 32-pounder guns
Middle gundeck: 30 × 18-pounder guns
Upper gundeck: 30 × 18-pounder guns
Quarterdeck: 8 × 12-pounder guns
Forecastle: 2 × 12-pounder guns

If you liked this column, please consider joining the International Naval Research Organization (INRO) They have one of the largest collections of ships photos from avid martial art enthusiasts around the world, many never before seen. Some of the collection online is at http://www.warship.org/ship.htm

The International Naval Research Organization is a non-profit corporation dedicated to the encouragement of the study of naval vessels and their histories, principally in the era of iron and steel warships (about 1860 to date). Its purpose is to provide information and a means of contact for those interested in warships.

Nearing their 50th Anniversary, Warship International, the written tome of the INRO has published hundreds of articles, most of which are unique in their sweep and subject.

I’m a member, so should you be!

How a Tuna Fleet Went to War

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Found this great article on the Tuna Fleet of San Diego by Peter Rowe of the North County Times.

“In October 1942, two of the Navy’s smallest vessels embarked on a big mission.

“You’re going to Guadalcanal,” one of the skippers was ordered. “This cargo has got to go through.”

The two vessels, the 110-foot Paramount and the 128-foot Picaroto, sailed northeast from the New Hebrides and into The Slot, one of the South Pacific’s most dangerous passages. Evading Japanese patrols, the two vessels reached Guadalcanal’s Red Beach in November. They were greeted by a band of Marines who, though exhausted by combat and malaria, unloaded both boats in record time.

“We won’t take a chance on you boys getting sunk,” one Marine assured the Paramount’s captain, Ed Madruga. “This cargo is really important.”

The cargo? Turkeys, potatoes, cranberries, oranges: Thanksgiving dinner.

The Paramount and the Picaroto were among the 53 original Yard Patrol boats, tuna clippers — most from San Diego — converted into military vessels during World War II. Known as YPs or Yippies, these vessels have been almost forgotten. That’s not surprising. They played a modest role in a mammoth conflict, hunting submarines and ferrying men, food, fuel and other supplies to American outposts.

These unglamorous yet vital missions — just ask the men on Red Beach — were fulfilled at great risk.  Twenty-one of the vessels and dozens of fishermen would never come home. When the survivors did sail back into San Diego Bay, though, their wartime experience would transform the tuna fleet and usher in this industry’s golden era. Using new technology and an intimate knowledge of previously unknown waters, they would chase tuna around the globe, hauling in record-setting catches.”

Read the rest of the article here (link)

tuna boats as Yps

Flattop Collection

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121912-N-TB177-760

NORFOLK (Dec. 19, 2012) The Nimitz-class aircraft carrier USS Dwight D. Eisenhower (CVN 69) arrives at Naval Station Norfolk after a six-month deployment to the U.S. 5th and 6th Fleet areas of responsibility supporting Operation Enduring Freedom, maritime security operations and theater security cooperation efforts. (U.S. Navy photo by Mass Communication Specialist 3rd Class Kevin J. Steinberg/Released).

I always had a soft spot for the Ike and featured her in a cameo in my zombie novels Last Stand on Zombie Island and the upcoming Pirates of the Zombie Coast.

Whats massively impressive about this picture is all the flatops tied up waiting for Ike. From left to right you see a unidentified Nimitz class (possibly the Theodore Roosevelt or the George Bush), then the recently decommisoned USS Enterprise CVN-65 with her stern facing the camera. On the pier opposite of The Big E is the USS Bataan (LHD-5). At the far right are the USS Harry S. Truman (CVN-75) bow on and the USS Abraham Lincoln (CVN-72) stern on.

That’s six flat-tops weighing in at about 550,000 tons of warships. This is likely more than the entire rest of the world’s carriers combined. Granted the Big E is decommed and pending scrapping, and the Bataan is a gator rather than a ‘real’ aircraft carrier, but still..impressive.

Warship Wednesday, December 26

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Here at LSOZI, we are going to take out every Wednesday for a look at the old steam/diesel navies of the  1859-1946 time period and will profile a different ship each week.

– Christopher Eger

Warship Wednesday,  December 26

dualio

Here we see the beautiful legacy dreadnought Caio Duilio as she appeared in WWII. Caio Duilio was an Italian Andrea Doria-class battleship that served in the Regia Marina during World War I and World War II. She was named after the First Punic War Roman fleet commander Gaius Duilius, winner of the  Battle of Mylae in 260 BC.

Ordered in 1911 she was completed in 1916. Even though this was in the middle of WWI, the Duilio didn’t see much active service as from 1916-18 naval combat in the Med was largely restricted to patrolling the barrage line in the Adriatic to keep the Austro-Hungarian fleet bottled up while avoiding both German and Austrian U-boats (Captain Von Trapp!).

dreadnought Caio Duilio and her sister Andrea Doria as they appeared in the 1920s. Note the immense coal smoke.

Dreadnought Caio Duilio and her sister Andrea Doria as they appeared in the 1920s. Note the immense coal smoke.

Between the wars the ship was modernized. Originally a 22,000-ton coal-fired battleship with a baker’s dozen 305mm guns (in three triple and two double turrets) that could make, she became a 30,000-ton oil-fired (which more than doubled her horsepower) battleship with ten 320mm guns that could make 27-knots. It was in this configuration that she entered WWII.

During the war she fought, as Italy did, first with the Axis (1939-43) then with the Allies (1943-45). She was assigned to convoy duty between Italy and Libya to supply Axis troops fighting in the North African Front. She took a torpedo from a Swordfish in her bow during the Battle of Taranto but was quickly repaired. In the First Battle of Sirte in 1941, she was the flagship of the Close covering force under Rear Admiral Raffaele de Courten (on Duca d’Aosta) as he slugged it out with a force of British cruisers and destroyers. The battle, like most of the naval combat in the Med during WWII, was inconclusive with a few rounds fired from extreme range and much maneuverings done but few ships on either side hit. After Italy came over to the Allies she spent the rest of the War cooling her heels in Malta.

After the war she was retained in service for another decade. She was the flagship of the Italian Navy 1947 to 1949 and after that was retained as a training vessel and ceremonial duties ship for senior personnel. She was stricken in 1956 and scrapped the following year after more than forty years of honorable service. Her sister-ship, Andrea Doria, was scrapped two years later and was the last Italian battleship.

Caio Duilio didn’t have the most impressive legacy of sea service, having never sunk another ship in combat through two world wars. Still, she was one of the handful of warships planned before 1914 that served in both world wars to one extent or another and survived to see NATO service in the twilight of the battleship.

In 1962 the Missile cruiser Caio Duilio was commissioned and had a 30-year career of her own which celebrated the elder Gaius Duilius as well as the former battleship. In 2009, an Orizzonte-class destroyer was commissioned with the same name, ensuring that there will be a Caio Duilio in the Italian navy for generations yet to come.

Specs:
Displacement:     As built:
22,956 tons normal
24,729 tons full load
As modernized:
26,434 tons normal
29,391 tons full load
Length:     168.96 m (554.3 ft)
Beam:     28.03 m (92.0 ft)
Draft:     8.58 m (28.1 ft)
Propulsion:     As built:
Steam turbine system
20 boilers
4 shafts
30,000 shp
As modernized:
Steam turbine system
8 Yarrow type boilers
2 shafts
75,000 shp
Speed:     As built: 21 knots (39 km/h)
As modernized: 27 knots (50 km/h)
Complement:     As built: 1,233
As modernized: 1,485
Armament:     As built:
13 × 305 mm (12 in) guns (Three triple and two double turrets)
16 × 152 mm (6 in) guns
13 × 76 mm (3 in) guns
6 × 76 mm anti-aircraft guns
3 × 450 mm (18 in) torpedo tubes
As modernized:
10 × 320 mm (12.6 in) guns (Two triple and two double turrets)
12 × 135 mm (5.3 in) guns (Four triple turrets)
10 × 90 mm (3.5 in) anti-aircraft guns
15 × 37 mm anti-aircraft guns
16 × 20 mm anti-aircraft guns
Armor:     Belt: 254 mm
Turrets: 280 mm
Decks: 98 mm

If you liked this column, please consider joining the International Naval Research Organization (INRO)

They have one of the largest collections of ships photos from avid martial art enthusiasts around the world, many never before seen. Some of the collection online is at http://www.warship.org/ship.htm

The International Naval Research Organization is a non-profit corporation dedicated to the encouragement of the study of naval vessels and their histories, principally in the era of iron and steel warships (about 1860 to date). Its purpose is to provide information and a means of contact for those interested in warships.

Nearing their 50th Anniversary, Warship International, the written tome of the INRO has published hundreds of articles, most of which are unique in their sweep and subject.

I’m a member, so should you be!

Warship Wednesday, December 19

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Here at LSOZI, we are going to take out every Wednesday for a look at the old steam/diesel navies of the 1859-1946 time period and will profile a different ship each week.

– Christopher Eger

Warship Wednesday,  December 19

French bb Charlemagne
Here we see the beautiful pre-drednought  Charlemagne of the French navy undated photo around 1900.

Built before the lessons learned in the Spanish-American war, but utilizing some learned from the clash of Japanese and Imperial Chinese armored vessels in 1894,  she was commissioned in September 1897. She is typical of her era with Harvey armor, a varied and confusing series of main, secondary, tertiary, quaternary, and quinary batteries of armament– all of which had limited elevation and arcs of fire. Built with twenty coal-fired boilers to power a trio of 4-cylinder vertical triple expansion steam engines on independent shafts, the 386-foot long battleship broke a blistering 18-knots on her trials.

PhotoWW1-01bbFrCharlmagnePS

By 1906, at the ripe old age of 8, she was thoroughly obsolete. Her place in the battle line was taken by fast oil-fired warships with Krupp armor and an all-big gun battery. However this did not mean she was retired. On the contrary the French kept her in service for another decade of service in both peace and war. Considered almost expendable by 1915, she and five other French battleships were tasked with close in bombardment of the Turkish defenses of the Dardanelles during the Gallipoli campaign.

She served it up hot to the Turks and took some punishment in return. She was patched back together but by 1917 Charlemagne was laid up.

She was scrapped in 1923.

Specs:

Displacement:     11,275 t (11,097 long tons) (deep load)
Length:     117.7 m (386 ft 2 in)
Beam:     20.3 m (66 ft 7 in)
Draught:     8.4 m (27 ft 7 in)
Installed power:     14,500 PS (10,700 kW)
20 Belleville water-tube boilers
Propulsion:     3 shafts, 3 four-cylinder vertical triple-expansion steam engines
Speed:     18 knots (33 km/h; 21 mph)
Range:     4,200 miles (3,650 nmi) at 10 knots (19 km/h; 12 mph)
Complement:     727
Armament:     2 × 2 – 305 mm (12 in) Mle 1893 guns
10 × 1 – 138.6 mm (5.46 in) Mle 1893 guns
8 × 1 – 100 mm (3.9 in) Mle 1893 guns
20 × 1 – 47 mm Mle 1885 Hotchkiss guns
4 × 450 mm (17.7 in) torpedo tubes
Armour:     Belt: 110–320 mm (4.3–12.6 in)
Decks: 55–90 mm (2.2–3.5 in)
Barbettes: 270 mm (10.6 in)
Turrets: 320 mm (12.6 in)
Conning tower: 326 mm (12.8 in)

If you liked this column, please consider joining the International Naval Research Organization (INRO) http://www.warship.org/

The International Naval Research Organization is a non-profit corporation dedicated to the encouragement of the study of naval vessels and their histories, principally in the era of iron and steel warships (about 1860 to date). Its purpose is to provide information and a means of contact for those interested in warships.

Nearing their 50th Anniversary, Warship International, the written tome of the INRO has published hundreds of articles  most of which are unique in their sweep and subject.

I’m a member, so should you be!

Warship Wednesday, December 12

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Here at LSOZI, we are going to take out every Wednesday for a look at the old steam/diesel navies of the 1859-1946 time period and will profile a different ship each week.

– Christopher Eger

Warship Wednesday,  December 12

0408605
Here we see the USS Vicksburg (CL-86), a Cleveland-class light cruiser, off the U.S. East Coast, 17 October 1944. Photographed by from a blimp of squadron ZP-12, based at Naval Air Station Lakehurst, New Jersey. The ship is painted in Camouflage Measure 33, Design 6d. (Official U.S. Navy Photograph, from the collections of the Naval Historical Center #NH 98331.)

Vicksburg was first laid down as the cruiser Cheyenne in 1942 she was renamed before commissioning in June 1944 a week after the D-Day landings. She rushed to the Pacific and was soon in the midst of protecting the fast carrier task forces of the US Navy from Kamikazes in the push to the Japanese home islands. Although arriving late in the war she made her presence felt in Iwo and Okinawa, dropping six-inch shells on Japanese positions while bagging a number of kamikazes with her formidable battery of 40mm and 20mm guns as perhaps the most modern ship of her class.

with searchlights

with searchlights

After the war she served as the flag of Commander, 3rd Fleet before being placed into mothballs at the ripe old age of three-years old. There she remained for 15-years quietly waiting for a call that never came.

Like 26 of the 27 Cleveland class that were completed as cruisers, Vicksburg was scrapped.  Only one Cleveland-class ship remains, the CLG-converted Little Rock, which has since 1976 been a museum ship in Buffalo, New York. Elements of the Vicksburg were used to refurbish her.

The Little Rock, Vick's sistership, on display in Buffalo.

The Little Rock, Vick’s sistership, on display in Buffalo.

Specs:
Displacement:     11,800 tons (standard), 14,131 tons (full)
Length:     600 ft (Waterline) 600 ft (180 m), 608 ft 4 in (Overall) 608 ft 4 in (185.42 m)
Beam:     63 ft (20.2 m)
Height:     113 ft (34.5 m)
Draft:     20 ft mean (7.5 m)
Propulsion:

4 Babcock & Wilcox, 634 psi boilers
4 GE geared steam turbines
4 Screws
100,000 hp (75 MW)

Speed:     32.5 knots
Range:     14,500 nm @ 15 kts
Complement:     992 officers and enlisted although by 1945 this grew to 1255 total.

Armament:     12 × 6 in (150 mm) guns (4×3), 12 × 5 in (130 mm) guns (6×2), 12 × 40 mm Bofors guns (2×4, 2×2), 10 × 20 mm guns (10×1)
Updated in 1945 with 28 × 40 mm Bofors guns (4×4, 6×2) and additional sensors

Aircraft carried:     4 OS2U Kingfisher scout planes
Aviation facilities:     2 launching catapults

If you liked this column, please consider joining the International Naval Research Organization (INRO)

The International Naval Research Organization is a non-profit corporation dedicated to the encouragement of the study of naval vessels and their histories, principally in the era of iron and steel warships (about 1860 to date). Its purpose is to provide information and a means of contact for those interested in warships.

Nearing their 50th Anniversary, Warship International, the written tome of the INRO has published hundreds of articles most of which are unique in their sweep and subject.

I’m a member, so should you be!

Warship Wednesday, December 5

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Here at LSOZI, we are going to take out every Wednesday for a look at the old steampunk/dieselpunk navies of the 1866-1946 time period and will profile a different ship each week.

– Christopher Eger

Warship Wednesday,  December 5

New_Mexico_class_battleship_bombarding_Okinawa
Here we see the old dreadnought USS Idaho showing some love to Japanese infantry ashore on Okinawa on 1 April 1945, easily distinguished by her tower foremast & 5”-38 Mk 30 single turrets (visible between the barrels of the forward main turrets). Idaho was the only US battleship with this configuration.

With lattice masts as originally commissioned.

With lattice masts as originally commissioned.

As a New Mexico-class battleship, she was designed just before World War One, and her construction from her award in November 1914 to her commissioning in March 1919, covered the entire period of that great war. One of the most advanced US battlewagons of her days, she spent most of her career from 1919-1941 in the Pacific. That makes it even more amazing that she was not on Battleship Row on December 7, 1941..but was quietly at anchor in Iceland enforcing the US Neutrality Patrol in the Atlantic. She and her sistership USS Mississippi steamed to the Pacific and she had a very active war from then on to make up for it.

She was one of the only US ships that ever bombarded the United States in anger when she pummeled the Japanese held islands of the Aleutian chain in 1943. She later went on to lend a hand at landing after landing across the Pacific and was awarded 7 battle stars. At Iwo Jima and Okinawa she came almost point-blank to the beaches and hammered those hard-fought battlefields 24/7 as needed. She may have been designed for Jutland but the 30-year old hull was a lynchpin to the embattled Devil Dogs dug in among the volcanic ash of the Japanese home islands.

Uss_idaho_bb-42

Sadly, less than a year after the end of the war, she was decommissioned and within a year of that date, scrapped.

Specs:
Displacement:     32,000 tons
Length:     624 ft (190 m)
Beam:     97.4 ft (29.7 m)
Draft:     30 ft (9.1 m)
Speed:     21 kn (24 mph; 39 km/h)
Complement:     1,081 officers and men
Armament:     (1919)

12 × 14 in (360 mm) guns
14 × 5 in (130 mm)/51 cal guns,
4 × 3 in (76 mm) guns
2 × 21 in (530 mm) torpedo tubes
(added after 1942)
10×4 40mm, 43×1 20mm, 8×1 .50-caliber MG for AAA

Armor:

Belt: 8–13.5 in (203–343 mm)
Barbettes: 13 in (330 mm)
Turret face: 18 in (457 mm)
Turret sides: 9–10 in (229–254 mm)
Turret top: 5 in (127 mm)
Turret rear 9 in (229 mm)
Conning tower: 11.5 in (292 mm)
Decks: 3.5 in (89 mm)

If you liked this column, please consider joining the International Naval Research Organization (INRO)

The International Naval Research Organization is a non-profit corporation dedicated to the encouragement of the study of naval vessels and their histories, principally in the era of iron and steel warships (about 1860 to date). Its purpose is to provide information and a means of contact for those interested in warships.

Founded in 1963 INRO, while based in the United States, has members around the globe. The membership includes, besides many of the leading authorities in the field, members of a large variety of professions, both men and women, active and retired naval personnel, historians and just plain “warship buffs”. Anyone interested in the subject will find INRO a most valuable source of information and contact with others who have the same interest.

One of the most amazing services of the INRO/Warship International is the INFOSER . Since its inception, Warship International has included an question/answer section in which questions submitted by readers were published and responses were provided by the general membership. This section was initially known as Warship Information Service through the No. 1, 1975, issue, and thereafter as Ask INFOSER. From the first issue of WI in January 1964 through the No. 4, 1996, issue, 2377 questions were published in the WIS/INFOSER section. Well researched answers were provided for 1866 of these questions, many of which contained never before seen illustrations, charts, and diagrams.

This is an invaluable source for the naval historian.

I’m a member, so should you be!

Warship Wednesday, November 28

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Here at LSOZI, we are going to take out every Wednesday for a look at the old steampunk/dieselpunk navies of the 1866-1946 time period and will profile a different ship each week.

– Christopher Eger

Warship Wednesday,  November 28

Note the four turrets, each with a trio of huge 12-inch (305mm) guns and the Tsarist Navy banner on the stern. The Gangut class was set up with one turret forward, one sten, and two amidships that could only fire to the port and starboard in broadside.

Here we see the Petropavlovsk (Russian: Петропавловск) when she was commissioned around 1915

Laid down as a member of the four-ship Gangut class of battleships, the Petropavlovsk was the most advanced design ever to sail the Baltic under a Russian flag. Laid down in 1909 to replace the ships lost at Tsuhuma, the Petro was only completed in September 1915, a year into World War One. She spent her war years in quiet readiness as a member of the Russian fleet in being that largely barred the Gulf of Finland from German ships.


In arguably the last Russian naval action of WWI, the Petropavlovsk led the break out of the Baltic Fleet from their ice locked  bases at Tallinn and Helsinki to Kronstadt in February 1918. The Russian navy was instrumental in the Russian Revolution of 1917 and the ship itself flew one of the first red flags in the fleet. Her sailors served ashore with the Red Army as shock troops during the Russian Civil War while the ship itself traded shots with British torpedo boats and destroyers, who were assisting the counter-revolutionary White Russian forces. In a twist of fate, her sailors, long the bulwark of the Red forces, rebelled in the epic Kronstadt mutiny in 1921. After this, to erase the memory of the ship that fought for the Tsar, then the Soviets, then against the Soviets, she was renamed in 1921 at the end of the Civil War Marat, after French revolutionary sailor Jean-Paul Marat.

Main Caliber by Ivan Shagin, taken 1936, probably on the Marat. Some of the best battleship art ever.

With more than a dozen battleships inherited from the pre-1917 Tsarist navy, the Soviets made a move to modernize and keep a few of these around in the late 1920s. The Marat was refitted 1928-31 and turned into something of a floating showcase for the People’s Navy. She was one of the few truly oceangoing Red Banner Fleet vessels in good repair and in 1937 represented the CCCP at the Royal Navy’s Fleet Review at Spithead, sailing alongside such modern ships of her day as the Dunqurque, Graf Spee, and Rodney. She spat out 12-inch shells against Finn batteries during the Winter War in 1940 and during World War Two, she became a legend of the siege of Leningrad. Four months into the war she was hit literally by a ton of bombs (one dropped by famous German Stuka tank ace Hans-UlrichRudel ) and sank.

As post-1942 floating battery. Nine operational 12-inch guns with a twenty-mile range still makes a pretty heavy impact, even if the ship could never put to sea again.

However the ship only sank in 36-feet of water and the Soviets cut away the front, refloated the stern, filled the forward areas with concrete, and managed to get three of her four 12-inch gun turrets back in action within weeks. Her upper decks were covered with inches of concrete and slabs of granite to help provide reinforcement against future air attacks. She literally became a concrete battleship. During 1942-43 she fired more than 1900 rounds of 12-inch shells against German army land targets around Leningrad, while her excess crew fought ashore. Her small guns were landed and rushed to the front where they fought panzers face to face. Even though she never sailed again, the Soviets kept the battered relic around for another eight years after the war ended as a stationary training ship before finally breaking the half-century old ship up in 1953.

Specs:
Displacement:     24,800 tonnes (24,408 long tons)
Length:     181.2 m (594 ft 6 in)
Beam:     26.9 m (88 ft 3 in)
Draft:     8.99 m (29 ft 6 in)
Installed power:     52,000 shp (38,776 kW) (on trials)
Propulsion:     4-shaft Parsons steam turbines
25 Yarrow Admiralty-type watertube boilers
Speed:     24.1 knots (44.6 km/h; 27.7 mph) (on trials)
Range:     3,200 nautical miles (5,900 km; 3,700 mi) at 10 knots (19 km/h; 12 mph)
Complement:     1,149
Armament:     4 × 3 – 12-inch (305 mm)/52 guns
16 × 1 – 4.7-inch (119 mm) guns
1 × 1 – 3-inch (76 mm) Lender AA gun
4 × 1 – 17.7-inch (450 mm) submerged torpedo tubes
Armor:     Waterline belt: 125–225 mm (4.9–8.9 in)
Deck: 12–50 mm (0.47–2.0 in)
Turrets: 76–203 mm (3.0–8.0 in)
Barbettes: 75–150 mm (3.0–5.9 in)
Conning tower: 100–254 mm (3.9–10.0 in)

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Warship Wednesday November 21

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Here at LSOZI, we are going to take out every Wednesday for a look at the old steampunk/dieselpunk navies of the 1866-1946 time period and will profile a different ship each week.

– Christopher Eger

Warship Wednesday,  November 21


Here we see the coastal schooner Claire Crouch around 1960. She was origanlly built in 1917 as the De Lauwers in Holland, during World War One for a Newcastle shipping company. The old schooner, at the time known as the Argosy Lemal was taken up for use by the US Army in 1942 for use in the US Army Small Ships Section, functioning as a radio communication vessel in the Arafura and Timor Seas during World War II. With a 12 man crew of mixed nationality civilian crew members and skipper, and seven army signal corps commo guys, the ship was one of the odder vessels in the war.  Her wartime service sounds like a Joseph Conrad novel:

In the Thompson’s publication for the COMH United States Army In World War II-The Technical Services-The Signal Corps: The Outcome (Mid-1943 Through 1945), S/Sgt. Arthur B. Dunning, Headquarters Company, 60th Signal Battalion, related that  he and six other enlisted men of that unit were ordered aboard her on 9 September 1943, at Oro Bay, New Guinea, to handle Army radio traffic. The commander of the ship reported to naval authorities, not to General Akin. After six months’ service along the New Guinea coast, the skipper was removed for incompetence. His replacement was no better. Among other things, he obeyed to the letter Navy’s order forbidding the use of unshielded radio receivers at sea. Since the Signal Corps receivers aboard the ship were unshielded and thus liable to radiate sufficiently to alert nearby enemy listeners, the men were forbidden to switch them on in order to hear orders from Army headquarters ashore. As a consequence, during a trip in the spring of 1944 from Milne Bay to Cairns, Australia (on naval orders), the crew failed to hear frantic Signal Corps radio messages to the Argosy Lemal ordering her to return at once to Milne Bay to make ready for a forthcoming Army operation. On the way to Australia the skipper, after a series of mishaps attributable to bad navigation, grounded the Argosy hard on a reef. Most of the crew already desperately ill of tropical diseases, now had additional worries.

The radio antennas were swept away along with the ship’s rigging, and help could not be requested until the Signal Corps men strung up a makeshift antenna. Weak with fevers and in a ship on the verge of foundering, they pumped away at the water rising in the hold and wondered why rescue was delayed till they learned that the position of the ship that the skipper had given them to broadcast was ninety miles off their true position. As they threw excess cargo overboard, “some of the guys,” recorded Dunning, “were all for jettisoning our skipper for getting us into all of this mess.” Much later, too late for the need the Signal Corps had for the ship, the Argosy Lemal was rescued and towed to Port Moresby for repairs to the vessel and medical attention to the crew, many of whom were by then, according to Dunning, “psycho-neurotic.” Besides Dunning, a radio operator, there were T/4 Jack Stanton, also a radio operator; T/Sgt. Harold Wooten, the senior non-commissioned officer; T/4 Finch and T/5 Burtness, maintenance men; and T/5 Ingram and Pfc. Devlin, code and message center clerks. Dunning described the Argosy as a 3-mast sailing vessel with a 110-horsepower auxiliary diesel engine. “She was the sixth vessel,” he wrote, “to be taken over by the Small Ships Section of the U.S. Army, her primary purpose was handling [radio] traffic between forward areas and the main USASOS headquarters.”

The Army kept the ship until 1949 for use in the Pacific. She then transferred back into civilian service as a mothership carrying fuel and food to offshore fishing fleets and running cargo along the Australian coast under the name of Booya. On 24 December 1974, Booya was moored near Fort Hill wharf with four crew and one guest on board as Cyclone Tracy approached. She put to sea to avoid the stormand  Booya was last seen at about 8.00pm leaving Fort Hill wharf. For the next 29 years she remained missing, presumed sunk with the loss of all lives in the huge seas whipped up by Cyclone Tracy’s 300 km/h winds. She was just recently found– still inside Darwin Harbor (!) in sixty feet of water.  Police divers dredged the hull searching for the bodies of the five people that had been onboard. No bodies were found but personal belongings such as jewellery and clothing were recovered. These were offered to the families and friends of those onboard.

Side Scan sonar of the Booya turned turtle on the bottom of Darwin Harbor

Specs
Tonnage:     254 GRT (Argosy Lemal)
Length:     117 ft 5 in (35.79 m)
Beam:     24 ft 5 in (7.44 m)
Draught:     10 ft 4 in (3.15 m)
Propulsion:     Sails, 1 x 2SCSA oil engine, 79 hp (59 kW) (as Argosy Lemal)
Sail plan:     Schooner

Armament:  (sidearms of Army signal detachment)

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