Category Archives: warship wednesday

Montevideo Maru, found

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Class leader USS Salmon (SS-182) running speed trials in early 1938. Note the S1 designator. NH 69872

As covered in past Warship Wednesdays, the hard-charging Salmon-class fleet submarine USS Sturgeon (SS-187), under command of LCDR William Leslie “Bull” Wright (USNA 1925), a colorful six-foot-three cigar-chomping Texan, made a name for herself in the early days of the Pacific War. After an early attack on a Japanese ship just after Pearl Harbor, she flashed “Sturgeon no longer virgin!”

It was on her fourth patrol that she came across the 7,266-ton, twin-screw diesel motor vessel passenger ship MV Montevideo Maru which had been used by the Imperial Japanese Navy as a troop transport in the early days of the war, supporting the landings at Makassar in February 1942 and was part of the Japanese seizure of New Britain.

Via ONI 208J.

Sailing on 22 June unescorted for Hainan Island off China, Montevideo Maru ran into Sturgeon eight days later. Our submarine pumped four fish into the “big fella” in the predawn hours of 1 July, after a four-hour stalk, with young LT Chester William “Chet” Nimitz Jr. (yes, that Nimitz’s son) as the TDC officer.

Tragically, in what is now known as the “worst maritime disaster in Australian history,” Montevideo Maru was a “Hell Ship,” carrying more than 1,000 prisoners of the Japanese forces, including members of the Australian 2/22nd Battalion and No.1 Independent Company of the incredibly unlucky Lark Force which had been captured on New Britain.

All the prisoners on board died, locked below decks. Of note, more Australians died in the loss of the Montevideo Maru than in the country’s decade-long involvement in Vietnam.

Sturgeon, of course, was unaware that the ship was carrying Allied POWs and internees.

DANFS does not mention Montevideo Maru‘s cargo.

Four days later, Sturgeon damaged the Japanese oiler San Pedro Maru (7268 GRT) south of Luzon, then ended her 4th war patrol at Fremantle on 22 July.

Sturgeon earned ten battle stars for World War II service, with seven of her war patrols deemed successful enough for a Submarine Combat Insignia.

Bull Wright, who earned a Navy Cross for his first patrol, never commanded a submarine again– perhaps dogged over the Montevideo Maru, or perhaps because he was 40 years old when he left Sturgeon— and he retired quietly from the Navy after the war as a rear admiral. Although a number of WWII submarines and skippers with lower tonnage or fewer patrols/battle stars under their belt were profiled in the most excellent 1950s “Silent Service” documentary series, Bull Wright and Sturgeon were noticeably skipped.

Now, Montevideo Maru has been discovered in her resting place off the Philippines. An expedition team, led by Australian businessman, maritime history philanthropist, explorer, and director of not-for-profit Silentworld Foundation, John Mullen, found the hell ship’s wreck earlier this month.

Dogs Playing Poker, Capt. Casey edition

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Happy National Bulldog Day!

This 1891 photograph via the Detroit Photographic Company shows Captain Silas Casey III (USNA 1860), skipper of the cruiser USS Newark (C-1), sitting in his well-furnished stateroom with his Old English Bulldog sleeping quietly on the floor.

Casey doubled down on being a dog lover as shown by his taste in art as the picture behind him is an illustration used for the “No Monkeying” brand of cigars, which depicts two bulldogs playing poker with a monkey, from a lithograph by Emile Steffens.

A better view of the stateroom is Lot 3000-F-14 at the National Museum of the U.S. Navy, which still shows the dogs playing poker image on the bulkhead.

U.S. Navy protected cruiser, USS Newark (C-1), the cabin, possibly Captain’s Cabin. Note the dogs playing poker illustration and the spittoon

Laid down by William Cramp and Sons, Philadelphia, Pa., on 12 June 1888, the brand-new 4,000-ton/311-foot cruiser was commissioned on 2 February 1891, with Casey in command, and was the first modern cruiser in the U.S. Fleet. The above images were likely taken around the time of her commissioning. 

Active in the Spanish American War– the warship bombarded the port of Manzanillo on 12 August 1898 and on the following day accepted its surrender then after the Battle of Santiago, she participated in the final destruction of Admiral Cervera’s fleet through the bombardment of the burned hulks– she went on to serve in the Philippines. She spent her last days as a station ship at Guantanamo Bay and then as a quarantine hulk for the Naval hospital in Providence/Newport until scrapped in 1926. USS Newark (C-1) unofficial plans, published in the Transactions of the Society of Naval Architects and Marine Engineers, 1893. Published in the Transactions of the Society of Naval Architects and Marine Engineers, NH 70105.

For reference, Casey was the son of the well-known Civil War Maj. Gen. Silas Casey, Jr., author of the three-volume System of Infantry Tactics manuals that were in use by the Army for a generation. During the Civil War, the younger Casey was very busy. He served aboard the USS Niagara in the engagements with the batteries at Pensacola; aboard the USS Wissachicken with the South Atlantic Blockading Squadron including engagements with Fort McAllister; and on USS Quaker City with the North Atlantic Blockading Squadron against Charleston and Fort Fisher.

After commanding Newark, Capt. Casey served a stint at Annapolis then went on to serve as rear admiral commanding the Pacific Squadron, 1901–1903, before retiring.

He passed in 1913, aged 71, no doubt with a dog somewhere near.

Warship Wednesday, April 19, 2023: Norway’s Fair-haired Bruiser

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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

Warship Wednesday, April 19, 2023: Norway’s Fair-haired Bruiser

Norwegian Marinemuseet image MMU.942036

Above we see the proud crew of the Royal Norwegian Navy Tordenskjold-class panserskipet (battleship) KNM Harald Haarfagre (also seen as Harald Hårfagre) posed around her aft 8.26-inch Armstrong main gun in the fall of 1914. Besides the large range clock on the mast, note the crews’ German-style wool jumpers and flat caps, as well as the uniforms of the officers, arrayed to the right.

Coastal battleships

Ordered from Sir WG Armstrong, Mitchell & Co’s Low Walker yard in 1895 as Yard Nos. 648 and 649, respectively, Harald Haarfagre and Tordenskjold at the time were the largest warships envisioned for the Norwegian fleet. Essentially smallish slow armored cruisers, the pair went 304 feet long overall (279 at the perpendiculars), displaced some 3,800 tons, and were swathed in up to 8-inches of Harvey steel armor– including a 174-foot long by 6.5 foot 7-inch main belt.

The cost was on the order of $925,000 per ship.

Armstrong blueprint for Norwegian Tordenskjold Class Coastal Defense Ship HNoMS Harald Haarfagre

Harald Haarfagre by Geoff Gray, pg 60 in the 1900 edition of Brassey’s Naval Annual. Their peacetime Norwegian livery was of black hulls with yellow funnels and gun shields, and white superstructure and masts.

Lead Ship, Coastal Defence Ship HNoMS Tordenskjold at Armstrong Whitworth & Co. Ltd Yards. (Low Walker Shipyard), Newcastle upon Tyne, March 18th, 1897. 

Tordenskjold at Armstrong Whitworth & Co. Ltd Yards. (Low Walker Shipyard), Newcastle upon Tyne, March 18th, 1897.

Panserskipet Harald Haarfagre, via Tyne Museum. Note the ram bow

Powered by three cylindrical boilers driving two R & W Hawthorn Leslie Co-built engines, each on their own screws, they were rated for 16 knots– surpassing this by hitting 17.2 on builder’s sea trials in 1897.

Built for the often narrow confines of Norway’s craggy and unpredictable coast, they could float in just 16.5 feet, which is comparably shallow for a well-armored steel-hulled warship.

The sisters carried a single 8.2″/44 Armstrong B forward and a second aft in well-protected turrets clad in up to 8 inches of armor and fed by electric hoists from magazines well below deck.

HNoMS Tordenskjold at Armstrong Whitworth & Co. Ltd Yards. (Low Walker Shipyard), Newcastle upon Tyne, March 18th, 1897, showing her stern 8.2″/44 Armstrong turret.

Their main guns proved a common focal point for crew and wardroom portraits over the years.

Offisersbesetningen på PS Harald Hårfagre 1897. Note the 12-pounder in the background. MMU.940805

Panserskipet Harald Hårfagre første offiserbesetnig 18. Des 1897 9.mars 1898. Note the 12-pounders in the background MMU.942040

Panserskipet Harald Hårfagre besetnigen 1899 MMU.942037

Panserskipet Harald Hårfagre besetningen 1910 MMU.942035

Panserskipet Harald Hårfagre besetningen 1921 MMU.942034

Secondary and tertiary batteries included six 4.7″/44 Armstrong Model Y guns in shielded mounts, six shielded Armstrong N 12-pounder singles, six Hotchkiss 37mm three-pounders in fighting platforms on the masts, and two submerged torpedo tubes (17.7 inch in Haarfagre and 18 inch in Tordenskjold) along the beam for Mr. Whitehead’s devices.

Harald Haarfagre, seen in Horten, October 1903, with a good view of her gun decks. Note the 4.7″/44s and smaller 12-pounders along with the three-pounders in the mast. Also note the extensive small boat storage facility, with most boats apparently off-ship at the time of the photo. Photo via Norsk Maritimt Museum, Anders Beer Wilse Collection.

Another Anders Beer Wilse photo from the same period at Horten shows her crew in gun-loading exercises in summer whites towards the stern of the gun deck. Note the 4.7-inch Armstrong on deck, with the 12-pounders above. Also, note the crew’s bayonets and Krag rifles at the ready on racks. The officers stand ready with sabers. Note the ornate “For Konge Og Fedreland Flaggets Heder!” (For the honor of the King and Fatherland Flag) crest. Photo via Norsk Maritimt Museum, Anders Beer Wilse Collection.

Panserskipet Harald Hårfagre Styrbord side MMU.940381

They were seen by many at the time as being effectively just miniature versions of the British circa 1892 Centurion class battleships (10,000 tons, 390 ft oal, 2×2 10 inch, 9-12 inches armor, 17 knots).

Centurion class battleship HMS Barfleur, 1895. The Tordenskjolds were about half as heavy but of a similar arrangement and with smaller guns. Symonds and Co Collection, IWM Q 20993.

As such, the Tordenskjolds were considered a close match for the three new Swedish Oden class pansarbats, or coastal battleships (3400 tons, 278 ft oal, 1 or 2x 10″/41, 9.5 inches of Creusot or Harvey armor, 16 knots). This was important as, although the two countries were a United Kingdom under a Swedish king since 1814, the union’s dissolution was on the horizon, and some thought it could lead to bloodshed.

Tordenskjold was named in honor of Peter Jansen Wessel Tordenskiold, the famed 18th Century Scandinavian admiral and naval hero who perished at the ripe old age of 30 in a duel. Meanwhile, Haarfagre was named for the famed “Harald Fairhair” (Haraldr inn hárfagri), the storied 9th Century first king of a united Norway.

Portrayed by Peter Franzén in the recent Vikings TV show, the semi-fictionalized Harald is celebrated throughout Norway and Iceland going back to the sagas of his era, and numerous monuments stand throughout Norse lands honoring the old king, his reputation is akin to King Arthur in the Anglo-Saxon culture.

Quiet peacetime service

Completed in early 1898 and delivered to the Norwegian navy, the twin Tordenskjolds remained the strongest ships in that fleet until the two slightly heavier (4,100-ton) Armstrong-built Norge class panserskipene were delivered in 1901. 

1931 Jane’s listing for the Norge class and Tordenskjolds, very similar ships built by the same yard, only differing in armor type (Krupp vs Harvey) and engineering plants. The Norwegians regarded all four ships as sisters of the same class. Note the 3-inch AAA guns mounted on the turrets, added in 1920.

This quartet of Norwegian coastal battleships would serve side-by-side for three decades, giving the country the bulk of its maritime muscle going into the tense six-month 1905 crisis with Sweden that almost led to a real shooting war between the two and the ultimate founding of today’s Norway and Royal Norwegian Navy, with the cipher of Sweden’s King Oscar II being replaced by that of his grandnephew, Prince Carl of Denmark who would rise to the Norwegian throne under the regnal name of Haakon VII.

The new Royal Norwegian Navy in 1905, besides the four coastal battleships, included 34 coastal torpedo boats (led by the unique torpedobåtjager Valkyrjen), a dozen gunboats of assorted types, and four elderly monitors.

Norwegian torpedo boats. 1900. The country had these craft as the backbone of littoral naval forces at the time

Had it gone to war against Sweden, they faced at the time not only the three Odens, but also four larger Aran-class coastal battlewagons, the one-off battleship Dristigheten, the three old but reconstructed Svea-class coastal battleships, five 800-ton destroyers labeled by the Swedes as torpedo cruisers (torpedokryssare), a small Italian-built submarine, and about 40 assorted torpedo boats. Although the Swedes had the advantage in terms of big guns, the Norwegians would surely have fought on their home turf which would have been interesting, to say the least.

Besides the 1905 crisis, the panserskipene also would stand guard over Norway’s coast during the Great War, enforcing Oslo’s neutrality against all comers. This came as the British seized a new pair of 5,000-ton 9.4-inch gunned Bjørgvin-class coastal battleships that were building in the UK. Of note, the planned KNM Bjørgvin and KNM Nidaros would enter RN service as the monitors HMS Glatton and HMS Gorgon and never flew a Norwegian flag.

Other than that, before 1940 at least, the Tordenskjolds were happy ships, and many peacetime photos exist from that period, often calling at other European ports.

Norwegian Norway coastal battleship Tordenskjold. How about that beautiful bow scroll

Norwegian Panserskipet Tordenskjold, note her stern scroll

HNoMS Harald Haarfagre

Skaffing på banjeren på PS Harald Hårfagre MMU.940449

HNoMS Harald Haarfagre 

HNoMS Harald Hårfagre or HNoMS Tordenskiold at the roadstead of Trondhjem 1906

Panserskipet Harald Hårfagre, Aktenfra MMU.940387

Køyestrekk om bord i PS Harald Hårfagre MMU.940448

Harald Haarfagre crew at mess. Photo via Norsk Maritimt Museum, Anders Beer Wilse Collection.

Harald Haarfagre’s crew practice signals. Photo via Norsk Maritimt Museum, Anders Beer Wilse Collection.

Harald Haarfagre’s bridge, circa 1903. Note her extensive brass fittings and the impressive whiskers of her officers and quartermasters

The Norwegian coastal defense ship HNoMS Harald Haarfagre in drydock at Karljohansvern naval base, 1903. Photo via Norsk Maritimt Museum, Anders Beer Wilse Collection.

The Norwegian coastal defense ship HNoMS Harald Haarfagre in drydock at Karljohansvern naval base, 1903. Photo via Norsk Maritimt Museum, Anders Beer Wilse Collection.

Harald Haarfagre in dry dock, 1903. Note her extensive bow scroll. Photo via Norsk Maritimt Museum, Anders Beer Wilse Collection.

In the 1920s, they were modestly modernized, landing their old low-angle 37mm guns and dated torpedo tubes in exchange for a pair of more modern 76mm AAA guns.

By the early 1930s, with defense kroner at an all-time low, the Norwegians decided it was better to partially strip and sideline the older Tordenskjolds and sort of modernize the better-protected Norge class panserskipene (which were transferred to a reserve status), as the fighting line of old had been augmented by six American L-class coastal submarines built under license at Karljohansvern and a planned eight fast new Sleipner– and Ålesund-class destroyers.

This saw Tordenskjold and Harald Haarfagre land most of their armament (which was recycled in many cases for use in coastal forts) and retained for use as training vessels and accommodation hulks at Karljohansvern (Horten), out of commission.

WWII

When the Germans blitzed into Norway in April 1940 without a declaration of war, in an action billed as a preemptive move to forestall Allied occupation, the toothless Tordenskjold and Harald Haarfagre were captured. The vessels had raw recruits and some reactivated retired reserve cadres on board, and, lacking all but a few small arms, were captured intact.

This inglorious fate came as their near-sisters Eidsvold and Norge, hopelessly obsolete, were sunk in very one-sided surface engagements with the Kriegsmarine.

Panserskipet Eidsvold and Norge at Narvik in early April 1940, still with their range clocks. Reactivated from mothballs the previous year and undermanned, they were outdated and outclassed by just about any period cruiser or battleship, and lost their only battle. A total of 276 men died on these two vessels, while just 96 were plucked from the freezing water, the largest single loss of life for the Norwegian navy in WWII

The Germans soon converted the captured pair of old “bathtubs” to floating batteries (Schwimmende Batterien or Schwimmende Flakbatterie, or Norwegian luftvernskrysser) with Tordenskjold rechristened as Nymphe, and Harald Haarfagre as Thetis. The conversion saw a much modernized German armament of six 4.1-inch SK C/32 guns, two 40mm Bofors guns, and nine 20mm Oerlikon guns– the latter two salvaged from Norwegian stores.

PS HARALD HÅRFAGRE ombygget til tysk luftvernskrysser THETIS i Tromsø 1945 MMU.940250

Flakschiff Nymphe, German Anti-Aircraft Ship, 1940. Formerly Norwegian Tordenskjold, anchored in a Norwegian harbor during World War II. Note her 105mm A.A. guns with camouflaged barrels, and crew members standing in formation on deck. U.S. Naval History and Heritage Command Photograph. NH 71445

Flakschiff Nymphe, German Anti-Aircraft Ship, 1940. Formerly Norwegian Tordenskjold, surrounded by torpedo defense nets, in a Norwegian harbor during World War II. Note her camouflage. U.S. Naval History and Heritage Command Photograph. NH 71444

Their German naval service, which was restricted to the Norwegian littoral and apparently included protecting Tirpitz and other key Kriegsmarine surface ships against RN Fleet Air Arm and RAF raids during the war, is poorly documented.

Nonetheless, the sisters survived the war, with Tordenskjold/Nymphe bombed and deliberately run aground by her German crew at Helleford in May 1945 to prevent sinking.

Harald Haarfagre/Thetis was still capable of steaming and, returned to limited Norwegian service, would carry German POWs back to their Fatherland post-war.

Both ships remained as barracks and accommodation vessels (losjiskip) as late as 1948, when the last two Norwegian panserskipene were broken up at Stavanger.

Epilogue

The dozen German 4.1-inch SK C/32 guns salvaged from Harald Haarfagre/Thetis and Tordenskjold/Nymphe were recycled for use in vessels such as thCorvettete Nordkyn and in coastal forts. At least one survives.

This German BVV-made 10,5cm SK C/32, Nr 755, circa 1932, was used as the main gun on board the corvette Nordkyn until 1956, then was dismounted and transferred to the Coast Artillery (Kystartilleriet) who mounted it at Fort Tangen (HKB Langesund), located at the far end of Langesundstangen, as cannon 3 in 1966.

Active into the 1990s, it is preserved today. MMU.071018

They also were immortalized in period maritime art.

Hårfagre and Tordenskjold, surrounded by torpedo boats, by Zacharias Martin Aagaard, circa 1902

Today, Harald Haarfagre is remembered by the Norwegian military as the shore establishment KNM Harald Haarfagre at Stavanger, tasked with training both Navy and Air Force personnel since 1952.

They have the old battleship’s circa 1897 bell on their quarterdeck for ceremonies.

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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Warship Wednesday, April 12, 2023: Wind Them Up

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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

Warship Wednesday, April 12, 2023: Wind Them Up

Naval History and Heritage Command photo NH 85018, Courtesy of Donald McPherson, 1976.

Above we see USS Winder (PCS-1376), the leader of her class of 89 very interesting Patrol Craft, Sweepers, seen in a World War II image, likely while on coastal escort out of Miami in 1944-45.

You’ll note that, although she is only 136 feet long overall, she is very well armed with both twin Mousetrap ASW rocket racks and a 3″/50 DP mount forward, four 20mm Oerlikon singles amidships, a 40mm Bofors aft, four depth charge projectors, and two depth charge racks over her stern.

These criminally forgotten little patrol boats went on to serve a myriad of roles in the Cold War.

Meet the 1376s

With the British 105-ft Admiralty-type motor minesweepers (MMS) making a good impression on the U.S. Navy– after all, the Royal Navy ordered more than 300 of those hardy 295-ton wooden coastal mine hunters from 1940 onwards and used them for everything from gunboat to light salvage in addition to their mine warfare roles– the idea of a PCS seemed a good one to the Americans.

With wooden hulls to counter magnetic influence mines, the 105-ft Admiralty-type motor minesweepers were very successful– and easy to make by small commercial shipyards. Here a 105, Motor Minesweeper J 636, is underway in British coastal waters. IWM A 14421

Whereas the Admiralty 105s typically only carried a few Oerlikons in addition to their sweep gear and acoustic hammer, the Americans needed something with longer legs and, they felt, a lot more firepower. As described above, they got it with a mix of 3-inch, 40mm, and 20mm guns as well as the capacity to carry as many as 50 depth charges to feed their racks and K-guns.

Hampton (PCS-1386), 4 November 1944, As completed. Line drawing by A. D. Baker III from U.S. Small Combatants: An Illustrated Design History by Norman Friedman, Russian version.

Plus, there was Mousetrap.

The Mk 20 Mousetrap anti-submarine rocket system is both loaded/ready to fire and stowed on a similarly sized PC. The projectiles were 7.2 inches in diameter and weighed 65 pounds with an explosive charge of 31 pounds. Unlike the Hedgehog weapon, the Navy classified the projectile as a rocket, as it utilized propellant that burned for 0.2 to 0.7 seconds.

They carried an SF-1 type radar (some later fitted with more advanced SO-1 or SU-1 sets) and a QHA sonar set (later upgraded to the more mine-sensitive FM sonar in some ships).

First fielded in 1942, the SF-1 was a 10cm 150 kW surface search radar good out to 16nm. Here, USS PCS-1389 is seen on 12 December 1944, showing an updated SO-1 radar antenna. NH 64671

Simple and cheap, their engineering suite consisted of a pair of General Motors 8-268A diesel engines, generating 800hp, using Snow and Knobstedt single reduction gear, turning two shafts. This enabled a top speed of 14 knots but meant the cruising speed was still in the 12-13 knot range.

Constructed by firms as diverse as the Burger Boat Co of Manitowoc, Tacoma Boat, Western Boat in Tacoma, Astoria Marine Construction Co., Bellingham Marine Railway & Boatbuilding Co, Wheeler Shipbuilding of Long Island, Robert Jacob Shipyard in the Bronx, Greenport Basin & Construction Co in Connecticut, W.F. Stone & Son Shipyard in Alameda, and the Gibbs Gas Engine Co of Jacksonville, these warships could be made fast and without tying up a lot of precision slipways or using tough-to-source material.

Our class leader was laid down on 13 October 1942 as PC-1376 at Wheeler on Long Island, soon reclassified to PCS-1376 while still under construction, and commissioned on 9 July 1943.

As befitting an overgrown armed yacht built on Long Island, her skipper was LT J. P. Morgan III, USNR, (Harvard 1940), the great-grandson of robber baron J. Pierpont Morgan and son of Junius Spencer Morgan III– the latter at the time an OSS officer. Along with three other officers (two ensigns and an LT jg) and 54 enlisted, they provided PC-1376‘s first crew.

Check out the rates, for those curious, as seen in the ship’s war diary:

Her first ammo draw from Iona Island on the Hudson River included 296 3-inch shells (270 service, 16 target, 2 practice, 8 dummy), 1,784 40mm shells (1760 service, 16 target, 8 dummy), 2,800 rounds of .45 for the Tommy guns and M1911s in her small arms locker; and 1,800 rounds of .30 caliber for her M1903A3 rifles. This did not include depth charges, Mousetrap bombs, and 20mm ammo.

The class leader had a rather boring war career, being ordered for duty as a school ship at the Submarine Chaser School located in Miami after she completed her shakedown. She would spend the rest of the war there, alternating between use as a training bot and in coastwise patrol, riding shotgun on convoys from Miami to Cuba and back.

But our story is about all the 1376s.

The rest of the class…

USS PCS-1421 in San Francisco Bay, 2 March 1944. 19-N-66847

USS PCS-1423. Note her Mousetraps ready to fire. World War II photograph. NH 89237

USS PCS-1424 photographed by her builder, Burger Boat Company, Manitowoc, Wisconsin, on 24 November 1943. NH 96491

USS PCS-1424 photographed by her builder, Burger Boat Company, at Manitowoc, Wisconsin, on 24 November 1943. Note that she is fitted with Mousetrap anti-submarine rocket launchers forward. NH 97492

A baker’s dozen became Control Submarine Chasers (PCSC) almost as soon as they were completed. This conversion was simple, removing the 40mm mount to allow a radio shack to be built. In this role, they could better control swarms of inshore landing craft headed toward the beach.

A sort of mini amphibious command ship.

This was detailed by the NHHC further in its coverage of the Iwo Jima landings:

The Iwo Jima operation provided the first test of the amphibious forces’ newly formed permanent control organization. This organization was established following the Marianas campaign, where it was realized that proper control of the ship-to-shore movement of the amphibious craft had become a continuing 24-hour-a-day task, requiring specially trained control personnel and specially equipped control vessels.

The control organization for the Iwo Jima operation consisted of the Transport division, Transport Squadron, and Central (Amphibious Group or Force) Control Officers, permanently assigned to the staff of their respective commanders. This organization now parallels the echelons of both the beach party and the shore party. Control officers were embarked in the same ships as their opposite number in the beach and shore party, giving the maximum amount of time for coordination and understanding of each other’s problems prior to the landing.

Each control officer was provided with a control vessel (PCE, PCS, PC, or SC) which had been previously equipped with special communication facilities and provided with a control communication team and advisors from the troops. The control vessels were obtained and equipped, and the personnel were trained in their specialized duties, well in advance of the operation. As a result, for the first time the task of controlling the ship-to-shore movement, both during the assault and unloading phases, was handled by a “professional.” In addition, the control-equipped craft was provided to the different troop staffs for use as floating command posts.

Another 33 became Auxiliary Motor Minesweepers (YMS), renumbered YMS 446-479. This involved landing most of their ASW weapons and loading up on the sweeping gear.

USS YMS-475 (ex PCS-1447) and USS YMS-461 (ex PCS-1448) In San Francisco Bay, California, shortly after the end of World War II, circa late 1945 or early 1946. YMS-475 was disposed of in 1947 and YMS-461 was later transferred to South Korea as Hwaseong (PCS 205). Courtesy of Donald M. McPherson, 1976. NH 84992

USS LST-277 sails in the background while USS PCS-1404, is being refueled while en route to Saipan, by an unidentified vessel, on 15 June 1944. US National Archives Identifier 193832778 US Army Air Corps photo # A63650A.C.

Some managed to get some real trigger time in, for instance, USS PCS-1379 participated in the invasion of Peleliu and Angaur Islands, shelled Japanese targets on Eil Malk and in the Abappaomogan Islands, then saddled up for the Okinawa campaign.

PCS-1391 took part in the Leyte and Lingayen Gulf operations in the Philippines, serving as a landing craft direction vessel. Then at Okinawa, she carried Maj. Gen. Pedro del Valle, the Commanding General of the First Marine Division, to the beach during the initial assault landings.

USS PCS-1391 photographed circa 1945-1946. Courtesy of William H. Davis, 1977. NH 85160

Okinawa Campaign, shipping as seen from the beach in May 1945. Most ships present appear to be amphibious types. USS PCS-1391 is just to the right of the exact center, with USS LCI(L)-77 partially hidden behind her bow. 80-G-K-16204

PCS-1452 participated in operations at the Marianas, Saipan, Tinian, Iwo Jima, and Okinawa. She had lots of company, as no less than 10 of her class were present at the latter two operations.

YMS-481 (exPCS-1462) was lost to Japanese shore batteries off Tarakan, Borneo, on 2 May 1945.

YMS-478 aground after taking fire from a shore battery at Tarakan, Borneo.

PCS-1396 was damaged off Okinawa by a Japanese Kamikaze but would shrug it off and continued serving until 1949.

PCS-1407, PCSC-1418, PCS-1440, PCS-1454, PCS-1461, and YMS-472 were lost to the September-October 1945 Typhoons Ida and Louise off Japan and Okinawa.

PCS-1435 was present in Tokyo Bay during the Japanese surrender ceremony in September 1945.

PCS-1445 would serve with the 7th Fleet for the last ten months of the war then spend another eight months as the harbor entrance control vessel for the Yangtze River at Shanghai.

Jane’s 1946 listing on the type.

Some would serve in the Korean conflict as mine hunters, with PCS-1416 for instance clearing a channel more than 60 miles inland from the Yellow Sea and up the Taedong River to Chinnampo.

Catching names

Oddly, while many were laid up in the 1950s, they picked up a series of names, typically those of small towns. This non-inclusive list shows some of the variety. Sadly, many of these towns have never had another warship named in their honor.

  • Provincetown (PCS 1378)
  • Rushville (PCS 1380)
  • Attica (PCS 1383)
  • Eufaula (PCS 1384)
  • Hollidaysburg (PCS 1385)
  • Hampton (PCS-1386)
  • Beaufort (PCS 1387)
  • Littlehales (AGSC 7, ex-PCS-1388)
  • Deming (PCS 1392)
  • Sanderling (MHC 49)
  • Dutton (AGSC 8, ex-PCS-1396)
  • Coquille (PCS 1400)
  • McMinnville (PCS 1401)
  • Elsmere (EPCS 1413)
  • Swallow (MSC[O] 36)
  • Prescott (PCS 1423)
  • Verdin (MSC[O] 38)
  • Conneaut (PCS 1444)
  • Waxbill (MHC 50)
  • John Blish (AGSC 10)
  • Medrick (AMc 203)
  • Minah (MHC 14)

Shifting duties and designations

Postwar, besides utility work, many became naval reserve training vessels, with their shallow draft allowing them to be stationed well inland. For example, PCS-1423 was stationed at Vicksburg, Mississippi, and PCS-1431 in Louisville.

Louisville, KY, 1958, U.S.Navy sub chaser USS Grafton (PCS 1431) passing 

Their designations often shifted to Coastal Minesweepers (AMc), or Motor Minesweepers (AMS) in the late 1940s, designations they carried until they were decommissioned and struck.

Another quartet became Coastal Surveying Ships (PCS-1388, PC-1396, PC-1404, and PC-1457 became AGSC 7/8/9/10).

Survey ship USS Littlehales (AGSC 7, ex-PCS-1388) Courtesy of D.M. McPherson. NH 51413

Three of the ships, PCS-1393, PCS-1456, and PC-1465, would be reclassed no less than four times as a YMS, then an AMS, then a Coastal Minesweeper Underwater Locator (AMCU), and finally a Coastal Minehunter (MHC)– carrying five different pennant numbers in 12 years.

PC-1413 and PC-1431 would be reclassified as Experimental Patrol Craft Sweepers (EPCS).

At least three picked up the curious designation of Coastal Minesweeper, Old (MSC(O)).

By this time, their fit had changed significantly, shedding most of their guns and Mousetrap devices in lieu of a large Hedgehog ASW device forward (which it was thought could also prove effective in minefield destruction).

USS PCS-1445 underway off the U.S. west coast. She has been fitted with a Hedgehog mounting forward, in place of her 3/50 gun. NH 96492

USS PCS-1400 off the Puget Sound Navy Yard, 24 January 1947. She was later named USS Coquille. Note her Hedgehog. NH 55385

USS Rushville (PCS-1380), 26 August 1959, showing her postwar fit, which saw all her weapons landed. USN 1043655

USS Eufaula (PCS-1384), late in her career, with Hedgehog. Note she still has DC racks and projectors as well. USN 1043656

USS Deming (PCS-1392), 1959. Note the Hedgehog, depth charge racks, and not much else. USN 1043658

USS PCS-1387 photographed circa the late 1940s, with extensive awnings in place. This ship was renamed Beaufort (PCS-1387) in February 1956 and used as a naval reserve training ship in St. Petersburg, Florida until 1967. Courtesy of Donald M. McPherson, 1976. NH 85019

Moving on…

While some were disposed of by scrapping as soon as 1947, the Navy would look to transfer others to allies and other missions.

One, PC-1458, served both as a Navy survey ship (AGS-6), in 1944, then was transferred to the Coast and Geodetic Survey in 1948 as USC&GS Derickson, serving until 1954.

USC&GS Derickson, NOAA photo

Two other ships of the class, PC-1405 and PC-1450, were also transferred to the survey and named USC&GS Bowie (CSS 27) and USC&GS Hodgson (CSS 26), respectively. Bowie served until 1967 when she was scrapped, and Hodgson was transferred the following year to South Korea for further service.

USC&GS Bowie (CSS 27) (bow visible at left) and USC&GS Hodgson (CSS 26), circa 1965. NOAA photo

One, PCS-1425, was transferred by the WSA to the Puget Sound Naval Academy in 1947 to serve as a training vessel. At the same time, PCS-1445, formerly of the Yangtze squadron, went to Texas A&M.

As with any WWII-era American warship smaller than a heavy cruiser, several were transferred to the Allies as Lend Lease.

The Russians got a full dozen PCSs in 1945 which were active well into the late 1950s, serving as dive boats, degaussing ships, as well as mine vessels. Unlike most larger vessels, these were never repatriated.

Three were handed over to the Philippines at Subic Bay post-war as military aid (USS PCS-1399, USS PCS-1403, and PC-1404) and served into the late 1960s.

The Japanese got one (PCS-1416) while the South Koreans picked up five (PC-1426, PCS-1428, PCS-1443, PC-1445, and PCS-1448) and continued to use them into the 1970s. Meanwhile, Turkey got PCS-1436.

The end game

January 1958, left to right: ex-Rushville, ex-Deming (PCS 1392), and two unidentified PCS’/YMS’ at Mare Island awaiting transfer to civilian buyers.

The last in Navy inventory was McMinnville (PCS 1401), placed out of service and struck from the Naval Register in August 1962. Sold the next year to a group of treasure hunters in south Florida, she remained in the Keys as a yacht for another 20 years.

Ex-USS Prescott (PCS-1423) ashore after its towing vessel, the fishing craft Sea King, struck a rock jetty at Barnegat Inlet, New Jersey, and sank in February 1963. The Prescott had just been purchased from the Navy at Brooklyn, New York. She was later pulled free and, converted to a trawler, and would remain active into the 1980s. UA 455.12

Others were bought up at auction by fishing companies and converted to that life, bumping around with nets and dredges as late as the 1990s, often under Caribbean nation or Panamanian flags. 

One, ex-PCS-1438/YMS-470/AMS-37/MSC(O)-37, was bought by General Motors in 1959 and used as a corporate yacht in California, then was acquired by Windjammer Cruises to operate as the M/Y Royal Taipan out of Hawaii. She was famously almost lost at sea in 1990.

As for class leader Winder (PCS 1376), she was decommissioned after the war in February 1947, used for a time as a Naval Reserve training vessel at Norfolk, then was laid up in Florida where she was struck in 1957 and sold. Her ultimate fate is unknown. I’d like to think that she is still out there somewhere in some sort of low-pressure use. 

As far as I can tell, there are no surviving PCS-1376s afloat and they left behind few relics to prove they even existed, save for some war diaries in the National Archives.

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.

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

They are possibly one of the best sources of naval study, images, and fellowship you can find. http://www.warship.org/membership.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.

With more than 50 years of scholarship, Warship International, the written tome of the INRO has published hundreds of articles, most of which are unique in their sweep and subject.

PRINT still has its place. If you LOVE warships, you should belong.

I’m a member, so should you be!

Patched Minnie gets back to work

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Some 80 years ago today, check out these beautiful original color images of the New Orleans-class light/heavy cruiser USS Minneapolis (CA-36), seen at Pearl Harbor Naval Shipyard on 11 April 1943, showing off her shiny new bow.

U.S. Navy photo 80-G-K-544. Note the New Mexico-class battleship in the left distance.

Same date, heading out for points West. 80-G-K-541

Same as above, 80-G-K-545

The 10,000-ton “Treaty” cruiser was commissioned in 1934 and, at the forefront of the Pacific War, would earn an amazing 17 battle stars for her combat service.

Some of these were harder than others, for instance, while at the Battle of Tassafaronga in late November 1942, while she is credited with sinking the Japanese destroyer Takanami with her 8-inch shells, Minneapolis took two torpedo hits which ultimately caused her bow to collapse back to the hawsepipes.

Able to repair under heavy camouflage at Tulagi, she ultimately made it back to Mare Island Naval Shipyard where a new bow had been constructed in the time it took her to retire to California.

Hence, she is seen in the above period Kodachromes less than five months later good as new and headed back to the fight. 

Laid up in 1947, she was ultimately scrapped in 1959.

Warship Wednesday, April 5, 2023: Jackie’s Toys

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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 time 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

Warship Wednesday, April 5, 2023: Jackie’s Toys

Above we see the British C-class coastal submarine HMS C-27 (57) in the Spring of 1916 as she rides like a beached whale aboard a barge in Russia on her way, via inland lakes and rivers, from Archangel to Petrograd (St. Petersburg), where she would join a flotilla of similar boats in an aim to put the Eastern Baltic off limits to the German High Seas Fleet. You wouldn’t know it by the looks of her, but this little sub had already chalked up one of Kaiser Willy’s U-boats.

Sadly, C27 was lost 105 years ago today, at the hands of her own crew.

The tiny C boats

A slightly better and larger follow-up to the 13-strong A-class (200t, 105 ft, 2×18 inch TT, 11.5 kts) and 11-unit B-class (316t, 142 ft, 2×18 inch TT, 12 kts), the C-class boats went some 300 tons and ran 143 feet overall. Powered by a 600hp Vickers gasoline (!) engine on the surface and a single 200hp electric motor when submerged, the C1, as built, could make 13 knots.

HMS C25. Note the pennant number on the hull is 30 digits off of the name.

Manned by up to 16 officers and crew, they still just carried two 18-inch torpedo tubes with no reloads (although they were designed to carry an extra pair of “fish”) and no deck gun.

HMS C11. Note her two tubes at the bow under caps

British C class submarines Grimsby

These boats were known at the time in naval circles as “Fisher’s Toys” as Jackie Fisher fancied them instead of minefields for harbor and roadstead defense against enemy sneak attacks.

Five of the boats (C12 through C16) were even fitted with three airlocks and enough emergency dive gear for the entire complement should the boat bottom be unable to surface. Certainly, a forward-looking concept. This was later changed to a planned underwater egress via a hatch in the torpedo compartment.

Crew members of the submarine HMS C7 wearing their Rees Hall escape apparatus, dating from the 1900s. “There is no record of the apparatus ever having been used.”

These boats were seriously meant for coastal work, as they could float in just 12 feet of water while on the surface, and they often made appearances in river systems and small littoral harbors.

British submarine HMS C13 moored at Temple Pier, London. July 1909 National Maritime Museum Henley Collection.

A view looking west from Victoria Embankment towards Waterloo Bridge. Three C Class submarines are berthed alongside Temple Stairs, with two torpedo boats moored in Kings Reach at the time of the Thames Naval Review. 23 July 1909. RMG P00045

HM Submarine C34 (66) alongside HMS Victory to supply electric current from her generators to power lights and a “cinematograph lantern” for movie night for the cadets’ movie night.

The 38-vessel* class was split into three flights constructed in the half-decade between 1905 and 1910, with the first 18 boats (C1-C18) running a Wolseley 16-cylinder horizontal opposed main engine that allowed a 1,500nm surface radius. The second (C19-30), and third (C31-38) flights were equipped with a more efficient Wolseley-Vickers 12-cylinder engine that gave a better 2,000 nm radius while proving a knot faster (14 surfaced, 10 submerged).

*Two additional units were later built to a modified design for the Chilean government in Seattle and then later taken over by the Canadians (as HMCS CC1 and HMCS CC2) and should be considered their own separate class as they had different engineering and an additional stern torpedo tube along with four bow tubes rather than two.

Boy sailors having submarine instruction in the engine room in a C-class submarine in Portsmouth. IWM Q 18868

Most were built by Vickers, as they were a Vickers design, at Barrow, although six were constructed by the Royal Dockyard at Chatham as sort of an educational run.

HMS C1

HMS C14 (44)

HMS C25

HMS C38 (68)

HMS C32

HMS C31 (61)

The class was soon outpaced by the follow-on D and E-classes, which were almost twice as large, could make 16 knots on the surface, and carried safer diesel engines– the C-class submarines were the last class of gasoline-engined submarines in the Royal Navy.

Jane’s 1914 entry for the RN’s 75~ odd submarines, of which the Cs made up fully half of those numbers.

These little boats were tricky as they had very low freeboard while surfaced and the Submarine Force had both tremendous growing and teething pains at the same time. This cost lives as HMS C11 was sunk in a collision with the collier Eddystone in the North Sea in 1909, with only three survivors. In the same incident, HMS C16 and C17 collided but remained afloat. Four years later, HMS C14 was lost in a collision with a coal hopper in Plymouth Sound but was later salvaged and returned to service.

Nonetheless, some of these boats became among the first of HM Submarines to operate in the Pacific as HMS C36, C37, and C38 were transferred to Hong Kong in February 1911 to operate with the China Squadron. Ironically, the Japanese were building a series of almost identical boats at the same time, having bought the plans from Vickers.

By the time the Great War kicked off in August 1914, the remaining C-class boats were generally tasked with coastal defense and training duties in home waters while the larger craft were given more dynamic offensive missions. They did prove deadly in some cases, with HMS C15 for example torpedoing the highly successful German UC-65 (106 ships sunk for 125,000 tons) in the English Channel in November 1917.

U Boat Trap

Suggested in April 1915 by Acting Paymaster F. T. Spickernell, Secretary to VADM Sir David Beatty, as a method to combat German U-boats haunting the British Home Islands, the idea was to team up a trawler in RN service with a small coastal submarine– the Cs were ideal for this– with the fishing boat serving as bait to draw in said Hun to be bashed by waiting C-boat.

As underwater communication was non-existent at the time, and even hydrophones were still a new concept, the trawler, and C-boat were attached by a telephone line. The concept was that the trawler, being too small for the German to waste a torpedo on but still an inviting target, would soon be confronted by surfaced U-boat that would dispatch the fisherman via deck guns or a landing party. Either way, this would set up the idle and unsuspecting German to be zapped by the shadowing C-boat’s submarine volley.

Eight trawlers and a corresponding number of C-boats were tasked to operate from four ports: HMS C26 and C27 were to work with trawlers from Scapa Flow; C14 and C16 from the Tyne; C21 and C29 from the Humber; and C3 and C34 from Harwich.

Put together in May, this “U-Boat Trap” technique soon proved effective, with HMS C24, operating with the trawler Taranaki, sinking U-40 in the North Sea off Eyemouth on 23 June 1915.

This was followed up by our HMS C27, under the command of LCDR Claude Congreve Dobson, along with the trawler Princess Louise, ending the career of U-23 in the Fair Isle Channel between Orkney and Shetland on 20 July. She made good on this after missing a shot at U-19 the month prior.

As detailed in Martin Gibson’s War and Security Blog on the Royal Navy in the Great War:

The trawler was captained by Lieutenant L. Morton, but Lieutenant C. Cantlie and Lieutenant A. M. Tarver were also on board in order to train the crew. Cantile, who was the only regular officer of the three, the others being peacetime merchant marine officers who were members of the Royal Navy Reserve, took command during the subsequent operation.

At 7:55 am on 20 July Cantlie telephoned Dobson to tell him that a U-boat had been spotted 2,000 yards away. The phone then broke down; Dobson waited five minutes before slipping the cable; contact had not been restored, and he could hear gunfire.

The U-boat, which was U40, had fired one warning shot before firing at the trawler. She stopped, raised the Red Ensign, and dipped it as a sign of surrender, whilst her crew prepared to abandon ship in an apparent panic. This was in accordance with the plan, which was to trick the Germans and hopefully persuade them to come closer. It worked so well that U40 stopped near the trawler.

The trawler’s crew did not know where C27 was, but she was only 500 yards away on U40’s starboard beam when Dobson raised her periscope. He fired a torpedo, but U40 then started her engines, and it passed under her stern. He fired another that hit and sank U40. The British rescued 10 survivors, including her captain, Oberleutnant Hans Schulthess, and two other officers.

The British Naval Staff Monograph, written after the war for internal Royal Navy use only, stated that the prisoners ‘gave a good deal of information, not only of a technical character…but also on the general work of German submarines’, which it suggests may have been a result of their good treatment.

However, the U-Boat Trap results were mixed, with HMS C33 mined off Great Yarmouth while operating with the armed trawler Malta on 4 August. This was repeated when HMS C29 was lost when her companion trawler, Ariadne, strayed into a minefield in the Humber on 29 August. These losses, coupled with the increasing German wariness to fall for the bait of trawler decoys and larger Q-ships, led to the end of the program.

Nonetheless, the RN had other plans for C-27.

Headed East

With Tsarist Russia’s main ports in the Black Sea closed down by the entrance of the Ottomans to the war, and the Germans controlling the Baltic, the Imperial Russian Navy was effectively bottled up except the obsolete and neglected Siberian Flotilla. As an attempt to aid the Russians via their extra naval capacity, Britain and France attempted to force the Dardanelles and break into the Black Sea in a fiasco that was soon followed up by the slow-moving Salonika campaign.

At roughly the same time as the Gallipoli misadventure, the Royal Navy was sending a few small E-class boats through the Baltic to give the Russians some extra torpedo tubes to throw at German shipping.

Three British E-class boats in mid-October 1914 attempted the dicey journey into the Baltic through the Oresund Strait separating Denmark from Sweden, against tough German opposition. This saw HMS E-11 forced to turn back while HMS E-1 and E-9 got through to Reval in the Gulf of Finland.

SUBMARINE WARFARE DURING THE FIRST WORLD WAR (Q 114325) The Royal Navy’s submarine E1 in Russia during the First World War. Copyright: © IWM. Original Source: http://www.iwm.org.uk/collections/item/object/205356741

Iced in over the winter, the following summer they soon torpedoed and sank a German collier, and badly damaged the destroyer SMS S-148, the battlecruiser SMS Moltke, and the cruiser SMS Prinz Adalbert. Such exploits brought a meeting with the Tsar, and boxes of Russian decorations including the St. George, the country’s highest.

In late 1915, E-1 and E-9 were joined by E-8, E-18, and E-19, while sister E-13 was disabled after she ran aground in Danish waters and interned.

E18 Arriving off Dagerort, 12-9-1915. Note the extensive camouflage applied. Photo: Royal Navy Submarine Museum

They were assigned the steamers Cicero, Emilie, and Obsidian to serve as tenders and a home (away from home) for the British submariners and support staff.

By October, they waged a campaign to disrupt iron ore traffic from Lulea in Sweden to German ports and sank ten merchantmen over three weeks. The month ended with E-8 sinking Prinz Adalbert when a spread of torpedoes sent her magazine to the heavens, carrying almost 700 of the cruiser’s complement with it. The following month, E-19 hit the German light cruiser Undine with two torpedoes, sinking her south of the southern Swedish town of Trelleborg.

While the five Es were busy, a further four smaller C-class boats (our C27 along with HMS C26, C32, and C35) were given the mission to join them. However, since it was unlikely they could force the Oresund, they were stripped of as much weight as possible to give them increased buoyance, then towed to Archangel in the frozen Russian North, and finally taken by barge down the Dvina and across Lakes Onega and Ladoga to the Gulf of Finland where they would take the water once again and be ready to almost double the British submarine flotilla in the Baltic.

The thing is, this boondoggle, which sounded good on paper to someone, took almost 18 months to carry out and by the time the C-boats were ready for action in early 1917, the Tsar had been deposed, and things were getting downright weird in Russia. Nonetheless, the British boats were still as active as they could be, even while the now revolutionary Russian fleet was content to sit on its hands. As such, C32 was lost in October 1917 in the Gulf of Riga but claimed at least one German merchant sunk.

As the Bolsheviks swept to power in November 1917, and soon signed first a truce and then a peace with the Germans, the Kaiser’s troops started swarming through the Baltics and landing in Finland in March 1918. With the remaining British subs backed into a corner with no options, they made one final sortie to scuttle.

HMS E18 leaving Reval for the last time on May 25th, 1916

HMS E-18 had already been lost to German activity in May 1916, leaving E-1 and E-9 to be scuttled in the Gulf of Finland off the Harmaja Lighthouse on 3 April, followed by E-8 and C-26 on 4 April, and our C27 and C35 on 5 April. E-19 was sunk on 8 April. The supply ship Emilie was sunk on the northwest side of Kuivasaari on the 9th. The maintenance ships Cicero and Obsidian were sunk southwest of Bändare on the 10th, ending the carnage.

This left the flotilla’s 150~ remaining members to exfiltrate with the nominal help of the Reds back to Murmansk, where most soon became part of the British interventionist forces that would operate on the White Sea and the Dvina against the Reds well into 1919.

The flotilla’s senior officer, E-19‘s skipper CDR Francis Newton Allen Cromie, stayed behind in Petrograd where he was officially a naval attaché but nonetheless assumed the vacant portfolio of the British ambassador. There, he helped interface with assorted counter-revolutionary types, only to be killed by Cheka agents when the Reds raided the embassy in August 1918.

C-27‘s final commander, LT Douglas Carteret Sealy, survived the war and revolution but would be lost on HM Submarine H42 when she was rammed while submerged near Gibraltar by the “V” Class destroyer HMS Versatile in 1922.

For a deeper dive (see what we did there?) into the British Baltic boats, see Baltic Assignment: British Sub-Mariners in Russia 1914-1919, by Michael Wilson.

Epilogue

Of the other 35 C-class boats built for the Royal Navy that entered the war, several failed to emerge on the other side after the Armistice. As covered, C26, C27, C32, and C35 were scuttled in the Baltic to avoid capture, while C29 and C33 were lost in 1915 while on the U-boat Trap detail.

Other wartime losses included:

  • HMS C31 was sunk by a mine off the Zeebrugge on 4 January 1915, lost with no survivors
  • HMS C16 sunk after being rammed at periscope depth by destroyer HMS Melampus off Harwich on 16 April 1917
  • HMS C17 collided with the destroyer HMS Lurcher the following month and sank.
  • HMS C34 was sunk by U-52 in the Shetlands while on the surface on 17 July 1917. Her sole survivor ended the war in a German POW camp.
  • HMS C3 was packed with explosives and rammed into the viaduct at Zeebrugge on 23 April 1918, blasted sky high, with her skipper earning the VC.

LT Richard Douglas Sandford VC HM Submarine C3, Zeebrugge Raid, 22 – 23 April 1918 IWM Q 104329

The two dozen enduring C-boats left on the Admiralty’s list in 1919 were soon disposed of, largely through sale for dismantling. They were just too obsolete for further use, even though the oldest hull in the batch had just 15 years on its frames.

HMS C4, converted in secret by D.C.B. Section at the RN Signals School at Portsmouth into an unmanned vessel controlled remotely by an operator in a nearby aircraft, was the only surviving C-class submarine not to be scrapped at the end of the Great War. Still, she only lingered until 1922 when she went to the breakers.

The wrecks of the British Baltic flotilla, our C27 included, have largely been found and well documented over the years, with some even raised for scrap or attempts to put back into service, with unsatisfactory results.

Today, the C-class is best remembered in a series of period maritime art that still stirs emotions.

“HMS Bonaventure and Submarines” circa 1911 by William Lionel Wyllie. RMG PW2083. Inscribed, as title, and signed by the artist, lower right. The ‘Bonaventure’ (1892) was a second-class protected cruiser converted to a submarine depot ship in 1907. This finished watercolor shows the ship in her 1911-14 condition. Both the ‘Bonaventure’ and the trawler tender on the left are flying large red flags, advising other vessels to keep clear of a submarine operating area. The submarine with the number ’61’, lying close to ‘Bonaventure’, is the ‘C31’, launched on 2 September 1909 and lost by unknown causes after leaving Harwich for the Belgian coast on 4 January 1915. What appears to be a practice torpedo is in the foreground and an unidentifiable submarine is on the left. As the circumstances indicate, the drawing is of an exercise off the English coast, probably in the Channel from the relatively high ground behind.

“Near the Dardanelles, English, and French warships in the harbor of Malta,” by Alexander Kircher, with C22 and C26 in the foreground.

“A fleet of submarines passing HMS Dreadnought,” by Charles Edward Dixon, circa 1909. The closest boat is HM Submarine C-14

“The submarine ‘C15’ fundraising for the Gosport war effort” by William Lionel Wyllie. RMG PV3490

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.

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

They are possibly one of the best sources of naval study, images, and fellowship you can find. http://www.warship.org/membership.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.

With more than 50 years of scholarship, Warship International, the written tome of the INRO has published hundreds of articles, most of which are unique in their sweep and subject.

PRINT still has its place. If you LOVE warships you should belong.

I’m a member, so should you be!

80 Years Ago: Patching Up the Swayback Maru

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On 27 March 1943, the Pensacola-class heavy cruiser USS Salt Lake City (CA-25), the bruiser of RADM Charles McMorris’s Task Group 16.6, steaming along with the much smaller Omaha-class light cruiser USS Richmond (CL-9), and the destroyers USS Coghlan, Bailey, Dale, and Monaghan, bumped into VADM Boshirō Hosogaya Northern Force off the Soviet Komandorski Islands.

Hosogaya was riding heavy, with two hulking cruisers (Nachi and Maya) that were at least a match for Salt Lake City and Omaha, along with a further two light cruisers, Tama and Abukuma, and a force of three destroyers. While burdened by escorting three transports, his force had easily twice the combat power of TG 16.6.

Nonetheless, in a swirling 3.5-hour daylight engagement that saw both sides mauled but no ships sunk and only about 30 casualties on each side, the Japanese ultimately broke off the engagement and retired, leaving the Americans with a tactical victory as, while the transports were safe, they were not able to reinforce the Japanese bases in the Aleutians.

It came with a price for SLC.

While she had arguably “given better than she got” in the firing of 806 AP shells and 26 HE shells from her 8-inch guns– exhausting her supply of the former– Salt Lake City came away with lots of structural damage that would require five weeks of extensive repair at Mare Island.

She was hit by at least five 8-inch shells from Maya. Reports from her spotters also observed nearly 200 near-misses within 30 yards.

With her rudders jammed and her boiler room flooded, at one point she was dead in the water and saved only via the shelter of a destroyer-laid smoke screen.

Battle of the Komandorsky Islands, 26 March 1943, USS Salt Lake City (CA 25) in action during the battle. At right is a smoke screen laid by U.S. Navy Destroyers. 80-G-44937

The summary from her damage report done at Mare Island weeks later:

For those interested, the full 30-page BuShips report on the damage is in the National Archives.

Below we see a series of images taken 80 years ago today while she at Dutch Harbor, on 30 March 1943, getting evaluated and patched up enough to make California.

8”/55 Guns of Turret #3, USS Salt Lake City (CA 25), showing heat scale on the tubes from extensive firing during the action. The image was taken at Dutch Harbor, on 30 March 1943. Note snowflakes falling. National Archives photograph: 80-G-50221.

Blistered triple 8”/55, Mk.14 Guns of the USS Salt Lake City (CA 25)’s turret #3, photographed at Dutch Harbor, Alaska, on 29 March 1943, three days after the Battle of the Komandorski Islands. Note turret rangefinder at left. National Archives photograph, 80-G-299018.

Muzzles of 8″/55, Mk. 14 guns of turret #3, USS Salt Lake City (CA 25), taken at Dutch Harbor after the action, 30 March 1943. Note 1/2″ of liner creep that occurred during the battle. 80-G-50222

Crewmen of USS Salt Lake City (CA 25) examine shrapnel holes in the outboard catwalk of the ship’s starboard catapult, at Dutch Harbor on 30 March 1943, after the battle. 80-G-50211

Crewmen of USS Salt Lake City (CA 25) hunting for shell fragment souvenirs on their ship’s main deck, at Dutch Harbor, after the action. 80-G-50210

USS Salt Lake City (CA 25) crewmen cutting a patch to cover a shrapnel hole in their ship’s side, at Dutch Harbor after the action, 30 March 1943. Note the fire extinguisher. 80-G-50216

Patching shrapnel holes in the main deck of USS Salt Lake City (CA 25), at Dutch Harbor, after the action, 30 March 1943. Note 8″ powder cans at right. 80-G-50215

Crewman cutting damaged metal from a shrapnel hole in the side of USS Salt Lake City (CA 25) at Dutch Harbor, after the action, 30 March 1943. Note rigging for scaffold platform. 80-G-50212

View of the forward outboard side of 40mm director #5 platform on USS Salt Lake City (CA 25) showing damage caused by concussion of gunfire by turret #4 during the battle. Photographed at Dutch Harbor on 30 March 1943. 80-G-50229

Her crew also buried their two war dead, one of the few instances where men killed in blue water surface actions in the theatre were not interred at sea.

Funeral of Lieutenant Commander Colvig Gale and Fireman Second Class Frederick David, crewmen of USS Salt Lake City (CA 25), at Dutch Harbor, Alaska, soon after the battle. They had been killed by shrapnel during the action. Chaplin is Lieutenant R.W. Hodge. National Archives photograph: 80-G-50251.

Funeral of USS Salt Lake City (CA 25) crewmen, Lieutenant Commander Winsor Colvig Gale and F2/C Frederick David, who was killed by shrapnel during the action. Photographed at Dutch Harbor, Alaska, soon after the battle. National Archives photograph, 80-G-50249

For additional details and personal remembrances of SLC at Komandorski, see the ship’s Veterans’ page.

Salt Lake City would ultimately return to service, earning 11 battle stars for her Pacific War.

She retired after surviving two atomic bombs during the Crossroads tests in 1946, ultimately sunk as a target on 25 May 1948, some 130 miles off the Southern California coast.

The “Swayback Maru” couldn’t shrug off that one.

Warship Wednesday, March 29, 2023: The Republic’s Lightning

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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 time 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

Warship Wednesday, March 29, 2023: The Republic’s Lightning

Naval History and Heritage Command NH 64202

Above we see the French torpedo boat cruiser (croiseur porte-torpilleurs) Foudre (Lightning) circa 1901 with a half-inflated free balloon on her quarter deck and numerous 59-foot steam-powered torpedo boats arranged in her complicated gantry system. About as interesting a warship as has taken to the waves, Foudre would be a chameleon of sorts when it came to naval technology, all of which has sadly been almost forgotten.

Torpedo Boat Carrier Race

In 1878, the Royal Navy purchased the incomplete merchant steamer British Crown (Yard 7A, C7) while on the builder’s ways at Harland & Wolff in Belfast. The 390-foot, 6,400-ton iron-hulled merchantman was originally to be a cargo hauler, but her owner ran into physical limitations before she could be completed. The Admiralty picked her up for a bargain and converted her to HMS Hecla, a new type of experimental “torpedo depot ship and floating factory” that would carry and support a series of at least four small 2nd class torpedo boats.

Besides her torpedo boats, she was given enough topside armament to be considered a small cruiser. This included five 6.32-inch (64pdr) MLRs and a 4-inch (40pdr) breechloader, along with enough small arms to send a company-sized force of Tars ashore.

HMS Hecla (British Torpedo Depot Ship, 1878) Note torpedo boats on deck. NH 60288

Lessons from Hecla’s service led the Admiralty in 1888 to order from the Portsmouth Dockyard a more purpose-built “enhanced Hecla type” a 350-foot 6,820-ton steamer dubbed HMS Vulcan. Much faster (20 knots vs 12 knots) than Hecla, Vulcan could also carry more than twice the number of boats (9) while mounting a very decent armament of eight 4-inch QF guns, 12 Hotchkiss 3 pounders, and six torpedo tubes for Mr. Whitehead’s deadly steel fish. Also, unlike the unprotected Hecla, Vulcan carried an armored conning tower as well as up to four inches of plate over her machinery spaces.

H.M. steel twin-screw torpedo depot ship Vulcan

The TBs used by the two British carriers were a class of one dozen wooden-hulled craft (WTB Nos. 1-12) of some 56 feet and 14 tons that carried either a pair of 14-inch torpedoes in dropping gear or one in a centerline tube and a couple of Mr. Maxim’s water-cooled machine guns. Essentially steam-powered picket boats that carried a single locomotive boiler, they were among the largest carried by RN warships for launching via davits.

Between Hecla and Vulcan, it was thought the Royal Navy could use the vessels to set up an instant blockade of an enemy seaport or coastline, or deploy to a disputed land and establish a working naval base virtually upon arrival. Alternatively, they could be used to raid an enemy roadstead at night, with the cruisers closing to within 15 miles or so just after sunset, putting their boats in the water, then retrieving the survivors after the attack and beating feet as soon as possible after the attack.

Enter Foudre

With such a capability out there in British hands, the French moved to field a similar vessel in 1890, ordering Foudre from Soc de la Gironde, Bordeaux.

Some 389 feet overall, she hit the scales at 6,000 tons (full). Powered by twin VTEs fed by a staggering 24 boilers, she could make 19.5 knots at least on trials.

Swathed in Harvey nickel steel armor up to five inches thick, she had a decent gun armament of eight 4-inch M1891s located one fore, one aft, and six in sponsons, as well as two batteries of smaller anti-boat guns.

She carried eight 100/45 M1891 Canet guns in shields

However, her boats were her main battery.

A closer inset of NH 64202, the first image in the post, shows two of Foudre’s embarked Type A torpedo boats under the gantry with their funnels folded down.

The French had six old torpilleur-vedette spar boats but wanted something better. This led to ordering designs from Thibaudier & Normand domestically with seven built at Creusot (Lettered A, B, D-I) and Yarrow in England, with the latter being a single boat (Letter C) constructed of an early Webster’s process aluminum. The fact that they were lettered set them easily apart, as the more than 200 larger torpedo boats in the French Navy, capable of independent operations, were all numbered. 

Their length was 59 feet overall with a single stern-mounted 14-inch torpedo tube (with no reloads) oriented to fire either over the port side just off-center for banking shots at an enemy ship or downward from the bow.

Taking on a torpedo

Note the downward-sloped bow tube

Note the folding funnel and detail of the slanted bow tube

Other than the torpedo, the boats had no other armament to save weight. Speed on these boats was a paltry 16 knots with a range of about 100 miles, a performance that was largely in the hands of how effectively the vessels’ seven-man crew worked their boiler.

The difference in weight between the Creusot boat (11.5 tons) and the Yarrow-built aluminum craft (9.5 tons) was significant. However, the English boat was a failure due to electrolytic action with the salt water.

Yarrow built torpilleur-vedette a embarquer “C” for the torpedo boat cruiser Foudre. Note the offset funnel to allow for the slanted topside tube, and the armored wheelhouse, clad in a 4mm plate to protect the skipper and helmsman. She used a hull skin and frames of aluminum from 1mm to 5mm thick. Via Feb. 1895 Cassier’s drawing.

Foudre would be completed and enter service in September 1897 and based at Toulon, would spend the next four years in a series of fleet operations and experiments.

A great clear shot of her around 1900. NH 63905

And during balloon trials off Toulon in 1901. Note her forward 4-inch gun

It was discovered that her boats were so large and unwieldy that they proved hard to launch rapidly, or in any sea state, while conversely, they were too small and slow to prove much practical value in anything more than coastwise operations. This led Foudre to be laid up by 1902 after just a few years of service.

But don’t worry, the French soon found many other uses for her.

Sub-transport and conversion

Recommissioned in March 1904, she had her aft gantry works removed and, with four of her old torpedo boats loaded forward and the newly built small (70 tons, 2×17.7 inch tubes) Naiade-class submarines Lynx (Q23) and Protee (Q16) aft, sailed for Saigon in French Indochina where she disembarked the menagerie.

1904 with Lynx and Protee aboard under canvas

1904 with Lynx and Protee aboard. Note the white “colonial” scheme

She would repeat the trip the following year with the subs Perle (Q17) and Esturgeon (Q18) and four more TBs.

Finished with her Asian excursions, Foudre was reclassified as a floating repair ship in 1907 and then converted to become a minelayer in 1910, although she was also used to transport troops back and forth from Africa.

“Foudre will transport the troups of the Armée d ‘Afrique to France. 2-6-10” Note her gantries are gone and the forward deck house is much more visible.

Likewise, her British counterparts, HMS Hecla and Vulcan, would be soon converted from their primary mission into becoming submarine and destroyer tenders.

To the skies!

A pet project of the forward-looking VADM Auguste Boué de Lapeyrère, who had fought with the Marines ashore against the Germans as a cadet in 1870 and then later commanded the torpedo boat Volta in its fight against the Chinese sloop Fou-Sing in 1884, Foudre set her mine warfare role aside and soon became part of the budding Aéronavale, the French Navy’s air arm.

Long experimenting with balloons, by December 1911 she had become a full-fledged seaplane carrier capable of transporting, launching, and recovering up to four small floatplanes. This included large (30×15-foot) on-deck hangars, below-deck workshops, and cranes to lift the aircraft aboard and down to the sea.

This feat made her the first seaplane carrier in history, predating the British HMS Hermes and the seaplane antics aboard USS Mississippi by over a year, and the Japanese Wakamiya by nearly three.

Her arrangement as a seaplane carrier. Note she still has her stern 4-inch gun but her forward has been removed and she now has a large hangar center deck. Her forward deck house has been deleted as well. 

In the summer of 1912, she supported trials of the Voisin Canard (Duck) amphibie floatplane, equipped with Fabre floats, under the control of aviation pioneer LT Pierre Cayla. Foudre’s skipper at the time was Capt. (later VADM) Louis Fatou.

Cayla would later go on to lead the 1re Escadrille de Bombardement on the successful attack on the Pechelbronn oil complex in 1915, one of the first practical uses of strike aircraft, and earn the Legion D’Honneur.

In November 1913, she had a 113×24-foot wooden deck installed to launch a small single-seat Caudron G.3 biplane. Powered by an 80hp Rhone engine, the G.3 was light, with just a 1,600-pound maximum loaded weight, but could carry a small bomb.

Boarding a Caudron G.3 Type J on the Foudre. Note the hole cut in the wings for the lifting hook

Boarding a Caudron G.3 Type J on the Foudre. Note the hole cut in the wings for the lifting hook

She conducted at least one take-off of the aircraft from her deck on 8 May 1914, with Rene Caudron at the stick.

While this was four years after Eugene Ely’s historic flight in his Curtiss pusher airplane from the cruiser USS Birmingham at Hampton Roads, it was a first for the French.

War!

Jane’s 1914 entry on Foudre.

Soon after the Great War began, Foudre landed her aircraft ramp, thus ending her G.3 operations, and joined the fleet as a sort of do-all vessel deployed to the eastern Med. In this work, she clocked in as an auxiliary cruiser, a troop transport, a tender and depot ship for seaplanes, destroyers, and submarines; and basically, any other mission that came up.

She was attached to the allied fleet for the Dardanelles operations and in October 1915 evacuated 4,000 Armenian refugees from Antioch to Port Said, thus helping to document the genocide perpetrated by the Ottomans.

By 1916, she was a floating headquarters and depot ship for the Armée d ‘Orient, the French expeditionary corps in Salonika, and would continue in that role for the remainder of the conflict.

Post-Armistice, she was heavily involved in occupation duties in the former Ottoman and Austro-Hungarian regions. A floating ship of state to protect the Republic’s interests everywhere from Syria to the Adriatic. 

The French torpedo boat carrier Foudre (L. 1895) at Spalato (Split, Yugoslavia), in 1919. NH 64205

After the war, she was used as an aviation school ship.

By August 1921, the former torpedo boat carrier/submarine transport/repair ship/minelayer/aircraft carrier/headquarters ship was retired and scrapped.

Epilogue

Little of the old Foudre still exists, other than a collection of period postcards, some of which used early photoshop techniques to overlay assorted airplanes. 

Since then, the French have recycled her name for an American-built Casa Grande-class landing ship dock (A646, ex HMS Oceanway) that was active in the 1950s and 60s.

TCD Foudre (A646) moored on the Saigon River, French Indochina in 1955. Note the F4U Corsairs on her deck. Built at Newport News in 1942-43, she was Lend Leased to the Royal Navy as HMS Oceanway (F-143) and landed U.S. troops on Omaha Beach on D-Day. The French operated her from 1952 to 1969. Photo: Georges Demichelis via Navsource.

The name was used again as the class leader (L9011) of a similar type of LPD that served the French Navy from 1990 through 2011. As LPDs are every bit the same sort of “all things to all people” multitool that our Great War era Foudre was, the logic is obvious.

TCD Foudre (L9011). The ship now serves in the Chilean Navy.

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.

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

They are possibly one of the best sources of naval study, images, and fellowship you can find. http://www.warship.org/membership.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.

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Warship Wednesday, March 22, 2023: Herr Ericsson’s Original Tin Can

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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 time 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

Warship Wednesday, March 22, 2023: Herr Ericsson’s Original Tin Can

Naval History and Heritage Command Photo NH 52307

Above we see the circa 1892 image of John Ericsson’s experimental war vessel, “Destroyer” testing her “submarine artillery” by the firing of an inert shell into the flooded drydock at the Brooklyn Navy Yard to be recovered later.

The Swedish-born inventor and mechanical engineer had just passed on to the great drawing board in the sky the previous March, aged 85, and is best known for the U.S. Navy’s first screw-propelled steam-frigate USS Princeton in 1843 and the Civil War-era USS Monitor— the world’s first armored ship with a rotating turret, with his penultimate warship, Destroyer, most often falling through the cracks of history.

John Ericsson (1803-1889). Photographed by the Matthew Brady studios, 1862 & 1863. Naval History and Heritage Command: NH 305 & NH 482

Ericsson spent the last 12 years of his life working on Destroyer, which he envisioned would be the ideal harbor defense vessel, particularly for his beloved New York.

A compact iron-hulled beast of some 130 feet in length with a narrow 17-foot beam and the ability to float in just 11 feet of water, she carried a 70-foot “wrought iron breastwork of great strength near the bow” as a defense to allow for bow-on close-in attacks with a sort of innovative albeit not effective centerline underwater cannon. She could be built for about the cost of a small gunboat and crewed by as few as a dozen men.

Ericsson’s Destroyer. View of this experimental ship showing submarine gun projectiles on deck. Taken at the New York Navy Yard, circa 1890. USS Maine of Spanish-American War fame is fitting out in the left background. Detriot Bain News Service image LOC LC-D4-20348

The Destroyer’s “submarine gun” was a whopper.

With a 16-inch diameter bore and a 30-foot barrel that was eight feet below the waterline, it fired a 26-foot long projectile crafted of spruce and pine timbers and sheathed with thin metal. In all, it weighed 1,500 pounds of which 300 was gun cotton payload. Alternatively, a smaller, 10-foot-long projectile was designed as well.

Ericsson’s Destroyer plan of submarine gun for this experimental ship, dated 7 October 1890. NH 54252

John Ericsson’s “Destroyer” Longitudinal section of the ship’s bow, showing the underwater gun and its projectile torpedo, circa 1881. Note the “inflated air bags” in the bow and original pneumatic feeder tubes for the gun. NH 84476

It was thought by Ericsson that the gun could be fired at a target from some 500 feet away. To keep the projectiles on a level course, they were fitted with “hydrostatic bellows” in the center along with two horizontal rudders.

The method of the launch was originally to be via a piston that would be actuated by a steam line but this was eventually changed to a 40-pound explosive (black powder) charge. The energy produced by such a projectile at damaging speeds was estimated to be something on the order of 2,000,000 foot-pounds.

The idea was Destroyer’s hull would be ballasted down when operational to have as low a freeboard as possible, only exposing the armored plate iron deck house. Voids were to be filled with blocks of cork and inflated rubber airbags to allow for buoyancy even with a penetrated hull.

Ericsson’s Destroyer interior view showing the submarine gun and pneumatic loading mechanism, taken circa 1890. NH 54251

Ericsson’s Destroyer interior view shows the breech mechanism of the submarine gun. Taken about 1890. NH 54248

Ericsson’s Destroyer interior view shows the breech mechanism of the submarine gun. Taken about 1890. NH 54249

Uncrated projectile and body. NH 52494

In an initial low-pressure light load test in April 1886, Ericsson himself declared that “the submarine gun has proved a perfect success” after its inert projectile ran 300 feet into a suspended net in less than three seconds, a speed of about 59 knots. “The effect produced by exploding a loaded projectile remains to be ascertained, but this trial an individual is not permitted to make, hence I now desire to hand the Destroyer over to the Government.”

Built on spec with $150,000 ($5 million in today’s dollars) coughed up by foundry owner and Ericsson friend Cornelius Henry DeLamater (who also died in 1889)– and was the guy who built the steam boilers and machinery for both USS Princeton and USS Monitor— Ericsson proposed in 1886 to sell the vessel and its patents to the Navy for “modest sum” of $220,000. Not much of a profit although there would presumably be royalties involved as well should the patents be utilized on a wide scale. 

In the end, it turned out that Destroyer and her related submarine artillery still needed another $30,000 in funds from the Navy to be made ready for a firing trial after the death of both Ericsson and DeLamater. At the time, that was about the cost of a harbor tug (four were ordered that year at a cost of $35K each).

By this stage, the prototype warship and her gun were the assets of the independent Ericsson Coast Defense Company.

The thing is, other, more proven, locomotive torpedoes had already far surpassed Destroyer’s gun and the world was awash in small, steam-driven, torpedo boats that used Mr. Whitehead’s deadly and economical devices.

They had even been proven in warfare already, with the Ottoman ship Intibah sunk in 1878 by Russian torpedo boats carrying Whiteheads. Even the U.S. Navy had ordered one, USS Cushing (Torpedo Boat No. 1), from Herreshoff in Rhode Island in 1886, and the 140-foot craft was undergoing experiments by 1890 at the Naval Torpedo Station in Newport.

USS Cushing torpedo boat experiments, ca. 1890, DeGolyer Library, SMU.

The E.W. Bliss Company of Brooklyn had stood up the same year, and, using Whitehead’s patents under license, had won a 100-unit contract for American-made 18-inch (diameter) torpedoes.

The number of torpedo boats in service or building around the globe topped 1,000 in 1889-90, from a Navy Department report published in the NYT. Of course, many of these were very small coastal steam launches with no overnight/rough weather/blue water capability, but they could still carry a “fish.”

Argentinian sailors with a Whitehead torpedo, Fiume, Austria, 1888. At the time this picture was taken, torpedo boats were in all of the world’s major– and many minor– fleets.

Meanwhile, Ericsson’s body was repatriated to his native Sweden, carried on the deck of a modern new U.S. Navy cruiser that was very much the descendant of his USS Princeton and USS Monitor.

“The White Squadron’s Farewell Salute to the Body of John Ericsson, New York Bay, August 23, 1890”. Oil on canvas, 36″ by 54″, by Edward Moran (1829-1901), signed and dated by the artist, 1898. It depicts USS Baltimore (Cruiser # 3) departing New York Harbor to return the remains of John Ericsson to his native Sweden. Note the Swedish ensign flying from the ship’s foremast. Painting in the U.S. Naval Academy Museum Collection. Gift of Paul E. Sutro, 1940. Official U.S. Navy Photograph. National Archives photograph, KN-10851 (Color).

Subaquatic Shooting

The Government Torpedo Board then embarked on a series of experiments in the Spring and Summer of 1892 with the late Mr. Ericsson’s Destroyer. The board, who watched the trials from the vessels’ deck, consisted of Commander George Albert Converse (USNA 1861, later RADM) and lieutenants T.C. McLean and C.A. Bradbury. Each shot was triggered at the drop of CDR Converse’s handkerchief.

Initial tests were done in March in Brooklyn’s Erie Basin, with a few inert rounds fired into a net with a modest 20-pound charge of black powder.

The May-June 1892 tests at the Brooklyn Navy Yard saw Destroyer moored off the mouth of the Simpson wooden dry dock, which was flooded, and its gates locked opened. Inside the dock was a series of six 40×20-foot nets, at 100-foot intervals. The nets were made of 1/4-inch manila cordage. At each net stood a team of bluejackets who, holding an attached rope to gauge the vibration of the projectile hitting the net, stood ready with a chronograph in hand to be used to help calculate velocity through the docks.

The below images described as “circa 1890” were actually in May-June 1892.

View during tests of her submarine gun at New York Navy Yard circa 1890. The projectile is shown. NH 52495

Projectile body. NH 52496

View during tests of her submarine gun at New York Navy Yard circa 1890. Assembly of warhead and projectile body. NH 52497

Ericsson’s Destroyer interior view shows the breech mechanism of the submarine gun open and the shell ready to load. Note the net slicers on the tip. Taken about 1892. NH 54246

Ericsson’s Destroyer interior view showing shop facilities and a projectile for the submarine gun, taken circa 1890. Note the projectile along the bulkhead. It was thought the vessel could carry up to 15 shells. NH 54250

View during tests of her submarine gun at New York Navy Yard, circa 1890. The firing of a shell. NH 52305

NH 52306

View during tests of her submarine gun at New York Navy Yard, circa 1890. Firing of a shell into the drydock to be recovered later. NH 52311

Ericsson’s Destroyer. View during tests of her submarine gun at New York Navy Yard, circa 1890. The projectile is in a drained drydock. NH 52313

Firing 20 inert cigar-shaped projectiles, with charges not exceeding 25-30 pounds of black powder, tests were conducted from as close as 100 feet off the dock to as far as 600 feet away, with the latter showing a lateral spread of 22 feet on average. The warheads, carrying equivalent ballast rather than guncotton, were topped with four razor-sharp net cutters. It was thought able to penetrate at least one steel mesh net, as in most tests the wooden bolts zipped through at least five of the six of the manila nets.

Muzzle velocity was estimated by the board to be around 300 feet per second, which translates to about 204 mph. At the 1,200-pound test weight, that’s kinetic energy of something like 2,097,963 ft./lbs.– remarkably close to Mr. Ericsson’s estimates.

There were some glaring failures, including projectiles that sank after they filled with water, some that nosedived just after launch, and others that decelerated rapidly and were caught in the first couple of nets, or came too fast and broached over the nets.

As noted by the New York Times, “Of the 20 shots fired, 15, at the maximum range of 600 feet, were sufficiently accurate in flight to have sunk the underwater hull of an average-sized vessel.”

The craft was taken into Naval custody, although not formally purchased, then tugged for more experiments at the Newport Naval Torpedo Station, where CDR Converse’s team would continue to keep Destroyer into late 1893. This involved testing anti-torpedo nets constructed by the Washington Gun Foundry and a series of nine live submarine gun shells fabricated by the Continental Iron Works of Brooklyn.

This came after a public outcry when “the majority of foreign warships present in the World Columbian Naval Review fleet carried torpedo nets” while no American ship was fitted with one.

Sale and overseas service

In October 1893, Flint Co. of New York City bought Destroyer from the Ericsson Coast Defense Company for resale to Brazil, where a civil war/revolution that included a naval aspect was afoot. Converse dutifully handed the vessel back to ECDC president Ericsson F. Bushnell (the son of Cornelius Scranton Bushnell of USS Monitor and Intelligent Whale fame) later that month and she was towed back to NYC by the tug Scandinavia.

Seafaring adventurer Joshua Slocum, soon after to be the first person to sail single-handedly around the world, accepted the job to take Destroyer to Brazil with a scratch crew that included a Royal Marine officer on furlough who was never without his Colt revolver and sword, a Brazilian “count” whose only redeeming quality “was a good judge of a hotel,” and a handful of other hardy souls.

Supported by the freighter Santuit, Slocum was “navigator in command” and set out on 7 December, arriving at Pernambuco on 20 January 1894, with a weeklong layover in Martinique to make repairs following a hairy incident during a storm in which the vessel was nearly lost at sea.

Destroyer never made it into much active service with the Brazilians, and Slocum, recalling in a self-published pamphlet on the trip, would say:

Concerning the last days of my worthy old ship, there is little more to say. The upland navigators at the Arsenal at Bahia, having observed the New York crew put the Destroyer in the basin and out again with dispatch, undertook, like some tropical quadrupeds, to do the “trick” themselves. Whether from pure cussedness or not this time, I can’t say, but they stove a great hole in her bottom, having grounded her on a rock, “accidentally,” they said.

Alas! for all our hardships and perils! The latest account that I heard said that the Destroyer lay undone in the basin. The tide ebbing and flowing through her broken hull–a rendezvous for eels and crawfish–and now those high and dry sailors say they had a “narrow escape.”

In handwritten notes to a copy found in 1997, Slocum would also detail:

When I returned to Brazil, later, in the Spray [the 36-foot sailboat he rounded the globe in] and inquired about a balance of wages due me from the Destroyer some $600 or more: The officer I addressed said “Captain so far as we are concerned we would give you the ship and if you care to accept it we will send an officer to show you where she is – I know very well where she was, as I have already said at the bottom of the sea.”

Epilogue

While Ericsson’s Destroyer was borrowed by the Navy for about 20 months in 1892-93, she was never commissioned as USS Destroyer, nor given a crew. The Navy did, however, name its second torpedo boat (TB-2), USS Ericsson, after the late inventor in 1897. Later, a Great War-era O’Brien-class torpedo boat destroyer (DD-56) and a WWII-era Gleaves-class destroyer (DD-440) would carry the same name.

USS Ericsson, (TB-2) alongside USS Cushing (TB-1), November 1900. Catalog #: 19-N-14-24-10

USS Ericsson (DD-56) circa 1916. NH 77909

The third USS Ericsson (DD-440), a Gleaves-class destroyer, was pretty enough to star on a 1941 Naval Reserve poster by Matt Murphey. UNT World War Poster Collection

Sadly, today the name of this titan of naval technology rides on an MSC-manned Kaiser-class oiler, USNS John Ericsson (T-AO-194), which has been in service since 1991. If ever a destroyer should be named for a man, it is Mr. Ericsson. 

170718-N-OY799-016. CORAL SEA (July 18, 2017) The Military Sealift Command fleet replenishment oiler USNS John Ericsson (T-AO 194) is underway alongside the Navy’s forward-deployed aircraft carrier, USS Ronald Reagan (CVN 76), as part of a replenishment-at-sea during Talisman Saber 2017. (U.S. Navy photo by Mass Communication Specialist 2nd Class Kenneth Abbate/Released)

Since Ericsson’s Destroyer, the Navy has commissioned no less than 1,087 destroyer (DD/DDR/DL/DLG/DDG) series vessels and another 588 destroyer escort (DE) types spanning from USS Bainbridge, laid down on 15 August 1899, by Neafie and Levy Ship and Engine Building Company at their shipyard in Philadelphia, to the next set to come to life, the future guided-missile destroyer USS Lenah Sutcliffe Higbee (DDG 123) accepted from Ingalls shipbuilding last November.

She is scheduled to be commissioned, Saturday, May 13 in Key West Florida.

USS Bainbridge (DD-1) was the first ship commissioned as a destroyer in the United States Navy, authorized on May 4, 1898, three days after the commencement of the Spanish-American War. She served most of her active life in the Asiatic Station. In World War I she was based at Gibraltar, where she served as an escort ship for Allied shipping out of the Mediterranean Sea. Bainbridge was decommissioned at the end of the war in 1919 and sold. Lithograph by C. F. Kenney; C. 1950. NHHC 07-572-A

PCU USS Lenah Sutcliffe Higbee (DDG 123) during sea trials. HII photo

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.

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

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Warship Wednesday, March 15, 2023: Of Skis, Retired Admirals, and Tons of Gold

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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 time 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

Warship Wednesday, March 15, 2023: Of Skis, Retired Admirals, and tons of Gold

Jean Manzon/ECPAD/Défense, Réf MARINE 257-3588

About we see a scene from the deck of the French croiseur auxiliaire (auxiliary cruiser) Ville d’Oran (X5) in which famed alpine skier Maurice Lafforgue– who competed in the 1936 Winter Olympics and won two silver medals at Chamonix in 1937– showing his skis to a bachi-clad French sailor. The date is mid-April 1940, and Lafforgue is suited up in the traditional “Blue Devils” uniform of France’s elite mountain troops. At the time, Ville d’Oran was carrying the 13e Bataillon de Chasseurs Alpins (13e BCA), a proud unit that dated to 1853, to Norway as part of the Corps Expéditionnaire Français en Scandinavie with the doomed goal of kicking the Germans out.

But first, happier beginnings

Sunny Mediterranean travel plans

A paquebot in French parlance, Ville d’Oran and her sister ship, the logically named Ville d’Alger, were short-trip ocean liners ordered in 1935 from Société Provençale de Constructions Navales at La Ciotat for the Cie Gle T (Compagnie Generale Transatlantique) line– the same folks that owned the Normandie.

At some 10,172 tons (GRT) and 461 feet in length, they were not ocean crossers but were instead built for express service between Marseille to Algiers– a run of just under 500 miles that the turbine-powered passenger liners could make in just over 19 hours, or Marseille to Oran in 25.

Capable of carrying as many as 1,100 passengers arranged in four classes (Deluxe, Priority, Tourist, and Deck) as well as a modicum of dry and refrigerated goods, the sisters enjoyed a fair bit of enjoyable peacetime service, complete with a full white, black and red livery and false second funnel to give the illusion of extra grandeur. Indeed, for the upper-class passengers, there were very well-appointed dining rooms and elegant smoking lounges as well as both open and closed promenade decks.

A Cie Gle Transatlantique poster with the 25-hour Marseille-to-Oran promise, a 615 statute mile run which required an average speed of at least 21.37 knots to achieve.

Alas, we are not here to talk of sedate peacetime seaside travel.

War!

Following the outbreak of WWII, Ville d’Alger was requisitioned by the French Navy for use as a troopship while her sister, our Ville d’Oran, was given a quick makeover to become an auxiliary cruiser, one of 12 such conversions ordered by the Navy in September-October 1939.

Under the command of one Capitaine (de Frégate) Roqueblave, Ville d’Oran had her false second funnel removed, received a coat of grey paint, five Canon de 138 mm Modèle 1910 naval guns in shielded single mounts, and 16 13.2mm Hotchkiss M1929 AAA guns. Her pennant number was X5 while the rest of the French auxiliary cruisers used similar numbers ranging from X01 to X20.

ECPAD images of Ville d’Oran headed for Norway with French mountain troops aboard in April 1940, showing her M1910 5.46″/55 guns.

Sailors serving a Hotchkiss M1929 light anti-aircraft piece on the bridge of the Ville d’Oran. These air-cooled guns ran a 13.2x96mm shell from 30-round box magazines at a correspondingly slow rate of fire– just 200 rounds per minute. ECPAD NAVY 211-2921

After such a quick refit, Ville d’Oran was assigned to RADM Jean-Emmanuel Cadart‘s (Ecole Navale 1903) 1re Division de Croiseurs Auxiliaires (DCX) along with three other converted liners– his flagship El Djézaïr (X17, 2400t, 7x138mm), El Kontara (X16, 5079t, 2x75mm AA), and El Mansour (X06, 5079t,2x75mm AA)– all of a similar speed.

RADM Jean-Emmanuel Cadart, whose prewar penultimate assignment had been as captain of the battleship Bretagne, had capped a 36-year career in March 1939 by moving to the reserve list as a rear admiral. His retirement lasted six months.

The mission of Cadart’s force, from October 1939 until March 1940, was simply to backfill the French Mediterranean fleet to cover units transferred to the Atlantic and, in doing so, keep one eye out for German blockade runners while using the other eye on the movements of (then neutral) Italian warships.

Headed to Norway

Then, 1er DCX was called up to the big leagues in late-February 1940 as part of the French effort to bring assistance to Finland during that country’s Winter War with the Soviets. However, as the Finns and Russians signed an uneasy peace on 12 March, the expedition soon morphed into an effort to occupy Norwegian ports and strategic mines to preempt a German invasion aimed at doing the same. This effort, too, would have to be morphed as the Germans struck first, launching Operation Weserübung to occupy Denmark and Norway on 9 April– beating the French, Free Polish, and British to the punch by days.

The relief force sent to dislodge the Germans from Norway, as far as the French go, consisted of the light cruisers Emile Bertin and Montcalm, six destroyers (along with three Free Polish tin cans), three large torpedo boats, Cadart’s four auxiliary cruisers (which would carry troops as well as provide muscle), the submarines Rubis and ORP Orzeł, and a further 20 transports and cargo ships. Of the 38,000 Allied expeditionary troops sent to Norway in April 1940, over two-thirds were French and Polish.

Ville d’Oran and her sister, the unarmed Ville d’Alger, would carry the 5e Demi-Brigade de Chasseurs Alpins (DBCA) of Brig. Gen. Antoine Béthouart, consisting of the 13th, 53rd, and 67th BCA, as well as other brigade and division assets. Laffourge, the Olympian in the top photo, was a member of the brigade d’éclaireurs-skieurs (ski recon) company.

There are several captivating photos of the trip to Norway aboard Ville d’Oran, including lots of shots of their dogs.

With the Germans already in possession of every decent harbor and airstrip in the country, the British and Franco-Polish troops eschewed the heavily-defended (and populated) south Norway and instead landed in the center and north of the country around rural Narvik, Aandalsnes, and Namsos. It was the last small port (pop. 3,000) where Gen. Bethourart’s 5e DBCA would be landed by Ville d’Oran and Ville d’Alger, with the 2,500 French alpine troopers assigned to support Mauriceforce, British Maj Gen. Carton de Wiart’s 146th Infantry Brigade, which began landing at Namsos, 70 miles north of Trondheim, on 14 April.

Sadly, as the harbor facilities at Namsos were not capable of handling 10,000-ton ocean liners, most of the heavy cargo– including 5e DBCA’s mules, artillery, and skis– could not be unloaded. Further, with the Luftwaffe committing over 300 land-based tactical fighters and bombers to the fight and the Kriegsmarine supplying the battlecruisers Gneisenau and Scharnhorst along with almost 40 U-boats to the region, the Allies could neither count on control of the air or sea off Norway. The French task force only carried a handful of 5- and 6-inch guns as a talisman against the potential damage from the 11-inchers carried by Gneisenau and Scharnhorst and was woefully lacking in AAA guns.

After two weeks of withering on the vine, 5e DBCA/Mauriceforce at Namsos would leave everything larger than a rucksack behind and be evacuated by Allied destroyers coming in danger close under a rain of bombs by German Ju 87 Stukas of I./StG 1, with the French losing the Guépard-class destroyer Bison and the British losing the Tribal-class destroyer HMS Afridi (F07) on 3 May in the process. The destroyers transferred 1,850 French and 2,354 British troops to Cadart’s four-pack of auxiliary cruisers and the whole force headed back home from Scandinavia– just as the war in the Lowlands was fixing to heat up.

The Fall of France

Sailing for Brest, Cadart’s little squadron of converted liners, Ville d’Oran included, could do little but patrol as the German blitzkrieg crashed through Luxembourg, Belgium, and Holland and into Northern France, trapping the British Expeditionary Force along with the French First and Seventh Armies along the coast around Dunkerque by the end of May. Ordered to help pull off the “Miracle” there, 1er DCX pitched in with the Allied flotilla that ultimately was able to evacuate 338,000 Allied troops.

Then, with Paris under direct threat, the French government needed something other than soldiers moved to safety.

The Banque de France’s reserves at the time included 1,777 tons of gold that belonged to the Republic. Added to this were another 230 tons of Belgian and Polish gold, as well as 200 cases stored for the National Bank of Switzerland.

In late May, the carrier Béarn and training cruiser Jeanne-d’Arc sailed for Halifax with 299 tons of gold on board.

Ville d’Oran was detailed, escorted by the torpedo boat Le Hardi, to sail for Casablanca at top speed with 212 tons of gold bars and coins, arriving there on 9 June and transferring the precious cargo to the vaults of the Banque de l’Afrique Occidentale. She then rushed back to Brest.

This still left a huge chunk that could possibly fall into German hands. With that, some 1,260 tons of gold were rushed to the Fort de Portzic, near Brest, via a military convoy.

The light cruiser Emile-Bertine, also just returned from the Norway fiasco, left in early June with another 254 tons of gold, which would ultimately arrive at Fort-de-France in the overseas Caribbean colony of Martinique.

The cruiser Primauguet likewise left for Casablanca with a smaller, 11-ton, shipment.

Meanwhile, the ocean liner Pasteur left Brest with 213 tons of gold which it unloaded at Halifax for storage with the Royal Bank of Canada.

Working around the clock over three days, between 16-19 June, paroled sailors from the French Navy brig at Brest helped load 16,201 boxes and bags of gold– carried from Fort de Portzic by garbage trucks– on the recently returned Ville d’Oran as well as three of Cardet’s other auxiliary cruisers just returned from the Dunkirk evacuation: El Djezair, El Kantara, and El Mansour.

Loading the gold at Brest

The ships left for Casablanca with nearly 750 tons of gold and were met while underway by the auxiliary cruiser Victor-Schœlcher (X07, 4500t, 2x75mm AAA) with another 6,000 cases of gold from the banks of Belgium (200 tons) and Poland (71 tons) aboard.

This five-vessel convoy, under Cadart’s flag, arrived at Casablanca on 23 June– the day after the Frenc Armistice that knocked the country nominally out of the war– carrying a whopping 1,021 tons of gold between them. In one of the last gasps of the French Third Republic, an order was flashed to Cadart to pull up anchor for Dakar in the colony of Senegal, which was thought to be more secure as the country was still at war with the Italians (until 27 June) and the Vichy government had yet to be formed.

Pulling into Dakar safely on 28 June with their cargo intact, Cadart’s sailors helped transport the massive gold reserve 45 miles inland to the Army stronghold at Thiès. From there, it could be placed on boxcars of the Dakar–Niger Railway and be spirited even further inland another 600 miles to Koulikoro in French Sudan (now Mali) if needed. Koulikoro was also conveniently located on the Niger River, thus allowing even further access to anywhere in West-Central Africa at little notice. In short, neither the Germans nor the Allies were going to lay hands on it any time soon.

With this last service to the old Republic, Cadart’s 1er DCX was soon ordered to return to its place of birth, the Med, where it was disbanded in October. The old admiral was allowed to return to the retired list while his auxiliary cruisers were disarmed.

Continued wartime service

Ville d’Oran resumed a liaison shuttle service under Vichy’s orders between Marseilles and Algeria, under a more prewar livery complete with large French flags on her waterline, from October 1940 through September 1941. This pipeline saw thousands of demobilized officers and NCOs in mufti shuttle from Metropolitan France to North Africa, where the local authorities made sure to find places in police units, *new colonial formations, and secret ledgers should they be needed soon. Also on these regular runs were all manner of spies from both sides. You know, basically the subplot of the movie Casablanca.

*Notably, Brig. Gen. Antoine Béthouart, the old commander of 5e DBCA in Norway, was shipped to North Africa around this time to take command of the Division de Casablanca (newly formed from colonial units– 1e RTM, 6e RTM, RICM, 6e RTS, 1e RCA, 3e RSM, and the RACM), with the good general later assisting the Allies in rallying the French troops in Morocco to the Allied cause in November 1942. 

With the French government’s access to fuel oil greatly curbed by the Germans, even this rinky-dink cruise line was shuttered by October 1941, and Ville d’Oran was laid up in Algiers, where the war would soon catch up to her.

THE OPERATION TORCH, NOVEMBER 1942 (NA 89) British paratroops marching away after disembarking from a troop ship on the quayside in Allied-occupied Algiers, 12-13 November 1942. Note the French liner Ville d’Oran in the background. Copyright: © IWM. Original Source: http://www.iwm.org.uk/collections/item/object/205193505

Soon after the Allied Torch landings in French North Africa, and the fall of the Vichy government, Ville d’Oran, and Ville d’Alger would return to wartime work, this time with the Free French flag and under the management of Cunard, as troopships.

They would carry men to the beaches of Sicily in Operation Husky in July 1943, participate in the Avalanche landings at Salerno in August 1943, and the Dragoon landings in Southern France in August 1944.

Post VE-Day, Ville d’Oran would carry Allied POWs–specifically South African, Palestinian, and Cypriot troops– back from German Camps in Europe to Alexandria for demobilization.

She would also carry German POWs from Italy back to Egypt for processing at the same time, an expedient thought easier than sending them to occupied Germany.

WITH THE VILLE D’ORAN. 31 MAY 1945, ALEXANDRIA HARBOUR. PRISONERS OF WAR WERE BROUGHT BACK IN THE FRENCH SHIP FROM GERMAN PRISON CAMPS IN THE NORTH OF ITALY. (A 29333) Repatriated Palestinian and Cypriot Troops returning on the VILLE D’ORAN from German Prison Camps for demobilization. Copyright: © IWM. Original Source: http://www.iwm.org.uk/collections/item/object/205160575

WITH THE VILLE D’ORAN. 31 MAY 1945, ALEXANDRIA HARBOUR. PRISONERS OF WAR WERE BROUGHT BACK IN THE FRENCH SHIP FROM GERMAN PRISON CAMPS IN THE NORTH OF ITALY. (A 29332) South African Troops returning home on the VILLE D’ORAN for demobilization after seeing service on the North Italian front. Copyright: © IWM. Original Source: http://www.iwm.org.uk/collections/item/object/205160574

WITH THE VILLE D’ORAN. 31 MAY 1945, ALEXANDRIA HARBOUR. PRISONERS OF WAR WERE BROUGHT BACK IN THE FRENCH SHIP FROM GERMAN PRISON CAMPS IN THE NORTH OF ITALY. (A 29331) A cheering crowd of South African Troops on board the VILLE D’ORAN on their way home after liberation from German Prison Camps. Copyright: © IWM. Original Source: http://www.iwm.org.uk/collections/item/object/205160573

WITH THE VILLE D’ORAN. 31 MAY 1945, ALEXANDRIA HARBOUR. PRISONERS OF WAR WERE BROUGHT BACK IN THE FRENCH SHIP FROM GERMAN PRISON CAMPS IN THE NORTH OF ITALY. (A 29334) German Officers were among the 1.835 prisoners of war brought back in the VILLE D’ORAN from North Italy, on their way to internment camps in Egypt. Copyright: © IWM. Original Source: http://www.iwm.org.uk/collections/item/object/205160576

Ville d’Oran would receive the Croix de Guerre from the Fourth Republic for her wartime service.

Post-War

Returning to commercial service with Cie Gle T, Ville d’Oran and her sister Ville d’Alger would continue their pre-war Marseille to North Africa runs, and never did get that fake funnel back.

Following the outbreak of the Algerian War in 1954, the sisters would also serve as one of the main modes of transport for French troops coming from Europe to serve a stint on the lines against the ELN. Typically, conscripts would briefly train in metropolitan France, then be shipped to Algeria after which they would be released from their (nominal) 18 months of service upon arriving back home at Marseille.

In all, over 1.5 million young French conscripts were sent to Algeria to battle the fellaghas, Algerian guerrilla fighters, between 1954 and 1962. Seen here is Ville d’Oran on one such run. (ECPAD)

This duty earned Ville d’Oran an FLN bomb attack in January 1957 that cause negligible damage.

As Cie Gle Transatlantique had moved on to more prestigious ships in the early 1960s– the massive 70,000-ton SS France had just entered service– and, after the country’s withdrawal from North Africa after 130 years of colonization, ending the appeal of regular cross Med liner runs, Ville d’Oran and sister Ville d’Alger were sold in 1965 to the Greek Typaldos Lines.

However, the Greeks soon ran into financial trouble and both sisters were sold for scrap in 1969.

Epilogue

Today, few relics remain of Ville d’Oran, other than a Hein Muck 1:250 scale model both in her pre-WWII and wartime auxiliary cruiser layout.

Cie Gle T itself would be defunct by 1976, and its assets rolled into the container shipping company now known as CMA CGM.

Of the men associated with them, the jolly old admiral, Cadart, a man who had the distinction of receiving the Legion of Honor from the old Republic for his actions off Norway, and the Vichy Order of the Francisque from Petian himself for his gold run, would pass in 1962 at age 78. The Dakar gold stash, incidentally, would return back home in 1945.

Alpine troop commander Gen. Béthouart would command the Free French I Corps in Alsace and Austria in 1944-45, bagging no less than 100,000 German POWs. He would then serve as the High Commissioner for France in Austria and pass in 1982, aged 92.

Olympian Maurice Lafforgue survived WWII and passed quietly in 1999, aged 84. Note the 13e BCA insignia on his sweater.

Meanwhile, the 13e BCA is still in active service, having returned from Norway in May 1940 in time to fight the Germans along the Somme at Liomer-Brocourt, its men convert to maquis status during the Occupation, then reformed in 1945 just in time to seize the Petit-Saint-Bernard pass (altitude 7,600 ft) from German Gebirgsjäger during the Alpine Campaign. Post-war, they occupied Austria for seven years, fought in Algeria, Chad, Djibouti, and Côte d’Ivoire, scrapped with Saddam’s boys during the First Gulf War and served on a host of UN and NATO missions in Lebanon, Bosnia, Kosovo, Iraq, and Afghanistan. Since 1999, they have been part of the 27th Mountain Infantry Brigade (27th BIM), based in the Roc Noir district in the small Alpine town of Barbie, near Chambéry.

Their motto is “Without fear and without reproach” (Sans peur et sans reproche).

And they still use skis when needed.

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.

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

They are possibly one of the best sources of naval study, images, and fellowship you can find. http://www.warship.org/membership.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.

With more than 50 years of scholarship, Warship International, the written tome of the INRO has published hundreds of articles, most of which are unique in their sweep and subject.

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