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Warship Wednesday June 18, The Opening shot of the old subkiller

Posted on June 18, 2014 by laststandonzombieisland 12 comments

Here at LSOZI, we are going to take off every Wednesday for a look at the old steam/diesel navies of the 1859-1946 time period and will profile a different ship each week. These ships have a life, a tale all of their own, which sometimes takes them to the strangest places.- Christopher Eger

Warship Wednesday June 18, The Opening shot of the old subkiller

click to bigup

Here we see the old Wickes-class destroyer, USS Ward (DD-139/APD-16), with her No.3 4-inch MK9 gun dropping it like its hot on an unidentified submarine contact trailing the 11450-ton auxiliary USS Antares (AG-10/AKS-3) into Pearl Harbor on the early morning of December 7, 1941.

Ward had an eventful life to say the least.

Built as one of the 111-ship Wickes-class, she was one of the iconic ‘Four Piper” destroyers that were designed in 1915-16 with input from no less an authority as Captain (later Admiral) WS Sims. Beamy ships with a flush-deck, a quartet of boilers (with a smokestack for each) were coupled to a pair of Parsons geared turbines to provide a blistering 35.3-knots designed speed, which is still considered fast today, nearly 100 years later. The teeth of these 314-foot, 1250-ton greyhounds were four 4-inch/50 cal MK9 naval rifles and a full dozen 21-inch torpedo tubes.

They had short legs and were very wet, which made long-range operations a problem, but they gave a good account of themselves. Originally a class of 50 was authorized in 1916, but once the U.S entered WWI in April 1917, this was soon increased and increased again to some 111 ships built by 1920.

Ward was a warbaby. Laid down at Mare Island Navy Yard in San Fransisco on 15 May 1918, she was commissioned just 109 days later on 24 July.

USS WARD NH-50261 Mare Island 1918

Her service in World War One was brief, the war basically ending just weeks after she was transferred to the Atlantic. She did, however, help escort the four NC flying boats that crossed the Atlantic the following year.

Like most of the Wickes-class boats, she was soon laid up due to the shortage of real live shooting wars in the 1920s. By July 1921 Ward was on read-lead row.

During this time, the 111-ship class was reduced with several ships being lost in accidents, scrapped, or sunk as targets. In 1940, 27 of the class were transferred to Britain and Canada as part of the famous “Bases for Destroyers” deal. Then in 1941, with the new war coming, Uncle Sam started knocking the rust off his old four-pipers and bringing them back into service.

With that, Ward was recommissioned 15 January 1941. Since the Navy was short on man-power, the ship was crewed in large part by citizen sailors of the St Paul Division of the Minnesota Naval Militia.

As part of the increasing naval presence in Hawaii, the 23-year old, low mileage destroyer with her now active-reserve crew was sent to Pearl Harbor to patrol the coastline for unauthorized intruders. Her skipper was Lt.Cmdr. William Woodward Outerbridge (USNA 1927), on his first command.

It was then at 03:57 on Sunday Morning, 7 December 1941, that the Ward, on patrol outside of the peaceful harbor at Pearl, was alerted to a periscope sighting from the 85-foot long Coast Guard manned converted wooden-hulled purse seiner USS Condor. After going to battle stations and alerting Pearl, Ward spotted a periscope of unknown origin trying to sneak in past the harbor nets at about 0630. Her No.3 gun crew opened fire on the intruder, which later turned out to be Type A Ko-hyoteki-class submarine No.20 of the Imperial Japanese Navy.

Several of the 4-inch shells from the gun penetrated the conning tower of the midget sub, while depth charges lifted the tiny craft out of the water before she plummeted to a depth of 1200-feet where she lay on the seafloor and was found 3-miles from Pearl Harbor by a University of Hawaii research submersible on 28 August 2002.

For more than 50-years, it was claimed by many naysayers that Ward sank nothing on Dec 7th, then when the University of Hawaii found Midget Submarine No.20 with Ward‘s shell holes through her in 2002, they could naysay-nolonger.

The Ward had fired the first U.S. shots of World War Two and tragically, although they were an hour and a half before waves of Japanese carrier planes came in low over Battleship Row, the fleet was not properly alerted.

“A Shot for Posterity — The USS Ward’s number three gun and its crew-cited for firing the first shot the day of Japan’s raid on Hawaii. Operating as part of the inshore patrol early in the morning of December 7, 1941, this destroyer group spotted a submarine outside Pearl Harbor, opened fire and sank her. Crew members are R.H. Knapp – BM2c – Gun Captain, C.W. Fenton – Sea1c – Pointer, R.B. Nolde – Sea1c – Trainer, A.A. De Demagall – Sea1c – No. 1 Loader, D.W. Gruening – Sea1c – No. 2 Loader, J.A. Paick – Sea1c – No. 3 Loader, H.P. Flanagan – Sea1c – No. 4 Loader, E.J. Bakret – GM3c – Gunners Mate, K.C.J. Lasch – Cox – Sightsetter.”

Shell hole in conning tower of Japanese Type A Ko-Hyoteki two-man submarine, raised after the sub had been shelled and sunk during the Japanese raid on Pearl Harbor.

With the changing pace of the new naval war, the Ward, as was most of her class, was converted to other uses, being too small for fleet work. She lost her 4-inch guns, which went on to equip armed merchant ships, as well as her torpedo tubes. Also leaving were half of her boilers, which dropped her speed down to 25-knots. She was given a trio of newer high-angle 3-inch/50 guns, one 40 mm AA gun, and five 20 mm AA guns, and the capability to carry up to 300 marines or soldiers for a brief period of time. In this new role, she was re-designated as a high-speed amphibious transport (APD-16). Where her torpedo tubes once were, she now carried four 36foot LCP landing craft on davits.

Note just two funnels now, and with huge LCP’s amidships. The 3-inch gun forward looks tiny compared to the old 4-inch MK9s.

These conversions had a hard war. They transported troops to beachheads, served as escorts for transports and supply vessels, conducted anti-submarine patrols and survey duties, operated with Underwater Demolition Teams and commando units, performed messenger and transport duties, conveyed passengers and mail to and from forward units, and were involved in mine sweeping operations. Ward landed troops at Saidor, Nissan Island, Emirau, Aitape, Biak, Cape Sansapor, Morotai, Dinagat Island, Ormac Bay, and others.

“Sansapor, Dutch New Guinea, falls to the Allied Forces, July 30, 1944. One might almost say – Sansapor falls to the boys from St. Paul, Minn. – as all but two of these men come from that city and the entire group has shipped together since Pearl Harbor, with the actions and results shown on their banner. As a matter of fact, they are believed to have fired the first offensive shot of the war in the Pacific, while on patrol against Japanese subs.” Note the more than a dozen landings credited on the scoreboard on the left side as well as two subs and several planes. They are L/R: (bottom row) J.L. Spratt, MM2/c; A.J. Fink, CM2/c; O.S. Ethier, MM1/c; C.W. Fenton, BM1/c; D.R. Pepin, SM1/c; J.G. LeClair; SOM2/c; F.V. Huges, SOM2/c. (Top Row) R.B. Nolde, SF1c; W.G. Grip, BM2c; H.F. Germarin, S1c; H.J. Harris, MM1c; H.K. Paynter, CMoMM; J.K. Lovsted, CMMM; W.H. Duval, CCS, (of San Diego); I.E. Holley, CSK (of Los Angeles); W.S. Lehner, SC1c; F.J. Bukrey, CM1c; and F.L. Fratta, MM1c.”

It was off of Ormac in the Philippines that the Ward, with only her naval crew aboard, was attacked by a kamikaze.

Ward (APD-16, ex-DD-139) on fire after she was hit by a “Kamikaze” in Ormoc Bay, Leyte, 7 December 1944

On December 7th, 1944. Three years exactly from Pearl Harbor day.

A 314-foot ship is not designed to withstand a direct impact from a loaded fighter-bomber, and soon she was fully involved. Her crew abandoned ship and the newly built Allen Sumner-class destroyer USS O’Brien (DD-725), recently transferred to the Pacific after dropping it while it was hot on the Germans on Normandy on D-Day, administered the coup de grace.

Another amazing coincidence, O’Brien‘s skipper on that day was now-Commander William Woodward Outerbridge, who helmed Ward three years before.

In another turn, O’Brien herself would later be sunk as a target by U.S ships off California on 13 July 1972 at the end of her service life. Outerbrigde retired from the Navy in 1957 as a Rear Admiral after thirty years of service, taking his last breath on September 20, 1986.

Today no Wickes-class tin can survives. The last one afloat, USS Maddox (DD–168), was scrapped in 1952 after serving in the US, then RN, then Canadian, then Soviet navies.

One of the class, the USS Walker (DD-163), has been given new life in the excellent alternate history series Destroyermen written by Taylor Anderson.

However, it should be noted that Ward‘s famous gun No.3 still exists, saved from going down with the ship by virtue of it being replaced during the war with more modern ordnance.

Preserved in the Twin Cities area, it was presented to the state in 1958 by the Navy in honor of her Minnesota reservist guncrew on Dec.7, 1941. It is located on the grounds of the Veterans Service Building in St. Paul.

Specs:

(As built)
Displacement: 1,247 long tons (1,267 t)
Length:    314 ft 4 in (95.81 m)
Beam:    30 ft 11 in (9.42 m)
Draft:    9 ft 10 in (3.00 m)
Propulsion:    2 × geared steam turbines, 2 × shafts
Speed:    35 kn (65 km/h; 40 mph)
Complement:    231 officers and enlisted
Armament:    4 × 4 in (100 mm)/50 cal guns
2 × 3 in (76 mm)/50 cal anti-aircraft guns
12 × 21 in (530 mm) torpedo tubes (4×3)

(1942)
Displacement: 1,247 long tons (1,267 t)
Length:    314 ft 4 in (95.81 m)
Beam:    30 ft 11 in (9.42 m)
Draft:    9 ft 10 in (3.00 m)
Propulsion:    2 × geared steam turbines, 2 × shafts
Speed:    25kn
Complement: 180 officers and enlisted, upto 300 troops for short periods
Armament:    3x3inch/50
One 40mm bofors
Five 20mm OK

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

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

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

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

I’m a member, so should you be!

Warship Wednesday June 11, The other battleship New Jersey

Posted on June 11, 2014 by laststandonzombieisland 2 comments

– Christopher Eger

Warship Wednesday June 11, The other battleship New Jersey

Here we see the early Virginia-class pre-dreadnought battleship USS New Jersey (BB-16) in 1907, on the eve of that ship’s voyage as part of Teddy Roosevelt’s Great White Fleet. Most often when people think of a battleship named for the Garden State, the classic Iowa-class BB-62 ship comes to mind immediately. However, there was also BB-16, and her story, which saw a lot less action than the ship that would later carry on the name, is no less intriguing.

The Virginia class was one of the first ocean-going battleships of the newly emergent sea-power that was the United States Navy, built on earlier experience with the Kearsarge, Illinois, and Maine classes. Like the Kearsarge, they were given superimposed main and secondary armament turrets, which cut down on weight but hampered both batteries when in action and limited their range. Some 441-feet long and with a 15,000-ton displacement, they were of average size for pre-dreadnought battleships and are comparable to a large destroyer today (paging the Zumwalt…). She was fast for her time, able to touch 20-knots with her 12-boiler steam plant pushing twin engines/shafts/screws. At the time of the class design, they were the first U.S-made ships to carry Krupp armor, and they had up to 12-inches of it in the turrets.

She was a New England-made ship through and through, being built at Fore River Shipbuilding Company, Quincy, Massachusetts. She was commissioned 11 May 1906 and soon joined the fleet. After a brief tour of the Caribbean, including laying at anchor in Havana as a reminder of who controlled the purse strings of that country at the time, New Jersey became part of the 15-month epic voyage that was the Great White Fleet.

She, and three of her Virginia-class sister-ships, made up the Second Division of that fleet which was commanded by Rear Admiral William H. Emory (yes, the same guy that the destroyer tender was named after). The combined force of 16 battleships, supported by nearly forty coalers and a host of auxiliary craft, left Hampton Roads 16 Dec 1907, then, 43,000 nautical miles and twenty port calls on six continents later, arrived back there on 22 February 1909, just in time to be join the International fleet review as part of the 1909 Hudson-Fulton exhibition.

USS New Jersey (BB-16) In a China Sea typhoon, during the “Great White Fleet’s” cruise around the World, 1908. Courtesy of Donald M. McPherson, 1967.

Of course, this placed most of the U.S. fleet out of service and away from the continent for over a year, but it taught the growing steam navy how to operate on a global basis.

New Jersey at the 1909 Hudson-Fulton International Fleet review in New York. Note the more warlike haze gray scheme the navy switched to after the return of the Great White Fleet

After spending most of 1910 out of commission, her crew being sent to man new, more modern battleships coming down the ways. Recommissioned 15 July 1911, she was soon landing naval parties in Mexico in 1914 during the Tampico incident and from there to support US Marines in Haiti and the Dominican Republic.

When the US entered WWI in 1917, she spent the conflict escorting the occasional coastal convoy, camouflaged in a special pattern. However her main contribution was in training gunnery crews. Once the conflict ended, she made no less than four trips to Europe to carry dough boys back home from ‘over there’, transporting no less than 5000 US Army troops.

At the end of the war, the Navy deemed her surplus, decommissioning the mighty NJ 6 August 1920. Once the various series of Naval Limitations treaties started to be negotiated, she was stricken from the Navy List so that her tonnage could not be counted against precious battleship totals.

Turned over to the War Department for use by the Army, both New Jersey and her sister ship Virginia were towed to Diamond Shoals, off Cape Hatteras NC in Sept. 1923. There, lumbering Army Air Corps MB-2 bombers under Brig. Gen Billy Mitchell subjected New Jersey to a series of bombing runs of 600 lb bombs that left the ship damaged and taking on water. Focus was then shifted to Virginia and, after she was sunk, returned to New Jersey. The ship was subjected to further attacks until she took what is likely a fatal bomb hit just aft her main mast and sank in the afternoon.

Infograph of New Jersey, from the Courier-Post Online

The wreck lies upside down in a section of ocean where currents keep her scoured clean of marine life 355 feet down.

Specs:

Displacement: 14,948 tons (13,561 tonnes)
Length: 441 ft 3 in (134.49 m)
Beam: 76 ft 3 in (23.24 m)
Draft: 23 ft 9 in (7.24 m)
Speed: 19 kn (22 mph; 35 km/h)
Complement: 812 officers and men
Armament:

4 × 12 in (300 mm)/40 cal guns
8 × 8 in (200 mm)/45 cal guns
12 × 6 in (150 mm)/50 cal guns
4 × 21 in (530 mm) torpedo tubes

Armor:

Belt: 6–11 in (152–279 mm)
Barbettes: 6–10 in (152–254 mm)
Turrets (main): 6–12 in (152–305 mm)
Turrets (secondary): 4–12 in (102–305 mm)
Conning tower: 9 in (229 mm)
If you liked this column, please consider joining the International Naval Research Organization (INRO), Publishers of Warship International

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

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

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

I’m a member, so should you be!

Warship Wednesday June 4, the guardian angel of Omaha Beach

Posted on June 4, 2014 by laststandonzombieisland 4 comments

Here at LSOZI, we will take off every Wednesday to look at the old steam/diesel navies of the 1859-1946 time period and profile a different ship each week. These ships have a life, a tale all of their own, which sometimes takes them to the strangest places. – Christopher Eger

Warship Wednesday, June 4, the guardian angel of Omaha Beach

“The Battle for Fox Green Beach,” watercolor by Dwight Shepler, showing the Gleaves class destroyer USS Emmons(DD 457) foreground and her sister-ship, the USS Doyle, to the right, within a few hundred yards of the landing beach, mixing it up with German shore batteries on D-Day

Here we see the Gleaves-class destroyer USS Doyle (DD-494/DMS-34) along Fox Green landing area on Omaha Beach on D-Day. The Gleaves class is an unsung group of some 62 destroyers who began construction pre-WWII and completed into the first stage of the war. With the huge building of the follow-on Fletcher- and Sumner-class destroyers, the Gleaves are often forgotten. What should never be forgotten is the sacrifice these ships made, with no less than 11 of the class lost during WWII.

Built by Seattle-Tacoma Shipbuilding Corporation, Doyle was laid down six months before Pearl Harbor and commissioned 27 January 1943, at the height of both the Battle of the Atlantic and the war in the Pacific. It was decided that the ship, with her 11-foot draft, was desperately needed in the Atlantic for something the brass had brewing, and she arrived, after a stint in anti-submarine patrols, in British waters in early 1944. There, on June 5, 1944, she found herself sailing across the channel as part of the biggest amphibious invasion ever.

On D-Day, 70-years ago this week, the Doyle, was part of DESRON 18, under the overall command of Captain Harry Sanders. Consisting of the destroyers USS Frankfort (with Sanders aboard), USS Carmick, USS McCook, USS Emmons, and USS Thompson along with Doyle, these six hardy ships stood close by as the troops of the 29th Infantry Division and Big Red One, as depicted in the opening sequence of Saving Private Ryan, moved ashore in their landing craft on Omaha Beach.

The idea was that specially equipped tanks would come ashore and roll over the German positions. However, just a handful of these amphibious equipped tanks made it ashore. To make matters worse, some of the coxswains of the landing craft missed got turned around in the smoke and haze, and landed their troops at the wrong points. Some of the scariest moments were on Dog Beach, where the exits from the beachhead, Dog 1, the Vierville draw, were in fierce defilade of the German positions along the bluff overlooking the water.

It was murder.

Doyle‘s day started with this log entry,

0630: “‘H’ hour. Commenced indirect fire on target … to aid in clearing beach exit now completely obscured by smoke and dust.”

Soon the squadron was ordered to ceasefire for fear of hitting US forces moving ashore.

At 0830, violating a cease-fire order, USS Carmick opened up on the German positions with her 5-inch guns and within thirty minutes, the other ships of DESRON 18, under Sanders’ order, closed in as close as they could with the beachhead to plaster the lines. Among the ships that made it closest to shore, almost scraping bottom, was USS Doyle. She made it so close inshore, in fact, that her light AAA guns were able to pepper the German positions as well.

Doyle, as with the other destroyers, moved along Omaha, working her way where she was needed. These are selections from her log entries that day:

1100: “Stopped 800 yards off beach Easy Red. Observed enemy machine gun emplacement on side of steep hill at west end of beach Fox Red, enfilading landing beach. Fired two half [two-gun] salvos. Target destroyed. Shifted fire to casemate at top of hill, fired two half salvos, target destroyed. Army troops begin slow advance uphill from beach. Maneuvering ship to stay in position against current which is running west at 2.8 knots. Flood tide.”

With this, Doyle reported that Exit F-1 from Fox Red beach was open.

Can you imagine a 1,600-ton, 348-foot long ship just 800 yards offshore? Spitting fire from everything that could be manned…

1355: “Observed guns firing from trees on hill-top to eastward of landing area [Fox Red] …. Fired four full salvos. All shots burst in vicinity of target area.”

1957: “Observed enemy soldiers manning abandoned machine gun nest on hill to eastward of landing beaches. Fired three salvos, men and gun emplacement destroyed.”

2109: “Splashes, probably from 75MM shells, seen on both bows close aboard, about 25 to 50 yards. Gun flashes seen from German Patrol boat inside [Port-en-Bessin] breakwater previously fired on. Opened fire with full salvos, covered area around boat. Direct hits impossible because of sea wall. … Enemy troops … in vicinity of boat seen abandoning positions.”

In all that day the little destroyer fired: “558 rounds of 5″ A.A. common, 156 rounds of 5″ common dye loaded ammunition [projectiles carrying a colored dye for use in spotting fall of shot]. No casualties to personnel or to any of ship’s equipment.”

For the next 64 hours, as retold in a period piece in Yank, Doyle pounded shore batteries, targets of opportunity, filled fire support requests from naval shore parties inland, dodged near misses from Messerschmitt Me 110s and torpedoes from unseen enemies while recovering 37 survivors from shot up landing craft.

Not all the destroyers on D-Day were as lucky. Doyle‘s sister ship, USS Corry (DD-463), was sunk off Utah Beach by German shore batteries in dramatic action.

Another unsung hero of D-Day was the USS Emmons, who fired nearly twice the ammunition that Doyle did that day. Emmons would meet her end within a year at the hands of a Japanese kamikaze.

In a postwar essay written by William B. Kirkland Jr., the WWII gunnery officer on Doyle, the following was noted:

“DESRON 18 never failed in its duty at Normandy or Omaha beach might have been lost, and it wasn’t. It is hard to say how many more graves would have been filled, and how the invasion of Fortress Europe would have fared, without the efficient and effective performance of these nine destroyers. There is no doubt that DESRON 18 cracked the German wall at Omaha Beach in actions above and beyond the call of duty. The ships and sailors who manned them deserve to be better remembered.”

Force O’s ammo consumption on D-Day, note that the destroyers at the bottom were producing the same volume of fire as much larger cruisers

Nevertheless, Doyle had more history to make and was on the move again just days after D-Day.

Within short order, she found herself covering the landings in Southern France and finished the war in Europe by escorting convoys.

Converted to a fast minesweeper (any ship can be a minesweeper at least once!) in June 1945, she was transferred to the Pacific to take part in the coming epic invasion of the Japanese home islands. This conversion removed one of her 5-inch mounts, the torpedo tubes, took her depth charge racks, and repositioned forward from the stern and angled outboard, and saw her stern modified to support minesweeping gear including a myriad of davits, winches, paravanes, extra generators, and kites.

However, by the time she made it, the war had ended. For the next several years she quietly performed occupation duty and saw much of the now-quiet Pacific.

Then came 1950.

When the North Koreans came screaming across the 38th Parallel into South Korea in June 1950, Doyle was immediately dispatched. She was visions of D-Day when she helped cover landings by ROK forces along the peninsula as well as supporting covert operations by commando units. As a minesweeper she helped clear invasion landings near Wonsan and Hungnam, remaining in Korean waters until the
end of open hostilities in 1953. A very busy ship, she earned six battle stars in Korea.

She was decommissioned in the states on 19 May 1955, the Navy having enough of the more modern Fletcher-class destroyers that the slightly smaller and older Gleaves-class were no longer needed. Retained in mothballs for 25 years, she was struck from the Navy List 1 December 1970 and broken up two years later for the value of her scrap.

Specs:

(As built)
Displacement:    1,630 tons
Length:    348 ft 3 in (106.15 m)
Beam:       36 ft 1 in (11.00 m)
Draft:       13 ft 2 in (4.01 m)
Propulsion:    50,000 shp (37,000 kW) (37 MW);
4 boilers;
2 propellers
Speed:    37.4 knots (69 km/h)
Range:    6,500 nautical miles at 12 kt
(12,000 km at 22 km/h)
Complement:    16 officers, 260 enlisted
Armament:
4 × 5 in/38 cal guns (1 deleted in 1945)
4 x 40mm Bofors in two twin mounts.
7 x 20mm Oerlikon in single mounts.
Torpedo Tubes: 5 x 21-inch in one quintuple mount. (deleted in 1945)
ASW: 2 tracks for 600-lb. charges; 6 “K”-gun projectors for 300-lb. charges.

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/

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

I’m a member, so should you be!

Russia’s globetrotting Pacific Viking

Posted on June 2, 2014 by laststandonzombieisland Leave a comment

The Russian Cruiser Varyag of the Pacific Fleet, in Pudong, Shanghai, China. May 2014. Click to embiggen.

In the late 1960s, the Soviets envisioned a class of 10 or more massive 12,000-ton guided missile cruisers. Capable of traveling more than 12,000 miles without refueling, these bruisers would be able to sail the world, showing the Red Banner of the worker’s paradise. As a tie-in to the old Tsarist navy, many of these ships were named after classic warships of that fleet, including the lead ship of the class, Slava (Glory). One of the last of these craft completed, the Varyag (Varangian– based on what the Greeks called thVikings), although originally named Chervona Ukraina (Red Ukraine) was given the name of the Pacific fleet cruiser who fought and lost a wonderfully heroic one-sided battle in 1904 against the Japanese.

Commissioned October 16, 1989, Varyag was sent to the Pacific like her namesake and spent most of her life in a caretaker status in Vladivostok, the new Russian Navy being very cash strapped, especially after 1991.

Overhauled in 2008, she has found new life in the past half decade and has sailed from one end of the Pacific to the other, visiting California, Hawaii, Singapore, and all points in between. Equipped with 16 huge carrier-killer P-500 Bazalt (SS-N-12 Sandbox) anti-ship missiles, as well as enough of an anti-air and ASW suite to make most fleets think twice, she speaks softly but carries a big stick.

The Slava-class cruiser Varyag of the Russian Federation Navy Pacific Fleet.

Hail and farewell, noble Vikrant.

Posted on June 1, 2014 by laststandonzombieisland Leave a comment

Well, its official. The World War Two era 19,500-ton Colossus class aircraft carrier HMS Hercules/ INS Vikrant, after a more than forty year career that included seeing hot combat against Pakistan, and brief retirement as a museum ship, is scrapped.

INS Vikrant, Indian Navy’s first aircraft carrier, is seen moved on the Arabian Sea to a ship breaking yard at Reay Road in Mumbai, India, May 29, 2014. (Xinhua/Stringer)

Warship Wednesday May 28, The Great Italian Count

Posted on May 29, 2014 by laststandonzombieisland 2 comments

– Christopher Eger

Warship Wednesday May 28, The Great Italian Count

Here we see the pride of the 20th Century Royal Italian Navy (the Regia Marina), His Majesty’s battleship Conte di Cavour. Named after the first Prime Minister of a unified modern Italy, Camillo Paolo Filippo Giulio Benso, Count of Cavour, of Isolabella and of Leri, who was also the first Italian Minister of the Navy, the ship was to be the Regia Marina’s notice to all that the country was a legitimate naval power.

The good Camillo Paolo Filippo Giulio Benso, Count of Cavour.

Laid down 10 August 1910 at the La Spezia Arsenale, she was the lead ship of a class of new dreadnought-style ships for Italy. With a 25,000-ton displacement, 577-foot length, and 21-knot speed, she was comparable in size to battleships of the day. Equipped with good British Parsons steam turbines, and 20 boilers, she was reliable underway. Her armament of a baker’s dozen 12-inch guns, was designed with the help of Armstrong Whitworth and Vickers.

These were arranged in an odd five turret plan of three triple-gun turrets and two twin-gun turrets, was formidable while her 5-11 inches of locally made Terni cemented armor (crafted from U.S. steel and nickel) was sufficient for all but close combat from the most modern battleships.

At the time she was constructed, Italy’s biggest rival in the Med was France, who had just built a series of Courbet-class battleships of some 25,000 tons with up to 11-inches of armor, a 21-knot speed (also powered by British Parsons steam turbines), and 12x12-inch guns– which could be why the Italians insisted on having 13!

Delayed by the Italo-Turkish war, she took nearly a half decade to complete, being commissioned 1 April 1915, just in time for Italy’s entrance into World War One– as an ally of France. Nevertheless, she spent that war as the flagship of the Navy, calmly waiting for the Austrian fleet to sortie out into the Adriatic, which never happened. Two sisters, Leonardo da Vinci and Giulio Cesare would soon follow her down the ways although da Vinci suffered a catastrophic accidental magazine explosion in 1916 that destroyed her.

When the war ended, Cavour was something of a happy ambassador, embarking King Emmanuel III and his family on occasion and conducting extended sorties to the United States . She did however fire her guns in anger during the 1923 Corfu Incident, in which her tertiary battery bombarded the island during an Italian occupation. You see good old Mussolini was in power by then, and looking for trouble.

Laid up from 1927 until 1937 at Trieste (recently seized from the scraps of the Austrian empire), Cavour was extensively rebuilt under the orders of Generale del Genio navale Francesco Rotundi.

When she emerged from this decade of slumber, she had a thoroughly new look, as well as a new power-plant of eight superheated Yarrow oil-fired boilers (fueled by Libyan oil wells Italy had wrested away from the Ottomans in 1911). This made the old ship new aging, extending her range by a factor of 50 percent while increasing her speed to over 27-knots at a full clip. To accommodate the weight of more armor, the center triple 12-inch turret was removed, bringing her broadside down to 10 guns rather than 13. She was recommissioned 1 June 1937.

Soon, Mussolini had her clocking in to pay for all the recent improvements by covering the Italian invasion of hapless Albania in 1938. That same year, the Cavour served as the reviewing stand for both the chubby Benito and his stubby homie Adolf in a grand review of the Regina Marina at Naples.

Conte di Cavour, with the Duce and Hitler on the stern in Naples watching the torpediniera Cassiopea pass close in review.

When Italy entered WWII on the side of Hitler in 1940, both Cavour and her similarly rebuilt sister Cesare were soon mixing it up with the British Royal Navy’s Mediterranean Fleet with the two trading long-range shots with HMS Malaya and HMS Warsprite at the Battle of Punto Stilo.

This uneventful combat was to be her greatest moment, as the Brits soon decided to make sure the Italian surface fleet was marginalized.

Then late on the night of 11 November 1940, a group of just 21 British Swordfish torpedo bombers penetrated the Italian anchorage at Taranto and sank Cavour along with three other battleships with well-placed torpedoes. Note that this was a full year before Pearl Harbor.

‘Taranto Harbour, Swordfish from Illustrious Cripple the Italian Fleet, 11 November 1940′ by Charles David Cobb. Painting in collection of National Museum

She spent the rest of the war in a state of salvage and repair but was never returned to service. During this time first the Germans then the Americans captured the derelict ship which was finally scrapped in 1946.
Specs:

Note the center turret

(As built)
Displacement: 23,088 long tons (23,458 t) (standard)
25,086 long tons (25,489 t) (deep load)
Length: 176 m (577 ft 5 in) (o/a)
Beam: 28 m (91 ft 10 in)
Draught: 9.3 m (30 ft 6 in)
Installed power: 30,700–32,800 shp (22,900–24,500 kW)
20 × Water-tube boilers
Propulsion: 4 × Shafts
4 × Steam turbines
Speed: 21.5 knots (39.8 km/h; 24.7 mph)
Range: 4,800 nmi (8,900 km; 5,500 mi) at 10 knots (19 km/h; 12 mph)
Complement: 31 officers and 969 enlisted men
Armament:

3 × triple, 2 × twin 305 mm (12 in) guns
18 × single 120 mm (4.7 in) guns
14 × single 76.2 mm (3 in) guns
3 × 450 mm (17.7 in) torpedo tubes

Armor:

Waterline belt: 250–130 mm (9.8–5.1 in)
Deck: 24–40 mm (0.9–1.6 in)
Gun turrets: 280–240 mm (11.0–9.4 in)
Barbettes: 230–130 mm (9.1–5.1 in)
Conning towers: 280–180 mm (11.0–7.1 in)

….and no center turret

(after reconstruction)
Displacement: 29,100 long tons (29,600 t) (deep load)
Length: 186.4 m (611 ft 7 in)
Beam: 33.1 m (108 ft 7 in)
Installed power: 75,000 shp (56,000 kW)
8 × Yarrow boilers
Propulsion: 2 × Shafts
2 × Geared steam turbines
Speed: 27 knots (50 km/h; 31 mph)
Range: 6,400 nmi (11,900 km; 7,400 mi) at 13 knots (24 km/h; 15 mph)
Complement: 1,260
Armament:

2 × triple, 2 × twin 320 mm (12.6 in)
6 × twin 120 mm (4.7 in)
4 × twin 100 mm (3.9 in) AA guns

Armor: Deck: 166–135 mm (6.5–5.3 in)
Barbettes: 280–130 mm (11.0–5.1 in)
Aircraft: 1-2 Macchi M.18 seaplanes

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

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

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

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

I’m a member, so should you be!

Warship Wednesday May 21, Alexander’s Polar Star

Posted on May 21, 2014 by laststandonzombieisland Leave a comment

– Christopher Eger

Warship Wednesday May 21, Alexander’s Polar Star

Here we see a beautiful rendering by the noted Russian artist Alexander Beggrow in 1892 of His Russian Imperial Highness’s Ship Polyarnaya zvezda (Polar Star). This painting is currently in the Central Naval Museum, St.-Petersburg, Russia and is one of the few artifacts remaining of the craft.

The yacht/auxiliary cruiser Polar Star was built at the Baltic Shipyard in St. Petersburg under commission for the Tsar of all the Russias, Alexander Alexandrovitch Romanov III, as a gift for his wife, the Danish-born Tsarina Marie. Designed by the Navy’s shipbuilding plans group, she was laid out by Admiral I. Shestakova who used inspirational plans of the fast British second-class cruisers Iris and Mercury – who when she was completed was the fastest ship in the Royal Navy –as a base line for the Tsar’s fast new ship.

She was laid down at the Baltic shipyard May 20, 1888, in the presence of the Imperial couple and top officials of the Ministry of the Navy, she was launched on May 19, 1890. After mooring and sea trials in March 1891, the ship was adopted in the ships of the Baltic fleet and listed as part of the Imperial Guards.

She was thoroughly modern. Built of good German Siemens-Martin steel, she had full-length watertight doors, electric lighting throughout, a
double-bottom hull, and a modern steam plant that consisted of two vertical triple expansion steam engines with designed capacity of 3000 HP each and 10 boilers. She had fully redundant systems including two sets of emergency steering wheels, one above deck and another below. Polar Star was outfitted it precious woods and furniture, as fitting the Imperial family.

Dozens of sketches by Nabokov and Prokofiev decorated the salons of the ship. For going ashore in style, she carried 8 away boats, including two mahogany-constructed steam launches for the royals.

The Polar Star was built with four 47mm Gatling guns, very similar to this 37mm Hotchkiss shown here in Russian service. Note the bare feet. Thats gonna suck when the hot brass starts flying.

As she was to carry the Tsar, whose father had been assassinated just ten years before, the ship was heavily armed with a quartet of rather well hidden Hotchkiss 5-barreled Gatling-type 47 mm guns which were considered just the thing to smother an incoming anarchists controlled terrorist ship with hot lead, capable of spitting 30 rounds per minute out past 2000-meters. Called “Gockisa guns”, this armament, as well as an entire platoon of heavily armed Imperial Marines, quartered below deck, provided a formidable force.

Besides the Marines, the ships 313-man crew was extensively vetted and cleared by the Tsarist secret police, the dreaded Okhrana, and its members were thought salted among them as seemingly innocent stewards and stokers just to keep everyone honest.

Firing a salute in Copenhagen harbor while on a state visit

Further, whenever the yacht traveled with the Tsar aboard, she was accompanied by an escort that included at least a couple torpedo boats and a cruiser.

Whenever the ship anchored in isolated Finnish jetties, the local harbors and towns would carry the following message:

“Notice to all mariners concerning seafaring regulations when the Russian Imperial Yacht is in Finnish waters: Fire will be opened on all commercial shipping and all yachts–whether motor, sail or steam-that approach the line of guard ships. All ships wishing to put to sea must seek permission not less than six hours in advance. Between sundown and sunrise, all ships underway may expect to be fired upon.”

All of this security allowed the targeted royals to relax and enjoy themselves.

The yacht served the Imperial family for 26 years. After Tsar Alexander died in 1894, it was passed to his son who soon had his own super yacht, Standart, built in Denmark (to roughly the same plan as Polar Star only bigger– to confuse terrorists as to which yacht was carrying the royals.) Nevertheless the Polar Star stayed in the family and was used not only by Nicholas but by his mother, uncles, and others.

It sailed to England, Germany, and all points in between, serving as a safe refuge for the Imperial family as they visited friends and relatives in Europe.

A Smith and Wesson .44-Russian caliber No3 revolver presented by the Tsar to the retiring Captain of the Polar Star in 1895. It was good to be close to the Tsar!

Two sailors from the Imperial yachts were even chosen to be the new Tsarvitch Alexis’s nannies in 1905.

Alexei with Andrei Derevenko, one of the two sailor-nannies from the Royal yachts who would remain by his side for more than a decade. While Derevenko would desert the family after the Revolution, the second sailor, Klementy Nagorny would remain with them until they were executed in Siberia in 1918. Taken from the Imperial family days before the final act, his final fate is uncertain.

Speaking of 1905, the Polar Star almost changed history when Nicholas, traveling alone, met Kaiser Wilhelm II of Germany on his own yacht at the remote Finnish inlet named Bjorko. There, Willy got Nicholas, his cousin, to sign a non-aggression treaty with Germany. The problem was that the Tsar’s father had already in 1894 signed one with France, Germany’s clear and present danger. Long story short, and after a good bit of bad blood between the Tsar, the Kaiser, Paris and London, this treaty was discarded. If it hadn’t, the First World War could have been very different.

Speaking of war, when it finally came in 1914, the days of slow peaceful cruises were done. Both Standart and Polar Star were placed dockside and largely forgotten.

When the Russian Revolution found Polar Star in March of 1917, she was iced in Helsinki (then-Helsingfors) with units of the Baltic Fleet. Her Marine Guard long since sent to the front and her crew raided to man other warships, she was no longer full of the spit-and-polish Russian jacks that had doted on the Tsar and his family.

In fact, on April 28, 1917, the ship was made the headquarter of the Revolutionary Central Committee of the Baltic fleet (CENTROBALT) in Finland. Her Captain at the time, Lyalin, was very popular in the fleet and was elected the first Red fleet commander. The coming spring, Polar Star made steam and sortied across the Gulf of Finland in the epic Ice Crossing to Kronstadt, just days ahead of being seized by the Germans.

She sat out the Russian Civil War there and, relatively undamaged by British raids in 1919, and the harsh Red Army reprisals during the 1921 Kronstadt Uprising, she was left swinging at her anchor lines with her crew largely taking up residence aboard the old yacht. In 1930, after a review of available hulls, the Soviet Red Banner Fleet decided to refit Polar Star for further use. Considering she was nearly 40 years old, its a testament that she was constructed so well as to still be useful.

Her old steam plant was removed as was one of her funnels and she had installed a new low-speed diesel plant that could propel her at 10-knots. Armed with a number of old 3-inch guns, she was used as a submarine tender and troop transport during both the Finnish Winter War (1939-40) where she blockaded the Finnish Coast and later took troops into Tallin after Estonia was occupied. Then came World War Two, where she spent her time dodging German and Finnish bombs, mines, and torpedoes. In 1942 she was made the headquarters of the 3rd Submarine Division and by 1944 moved forward to Turku, which enabled a more rapid turn around for war patrols of the Soviet U-boats she supported.

By 1954 her new engineering plant was unreliable but her hull was still sound even at age 63 and as such she was made a static accommodation ship, with new sailors and officers assigned to ship’s bunks spent their time smoking cigarettes on the same decks as Kaisers, Kings, and Tsars once tread.

By December 1968, the old Polar Star was sent to the scrappers, her service done, although some reports mention that she may have been used to test anti-ship missiles as late as the early 1970s and was expended as a target hulk. Nevertheless, both the sovereign and later the Party got their ruble’s worth out of the old girl.

Specs:

Displacement: 3949-tons
Length 349.4-feet
Beam: 45.28-feet
draft: 17-feet
Speed: 17 knots (1891), 10 knots (1930)
Powerplant: 2 × vertical triple expansion steam engines, 2 bronze screws, 10 boilers (as commissioned) Two 625hp diesels after 1930.
Crew: 313 ships crew, 36 marines, 50 persons in Imperial suite. Post 1930, unknown
Armament:

4 x 47mm guns Gockisa (1891),
(1930)
3 × 76mm,
3 × 45mm
2 × 12,7mm HMG

(1944)
4 × 76mm
4 × 37mm

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

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

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

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

I’m a member, so should you be!

Warship Wednesday May 14, the lightning of the Atlantic

Posted on May 14, 2014 by laststandonzombieisland Leave a comment

Here at LSOZI, we are going to take off every Wednesday for a look at the old steam/diesel navies of the 1859-1946 time period and will
profile a different ship each week. These ships have a life, a tale all of their own, which sometimes takes them to the strangest places.

– Christopher Eger

Warship Wednesday May 14, the lightning of the Atlantic

(click to embiggen)

Here we see the exceptionally fast oceangoing yacht Atlantic. This 227-foot three-masted steel-hulled schooner had an exceptionally narrow beam (29-feet), giving her a length to beam ration of a very racy 1:8. Designed by famous naval architect William Gardner for industrial magnet Wilson Marshall, she was built at Townsend & Downey on Shooter’s Island, New York in 1903 to be two things: elegant and fast.

She had heating, refrigeration, and water heaters. The lobby was executed in marble and the interior was fitted out with the finest mahogany paneling. There were large and luxurious tiled bathrooms (with bath tub) and a large galley– and in a pinch could do over 17 knots.

More importantly, she was faster and better than the yard’s own previous creation: Meteor III, for Kaiser Wilhelm II of Germany. That Teutonic craft’s launch in February 1902 was attended by many hundreds of spectators, including Pres. Theodore Roosevelt and Prince Henry of Prussia. Alice Roosevelt, the president’s daughter, christened the boat.

Painting of the original Schooner Atlantic by A D Blake

In 1905, Atlantic was entered into the Kaiser’s Cup race, which would travel 3006-miles from New Jersey to the UK for the win of a solid gold cup donated by Kaiser Wilhelm. The American yachts enjoyed sponsorships from various industrialists such as J.P.Morgan, the Kaiser Wilhelm II backed the German team and the British were backed by Sir Thomas Lipton, the tea and grocery magnate.

Famously on one occasion, the Kaiser was asked as to whether his uncle King Edward VII would be attending a state function with some dry humor he replied “No, he has gone boating with his grocer.”

Well the Atlantic, captained by Charles Barr, now a member of the Sailing Hall of Fame, finished in first place with a time of 12d 4h 1min 19s, including some 341 nautical mikes in a single 24 hour period, which is a very fast 14+ knots on that period and 10.2 on average. While this doesn’t seem fast by today’s standards, the record held for sail-powered mono-hulls for nearly a century, only falling in 2002. She was so fast that the German Blitz-class gunboat SMS Pfeil (1600-tons, c.1882), sent as the timekeeper by the Kaiser, was caught napping and had to build steam up to meet the incoming New Yorker with the Naval attaché and ADC Captain (later Adm) Carl von Coerper aboard.

Barr

This feat made Barr a superstar of his time and on his death in 1911 Sir Thomas Lipton attended while the pall bearers were members of the British challenge team and from Lipton’s own luxury yacht.

In 1914, with the opening of WWI, the days of racing yachts across the Atlantic had faded. When the US entered the war in 1917, she was acquired by the Navy 10 June 1917 and commissioned as the section patrol boat USS Atlantic II (SP 651). Armed with a trio of 3″/23 cal guns, she was used as a guardship in the Hampton Roads/Yorktown area as well as a tender for smaller, faster subchasers looking, ironically, for the Kaiser’s submarines (whose cup she still held).

Speaking of the cup, the Atlantic’s owner donated the garish gold bauble to the American Red Cross who auctioned it off for a total of $175,000 in donations in 1918. The successful winner of the piece then found that it was simply a base pot-metal cup with a thin sheet of gold, rather than solid as had been advertised. What else did they expect from Willy?

At the end of the war she was decommissioned in 1919 and returned to civilian life. Then twenty years later, war came again.

Her owner gifted Atlantic to the US Coast Guard on 1 April 1941, a full eight months before Pearl Harbor. Commissioned as an auxiliary sail training ship, USCGC Atlantic (WIX-271) she served alongside the exiled Danish training ship Danmark at the Coast Guard Academy in New London, helping to train thousands of guardsmen during the war. Following the end of the conflict, Atlantic was decommissioned by Uncle Sam a second time and disposed of in 1948.

Going back to civilian life for the second time was hard on the old ship and by the 1980s she had fallen into disrepair. By 1982 she had sadly settled to the bottom of Norfolk harbor and her steel hull was later raised and scrapped.

Her original records including log books are preserved at Mystic Seaport, but a full size replica was built at the Dutch Van der Graaf yard for owner Ed Kastelein. She competed in the 2005 Rolex Transatlantic and is a faithful rendition of the beautiful old Atlantic– sans WWI bluejackets, 3-inch guns, and dizzy WWII coastie trainees.

Specs:

Displacement: 303 tonnes
Length:    69.40 m (227.7 ft) overall, 185-ft at waterline.
Beam:    8.85 m (29.0 ft)
Draught:    4.90 m (16.1 ft)
Installed power: steam and sail
Sail plan:    11,058 square feet of sail (18,000 when racing), one 150shp Seaburg vertical triple-expansion engine, one shaft.
Complement (1917-19) 66 US Navy crew,
Armament(1917-19) 3×3″/23cal. (1941-47) small-arms

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

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

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

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

I’m a member, so should you be!

1953 Spithead Review

Posted on May 8, 2014 by laststandonzombieisland Leave a comment

Includes HMS Vanguard and the mighty HMS Eagle, the largest RN carrier ever built. Never again would the Royal Navy be this impressive. Guest visits include the Italian training vessel Amerigo Vespucci (which still exists, at 85-years of age), the French 9120-ton La Galissonnière-class cruiser Montcalm and the heavy cruiser USS Baltimore as well as the supersexy Soviet cruiser Sverdlov (which was only scrapped in 1989, one of the last steel ships present on this day in existence).

Warship Wednesday May 7: Archer the giant killer and her pink sistership.

Posted on May 7, 2014 by laststandonzombieisland 15 comments

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

Warship Wednesday, May 7. Archer the giant killer and her pink sister ship.

Here we see the United States Ship Archerfish, SS-311, a diesel-electric fleet submarine of the USS Balao-class with a bone in her mouth in open waters. The Archerfish had a safe and happy life, with an earned a reputation as the Jack the Giant Killer of the US WWII sub force.

A member of the 128-ship Balao class, she was one of the most mature US navy diesel designs of the World War Two era, constructed with knowledge gained from the earlier Gato-class. US subs, unlike those of many navies of the day, were ‘fleet’ boats, capable of unsupported operations in deep water far from home. Able to range 11,000 nautical miles on their reliable diesel engines, they could undertake 75-day patrols that could span the immensity of the Pacific. Carrying 24 (often unreliable) Mk14 Torpedoes, thee subs often sank anything short of a 5000-ton Maru or warship by surfacing and using their 4-inch/50 caliber and 40mm/20mm AAA’s. They also served as the firetrucks of the fleet, rescuing downed naval aviators from right under the noses of Japanese warships.

Laid down at Portsmouth Naval Shipyard, Kittery, Maine 22 JAN 1943, she was commissioned just over eight months later on 4 September and promptly sailed for the Pacific to join the fray. She left Pearl Harbor two days before Christmas, 1943 on her first of seven war patrols. Her first four patrols were entirely uneventful, detailed to scan regions of the Pacific that were largely devoid of Japanese activity by 1944. Her fifth one, however, struck pay-dirt.

Standing off Tokyo Bay in November 1944, she was positioned to rescue downed B-29 crews who were bombing the Japanese Home Islands in preparation for the huge planned invasions in 1945-46. Then on the evening of November 28th, she was what appeared to be a huge naval tanker with a strong destroyer escort nudge out of the bay. This ‘tanker’ soon picked up 23-knots and started to zig-zag, which meant she was something altogether different.

Following closely, Archerfish worked her way through the screen of escorts, aligned her six forward tubes amidships of the immense target, and let rip a half-dozen improved Mk14 torpedoes, four of which found purchase on the hull of the largest aircraft carrier ever built in the world up until that time– the 73,000-ton, 872-foot long Imperial Japanese Naval ship Shinano. Capable of carrying up to 120 aircraft, including 47 in an armored hangar, she was the largest warship built until the USS Forrestal was completed in the 1950s.

Originally laid down as a super-battleship of the Yamato-class, she was converted following Japanese losses at Midway Island to a flattop. She had just been commissioned nine days before and was, when Archerfish found her, on her sea trials before entering service. Her existence was a secret and she was being moved in the middle of the night to Kure to complete her fitting out (she didn’t even have most of her watertight hatches installed). She was such a secret, in fact, she is the only major warship built in the 20th century to have avoided being officially photographed during its construction, with just two known photos, taken by chance, existing of her.

The Japanese didn’t even send radio messages about her sailing, much less her sinking.

Since the US Navy didn’t even think she existed, Archerfish and her skipper, Commander Joseph F. Enright, were not recognized for the feat of killing the huge carrier– which to this day is the largest ship ever sunk by a submarine in warfare– until after the war ended and post-war analysis of Japanese records. It was then that Enright picked up the Navy Cross and Archerfish was given the Presidential Unit Citation.

Her citation reads:

“For extraordinary heroism in action during the Fifth War Patrol against enemy Japanese combatant units in restricted waters of the Pacific. Relentless in tracking an alert and powerful hostile force which constituted a potential threat to our vital operations in the Philippine area, the Archerfish (SS-311) culminated a dogged six and one-half-hour pursuit by closing her high-speed target, daringly penetrated the strong destroyer escort screen, and struck fiercely at a large Japanese aircraft carrier Shinano with all six of her torpedoes finding their mark to sink this extremely vital enemy ship. Subjected to devastating air and surface anti-submarine measures, the Archerfish skillfully evaded her attackers by deep submergence and returned to port in safety. Handled with superb seamanship, she responded gallantly to the fighting determination of the officers and men and dealt a fatal blow to one of the enemy’s major Fleet units despite the most merciless Japanese opposition and rendered valiant service toward the ultimate destruction of a crafty and fanatic enemy.”

After this her sixth and seventh war patrols were back to being much less exciting, performing lifeguard duty for pilots and watching the almost-empty sea lanes for the occasional ship. U.S. submarines rescued 504 downed airmen– to include future President George Bush– during WWII lifeguard duty.

Archerfish was part of the US Fleet anchored in Tokyo Bay on Sept 2, 1945, for the Japanese surrender and end of WWII.

(Above) Archerfish and the rest of Subron 20 in Tokyo Bay at the surrender of Japan being nursed by the Fulton-class submarine tender, USS Proteus (AS-19). The hard-serving Proteus would remain as a submarine tender as late as 1992 and used as a berthing ship for sub crews for another decade after that, only being scrapped in 2007.

Future actor Tony Curtis, who was then a bluejacket by the name of Bernard Schwartz, had been inspired by Cary Grant’s role as a submarine skipper in the film Destination Tokyo to join the navy, was aboard Proteus at the time. Archerfish, Curtis, and Grant would all meet again 14-years later.

Decommissioned soon after World War Two, she sat in mothballs until Korea when she was reactivated. Unlike more than 90 WWII-era US diesel subs, she was not updated in the Guppy program with a new sail, snorkels, and improved batteries and fire control systems, keeping her old retro look until the end of the career– which helped make her a movie star.

Archerfish (inboard) and Balao (outboard), Key West 1959.

She was famously used in 1959 along with two of her sisters to simulate the fictional USS Sea Tiger in the Cary Grant/Tony Curtis film Operation Petticoat. USS Balao SS-285 was painted pink and was used for exterior shots in and around Key West while USS Queenfish SS-393 was used in opening and closing scenes, and was used for the “at sea” shots filmed in and around San Diego. Archerfish herself retained her standard haze grey and black trim and was used for interior and exterior shots in and around Key West.

It was at Key West, loaned out to the hydro-graphic command, that Archerfish was visited by then 44-year old Dr. George “Papa Topside” Bond who, along with EMC C. Tuckerfield ascended to the surface from a depth of over 322-feet over a 52-second time period, testing emergency escape protocols from the sub while she was bottomed on the Gulf of Mexico. Bond later grew famous for his work with the Sealab program in the 1960s and is considered the father of saturation diving techniques used today.

Finding further use for her, the Navy kept Archerfish around as an auxiliary submarine (AGSS-311), and, trading in her deck-guns and torpedoes for hydro-graphic gear and naval scientists, she conducted a series of ‘sea-scan‘ cruises around in the Atlantic and Pacific through 1968.

Balao Class Submarine USS Archerfish pictured at Hammerfest, Norway in 1960.

Then, on 1 May of that year, at the age of just under 25 years, she was condemned, decommissioned, and struck from the Navy List. She was one of the last unconverted WWII diesel boats in service in the US Navy.

On October 19th, stripped of anything useful, she was towed out to sea and sunk by the new Pascagoula-built Skipjack-class nuclear submarine USS Snook (SSN-592).

Archerfish survived the first two torpedoes until sunk appropriately by an old-school WWII-era Mk 14-5 in 52 seconds.

The ship still has a very active veterans association at ussarcherfish.com. Although she is no longer afloat, eight Balao-class submarines are preserved as museum ships across the country.

Please visit one of these fine ships and keep the legacy alive:

USS Batfish (SS-310) at War Memorial Park in Muskogee, Oklahoma.
USS Becuna (SS-319) at Independence Seaport Museum in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.
USS Bowfin (SS-287) at USS Bowfin Submarine Museum & Park in Honolulu, Hawaii.
USS Clamagore (SS-343) at Patriot’s Point in Mount Pleasant, South Carolina.
USS Ling (SS-297) at New Jersey Naval Museum in Hackensack, New Jersey.
USS Lionfish (SS-298) at Battleship Cove in Fall River, Massachusetts.
USS Pampanito (SS-383) at San Francisco Maritime National Historical Park in San Francisco, California, (which played the part of the fictional USS Stingray in the movie Down Periscope).
USS Razorback (SS-394) at Arkansas Inland Maritime Museum in North Little Rock, Arkansas.

Specs:

Displacement, Surfaced: 1,526 t., Submerged: 2,424 t.
Length 311′ 10″
Beam 27′ 3″
Draft 15′ 3″
Speed, Surfaced 20.25 kts, Submerged 8.75 kts
Cruising Range, 11,000 miles surfaced at 10kts; Submerged Endurance, 48 hours at 2kts
Operating Depth Limit, 400 ft
Complement 6 Officers 60 Enlisted
Armament, ten 21″ torpedo tubes, six forward, four aft, 24 torpedoes, one 4″/50 caliber deck gun, one 40mm gun, two .50 cal. machine guns
Patrol Endurance 75 days
Propulsion: diesels-electric reduction gear with four Fairbanks-Morse main generator engines., 5,400 hp, four Elliot Motor Co., main motors with 2,740 hp, two 126-cell main storage batteries, two propellers.
Fuel Capacity: 94,400 gal.

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

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

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

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

I’m a member, so should you be!

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laststandonzombieisland

Weapons, Wars, Preparation and Security from a recovering gun nut turned bad writer

Category Archives: warship wednesday

Warship Wednesday June 18, The Opening shot of the old subkiller

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Warship Wednesday June 4, the guardian angel of Omaha Beach

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Russia’s globetrotting Pacific Viking

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Hail and farewell, noble Vikrant.

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Warship Wednesday May 28, The Great Italian Count

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Warship Wednesday May 21, Alexander’s Polar Star

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Warship Wednesday May 14, the lightning of the Atlantic

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1953 Spithead Review

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Warship Wednesday May 7: Archer the giant killer and her pink sistership.

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Category Archives: warship wednesday

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