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Warship Wednesday Dec. 31, 2014 the Mystery of the St Anne, Flying Dutchman of the Arctic

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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 Dec. 31, 2014 the Mystery of the St Anne, Flying Dutchman of the Arctic

Saint Anne by Eugene Voishvillo

Saint Anne by Eugene Voishvillo

Here we see the Russian 145-foot arctic survey ship Svyataya Anna (formerly HMS Newport) as she pokes through the far north, the last of her class of Royal Navy Philomel-class gunvessel. Have you seen her?

She has been on a milk carton for the past 100-years.

In the 1860s, the Royal Navy needed a class of fairly fast but economical naval vessels that could run around coastal waters waving the flag in far-off colonial ports. The answer to this problem was the Philomel-class of ‘steam schooners’.

The steam yacht Jeannette, formerly HMS Pandora, HMS Newport's sistership at Le Havre, France, in 1878, prior to her departure for San Francisco, CA. She is flying the US Yacht Ensign and would become the USS Jeanette.

The steam yacht Jeannette, formerly HMS Pandora, HMS Newport’s sistership at Le Havre, France, in 1878, prior to her departure for San Francisco, CA. She is flying the US Yacht Ensign and would become the USS Jeanette.

These shallow-draught (13-foot at full load) schooner-rigged ships with an auxiliary 2-cyl. horizontal single-expansion steam engine to push a screw when in doldrums were capable of crossing the globe while their 145-ft. oal allowed them to enter even the smallest of colonial backwater harbors. Even though they had wooden hulls, they were triple oak planking sheathed with copper, which made them exceptionally strong.

Armed with a 68-pdr muzzle-loading smooth-bore gun (later upgraded to an impressive 110-pounder 7-inch breechloader) as well as a pair each of 20 and 24-pounders, their 60-man crew could make an impression on wayward natives, chase down maritime outlaws, and in times of war capture enemy merchant ships when found.

Best yet, since they were just armed and well-built merchantmen themselves, they could be constructed at private yards rather than tying up the navy’s larger dockyards. Class leaders Ranger and Espoir were ordered on April Fools Day 1857 and within the next four years some 26 of these hardy little craft were in the works at no less than 9 yards (8 private and one military) around the UK.

One of these, ordered 17 September 1860 from H. M. Dockyard Pembroke in Wales, was HMS Newport. Put on hold for an extensive period as the Royal Navy redirected its efforts to large men-of-war during a period of tension between both the Tsar and the United States and the UK during the Civil War, she wasn’t completed until April 1868.

Like the rest of her class, of which just 20 ultimately saw service, Newport spent her time under the red ensign in colonial service. While her sisterships saw Hong Kong, Australia and the West Indies, Newport was destined for African and Mediterranean service where she was under the helm of Cdr. George Nares (later Vice Admiral Sir George, a famed arctic explorer and surveyor who would later be a part of the Challenger expedition).

While under Nares’s watch, Newport became the first ship to cross through the French-built Suez Canal in November 1869, much to the chagrin of the French who had that coveted honor supposedly in the bag. It would not be the Newport‘s last brush with an arctic explorer by far.

Yacht Blencathra (formerly HMS Newport)

Yacht Blencathra (formerly HMS Newport)

Technology passed the Philomel-class in the 1870s as steel-hulled ships proved faster and less high-maintenance. This led to their rapid replacement in Her Majesty’s Navy and by 1882 all but HMS Nimble, which was herself to be relegated to RNR training duties at Hull until being paid off in 1906, were pulled from the line and sold. Newport was disarmed, pulled from the Naval List in May 1881 at age 13, and sold to British arctic explorer Sir Allen Young who had used Newport‘s sistership HMS Pandora in the 1870s to search for the lost Franklin expedition.

He had sold that ship to another would-be explorer, James Gordon Bennett, Jr. who would enter her into U.S. Naval service as the USS Jeannette, who would famously be lost at sea above Siberia in June 1881, crushed by drifting ice floes. Even triple oak sheathed in copper cannot stand up to millions of tons of ice.

Fresh out of boats and enamored with the Philomel-class design, Sir Allen picked up the now-surplus Newport and renamed her Pandora II (that sounds lucky). He lobbied hard for a British Antarctic Expedition, of which he would be the leader and Newport/Pandora II would be the flagship of, but that proved not to pan out and by 1890 Sir Allen sold his would-be polar survey ship to one F W Leyborne-Popham who (wait for it) wanted to take her to explore the far Arctic north of Siberia. It seems that in the last part of the 19th century, polar exploration was the ‘in’ thing to do.

Renamed the Blencathra, Leyborne-Popham took his third-hand ship as far as the mouth of the wild Yenisey River in Northern Siberia where he became involved in commerce to help support the new Trans-Siberian railway project before selling the ship to another Englishman, Major Andrew Coats, who in turn (this is going to shock you) used it for polar exploration, meteorological research and a good bit of commercial seal hunting in the Arctic ranging from Spitsbergen to Novaya Zemlya, the frozen Siberian island chain. Somewhere around this time her elderly Civil War-era engine had been replaced by a 41hp low-power plant.

HMS Newport as Svyataya Anna in St Petersburg, 1912

HMS Newport as Svyataya Anna in the Neva River,St Petersburg, 1912

It was then, at age of 43, that the old gunboat Newport/Pandora II/Blencathra found herself bought by an enterprising Imperial Russian Naval Officer, Senior Lt. Georgy Lvovich Brusilov in 1912. If the name sounds familiar, our story’s newest polar explorer was the nephew of the same General Alexei Alekseevich Brusilov (1853-1926) who later led the offensive in 1916 that very nearly knocked Austria out of World War One.

Endeavoring to make his own name in the history books, the younger Brusilov was competing for fame with no less than two other Russian polar expeditions outfitting at the same time,that of Vladimir Rusanov in his ship “Hercules,” and Lt. Georgy Sedov in his ship the “St Foka,” — both of which would end in abject failure in the frozen hell of the Arctic and their leader’s death. Rusanov tried to reach the far North and survey for coal deposits along the way, while Sedov was meaning to dog sled to the North Pole and Brusilov wanted to sail the Northwest Passage from St. Petersburg to Vladivostok.

With so many expeditions vying for fame (and funding), Brusilov had to make do with his elderly schooner and find a crew outside the normal naval channels for the great First Russian Northern Sea Route Expedition.

Brusilov, 28, had been to the Arctic before aboard the Navy’s icebreakers Taymyr and Vaygach so he at least had some knowledge of what he was up against. Wisely, he chose an experienced polar navigator, 31-year old Valerian Albanov for his crew. A classmate of Brusilov’s, Albanov had paid his own way through the Naval Academy by tutoring and selling model ships and the two were of vastly different backgrounds.

Georgy Brusilov and Valerian Albanov (left to right)

Georgy Brusilov and Valerian Albanov (left to right) Dont let the mustaches fool you, these men were two different sides of the same coin

The bulk of the two-dozen members of the expedition were mainly seal hunters as Brusilov counted on selling a hold full of seal pelts and walrus tusks in Vladivostok to cover the cost of the expedition, which had been fronted by friends and relatives. The crew was rounded out by  a few random St. Petersburg adventurers, a couple of professional mariners to do the heavy lifting, and, when no doctor could be conned, one 22-year-old female nurse, Yerminia Zhdanko. She was a society lady, the daughter of Port Arthur hero and then-head of the Imperial Hydrographic Bureau Gen. Ermin Zhdanko.

Yerminia Zhdanko, Saint Anna in background

Yerminia Zhdanko, Saint Anna in background. The ultimate fate of both ladies shown has been subject of much speculation in the past 100-years.

With time spent refitting his new ship, named Svyataya Anna (after the 14th Century Russian Saint Anna of Kashin) and assembling his supplies, Brusilov wasn’t ready to leave St. Petersburg until August– just weeks before the advent of winter.

Pro-tip: this is not the best time of year to try the Northwest Passage!

Soon, the Newport/Pandora II/Blencathra/Svyahtaya Anna was starting to bump into hard Arctic ice floes in the Kara Sea and by October 28, 1912 was locked in off the west coast of the Yamal Peninsula in Siberia. Brusilov had expected as much and laid in a huge stock of canned canned fish and meats enough to last through 1915 if needed. It was.

Arctic expedition George Brusilov on the schooner Saint Anna

Arctic expedition George Brusilov on the schooner Saint Anna

All of 1913 came and went with the St. Anne locked in the ice but unfortunately, the ship was never released. Instead of remaining close to the Siberian coast, it drifted north-northwest, back towards the Atlantic rather than the Pacific. As it did so, the boat past north of 83 degrees latitude and left shore far behind.

By 1914, shit got really out of hand on board.

While the crew still had a ton of canned food, supplemented by seals and bears, they had long ago ran out of fruits and vegetables, which left them scurvy-ridden and in a generally poor attitude about life. Soon Brusilov and many of the crew were so weakened they were bedridden. Fuel grew sparse and the schooner became an icy tomb in which her crew lived off frozen butter and hardtack biscuits in spaces kept warm by burning seal blubber. The bulkheads of the ship’s interior became encased in ice and temperatures in the vessel hovered just a few degrees over freezing, requiring everyone to remain fully clothed at all times, huddled over what meager flame they could find.

Long kept busy by taking met data and soundings through holes cut in the ice compared to celestial readings, monotony turned to rebellion.

This led to a largely peaceful mutiny in which the captain relieved Albanov of his post (which, according to Albanov’s later account, was mutual). Following this the unemployed navigator, taking a copy of the ship’s log book, correspondence from the crew, 500 pounds of biscuits, a shotgun and a few Remington rifles for bear protection, gathered 13 mariners who felt the same way, and left the St. Anne on April 10, 1914 walking on foot for Siberia which he reckoned was a few hundred miles or so to the south.

Pushing homemade kayaks sewn from sailcloth over the ice and alternating snowshoeing and skiing, the group dropped like flies in the inhospitable climate. Whittled down to just Albanov and a single sailor, 24-year old Alexander Konrad, they reached land at an old abandoned camp established by explorer Frederick George Jackson at Cape Flora, Franz Josef Land on July 9. There, the two remained alive on supplies left, coincidentally by the Sedov expedition who had passed there earlier. By stroke of luck, it was the St Foka, sans Sedov himself who was long since dead, who found the two survivors of the St. Anne on July 20.

Valerian Albanov and Alexander Conrad float to the schooner St. Fock in their schooner.

Valerian Albanov and Alexander Conrad float to the schooner St. Fock in their kayak.

Returning to Russia just as World War One was starting, Albanov turned over the logbooks from the St. Anne, which held valuable information on underwater topography, sea currents, ice drift, and meteorological data from the ship’s 18 months trapped in the ice and became something of a minor celebrity.

He wrote of his story of survival as did Konrad, the classic tale of which has been translated into several languages.

Original Russian version of Albanov's book as it appeared in 1916. The sketch was done by him

Original Russian version of Albanov’s book as it appeared in 1917. The sketch was done by him

Its English language version is “In the Land of White Death.”  Truly a bedtime story.

English version of Albanov's book

English version of Albanov’s book

Speaking of books, the story of Brusilov, and also incidentally of Sedov, was turned into a novel by Soviet author Veniamin Kaverin entitled The Two Captains which was one of the bestselling works of the 20th Century behind the Iron Curtain.

What happened to the St. Anne?

As for the St. Anne, rescue expeditions, including the first airplane flights over the Arctic region (by Polish-Russian naval aviator Jan Nagórski), were mounted to find the ship but they came to naught. After Albanov’s party left, Brusilov and some dozen sick men tended to by their female nurse remained aboard, with enough rations remaining to last for another 18 months, which bought them some time.

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In 1915, a lemonade bottle washed up near Cape Kuysky, not far from Arkhangelsk with a note from the ship signed by Brusilov in 1913 saying that he was feeling fine, which leads to the possibility that he just wanted the troublesome Albanov and his allies off the ship.

The former navigator was haunted by the fact that the St. Anne never appeared. Albanov journeyed to the Yensei area in 1919 and asked former arctic explorer Admiral Kolchack, then the White Army governor of the region, for help mounting a search for the St. Anne. However the Russian Civil War overtook both of these officers and neither lived to see 1920.

Konrad, the sailor who got away with Albanov, likewise remained in the Soviet merchant service and returned often to the Arctic several times before his death during World War II, likely with a weather eye out for the old schooner he walked away from.

In 1928 a story of a woman in Tallinn, Estonia of her long missing cousin, Yerminia Zhdanko coming for a visit from France with her ten-year old son in tow, after a marriage to Brusilov, made it to a local newspaper.

Likewise, a French novel, “In the Polar Ice,” edited by Rene Gouzee and attributed to being the diary of one Yvonne Sherpante , a woman who lived through a love-triangle on the schooner “Elvira” appeared on the market the same year. This of course draws some similarities to the tale of Zhdanko. Was  Yvonne Sherpante actually the still quite-alive Yerminia Zhdanko? Likely not but the story was surely modeled after hers.

All of which leads to the screwball theory that at least the Captain and the nurse escaped destruction and for whatever reason, shame maybe, kept a low profile and their story even lower as they aged. As the elder Brusilov was ill-liked among White Russian émigré circles in France due to his support of the Reds in the Civil War, this is almost believable.

But wait, there’s more!

In 1937 Soviet explorer VI Akkuratov, who coincidentally knew Konrad, landed on Rudolf Island and found a ladies patent leather shoe marked “Supplier of the Imperial Household: St. Petersburg” on it. Since the St. Anne’s nurse was the only known lady of Tsarist society to have ever passed near that icebox, it has been speculated that maybe Yerminia Zhdanko left the ship later with another group or Brusilov was convinced to eventually follow in Albanov’s footsteps. This could have left the unmanned ship to wander at sea alone in the Arctic.

Conceivably, it could have been there for years or even decades before being spit out into the Atlantic as a ghost ship.

This is not so farfetched.

On June 18, 1884, verified wreckage from St. Anne‘s sister USS Jeannette (including clothing with crewmember’s names) was found on an ice floe near Julianehåb (now Qaqortoq) near the southern tip of Greenland although she broke up near the Bearing Strait three years before.

In 1938 the Soviet icebreaker Sedov (yes, named after that Sedov– small world) became locked in the sea ice near the New Siberian Islands and remained there, adrift in the floe for 812 days, until she was broken out by a rescue party between Spitsbergen and Greenland. Had she not been extricated from the ice then, she may have remained there much longer.

Nansen’s Fram followed a similar course when it was icebound 1893-96.

Nansen's planned drift, via Wiki.

Nansen’s planned drift, via Wiki.

This suggests that the ice of the Arctic Ocean was in constant westward motion from the Siberian coast to the North American coast and as such would have eventually pushed St Anne into the Atlantic at some point, likely near Iceland or Spitsbergen, probably sometime around 1918.

In the 1988 Soviet seascape artist and writer Nikolai Cherkashin while visiting the Hanseatic bar in the port city of Stralsund, East Germany, came across a battered old ship’s wheel and a worn Russian icon of the little known Saint Anna of Kashin. Asking about it, he was told an amazing tale.

“The owner of the cellar told that the steering wheel and the icon was found by his father, who immediately after the Second World War, was fishing in the North Sea,” wrote Cherkashin. “In the autumn of 1946, his trawler in dense fog almost ran into an abandoned schooner. Examining this schooner, fishermen found her, a lot of canned meat, and other foodstuffs, which he handled himself and his father took the helm from the schooner and icon.”

On the wheel was a badly worn inscription that could be read in English script “..andor..” which, of course, could be part of,  “Pandora II.”

Its (wildly) conceivable that St Anne, abandoned by her crew, could have washed up along some forgotten glacial ice near Greenland around 1918– which in turn broke free decades later. She could then have drifted as far as the North Sea to be salvaged by a German fisherman before she sank. Stranger things have happened.

Most recently, in 2010, an expedition to Franz Josef Land by the Russian Wildlife Discovery Club found a male skeleton and some 20 artifacts that includes a set of sunglasses made from rum bottle bottoms, early pre-WWI era 208-grain 7.62x54R cartridges and shell casings, a canvas belt, sailor’s knife, dairy, whistle and brass pocket watch along the route that Albanov took.

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It is believed that the body is either sailor Vladimir Gubanov, helmsman Peter Maximov, sailor Paul Humbles, or ship’s steward Jan Regald, the four of the mariners who perished in that area, separated from Abanov. However, it could very well be from a follow-on group that tried to do the same. DNA tests are pending and should prove interesting while further expeditions are planned.

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“Today we got our last brick of tobacco; the matches ran out long ago,” reads the diary dated May 1913, adding that crew members hunted polar bear to supplement canned supplies.

Its unknown if there is a monument to St Anna in Russia.

The logs from the St Anna, as well as the original diaries of both Konrad and Albanov, are in the collection of the Arctic and Antarctic Museum of St. Petersburg.

A monument to the original HMS Pandora, Newport/St.Anne’s sistership lost as the USS Jeanette is, however, on the grounds of the US Naval Academy.

A number of geographic and landmarks and seabed features in the Arctic region have been named in honor of the St. Anne, Brusilov, Albanov, and Zhdanko.

Their final story, and the ship’s resting place, may never be known.

Specs:

1009466-i_010
Displacement: 570 tons
Length: 145 ft. (44.2 m) oa, 127 ft. 10.25 in (39.0 m) pp
Beam: 25 ft. 4 in (7.7 m)
Depth of hold: 13 ft. (3.96 m)
Installed power: 325 ihp (242 kW)
Propulsion:
Laird Brothers single 2-cyl. Horizontal single-expansion steam engine
Single screw
Auxiliary Schooner sailing rig, later Brigantine rig
Speed: 9.25 knots (17 km/h)
Complement: 60 as a naval vessel
Armament (As built)
1 × 68-pdr muzzle-loading smoothbore gun (replaced with 7-inch gun 1871)
2 × 24-pdr howitzers
2 × 20-pdr breech-loading guns
After 1881:
Smallarms

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Warship Wednesday Dec. 24, 2014, Remembering that Cold Winter in the Valley

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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, Dec. 24, 2014, Remembering that Cold Winter in the Valley

U.S. Navy - Official U.S. Navy photo USN 1043094 from the U.S. Navy Naval History and Heritage Command

U.S. Navy – Official U.S. Navy photo USN 1043094 from the U.S. Navy Naval History and Heritage Command

Here we see the “long-hulled” Essex-class anti-submarine aircraft carrier USS Valley Forge (CVS-45) as she appeared in 1959 as the centerpiece and flagship of U.S. Navy Task Group ALFA with Secretary of the Navy William B. Franke embarked. Ships include Valley Forge in the center, two submarines, and seven destroyers. Identifiable among the latter are USS Eaton (DDE-510) at left front, USS Beale (DDE-471) following Eaton, USS Waller (DDE-466) in the center foreground, and USS Conway (DDE-507) at right front. Aircraft overhead includes two four-plane formations of S2F “Trackers” and three HSS-1 “Seabat” helicopters from the Valley Forge air group, plus one shore-based P2V “Neptune.”

Valley Forge was one of 24 Essex-class fleet carriers started during World War II that were actually completed. Another eight sister-ships never were. We have covered the Essex class before, with the Mighty Oriskany last year, but hey, these were some great ships, and the “Happy Valley” is fitting for its namesake and today’s date.

As you remember from the history books and 3rd grade, Valley Forge (now a National Historical Park) is the site of the third winter encampment of the Continental Army during the American Revolutionary War, taking place from December 19, 1777, to June 19, 1778.

Valley Forge by miitary artist N.C. Wyeth

Valley Forge by military artist N.C. Wyeth

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While no battles were fought there, it was the turning point of the war as the unorganized and defeated Army that Washington led to camp that winter emerged as a hardened force, ready to do combat after being buoyed by news of an alliance with the French and turned into a mature outfit through the strict winter drills of German mercenary Baron von Steuben.

While the Essex-class carried the war from Guadalcanal to Tokyo and in large part helped win it, Valley Forge would come too late. Laid down fittingly at Philadelphia Naval Shipyard, near the location of her namesake, on 14 September 1943.

Also, in an ode to old-school patriotism, the Navy did not have to cough up a dime for her as War Bonds collected from the Eastern Pennsylvania area paid for the carrier. Further, Valley Forge received, according to reports, “the finest State Silver Service ever presented to the Navy.” The service was designed and made by Philadelphia silversmiths in 1904 and was originally placed aboard the old armored cruiser USS Pennsylvania by the Commonwealth. Carried by the battleship of the same name until it was transferred ashore for safekeeping in WWII (after all, the Pennsylvania BB-38 was almost lost at Pearl Harbor), it was entrusted to Valley Forge.

Work slowed on her after her July 1945 launch, and she wasn’t completed until 3 November 1946– some 14 months and one day after the end of World War II. Unlike other Essex boats, she would not be extensively modified in the 1950s to accommodate modern jet fighters, which rather made her a time capsule of WWII carrier technology.

View of the carrier's island, with members of the American Ordnance Association visiting on board, while the ship was operating near Long Beach, California, 27 April 1949. An F8F-2 "Bearcat" fighter is parked alongside the island.Note large SX radar antenna atop the tripod mast, and many onlookers standing on the island walkways. Photo #: 80-G-K-9904 (Color)

View of the carrier’s island, with members of the American Ordnance Association visiting on board, while the ship was operating near Long Beach, California, 27 April 1949. An F8F-2 “Bearcat” fighter is parked alongside the island. Note large SX radar antenna atop the tripod mast, and many onlookers standing on the island walkways. Photo #: 80-G-K-9904 (Color)

Nevertheless, Happy Valley didn’t let that get in her way. Afloat in Hong Kong when word the balloon went up at the 38th Parallel came down, she rushed to Korean waters.

On 3 July 1950, planes from her carrier air group conducted the first naval air strike of the war. Her 96-plane Air Group 5 was a hybrid of old and new aircraft that included the Grumman F9F-2 Panther jet fighter, Douglas Skyraiders, and the classic F4U Corsair, which was enjoying its swan song over Korea.

F4U approaching USS Valley Forge CV-45 Painted by Stan Stokes

F4U approaching USS Valley Forge CV-45 Painted by Stan Stokes

Valley Forge Fly-By by Ivan Berryman

Valley Forge Fly-By by Ivan Berryman

The first Soviet-made Yak-9 ever downed by U.S. planes was splashed that day by Lt (JG) Leo Plog as he flew is F9F-3 Panther of Fighter Squadron (VF) 51 from Valley Forge that day. In another first, Lt (JG) W. Boyd Muncie on 19 July 1950, became the first Naval Aviator to be shot down by North Korean anti-aircraft fire. He spent two and a half hours in the water before being returned to the carrier by helicopter, another first.

Valley Forge departs San Diego 6 Dec 1950

Valley Forge departs San Diego on 6 Dec 1950, headed back to Korea. Note that most of her WWII AAA guns have been stripped by this point.

During Korea, the brand-new ship earned no less than 8 battle-stars as her aircraft held the line at Pusan, generating more than 5,000 sorties in just five months in 1950, then returning in 1951 to generate another 2500, then returning time and time again to drop it like it was hot through 1953. She went on to be the scourge of the North Korean railway system, with her pilots severing the lines in over 5,346 places.

USS Valley Forge (CV-45) Crewmen use flight deck tractors with power brooms to sweep snow from the carrier's flight deck, during operations off Korea, circa early 1951.Plane parked in the foreground is a F4U-4 "Corsair" fighter. Those on the forward flight deck are an AD "Skyraider" attack plane and a HO3S helicopter. Photo #: 80-G-428267

USS Valley Forge (CV-45) Crewmen use flight deck tractors with power brooms to sweep snow from the carrier’s flight deck, during operations off Korea, circa early 1951. The plane parked in the foreground is an F4U-4 “Corsair” fighter. Those on the forward flight deck are an AD “Skyraider” attack plane and an HO3S helicopter. Photo #: 80-G-428267. Note the 5-inch mounts to the right of the image.

She covered the landings at Inchon, and the UN counter-offensive all the way to the Yalu and back, making daily visits when needed along Hungnam, Chungjin, Kojo, and the Chosin Reservoir. She was so busy, in fact, that just seven years after her commissioning, Commander C.V. Johnson made the carrier’s 50,000th landing when he touched his Skyraider down on her deck in May 1953.

USS Valley Forge (CVA-45) Approaches the Pedro Miguel Lock while transiting the Panama Canal, circa 18 August 1953. Her deckload includes several TBM, F4U and F2H aircraft and many automobiles Photo #: NH 96943

USS Valley Forge (CVA-45) Approaches the Pedro Miguel Lock while transiting the Panama Canal, circa 18 August 1953. Her deck load includes several TBM, F4U, and F2H aircraft and many automobiles Photo #: NH 96943

There she was converted in January 1954 into an anti-submarine warfare carrier (CVS-45) and tasked with carrying sub-buster planes as her Corsairs were being put out to pasture. This led to the Task Force picture at the beginning of this post.

Interestingly, during her operations as an ASW carrier in 1959, she had a large part of her flight deck destroyed by fierce waves in the Atlantic. This led her to have the affected area cut away and the forward port portion of the flight deck of the old USS Franklin (CVS-13) fitted in her place.

USS Valley Forge (CVS-45) underway in January 1959. Visible is the damage to the ship’s port forward flight deck, caused by heavy seas in the Atlantic. The damaged part was replaced with the identical part of the flight deck from the decommissioned aircraft carrier USS Franklin (CV-13)

USS Valley Forge (CVS-45) Arrives at Halifax, Nova Scotia, with crewmen in formation spelling out "HELLO HALIFAX" on her flight deck, 10 July 1959.Valley Forge, flying the flag of Rear Admiral John S. Thach and commanded by Captain William M. McCormick, was accompanied by the rest of Task Force ALFA, including seven destroyers and two submarines. Altogether, about 4000 U.S. Navy sailors were in Halifax for the six-day visit. At this point she has the deck of the Franklin installed. Photo #: NH 96939

USS Valley Forge (CVS-45) Arrives at Halifax, Nova Scotia, with crewmen in formation spelling out “HELLO HALIFAX” on her flight deck, 10 July 1959. Valley Forge, flying the flag of Rear Admiral John S. Thach (creator of the Thatch Weave) and commanded by Captain William M. McCormick, was accompanied by the rest of Task Force ALFA, including seven destroyers and two submarines. Altogether, about 4000 U.S. Navy sailors were in Halifax for the six-day visit. At this point she has the deck of the Franklin installed. Photo #: NH 96939 She still carries no less than eight 5-inch guns.

At about the same time, Valley Forge participated in the Balloon Wars, launching at least one GENETRIX spy balloon that carried a gondola of two 600-pound reconnaissance cameras. These were largely released from NATO ally land sites in Norway and Turkey, but a few of the 516 giant balloons came from the decks of naval ships such as the VF.

Ten-million cubic foot 400-foot high "Winzen" research balloon on the carrier's flight deck just prior to launching, during Operation "Skyhook,” Refly "B,” 30 January 1960. The balloon carried scientific devices to measure and record primary cosmic rays at 18-to-22 miles altitude. Photo #: NH 96948

Ten-million cubic foot 400-foot high “Winzen” research balloon on the carrier’s flight deck just before launching, during Operation “Skyhook,” Refly “B,” 30 January 1960. The balloon carried scientific devices to measure and record primary cosmic rays at 18-to-22 22-mile altitude. Photo #: NH 96948

Her life as a sub-buster was short-lived, however, and soon things started turning real green for Valley Forge. She was reclassified as LPH-8 on 1 July 1961 and made an amphibious landing helicopter carrier. In this capacity, she could carry up to a battalion of Marines as well as a force of some 30 choppers and put them all ashore using a concept known as vertical envelopment, which meant for the first time Uncle’s Devil Dogs could get where they needed to go without getting their feet wet.

Underway in the Pacific Ocean, circa 1962-63, prior to her "FRAM II" overhaul. She has fifteen UH-34 helicopters spotted in take-off positions on her flight deck. Photo #: NH 96946

Underway in the Pacific Ocean, circa 1962-63, before her “FRAM II” overhaul. She has fifteen UH-34 helicopters spotted in mass take-off positions on her flight deck. Photo #: NH 96946. Even with a jump like this, the collection of early choppers as seen here could just lift a company-sized force about 75 miles away.

1962 saw her landing Marines in Laos, and she stuck around for the next great conflict in the area, being involved in Vietnam continuously from 1965-69, winning another nine battle-stars that included Tet 68 and Tet 69.

The Happy Valley. Image from the USS Valley Forge Foundation

The Happy Valley. Image from the USS Valley Forge Foundation

She shuttled Marines back and forth from Okinawa to Vietnam, participated in Operations Blue Marlin, Dagger Thrust, Fortress Ridge, Harvest Moon, Badger Tooth, Badger Catch, Swift Saber, Defiant Measure, and Double Eagle as a floating base of operations from which her choppers ran men and material all along the coast as something of a fire brigade– rushing from one hot zone to another, putting out fires. She also served as a “Hero Haven” evacuation point, which allowed choppers from bases ashore that were too hot to bug out to her safer decks.

h96946

As part of the drawdown from Vietnam, she left Southeast Asia, with her choppers and Marines disembarked, and arrived back in California in September 1969. With the new Iwo Jima-class purpose-built LPHs coming online that could do the same job she did for the Marines, and her flight deck frozen in 1946, keeping her from operating fast-moving jets, there really wasn’t a need for the old Valley Forge anymore.

31 August 1965. A U.S. Marine Corps McDonnell F-4B-11-MC Phantom II (BuNo 149453) of Marine Fighter Attack Squadron Three One Four (VMFA-314) “Black Knights” is loaded aboard the Essex-class amphibious assault ship USS Valley Forge (LPH-8, ex CV-45) at Naval Air Station North Island, California. This was for one of two round-trip voyages Valley Forge made to Okinawa, carrying Marines and aircraft before commencing a WestPac deployment in the South China Sea in the fall of 1965. U.S. Navy photo from Valley Forge’s 1965-’66 cruise book

She was never operational again, and on 15 January 1970, she was decommissioned and struck from the Navy List. Plans to keep her around as a museum on the West Coast fell through, but she did have a final shot at living on forever.

While on red lead row in Long Beach, she was leased to a Universal for two weeks in 1971 and her interiors were used for the wide shots of a sci-fi movie, Silent Running, starring a young Bruce Dern and a group of tiny robot drones (manned by little person actors) living out their lives on a lonely starship by the name of the (wait for it) Valley Forge.

The producers of that classic film later went on to challenge the Star Wars franchise copied several items from the earlier movie.

Regardless of who copied whom, the Maritime Administration sold the USS Valley Forge on 29 October 1971 to the Nicolai Joffre Corporation of Beverly Hills, California, for her value in scrap. She was only 25 years old but was born in one World War and fought through two terrible conflicts in her short but hard life. Rather like the Continental Army in the winter of 1777-78.

USSValleyForge

Her memory is kept alive by a very active reunion club, while a number of her sisterships to include the USS Lexington, Intrepid, Yorktown, and Hornet, are preserved as museum ships.

And that beautiful 1904 silver service? When Valley Forge was decommissioned, the Navy handed it back to the Keystone State for safekeeping once more, and they still have it, on display at the State Museum of Pennsylvania. The Museum is about 80 miles from Valley Forge, PA, but if you go there, bundle up.

It gets cold there this time of year.

Specs:

Displacement: As-built:
27,100 tons standard
Length: As-built:
888 feet (271 m) overall
Beam: As-built:
93 feet (28 m) waterline
Draft: As-built:
28 feet 7 inches (8.71 m) light
Propulsion: As designed:
8 × boilers
4 × Westinghouse geared steam turbines
4 × shafts
150,000 shp (110 MW)
Speed: 33 knots (61 km/h)
Complement: 3448 officers and enlisted
Armament: As-built:
4 × twin 5-inch (127 mm)/38 caliber guns
4 × single 5-inch (127 mm)/38 caliber guns
8 × quadruple Bofors 40 mm guns
46 × single Oerlikon 20 mm cannons
Armor: As-built:
4 inch (100 mm) belt
2.5 inch (60 mm) hangar deck
1.5-inch (40 mm) protective decks
1.5 inch (40 mm) conning tower
Aircraft carried: As-built:
90–100 aircraft

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

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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.

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Warship Wednesday December 17, 2014, the Catfish of the Falklands

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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, December 17, 2014, the Catfish of the Falklands

(Courtesy of CDR Chester C. Culp Jr & submitted by Chris Culp, son of the EB “official” boat photographer of the Catfish (SS-339) from 1945-1953.Photo via Navsource) Click to big up.

Here we see the Balao-class submarine USS Catfish (SS-339) “swim” at Portland, Oregon, 27 October 1946. In this picture, she submerged in the Willamette River to permit the flowers placed on her deck in honor of the naval dead to float to sea with the outgoing tide. These 311-feet long fleet boats could float in as little as 15-feet of water, swim as above with her decks awash in just over 25 feet, and completely submerge in 50.

(*Note the USS Blueback SS-581, the last U.S. diesel sub to be decommissioned, has since 1994 been a museum ship near where this very picture was taken.)

Back to the Catfish

As part of the huge U.S. submarine build-up in World War II, Catfish was a member of the immense 120-ship Balao-class, the largest class of submarines in the United States Navy. 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, these subs often sank anything short of a 5000-ton Maru or warship by surfacing and using their deck guns. They also served as the firetrucks of the fleet, rescuing downed naval aviators from right under the noses of Japanese warships.

We have covered ships of this class in the past here at LSOZI (the plucky Perch and Archer, the giant killer), but don’t complain, they have lots of great stories.

Laid down 6 Jan 1944 at Electric Boat Company in Groton, Catfish (SS-339) was commissioned 19 March 1945 with less than six months left in the war. By the time she was accepted and transited to the Pacific, she only appeared in Japanese-controlled waters in August 1945, just days before the cease-fire. By the end of September, she was back on the West Coast, based out of San Diego with one battle star for her very quiet World War II service.

Catfish (SS-339) off Mare Island on 9 June 1947, USN photo. Note her WWII profile as commissioned.

Catfish in San Fran, with bluejackets pulling out puppies to make friends. Note the camo’d 40mm Bofors

In 1948-49, she was given a ten-month-long extensive modernization to upgrade her to a more Atomic-era GUPPY II profile. This involved streamlining her hull, having a new sail installed, removing her topside armament, and giving her sensors an update. Her auxiliary engines were removed, her batteries doubled, and a snorkel fitted.

Post guppy Catfish (SS-339) starboard view, underway, probably in Pearl Harbor, HI

USS CATFISH (SS-339) off the Mare Island rock wall following her GUPPY conversion in 1949.

June 1950 found her on a routine West Pac cruise when the Korean conflict broke out and, along with USS Pickerel, was the first submarine to make war patrols under a UN flag. Like her WWII service, Korea proved a quiet war for the Catfish, making two combat patrols in the area, keeping a sharp eye out for encroaching Chinese and Soviet ships.

In January of 1951, the recently GUPPY’d Catfish slipped into San Francisco Bay underwater and remained in the harbor for three days, taking photos of the Bay Area through their periscope in daylight as part of an authorized mission to see if they could do it with a minimum of civilian reaction. The mission was successful to a degree, as no one called SFPD or the military, as reported by the San Fran Chronicle.

Over the next two decades, she made regular cruises and by 1968 had conducted her 6,000th dive. She was used both as a fleet boat and as a training platform for Naval Reserve bubbleheads. Notably, she was one of the few submarines that were given the chance to sink a warship in peacetime when she sent the retired Barnegat-class seaplane tender ex-USS Suisan (AVP-53) to the bottom in an October 1966 Sinkex just after her last refit. At the time, she had augmented her WWII-era MK 14 fish with more modern Mk 37 ASW torpedoes against submarines.

USSCATFISH

Fresh off her sinking, she made an appearance in a third U.S. war, spending time in the Vietnamese waters from January to October 1967 and again from March to September 1970. She engaged in lifeguard duty for aircrews lost at sea, as well as hung close (within 100 yards, close enough to catch mortar rounds according to VA records) to shore for reasons likely still classified.

Speaking of classified, Catfish had already been there unofficially in 1962, laying off Dong Hoi, North Vietnam, keeping tabs on that country’s navy in Operation Wise Tiger, quietly transmitting intelligence information that would, in turn, be used by the CIA to run a group of Nasty boats and armed sampans in black ops all along the coast.

By 1971, the aging 27-year-old smoke boat had seen better days, and the U.S. Navy was increasingly all-nuclear when it came to submarines.

Under new management

However, she still had some life left in her, and on 1 July 1971, the same day she was decommissioned and struck from the Naval List, officers and men of the Argentine Navy took possession of their newest submarine through the Military Assistance Program, which they promptly renamed the ARA Santa Fe (S-21).

As ARA Santa Fe

As ARA Santa Fe. Note this is her final sail design, added after 1960.

Porpoising in Argentine service

Porpoising in Argentine service

The Argentines also took possession of Catfish‘s sister ship, USS Chivo SS 341, which they renamed ARA Santiago Del Estero (S-22). Already extensively worn out, the two ships sailed for Argentine waters for another decade of service without the benefit of a refit. During that time, they extensively prowled the areas around the Islas Malvinas (otherwise known as the Falklands), which Argentina had an increasingly militant claim towards.

Argentine submarine ARA Santa Fe (S-21) in Ushuaia, Tierra del Fuego, 1978. Via Postales Navales

By 1981, sistership Chivo/Santiago Del Estero was laid up with bad batteries and was increasingly cannibalized to keep the Catfish/Santa Fe afloat as two new German-designed diesel attack boats were to replace the pair within a year or two. In fact, Santa Fe was scheduled to be decommissioned in August 1982, but history had a funny story to tell before that could happen.

Falklands!

ARA Santa Fe in Argentine service

ARA Santa Fe in Argentine service

In the first part of 1982, the Argentine military junta decided that it would be an easy walkover to quickly occupy the Falkland Islands from an ailing British military machine. The colony only had a garrison of 40 Royal Marines, and its guardship, a supped-up supply boat with a red hull by the name of Endurance, was slated for retirement. The Brits had little power-projection capability, having scrapped their full-size aircraft carrier just years before, and were planning to sell even their tiny new Harrier carrier, HMS Invincible, to Australia. Further, the Brits were 8,000 miles away, while the Argentines were just 400.

With that, a military expedition was launched in which a small Argentine force set up shop on remote (and unoccupied) South Georgia Island, a frozen extension of the Falklands, and, when the Endurance and a small Marine detachment sailed for Hoth, a much larger Argentine task force seized the Falklands.

On the early morning hours of April 2, 1982, Santa Fe, by nature of her shallow draft for a large submarine, helped to land some 120 Buzos Tácticos, an elite force of Argentine naval commandos, just outside Port Stanley. These commandos assaulted the (empty) Royal Marine barracks at Moody Brook and took prisoner after a short series of lop-sided skirmishes, the Royal Marines in Port Stanley.

Santa Fe landed these Argentine commandos (Seen left with Sterling submachine gun) in this infamous photo of Royal Marines surrendering

Santa Fe landed these Argentine commandos (Seen left with a Sterling submachine gun) in this infamous photo of Royal Marines surrendering

After this, Santa Fe headed to South Georgia Island to reinforce the Argentine garrison there after HMS Endurance had left the area. LCDR Horatico Bicain, commander of the submarine, which had last seen a dry-dock in the 1960s and had been advised his Mk14 torpedoes were so deteriorated that they were more dangerous to his submarine than to a British ship, was ordered to lie low and keep out of the way.

However, the Brits would be back just three weeks later and in force.

While the Argentines had four submarines in the stable and more on the drawing board, somehow, Santa Fe was the best fully operational boat they had. After all, the even more worn out Chivo/Santiago Del Estero was laid up, the countries best and most experienced submariners were training for forthcoming new boats in West Germany, and the Type 209 submarine San Luis was crewed largely by inexperienced officers and men and had so many cranky systems that it was combat ineffective, even though it was able to close with the RN to within torpedo range. 

The mismatch between Argentine and British submarines, Falklands 1982

In the opening moves of recapturing the Falklands, the Royal Navy took South Georgia, where Santa Fe was held up with a small Argentine garrison, first.

From Lieutenant Chris Parry, Flight Observer of a Westland Wessex helicopter (XP142 #406- “Humphrey”) from the destroyer HMS Antrim off South Georgia on Sunday, April 25, 1982:

It’s a submarine,’ said our pilot, Lieutenant Commander Ian Stanley. ‘You’re joking,’ I said.

I quickly worked out the ballistic calculations for the movement of the submarine. He was heading 310 degrees northwest at eight knots. Talk about making it easy for us: we could just fly along the submarine’s track – and, when we were above, release. I fused both the depth charges.

Ian then spoiled it for everyone: ‘Are you sure that it is not one of ours? It could be Conqueror (one of our nuclear-powered subs).’

I was craning my neck and head trying to see. Frustrated, I asked, ‘Has he got a flat casing and a tapering flat fin?’

‘It’s the Argie, no doubt about it,’ came the reassuring call from Stewart in the left-hand seat. ‘OK,’ said Ian, ‘are you sure that we have the RoE [Rules of Engagement]?’

‘Of course,’ I replied, reflecting the briefing of the previous night. ‘He’s fair game.’

What a moment. It is every Observer’s dream to have a real live submarine caught in the trap with two depth charges ready to go! I thought about the men we might be about to kill, but Ian started calling down the range.

As Ian called: ‘On top, now, now, now,’ I saw the fin of a submarine pass under the aircraft through the gap around the sonar housing and I released both charges.

Ian flipped the cab around violently to starboard to see the results. As we turned, the whole of the aft section of the submarine disappeared and two large explosions detonated either side of it. Plumes of water shot up.

It looked as if she was in the process of diving when we struck her, but the explosions lifted her aft end up and out of the water. She then began careering violently as I reported back to Antrim.

Simultaneously, I asked Plymouth to launch her Wasp helicopter armed with AS-12 missiles, since the submarine still posed a threat.

The low cloud was lifting, as if a curtain was being raised on a stage, to reveal a stunning backdrop of peaks and glaciers. Antrim and the frigates Brilliant and Plymouth were closing at high speed from the northeast.

Plymouth’s Wasp fired an AS-12, which hit the submarine aft on the casing, causing a number of plates to fly off. The submarine was also attacked by Wasps from Endurance. We returned to Antrim, refueled, and relaunched with one depth charge to witness the final stages of the submarine flopping alongside the British Antarctic Survey jetty and the Grytviken whaling settlement on South Georgia. It was obvious that the submarine was no longer a threat and her ship’s company was streaming ashore. So we returned to Antrim and everyone was in a high state of excitement. It was all Boy’s Own Annual stuff!

In all, the hardy little diesel smoke boat was subjected to a combined attack from six (6) Royal Navy helicopters: one Westland Wessex, one Westland Lynx (from HMS Brilliant), and four Westland Wasps.

Wasp HAS.1, hanging AS.12 wire-guided missiles, presumably for anti-small boat work from HMS Minerva 1960s

The wonky-looking Wasp HAS.1, hanging a few AS.12 wire-guided missiles, presumably for anti-small boat work. While this picture is from HMS Minerva in the late 1960s, Catfish/Santa Fe faced a nearly identical foe in 1982.

These aircraft attacked the sub with machine guns, two depth charges (that did the most damage), one MK-46 torpedo, and eight AS-12 missiles, several of which peppered the topside of the Sante Fe, including breaching her sail, thus making it impossible to submerge.

"The Hunt" Painted by Daniel Bechennec shows the moment the Westland Wasp HAS.1 XS527 from HMS Endurance launches a AS-12 missile on the submarine ARA Santa Fe This hardy helicopter, crewed by Tony Ellerbeck and David Wells, attacked the Santa Fe three times in quick succession, firing a total of 6 AS-12s at the boat.

“The Hunt” Painted by Daniel Bechennec, shows the moment the Westland Wasp HAS.1 XS527 from HMS Endurance launches an AS-12 missile on the submarine ARA Santa Fe. This hardy helicopter, crewed by Tony Ellerbeck and David Wells, attacked the Santa Fe three times in quick succession, firing a total of 6 AS-12s at the boat.

Amazingly, with her sailors firing back at the slow British helicopters with small arms from her frozen decks, the crippled boat made it back to Grytviken harbor on South Georgia and landed her 76-man crew without a loss while setting booby traps on board the abandoned sub. They surrendered along with the rest of the Argentine garrison later that night.

Lt Chris Sherman (RN) and WO2 Lawrence Gallagher (D Squadron 22SAS), next to the Argentine submarine ARA Santa Fe (S-21) in South Georgia. The photo was taken on 25 April 1982. WO2 Gallagher died when the Sea King Helicopter he was travelling in crashed into the sea on 19 May 1982. This terrible accident would result in the loss of 21 lives and the deletion of decades of training and experience from the SAS

"Off Limits" per HMS Endurance

“Off Limits” per HMS Endurance

The Brits, afraid the battered hulk would sink at the only dock on the island, allowed some of her crew, under guard, to board her and move the sub to a more isolated shallow area at the old whaling jetty where she could settle on the bottom in peace. Tragically, when Argentine Navy Machinist First Class Felix Oscar Artuso moved too fast for the likes of a Royal Marine commando on board, he was shot and became the Catfish/Santa Fe‘s only wartime fatality in four conflicts over 38 years of service.

LCPL Jeremy “Rocky” Rowe, the then-23-year-old Royal Marine who shot Artuso, later had to sell his South Atlantic Medal and General Service Medal at auction after spending his savings while he recovered from cancer.

In 2019, Mr. Rowe, 60, said:

‘The shooting was a split second decision to stop him from throwing levers at the forward end of the control after receiving a phone call from the fin end holding his captain.

‘What was gong through my mind was a precarious position with many possibilities that could go wrong, i.e prisoners could pick up a weapon, fire a torpedo, it was listing and smoke coming out of it.

“It was claustraphobic and many things were happening.I had a Browning automatic pistol and warned him to touch nothing in the room clearly.I had received instructions from a naval officer about the levers which would sink the sub, which had open hatches. Artuso leapt for them so I shot him. Sometime after I was told our officer had the levers the wrong way round.”

Another view of her battered sail

Another view of her battered sail

Santa Fe hundido gacetamarinera

Her crew removed, the old girl technically became a British war prize but was dead in the water, full of moody munitions and old batteries.

Royal Navy Divers work to re-float the ARA Santa Fe (S-21)

Sunk hard

Sunk hard. This photo was as she was being lifted post-war by the RN

Grytvken South Georgia in the Background with the Sante Fe under tow

ARA Santa Fe (S-21) was towed to the beaching point

They towed her to a more out-of-the-way location in June 1982 after the Falklands conflict ended, and then, in Operation Okehampton, she was raised by the Brits. and in February 1985, towed “about 12 miles out from the mouth of Cumberland Bay, she lurched to starboard and started taking on water. The tow line broke, and she sank to a depth of about 1,176 feet… and lies there today.”

SANTA FE being towed out on 21 FEB 1985 from King Edward Cove

SANTA FE being towed out on 21 FEB 1985 from King Edward Cove

The grave of Felix Artuso, ARA, is in Grytviken, where he was buried with full military honors and is maintained by the British government.

gd09bm

There is a USS Catfish Association that keeps her memory alive in the U.S., while in Argentina, several Malvinas groups treasure the memory of that country’s lost submersible.

Eight Balao‘s are preserved in the country, making them the most popular submarine museum ship class.

–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 Patriots Point in Mount Pleasant, South Carolina
–USS Ling (SS-297) at the 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
–USS Razorback (SS-394) at the Arkansas Inland Maritime Museum in North Little Rock,

Further, when in the UK, you can visit Humphrey when at the Royal Navy’s Fleet Air Museum, where he is preserved and has quite the war record on her fuselage.

MoS2 Template Master

Humphrey’s observer, Chris Parry, retired in 2008 as a Rear Admiral in the Royal Navy and is unlikely to forget the Catfish of the Falklands any time soon.

(Sources: Histarmar.com.ar, elsnorkel.com.ar, DANFS, Navsource, USS Catfish Assoc homepage, and Revista Defensa)

Specs:

DibGuppyI-II

Displacement, Surfaced: 1,526 t., Submerged 2,242 t.
Length 311′ 9″
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; Patrol Endurance, 75 days.
Operating Depth, 400 ft.
Complement 6 Officers, 60 Enlisted (WWII) 75 Post-Guppy
Propulsion, diesel-electric reduction gear with four main generator engines, General Motors diesel engines, HP 5400, Fuel Capacity 118,000, four General Electric motors, HP 2,740, two 126-cell main storage batteries, two propellers. (As commissioned)
Post Guppy: three GM 16-278A diesel, 2 direct drive motors of 2700 HP each, 504-cell battery bank.
Armament (fish) ten 21″ torpedo tubes, six forward, four aft, 24 torpedoes,
Guns: One 5″/25 deck gun, one 40mm gun, one 20mm gun, two .50 cal. machine guns; (All removed in Guppy conversion)

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 December 10, 2014: The Japanese Saratoga

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Here at LSOZI, we are going to take off every Wednesday for a look at the old steam/diesel navies of the 1859-1946 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, December 10, 2014: The Japanese Saratoga

IJN Kaga 1930Here we see a wonderful colorized overhead shot of the Imperial Japanese Navy’s aircraft carrier Kaga as she steams in a deep blue sea in 1930. Note the huge twin 7.9-inch turrets up front just under her superimposed flight deck and the meatballs on the wingtips of the early Mitsubishi B1M torpedo bombers. This massive 812-foot long flattop was part of the backbone of Japanese Naval Aviation.

In 1922, the Empire built its first carrier, which was actually the purposely-built ship for that purpose with prior British and U.S. carriers being converted from other ships. This little 9,600-ton flattop, Hōshō, was the cradle of Japanese Naval Aviation much as the USS Langley was to the USN. Then followed two larger fleet carriers, which were actually able to fight. These were the 42,000-ton Akagi (converted from a battlecruiser hull in 1927), and the 38,000-ton Kaga (converted from a battleship hull in 1928). These two ships were comparable to the converted American battlecruisers-cum-carriers Lexington and Saratoga. Then came the experimental 10.500-ton light carrier Ryūjō (comparable to the too-small-for-fleet operations USS Ranger CV-4) whose poor design led to the development of the much better 20,000-ton purpose-built fleet carriers Soryu and Hiryū and follow-on 32,000-ton sisters Shōkaku and Zuikaku (who were roughly comparable in size and operation to the Yorktown-class carriers Yorktown, Enterprise, and Hornet completed at about the same time). A pair of slow light carriers converted from submarine tenders, Zuihō and Shōhō rounded out the Japanese fleet before the start of World War II in the Pacific, giving the Imperial Japanese Navy some 10 flattop-like ships at the start of the war to the American’s 8.

While the Japanese were able to commission another 10 flattops during the war itself (Ryūhō, Hiyō, Jun’yō, Chitose, Chiyoda, Unryū, Amagi, Katsuragi, Shinano and Taihō), these ships by and large were poorly constructed and in many cases never fully operational– a fact contrasted by the dozens of excellent Essex-class fleet carriers that the USN was able to field by the end of that conflict. No, the true flower of the Japanese Navy’s air arm was developed and at sea by December 7, 1941, and its sunrise would soon set.

Model of Battleship Kaga as she would have appeared.

Model of Battleship Kaga as she would have appeared.

Originally laid down 19 July 1920 as a leviathan 45,000-ton battleship that would have carried an amazing ten 16.2-inch guns in five twin turrets and been clad in up to 14-inches of sloping Vickers cemented armor (Japan was a British ally), the Washington Naval Treaty of 1922 doomed her and sistership Tosa, both of which had already been launched but were more than a year away from completion, to the scrap heap that was world peace. Tosa was towed out to sea and used an a floating target to test the effectiveness of her new armor and arrangement– which led to lessons in how the later Yamato-class super-dreadnoughts were built. Had these ships been completed as battleships, they would have been at least equal to, if not more powerful than the latest U.S. ships of the day: the Colorado-class.

Kaga fitting out, 1928. Note the rear ducked funnel stack which would br reworked in 1935. Also note the two casemated 7.9-inch guns near the waterline and twin 5-inch AAA guns at maximum elevation near the top of the deck

Kaga fitting out, 1928. Note the rear ducked funnel stack which would be reworked in 1935. Also, note the two casemated 7.9-inch guns near the waterline and twin 5-inch AAA guns at a maximum elevation near the top of the deck

Kaga, the more complete of the two sat at Kawasaki Shipyard, Kobe while the Japanese Navy considered what to do with her. Two of the faster 30-knot Amagi class battlecruisers (Amagi and Akagi), also canceled due to the Washington Naval Treaty, were undergoing conversion to aircraft carriers much as the U.S. was converting their canceled USS Lexington and Saratoga hulls to flattops at the same time. However, an earthquake in Tokyo in Sept. 1923 produced stress cracks throughout the unfinished Amagi and she was hulked. This meant that the Kaga was given a last-minute reprieve from the breakers and completed to take the place of the already treaty-allowed battlecruiser-tuned carrier.

Kaga 1933, note the two distinctive 7.9-inch turrets, one trained out. Also the large mum of the IJN on the bow.

Kaga 1933, note the two distinctive 7.9-inch turrets, one trained out. Also the large mum of the IJN on the bow.

After an extensive conversion and completion process, Kaga joined the Combined Fleet 30 November 1929. She was a big girl, at over 38,000-tons full load. Only the slightly longer Akagi along with the U.S. Lexington and Saratoga were bigger and not by much (42,000-tons). A brace of 8 Kampon Type B boilers powered 4-geared turbines giving her over 127,000 horses under the hood, meaning she could race around at 26-knots if needed. Although capable of carrying up to 100 aircraft, she also had a very decent main gun armament of 10 7.9-inch 3rd Year Type naval guns installed in six casemates with a maximum elevation of 25 degrees limiting maximum range to 22 kilometers and two forward twin turrets with a maximum elevation of 70-degrees thus giving them the same 29 km range as those guns carried by heavy cruisers. Another 16 5-inch guns were carried in her secondary battery, thus giving her the same armament of both a heavy and light cruiser. She still carried an impressive 6-inches of armor belt, which in theory at least meant she could fight it out on the surface against a decent sized cruiser and likely win without having to launch an aircraft.

Imperial Japanese Navy aircraft carrier Kaga conducts air operations in 1937. On the deck are Mitsubishi B2M Type 89, Nakajima A2N Type 90, and Aichi D1A1 Type 94 aircraft

Imperial Japanese Navy aircraft carrier Kaga conducts air operations in 1937. On the deck are Mitsubishi B2M Type 89, Nakajima A2N Type 90, and Aichi D1A1 Type 94 aircraft

Speaking of aircraft, she had three flight decks, stacked upon one another. This allowed her the very sweet option of launching and recovering planes at the same time from the multiple decks. The topmost deck was covered in 1.5-inches of armor for added protection.

Kaga conducts air operations training 1930. upper deck are Mitsubishi B1M Type 13 bomber and Nakajima A1N Type 3 fighters are on the lower deck. Photo from Kure maritime museum

Kaga conducts air operations training in 1930. upper deck are Mitsubishi B1M Type 13 bomber and Nakajima A1N Type 3 fighters are on the lower deck. Photo from Kure maritime museum

Her first missions saw her fitted with up to 60 aircraft, all biplanes, to include Mitsubishi B1M3 torpedo bombers, Nakajima A1N fighters, and Mitsubishi 2MR reconnaissance aircraft. She participated in the first invasions of China, escorting troops of the Imperial Army to Shanghai.

There on Feb. 19, 1932, three planes from the Kaga took off and were met by U.S. Army Air Force reservist 2nd Lieutenant Robert Short who, flying a Boeing 218 P-12 prototype fighter as a volunteer pilot to the Chinese Air Force, smoked a Japanese plane in combat, killing one Lt. Kidokoro, IJN.

short

Two days later a six-plane stack including three Mitsubishi B1M3 bombers and three Nakajima A1N1 biplane fighters met Short once more and he killed flight leader Lt. Kotani, IJN, disrupting the attack. Regrouping, the two fighters engaged Short and one, piloted by Lt. Nokiji Ikuta, sent the 27-year old American down in flames.

The three successful fighter pilots after the combat on 22 February 1932 Ikuta is on left

The three successful fighter pilots after the combat on 22 February 1932 Ikuta is on left

It was Japan’s first-ever air-to-air victory and would not be the last American life that Kaga would cut short.

The shootdown was widely celebrated in Japan for more than a decade.

“The American pilot, Robert Short shot down over Shanghai, 1932.” Painting by Murakami Matsujiro

While in China, the Japanese realized that Kaga had a crapload of flaws and sent her back to the yard. When she emerged, she only had a single flight deck supplemented by a large hangar deck, had lost her 7.9-inch turrets, had a new funnel arrangement, and picked up an island control tower on her deck. Engineering improvements increased her speed to over 28-knots and her hangar space was improved to where she could carry as many as 103 aircraft although never did.

How she would have looked post-mod

Back in Chinese waters, throughout 1937-38 her air group flew thousands of sorties as the ship covered more than 30,000 miles in constant shuttling up and down the coast to support the Japanese Army ashore.

“Kaga Carrier Aichi D1A1 Dive Bombers in Bombing Operation in China, 1937”. ´Painting by Murakami Matsujiro

During this time, her pilots mixed it up regularly with Chinese pilots flying American Curtis Hawk III aircraft, bagging 10 of the outnumbered fliers.

Kaga after her modifications. Note how the funnel now shifts steam/smoke amidships just abaft of the island

Kaga after her modifications. Note how the funnel now shifts steam/smoke amidships just abaft of the island

On 12 December 1937, three Yokosuka B4Y Type-96 bombers and nine Nakajima A4N Type-95 fighters left her deck to attack a group of Standard Oil-chartered Chinese oil tankers off Nanking. While attacking the merchant ships, the planes also took the 191-foot river gunboat USS Panay (PR-5) of the U.S. Asiatic Fleet’s Yangtze River Patrol under fire, sinking her in shallow water without provocation.

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Storekeeper First Class Charles L. Ensminger, Standard Oil Tanker Captain Carl H. Carlson, and Italian reporter Sandro Sandri were killed, Coxswain Edgar C. Hulsebus died later that night and 43 sailors, and five civilians were wounded.

It would not be the last American lives she would take.

Kaga steams through heavy north Pacific seas, enroute to attack Pearl Harbor, Hawaii, circa early December 1941. Carrier Zuikaku is at right. Frame from a motion picture film taken from the carrier Akagi. The original film was found on Kiska Island after U.S. recapture in 1943. U.S. Naval History and Heritage Command Photograph.

Kaga steams through heavy North Pacific seas, en route to attack Pearl Harbor, Hawaii, circa early December 1941. Carrier Zuikaku is at right. Frame from a motion picture film taken from the carrier Akagi. The original film was found on Kiska Island after the U.S. recapture in 1943. U.S. Naval History and Heritage Command Photograph.

 

Lieutenant Ichiro Kitajima, group leader of the Imperial Japanese Navy aircraft carrier Kaga's Nakajima B5N bomber group, briefs his flight crews about the Pearl Harbor raid, which will take place the next day. A diagram of Pearl Harbor and the aircraft's attack plan is chalked on the deck. Photo Chihaya Collection via Wenger via Wiki

Lieutenant Ichiro Kitajima, group leader of the Imperial Japanese Navy aircraft carrier Kaga’s Nakajima B5N bomber group, briefs his flight crews about the Pearl Harbor raid, which will take place the next day. A diagram of Pearl Harbor and the aircraft’s attack plan is chalked on the deck. Photo Chihaya Collection via Wenger via Wiki

December 7, 1941, some 73-years ago this week, Kaga was part of an impressive six-carrier striking force laying just off of Oahu, Hawaii Territory. Although a declaration of war had not been delivered, 26 Nakajima B5N Kates typically armed with Type 91 torpedoes modified to run in the shallow water of the harbor escorted by 9 Mitsubishi A6M Zeros from the carrier accompanied the first wave of Japanese aircraft into Pearl looking for American battleships. Soon after that wave, a second was launched consisting of 26 Aichi D3A Val dive bombers armed with 550 lb. general-purpose bombs and 9 more Zeroes that were tasked with attacking aircraft and hangars on Ford Island.

Photograph taken from a Japanese plane during the torpedo attack on ships moored on both sides of Ford Island shortly after the beginning of the Pearl Harbor attack. View looks about east, with the supply depot, submarine base and fuel tank farm in the right center distance. A torpedo has just hit USS West Virginia on the far side of Ford Island (center). Other battleships moored nearby are (from left): Nevada, Arizona, Tennessee (inboard of West Virginia), Oklahoma (torpedoed and listing) alongside Maryland, and California. On the near side of Ford Island, to the left, are light cruisers Detroit and Raleigh, target and training ship Utah and seaplane tender Tangier. Raleigh and Utah have been torpedoed, and Utah is listing sharply to port. Japanese planes are visible in the right center (over Ford Island) and over the Navy Yard at right. U.S. Navy planes on the seaplane ramp are on fire. Japanese writing in the lower right states that the photograph was reproduced by authorization of the Navy Ministry. Official U.S. Navy photograph NH 50930.

The photograph was taken from a Japanese plane during the torpedo attack on ships moored on both sides of Ford Island shortly after the beginning of the Pearl Harbor attack. The view looks about east, with the supply depot, submarine base and fuel tank farm in the right-center distance. A torpedo has just hit USS West Virginia on the far side of Ford Island (center). Other battleships moored nearby are (from left): Nevada, Arizona, Tennessee (inboard of West Virginia), Oklahoma (torpedoed and listing) alongside Maryland, and California. On the near side of Ford Island, to the left, are light cruisers Detroit and Raleigh, target and training ship Utah and seaplane tender Tangier. Raleigh and Utah have been torpedoed, and Utah is listing sharply to port. Japanese planes are visible in the right center (over Ford Island) and over the Navy Yard at right. U.S. Navy planes on the seaplane ramp are on fire. Japanese writing in the lower right states that the photograph was reproduced by authorization of the Navy Ministry. Official U.S. Navy photograph NH 50930.

Of these, 15 did not return, making Kaga‘s air group losses of 31 aviators the heaviest of the Japanese attack. Of the 55 that did make it back, over half were damaged. This is not that surprising as, of the 353 Japanese naval aircraft that attacked Hawaii that day; nearly every fourth one came from Kaga while just over half of the Japanese planes scratched came from the carrier.

kaga air wing Japanese Navy Type 99 Carrier Bomber (Val) is examined by U.S. Navy personnel following its recovery from Pearl Harbor

Japanese Navy Type 99 Carrier Bomber (Val) is examined by U.S. Navy personnel following its recovery from Pearl Harbor shortly after the attack. This plane was relatively intact, except that its tail section was broken away, and its recovery helped intelligence efforts. It came from the aircraft carrier Kaga

However, they inflicted a terrible price on the harbor on that infamous day. Her Zeros reported strafing more than 20 planes on the ground and her bomber and torpedo planes reported hits made by them on the battleships Nevada, Oklahoma, Arizona, California, West Virginia, and Maryland. While there is no way to know for sure, likely, a large portion of the 2,403 Americans killed and 1,178 others wounded came from Kaga‘s group as two-thirds of the torpedo planes that attacked battleship row in the first wave came from the flattop.

She then followed up this attack with supporting Japanese attacks in the Dutch East Indies and Australia, with her air group raiding Darwin.

June 1942 found her off Midway Island as part of Yamamoto’s final push to break the back of the U.S. Navy in the Pacific. Along with her old companion Akagi, two other Pearl Harbor veterans, Soryu and Hiryu joined Kaga for the epic naval battle. Of 248 Japanese carrier aircraft deployed, nearly a third flew from the Kaga.

Although her Zeros helped destroy a number of American attack squadrons wholesale, and her Vals and Kates bombed the isolated island, there was a final reckoning in the form of a 25 plane attack of SBD Dauntless dive bombers from the USS Enterprise that caught Kaga and her three companion carriers unaware with her decks full of torpedoes, bombs, aviation gas, and planes out in the open. At 10:22 am on June 4, one 1,000-pound and at least three 500-pound bombs from Enterprise’s VS-6 hit her and within minutes, the chain reaction of secondary explosions had the ship ablaze.

After a nine-hour funeral pyre, the Japanese sank her with a volley of torpedoes in more than 16,000 feet of seawater some 350-miles northwest of Midway. More than half of her complement, including dozens of her unreplaceable veteran aviators, rode her to the bottom of the Pacific.

The destroyers had picked up some 700 of her crew from the debris-clogged waters. These men became a pariah in their own service. Kaga ‘s surviving crewmembers were restricted incommunicado to an airbase in Kyūshū for months after returning to Japan, to help conceal word of the Midway defeat from the Japanese public and were then transferred back to frontline units without being allowed to contact the family.

In 1988, a grove of cedars along with a monument was erected to the carrier in the old Higashiyama Navy Cemetery, now part of Higashi Park in Sasebo City. Parts of her wreckage were found in 1999 by a U.S. Navy survey ship although none was recovered.

As for Lieutenant Ikuta, the Japanese ace who shot down Robert Short over China in 1932, against all odds, he was one of the very minuscule groups of Imperial Naval aviators who survived the war and in 1960; he tracked down Shot’s elderly mother in the United States and begged her forgiveness.

She accepted.

Specs:

Kaga in her final Pearl Harbor-Midway form

Kaga in her final Pearl Harbor-Midway form

Displacement: 38,200 long tons (38,813 t) (standard)
Length: 247.65 m (812 ft. 6 in)
Beam: 32.5 m (106 ft. 8 in)
Draft: 9.48 m (31 ft. 1 in)
Installed power: 127,400 shp (95,000 kW)
Propulsion: 4-shaft Kampon geared turbines
8 Kampon Type B boilers
Speed: 28 knots (52 km/h; 32 mph)
Endurance: 10,000 nmi (19,000 km; 12,000 mi) at 15 knots (28 km/h; 17 mph)
Complement: 1,708 (after reconstruction)
Armament: 10 × 200 mm (7.9 in) guns,
8 × 2 – 127 mm (5.0 in) guns,
11 × 2 – 25 mm (0.98 in) AA guns
Armor: Belt: 152 mm (6.0 in)
Deck: 38 mm (1.5 in)
Aircraft carried: 90 (total); 72 (+ 18 in storage) (1936) 18 Mitsubishi A6M Zero, 27 Aichi D3A, 27 Nakajima B5N (+ 9 in storage) (Dec. 1941)

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

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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 December 3, 2014, The Hidden Scandinavian Lion

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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, December 3, 2014, The Scandinavian Leviathan

Here we don’t see the Tre Kronor-class cruiser Hennes Majestäts Skepp (HSvMS) Göta Lejon (Gothic lion) of the Royal Swedish Navy. Her ship’s motto was Nemo me impune lacessit (“No one provokes me with impunity”) and she meant to back that up as needed.

Can’t see her?

How about now in this enhanced photo?

camo swedish ship reveal

Ok, this may actually be a destroyer, or a banana, or Tom Sawyer’s raft, but how can you tell for sure?

The Swedish navy has had a long history of camouflaging their ships while hidden next to rocky isolated inlets and islands, even large capital ships.

The Swedish navy has had a long history of camouflaging their ships while hidden next to rocky isolated inlets and islands, even large capital ships– note the bluejackets standing on mine rails

Swedish coastal defense battleship HSwMS Gustav V, using extensive camouflage, a serious tactic used to great extent by the Swedes, especially for air defense

Designed before the start of World War II, the Tre Kronor (Three Crowns)-class of three fast cruisers (Kryssaren) were to each serve as a flotilla flagship of a new squadron of four destroyers and six motor torpedo boats. As such, they were much larger, faster, and modern than the long long line of 18 Pansarskepps (literally “armored ships”) coastal defense ships built for the crown between 1897 and 1918.

1943-45. The brand new coastal destroyer J29 HMS Mode (J29) leads the armored division (pansarbåtsdivisionen) in an archipelago trail. In addition to Mode, we see the Sverigeskeppen pansarskeppen HMS Sverige, HMS Drottning Victoria, and HMS Gustaf V. Three more destroyers follow after that.

Kryssaren HMS Göta Lejon without her camouflage netting.

Kryssaren HMS Göta Lejon without her camouflage netting.

The three most modern (but still slow) pansarskepps would form a strategic reserve while the three new cruisers would race their destroyers up and down the coastline, sinking enemy ships and laying minefields as needed. Capable of sinking smaller fast ships and running away from those that could wreck them in turn; they were supposed to be “stronger than the quicker and quicker than the stronger.”

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Note the twin rear mine-laying chutes in stern and pair of twin 152mm turrets facing the national ensign.

Built to an Italian design, when the war broke out in 1939 the third ship was cut, with just class leader Tre Kronor and her sister, Göta Lejon remaining. With construction beginning in 1943 as the country suffered from shortages of everything due to her tense neutrality during WWII, they were only completed by Eriksbergs Mekaniska Verkstads AB, Gothenburg after the war’s end.

Armed with 7 M1942 Bofors 6-inch (152/53 mm) high-elevation guns, each capable of firing an impressive 10 rounds per minute (with a combined broadside of 70 rounds per minute) due to automatic loaders, she was classified as a light cruiser. They could fire a 99-pound AP/HE shell out to 28,400 yards and could be used in an AAA role if needed due to their high elevation.

hms_tre_kronor_50_talet_50d4ab6b9606ee5a68105afb

*As a side note, these guns were designed as 5.9-inchers by Bofors for the Royal Dutch Navy (Koninklijke Marine) cruiser De Zeven Provinciën. After the German invasion of the Netherlands in 1940, these artillery pieces were confiscated by the Swedes and promptly recycled into their new cruisers, stretched to accommodate the Swedish standard 6-inch shell. The DZP did eventually get a new set of guns of the same type delivered by Bofors— after the war. The sole survivor of the class, currently in service as the BAP Almirante Grau (CLM-81) of the Peruvian Navy, is the last WWII-era “gun” cruiser in fleet service.

152mm shells aboard Gota Lejon Wiki http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/User:OgreBot/Watercraft/2012_January_11-20

152mm shells aboard Gota Lejon Photo Wiki

For dooming larger vessels, Göta Lejon carried a half-dozen 533mm surface torpedo tubes. Her armor was adequate, at 2.8 inches, to defend her against destroyer-sized weapons while it was hoped her 33-knot speed could move her away from bigger brawlers. AAA was accomplished with ten twin 40mm Bofors (after all, the company was based in Sweden) and several smaller guns.

HMS_Göta_Lejon_in_ice

Iced in. Note early pre-modernization superstructure tower

Built as a large, well-armed minelayer of sorts, Göta Lejon could carry up to 150 heavy (300# warhead) contact mines in a hold below decks and rapidly drop them over the stern after running them down her topside deck on fitted rails.

HSwMS Göta Lejon with mines on her after deck, 1948, Fo70916AB

GL-minlastning

Hey, that’s MINE! (Get it)

Gota Lejon dropping it while its hot. She could sow mines at 20-knots if needed and her crew got the hustle on Wiki http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/User:OgreBot/Watercraft/2012_January_11-20

Gota Lejon dropping it while it’s hot. She could sow mines at 20 knots if needed and her crew got the hustle on. Photo Wiki

Mines are a big business in the Baltic. An estimated 200,000 mines were laid by all sides in the East of Sweden and the Straits of Kattegatt and Skagerrak to the West throughout the two world wars and are still regularly encountered.

Commissioned on 15 December 1947, Göta Lejon had a tense span of Cold War service with an increasingly active Soviet Navy poking its nose into Swedish waters. Over the next ten years, the older pansarskepps were retired while just the two cruisers endured.

Swedish cruisers kryssarna Tre Kronor and Göta Lejon together in 1951 in a rare meeting in Stockholm when both were active at the same time

Göta_Lejon_Original_Superstructure

A good close-up of how she looked as commissioned. She had a usual main battery layout with a triple single turret forward and two twin turrets aft. Note the HF/DF gear under the bridge.

Then, in 1958, her only slightly older sister and class leader Tre Kronor was laid up, leaving the Göta Lejon as the principal ship in the Swedish Navy, a legit WWII-style cruiser in a 60’s era fleet of mosquito boats and tin cans.

1954--note, no camo

1954–note, no camo, and modified superstructure

As such she was modernized, given advanced surface and air-search radars (Type 277 and Type 293), and her AAA suite augmented by more modern Bofors 57mm guns. Further, she was fitted to carry helicopters as needed.

Gota Lejon at anchor. Note the swabbie greasing and coating the mine rails as an armed platoon of sailors prepares to go ashore. Wiki http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/User:OgreBot/Watercraft/2012_January_11-20

Gota Lejon at anchor. Note the swabbie greasing and coating the mine rails as a Mauser-armed platoon of sailors drills nearby. The Swedish navy has long used national servicemen and, as with any large group of semi-motivated young men, must be kept busy. Photo Wiki

Tre Kronor (rear) and Göta Lejon (front) in Karlskrona, 1964, note the laid-up sister has been camouflaged as has the active-duty cruiser. Photo by Ingvar Andersson

As she appeared in 1978. The Swedes were very into camo by this time.

As she appeared in 1978. The Swedes were very into camo by this time. Note the large surface search radars

Tre Kronor was scrapped in 1964 as Göta Lejon remained, kept alive in part with items cannibalized from the elder whose steel was repurposed as a pontoon bridge.

A 15-minute long Swedish film from 1964 showing the cruiser under steam, in operations in the Baltic, laying mines (at the 3-4 minute mark) getting all camoed up (at the 9-ish minute mark), delivering broadsides (13 mins), and dropping depth charges.

In 1970, it was planned to modernize the ship by removing her aft turrets and replacing them with U.S. Terrier missiles. However, this plan was scrapped, as it would likely have brought political repercussions from the nearby Soviets.

HMS KkrV Göta Lejon handed over to her new owners

Aft view of HMS KkrV Göta Lejon handed over to her new owners on a sad and rainy afternoon.

With time marching on and no refit in sight, by 1 July 1970, after 24 years of service, she was withdrawn from the King’s naval list and transferred to the Republic of Chile the same year.

original_dsc_0635.jpg

At a hard turn. Note the extreme 70-degree elevation on the 152mm mount forward.

Renamed Almirante Latorre (CL-04) after the revered Jutland-veteran battleship of the same name, the ship sailed to Latin America and gave a hard dozen years of service to that fleet, serving as a counter to the aging Argentine Brooklyn-class light cruiser ARA Gen. Belgrano and Peruvian BAP Almirante Grau (small world) in times of tension.

Almirante LaTorre live fire 1983

Almirante Latorre lives fire 1983. At this point, her battery was four decades old.

As Almirante LaTorre

As Almirante LaTorre on a sunshine-filled day in the Pacific.

However, despite a limited refit when transferred, she was in poor condition again in just a few years and by 1980 rarely sailed. On 2 January 1984, she was decommissioned and held in reserve for two years.

latorre 1986

Then, in Sept. 1986, she was sold to the Shion Yek Steel Corp of Taiwan, tugged across the Pacific, and scrapped. No doubt her good Swedish steel has been re-blended and recycled into a myriad of household items by now.

Nevertheless, at least one of her screws is retained on display in Chile while her original Göta Lejon bell and shield remain in Sweden.

Admiral Latorre's port-side screw at Naval Base de Talcahuano, Chile

Admiral Latorre’s port-side screw at Naval Base de Talcahuano, Chile

Specs:

 

http://www.shipbucket.com/images.php?dir=Real%20Designs/Sweden/CL%20Tre%20Kronor%201964-70%20camo.PNG CL Tre Kronor 1964-70 camo shipbucket

CL Tre Kronor 1964-70. Image by ship bucket

Displacement: 7,400 long tons (7,519 t) standard, 9,200 long tons (9,348 t) full load
Length: 174 m (570 ft. 10 in) (pp)
182 m (597 ft. 1 in) (oa)
Beam: 16.45 m (54 ft. 0 in)
Draft: 5.94 m (19 ft. 6 in)
Propulsion:
Two shaft geared turbines, 4× 4-drum boilers,
100,000 shp (75,000 kW)
Speed:             33 knots (61 km/h; 38 mph)
Complement:   618
Armament:      As-built:
7 × Bofors 152 mm guns
20 × 40 mm guns
7 × 25 mm guns
6 × torpedo tubes
Post-1958:
7 × 152 mm (6 in) guns
4 × 57 mm Bofors
11 × 40 mm guns
6 × torpedo tubes
Armor:
Belt: 70 mm (2.8 in)
Deck: 30 mm (1.2 in) upper, 30 mm (1.2 in) main
Turrets: 50–127 mm (2.0–5.0 in)
Conning tower: 20–25 mm (0.79–0.98 in)

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 encouraging 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 Nov 26, Marilyn’s Tin Can(s)

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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 Nov 26, Marilyn’s Tin Can

USSBenhamDD796

Here we see the Fletcher-class destroyer USS Benham (DD-796) as she appeared during WWII where she earned an impressive eight battlestars in just over 21-months at sea. She is all made up in her Camouflage Measure 31, Design 2C war paint.

One of the last pre-WWII destroyer designs of the U.S. Navy, the amazing 175 Fletchers proved the backbone of the fleet during the conflict. These expendable ‘tin cans’ saved Allied flyers, sank submarines, duked it out with shore batteries, torpedoed larger ships, screened the fleet, and shot down wave after wave of enemy aircraft, keeping the carriers and transports safe behind their hail of fire. With the ability to float in just 17.5-feet of seawater, these ships crept in close to shore and supported amphibious landings, dropped off commandos as needed, and helped in evacuations when required. Small ships with long legs (5500-nm un-refueled at 15-knots) they could be dispatched to wave the flag in foreign ports, provide gunboat diplomacy in times of tension, and race just over the horizon at 36.5-knots to check out a contact.

This particular ship was named for U.S. Navy Rear Admiral Andrew Ellicot Kennedy Benham (1832-1905), a storied veteran of the old pre-Civil War Navy that included catching a pike to the leg from a crazy fisherman off Macao while still a Midshipman before achieving command of the gunboat Penobscot during the War Between the States and retiring as head of the North Atlantic Station in 1894.

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The first USS Benham (Destroyer No. 49/DD-49) was an Aylwin-class tin can built for the United States Navy prior to the American entry into World War I and scrapped in 1935. The second USS Benham (DD-397) was the lead ship of the her class of destroyers and served as the escort to the USS Enterprise on the Doolittle Raid and at Midway, saving the lived of over 700 sailors from the stricken Yorktown before being sunk at the Battle of Guadalcanal, 15 November 1942.

With big shoes to fill, the new Benham (DD796) was laid down just five months later on 23 April 1943 at Bethlehem Steel Company, Staten Island, NY. A war baby, she was built in less than eight months, being commissioned 20 Dec of the same year.

By May 1944, she was part of Task Group 52.11, a small force of two escort carriers and three destroyers just in time for the invasion of the Marianas and the Battle of the Philippine Sea. She shot down a number of enemy bombers and used her quartet of 5-inch guns well in gunfire missions against Japanese forces on Tinian and Guam. Joining the big boys of TG 38.2, she was the screen for the large fleet carrier USS Bunker Hill off Okinawa during raids there before striking at Japanese installations in the Philippines and helping support the landings along that massive archipelago. Just before Christmas, she was damaged, along with much of the Third Fleet, in a Typhoon off the Philippines, losing a man over the side.

In April 1945, Japanese kamikaze planes and friendly fire from another destroyer damaged her. One man was killed and two officers and six men wounded. Of the four planes shot down that day by antiaircraft fire, the Benham was credited with two, with assists on the others.

The above photo is from July 1945 while the Benham DD796 was refueling from the Wisconsin in preparation for a night run on the Japanese Shiminosuk Naval Base on the Eastern tip of Honshu. From the Benham Association

The above photo is from July 1945 while the Benham DD796 was refueling from the Wisconsin in preparation for a night run on the Japanese Shiminosuk Naval Base on the Eastern tip of Honshu. From the Benham Association. These boats were very wet in rough weather…

Later, while a part of Task Force 38, she pursued and depth charged a Japanese submarine and supported the invasions of Iwo Jima and Okinawa, helping to take wounded from the extensively damaged USS Franklin. Fighting in Japanese home waters, she was part of the massive Allied fleet in Tokyo Bay on Sept. 2, 1945 when the war ended.

Decommissioned on 18 October 1946 in San Diego, she spent five years on Long Beach’s red lead row before being recalled to the colors in 1951 to participate in the new war in Korea. Just after new life was brought to the veteran ship, a young starlet named Marilyn Monroe, who had done her part as a war industry worker herself in the previous conflict, visited her stateside.

On June 19, renowned Hollywood photographer John Florea accompanied Marilyn on a trip to the Benham at Long Beach, where she was being made ready to sail for the East Coast.

Ms. Monroe enjoying the company of a fee bluejackets

Ms. Monroe enjoying the company of a few bluejackets

 

She was visiting the ship for a special screening of the new Richard Widmark film, The Frogmen,  about Navy UDT teams, and was yet to become a household name. In the visit she wore the same studio wardrobe black netted dress seen in ‘As Young as You Feel’ filmed earlier that year in which she had a bit part.

Marilyn manning the 40mm Bofors

Marilyn manning the 40mm Bofors

Marilynn Monroe visits sailors during the Korean War-

Marilyn Monroe visits sailors during the Korean War-

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The thing is, Marilyn was known to see other destroyers on the side…

In this image Ms. Monroe wears a t-shirt from a visit to the slightly younger Sumner-class tin can USS Henly (DD762) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/USS_Henley_%28DD-762%29 . Say it ain't so, Joe! Nonetheless, Benham outlived the rival Henley by a good number of years as the more modern vessel was scrapped in 1974 while still a spry 30-year old. That will teach 'em to mess with a Fletcher sailor’s gal...

In this image Ms. Monroe wears a t-shirt from a visit to the slightly younger Sumner-class tin can USS Henley (DD762). Say it ain’t so, Joe! Nonetheless, Benham outlived the rival Henley by a good number of years as the more modern vessel was scrapped in 1974 while still a spry 30-year old. That will teach ’em to mess with a Fletcher sailor’s gal…

Sailing to the East Coast, she underwent a modernization that saw her trading in her 20mm and 40mm guns, Benham picked up some new 3-inch AAA mounts in exchange. At this time, the port aft depth charge rack and all “K” guns were removed but she did pick up some Hedgehog devices forward. The old SC air search radar was replaced by the SPS-6, and other improvements made.

View of Benham, post-1950, in common distribution to the public in the 1960's. John Chiquoine via Navsource. Note the Hedgehog emplacements under the bridge-wings forward.

View of Benham, post-1950, in common distribution to the public in the 1960’s. John Chiquoine via Navsource. Note the Hedgehog emplacements and reload lockers under the bridge-wings forward and the big SPS-6 array on top of the mast.

Her service during the Korean conflict was not as exciting as it was during WWII, never seeing the Pacific again until she circumnavigated the globe during a 1954 cruise. She was put out to pasture again after being transferred to the Atlantic, decommissioning at Boston on 30 June 1960.

Benham underway 1959 NH photo

Benham underway 1959 NH photo

Stricken in January 1974, she was transferred to the Marina de Guerra del Perú (Peruvian Navy) where she was recommisoned there as BAP Almirante Villar (D 76)—a traditional Peruvian Naval name held by a number of that country’s warships to honor the one-eyed sea dog Contralmirante Manuel Villar Olivera.

BAP Admirlante Villar firing a torpedo in the late 1970s. At this time the Mk15 torpedoes were nearing the end of their shelf life.

BAP Admirlante Villar firing a torpedo in the late 1970s. At this time the Mk15 torpedoes were nearing the end of their shelf life.

She gave a good six hard years service to that fleet until she was stricken in turn in 1980 at age 37.

Painted pink, she was disarmed and used in a series of Exocet missile tests before she was scrapped at the end of her life.

ex-Beham, ex-Almirante Villar after taking a MM-38 Exocet amidships. Not bad damage for a 35-year old Fletcher...

ex-Beham, ex-Almirante Villar after taking a MM-38 Exocet amidships. Not bad damage for a 35-year old Fletcher…

Another view

Another view

The very active USS Benham Association who intend to have their 23rd annual reunion in Norfolk, VA in 2015 keeps Benham’s memory alive.

Benham crew reunion aboard USS Kidd in Baton Rouge in 2005 in which the Kidd became the Benham for the day

Benham crew reunion aboard USS Kidd in Baton Rouge in 2005 in which the Kidd became the Benham for the day

To do your part to remember the old girl (Benham, not Marilyn), you can visit one of the four Fletcher sisterships have been preserved as museum ships, although only USS Kidd was never modernized and retains her WWII configuration:

-USS Cassin Young, in Boston, Massachusetts
-USS The Sullivans, in Buffalo, New York
-USS Kidd, in Baton Rouge, Louisiana
-AT (Destroyer of Hellenic Navy) Velos former USS Charrette in Palaio Faliro, Greece

Specs:

A detail of Fletcher sister ship USS Kidd. Benham came later in the war and substituted a more advanced radar and more AAA guns for the Number 3 5"/38 mount.

A detail of Fletcher sister ship USS Kidd. Benham came later in the war and substituted a more advanced radar and more AAA guns for the Number 3 5″/38 mount.

(As commissioned, 1943)
Displacement: 2,050 tons (standard)
2,500 tons (full load)
Length: 376.5 ft (114.8 m)
Beam: 39.5 ft. (12.0 m)
Draft: 17.5 ft. (5.3 m)
Propulsion: 60,000 shp (45 MW); 4 oil-fired boilers; 2 geared steam turbines; 2 screws
Speed: 36.5 knots (67.6 km/h; 42.0 mph)
Range: 5,500 miles at 15 knots
(8,850 km at 28 km/h)
Complement: 329 officers and men
Armament: 4 × single 5 inch (127 mm)/38 caliber guns
6 × 40 mm Bofors AA guns, 10 × 20 mm Oerlikon cannons
10 × 21 inch (533 mm) antiship torpedo tubes (2 × 5; Mark 15 torpedoes)
6 × K-gun depth charge projectors (later Hedgehog)
2 × depth charge racks

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 November 19, 2014 the Hard-to-Kill Russian Crown Prince

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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, November 19, 2014, the Hard to Kill Russian Crown Prince

Tsarvitch at Portsmouth 1903
Here we see the Tsar’s own pre-dreadnought battleship Tsesarevich (Цесаревич, also transliterated as Tsarvitch and Czarevitch = “Crown Prince”) of the Imperial Russian Navy at Portsmouth 1903, just after commissioning, on her way to the Pacific.

She was the only ship of her class, built in France at Forges et Chantiers de la Méditerranée, La Seyne-Sur-Mer. The same yard had produced a series of 12,000-ton leviathans for the French Navy (Jauréguiberry et. al.) and patterned the new Russian ship along those lines.

The new ship would be 388-feet long and very beamy at some 76-feet, giving her a 5:1 length-to-beam ratio that was accentuated by her 1900s typical tumblehome hull (now brought back for the USS Zumwalt super destroyer). Weighing in at 13,000-tons due to her thicker armor (up to 10-inches of good German Krupp plate), she was powered by 20 Belleville water-tube boilers who ate coal like it was going out of style.

A view inside one of the 12/40cal mounts

A view inside one of the 12/40cal mounts

Armament was in two pairs of impressive Russian designed 12-inch/40 (305mm) low-angle naval rifles mounted in double turrets fore and aft with six  French-made Canet Model 1892 6-inch gun in double tube turrets arrayed along the hull of the ship.

At the builder's yard on launching day.

At the builder’s yard on launching day.

Capable of 18-knots and able to steam over 6,000nm before needed more coal, she was capable of deploying to the Pacific, which was to be her homeport at Port Arthur.

The Tsesarevich himself. He was born in 1904, with the ship that carried his title outliving him. He was executed July 1918 by the Reds at age 17.

The Tsesarevich himself. He was born in 1904, with the ship that carried his title outliving him. He was executed July 1918 by the Reds at age 17.

The Tsar’s naval architects liked her well enough that they used the design with only minor changes to build five ships of the same type in Russia. Of these five follow-on ships of the Borodino-class battleships, four near-sisterships of the Tsesarevich: Borodino, Imperator Alexander III, Knyaz Suvorov, and Oryol, were all either sunk or captured at the Battle of Tsushima, 27 May 1905 during the Russo-Japanese War. Warship Wednesday-alumni Slava, the last of the class to commission, only survived because she was under construction during the war and never left the Baltic.

Vladimir-Emyshev's painting "Battleship Tsesarevitch"

Vladimir-Emyshev’s painting “Battleship Tsesarevitch”

Laid down 8 July 1899, Tsesarevich was complete by late 1903 and rushed to the Pacific where tensions with the Japanese were mounting. In truth, just 68 days after she arrived at Port Arthur, she was attacked at her anchorage without warning by a torpedo boat of the Japanese Imperial Navy.

Tsessarevich02

Shrugging off damage from a Nippon torpedo, she was hastily repaired. However, Tsesarevich, along with most of the Russian 1st Pacific Squadron, was blockaded in the port while the Japanese landed armies to besiege the far-flung and isolated Manchurian installation. Facing the ignoble fate of being sunk at anchor by Japanese Army howitzers firing over the hills into the harbor, Admiral Vitgeft took command of the fleet, with his flag on the brand-new and recently patched-up Tsesarevich, and sailed out on 10 August 1904 to break the Japanese fleet in half– then make good their retreat to Vladivostok before that harbor was iced in for the winter.

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However, things soon turned pretty shitty for the Russians and within minutes, the Russian force of five battleships and four light cruisers and eight destroyers met Togo’s force of four battleships, two heavy cruisers, and seven light. After six hours of vain maneuvering on both sides, Tsesarevich was riddled with over a dozen large-caliber Japanese shells from the Japanese battleship Asahi that killed Vitgeft and shot up most of the ship’s topside.

While the Russian 2iC withdrew back into Port Arthur, (to have his new command sunk in December and his landlubber crews captured when that harbor fell to the Japanese January 2, 1905), Tsesarevich limped away into the night with three destroyers to try to make Vladivostok.

Computer generated image of a Borodino Class Battleship in action at Tsushima. Tsarevitch had her turn in the barrel in August 1904 and four out of five of her sisters would sink the following Spring in that epic naval clash.

Computer generated image of a Borodino Class Battleship in action at Tsushima. Tsarevitch had her turn in the barrel in August 1904 and four out of five of her sisters would sink the following Spring in that epic naval clash.

Unable to do make it Vladivostok due to smoke and sparks escaping from her nearly shot-away stacks, Tsesarevich  instead made for the closest non-Japanese harbor and was interned at the German treaty port of Tsingtao, to be nominally disarmed and sit out the rest of the war under the protection of the guns of the Kaiserlichemarine‘s Far East Squadron. There she remained even when the Japanese sank the Tsar’s Baltic Fleet (renamed the 2nd Pacific Squadron), rushed to avenge previous losses, at Tsushima.

Interned at Tsingtao, 1904.

Interned at Tsingtao, 1904.

Demolished compartment

Demolished compartment

Damage from more than a dozen hits from Togo's fleet

Damage from more than a dozen hits from Togo’s fleet

Damage to her side belt. Note the 6-inch turret

Damage to her side belt. Note the 6-inch turret

Splinters

Splinters

A Japanese 6-inch shell through her deck

A Japanese 6-inch shell through her deck

Another view

Another view

When the war ended that September, the rested Tsesarevich sailed back for the Baltic where she, along with her only surviving sister Slava, formed the backbone of the Baltic Fleet. For the next several years, the bruised veteran, the only Russian battleship to make it out of Port Arthur, had a quiet life that consisted mainly of summer cruises around the jetties of the Finnish coastline (then part of the Russian Empire), and winter cruises once that sea froze over to the Med and Atlantic.

Russian battleship Tsesarevich, in Baltic 1913. Note classic white scheme with cap bands. These were the salad-days of her life.

Russian battleship Tsesarevich, in Baltic 1913. Note classic white scheme with cap bands. These were the salad-days of her life.

When the next war erupted, she and Slava, still in their default roles as battle sisters of the Baltic, barred the gates to the Gulf of Finland, supported Russian army operations ashore through naval gunfire, and generally tried to avoid being sunk by the Kaiser’s U-boats.

Russian battleship Tsesarevich, a pre-dreadnought battleship of the Imperial Russian Navy, docked Krondsdat, ca. 1915. Note dark wartime scheme

Russian battleship Tsesarevich, a pre-dreadnought battleship of the Imperial Russian Navy, docked Krondsdat, ca. 1915. Note dark wartime scheme

In March 1917, her crew joined the general mutiny of the Baltic Fleet and several of her officers were cashiered at the point of a bayonet. With senior NCOs largely in command of understrength divisions, the ship fought alongside Slava at the Battle of Moon Sound in October. Sadly, Slava was destroyed and Tsesarevich (renamed Grazhdanin= Citizen), took a licking from the German Koenig class dreadnought battleship SMS Kronpriz (Crown Prince, talk about irony).

Tsesarevich dropping it like its hot. Her 4x12-inch and 12x6-inch guns were typical of pre-Dreadnought battleships.

Tsesarevich dropping it like its hot. Her 4×12-inch and 12×6-inch guns were typical of pre-Dreadnought battleships.

She retired to the Russian base at Kronstadt, where the British attempted to sink her during the Russian Civil War without luck while most of her sailors shipped out to fight alongside Red Guards in the Ukraine and Siberia. Deprived of the technical expertise to make the ship function, she never sailed again.

In March 1921, her remaining crew, mainly junior rates who had never seen blue water, mutinied with the bulk of the fleet, this time against the Reds. That didn’t work out so well as the Red Army soon invaded the naval base, killing over 1,000 sailors outright and executing 2600 more after the rebellion was put down.

A non-functional hulk, Tsesarevich/Grazhdanin was stricken 21 November 1925 and scrapped although some of her guns endured as coastal artillery pieces into WWII and likely a few fired rounds in anger against the Germans once more.

Of her wartime enemies, the Japanese battleship Asahi was sent to the bottom by an American submarine in WWII while the German SMS Kronpriz was scuttled 21 June 1919 in Gutter Sound, Scapa Flow after internment following WWI, where her wreck lies today.

 

Specs:

French profile for the Tsesarevich

French profile for the Tsesarevich

Displacement: 13,105 t (12,898 long tons)
Length: 118.5 m (388 ft. 9 in)
Beam: 23.2 m (76 ft. 1 in)
Draught: 7.92 m (26 ft. 0 in)
Installed power: 16,300 ihp (12,200 kW)
20 Belleville boilers
Propulsion: 2 shafts, 2 Vertical triple-expansion steam engines
Speed: 18 knots (33 km/h; 21 mph)
Range: 5,500 nmi (10,200 km; 6,300 mi) at 10 knots (19 km/h; 12 mph)
Complement: 778–79
Armament:
2 × 2 – 305 mm (12 in) guns
6 × 2 – 152 mm (6 in) guns
20 × 1 – 75 mm (3 in) guns
20 × 1 – 47 mm (1.9 in) guns
8 × 1 – 37 mm (1.5 in) guns
4 × 381 mm (15 in) torpedo tubes
Armor:
Krupp armor
Waterline belt: 160–250 mm (6.3–9.8 in)
Deck: 40–50 mm (1.6–2.0 in)
Main Gun turrets: 250 mm (9.8 in)
Barbettes: 250 mm (9.8 in)
Conning tower: 254 mm (10.0 in)

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!

Update to København mystery ship, new photos

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Last July I covered the mystery of the Danish school ship København, one of the largest sailing ships ever built at a staggering 430-feet long and 4,000-tons. She is also one of the most enduring mysteries of the sea, having vanished in the South Atlantic in late 1928, with not a soul of her 17 officers and 62 naval cadet crew ever seen again.

Well LSOZI reader Sue Trewartha from South Australia sent in a stack of old Kobenhavn photos for us to enjoy. You see the “Big Dane” was a regular in Australian waters on the wheat run– and in fact was making her way around the tip of South American headed Down Under when she vanished.

Sue tells me, “I have been collecting local and family history here at Ceduna since 1986 and have gathered these photos and chased up a little of the history of Kobenhavn as well.”

Many of these photos are from the collection of the Ceduna National Trust Museum and have rarely been seen. They are all large images so “click to big-up!”

This first one is the Kobenhavn at the Thevenard jetty. The jetty was only opened in 1920 and could handle large sailing ships http://www.ceduna.sa.gov.au/page.aspx?u=498#jetty . Ceduna National Trust Museum

This first one is the Kobenhavn at the Thevenard jetty. The jetty was only opened in 1920 and could handle large sailing ships. Ceduna National Trust Museum

Image by David Harding

Amidships image by David Harding

Painting signed by the captain of the Kobenhavn. (Christensen?) for Mr Vin Irwin. His daughter Helene Bourne shared this photo with us and is happy we use it. Vin Irwin was the provisioner to the ships in Cedena as he was the local market owner from 1912-1953. As such he built up a close relationship with the various captains.

Painting signed by the captain of the Kobenhavn (Christensen?) for Mr Vin Irwin. His daughter Helene Bourne shared this photo with us and is happy we use it. Vin Irwin was the provisioner to the ships in Cedena as he was the local market owner from 1912-1953. As such he built up a close relationship with the various captains.

At the jetty, group of locals on jetty. From the Ceduna National Trust.

At the jetty, group of locals on jetty. She truly was an impressive ship.
From the Ceduna National Trust.

Kobenhavn Captain. Image courtesy of Helene Bourne

Captain of the sailing ship Mexico, who was part of the search for the Kobenhavn. Image courtesy of Helene Bourne

Photo labeled sailors and locals on board. This photo is shared by the family of Percy Lange, Ceduna.

Photo labeled sailors and locals on board Kobenhavn. This photo is shared by the family of Percy Lange, Ceduna.

Train along docks with Kobenhavn in distance. Photo courtesy of Helene Bourne

Train along docks with Kobenhavn in distance. Photo courtesy of Helene Bourne

This photo shows Kobenhavn on the right, and possibly steam ship VARDULIA on the other side. the smaller boat may be one that has lightered bagged wheat from smaller ports in the area, into THEVENARD

This photo shows Kobenhavn on the right, and possibly steam ship VARDULIA on the other side. the smaller boat may be one that has lightered bagged wheat from smaller ports in the area, into THEVENARD

Kobenhavn being loaded with bagged wheat. Photo courtesy of Geoff Lowe of Ceduna

Kobenhavn being loaded with bagged wheat. Photo courtesy of Geoff Lowe of Ceduna

Kobenhavn tied to jetty no 2, Ceduna National Trust Museum.

Kobenhavn tied to jetty no 2, Ceduna National Trust Museum.

Thanks again Sue, and be sure to check out her group’s FB page for more great old photos.

Warship Wednesday Nov 12, 2014: The Centennial State’s Dreadnought

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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 Nov 12, 2014: The Centennial State’s Dreadnought

USS COLORADO WC

Here we see the beautiful art deco battleship USS Colorado (BB-45), the pinnacle of pre-WWII U.S. Naval warship design as represented by maritime artist Jim Tomlinson.

Arguably the most powerful class of battleship afloat in the world at the time, Colorado was head of her class of three ships that included USS Maryland, and Warship Wednesday alumni USS West Virginia.

Colorado (BB-45) leading, Maryland (BB-46) following. The 3 sisters can be distinguished from one another (during the 20's and early 30's) by the forward range dial. Colorado carries hers half below the bottom of the fire control tower, the Maryland carries hers fully on the face of the fire control tower while the West Virginia (BB-48) carries hers like the Colorado but her dials are black with white numbers. Text & photo i.d. courtesy of Chris Hoehn.Photo possibly by Frank Lynch, chief photographer of the Seattle Post-Intelligencer, circa 1929.Photo from the collection of Carrie Schmidt. Navsource http://www.navsource.org/archives/01/45a.htm

Colorado (BB-45) leading, Maryland (BB-46) following. The 3 sisters can be distinguished from one another (during the 20’s and early 30’s) by the forward range dial. Colorado carries hers half below the bottom of the fire control tower, the Maryland carries hers fully on the face of the fire control tower while the West Virginia (BB-48) carries hers like the Colorado but her dials are black with white numbers. Text & photo i.d. courtesy of Chris Hoehn. Photo possibly by Frank Lynch, chief photographer of the Seattle Post-Intelligencer, circa 1929, from the collection of Carrie Schmidt. Navsource . Click to bigup

Displacing nearly 35,000-tons at a full load, their rakish clipper bow set them apart from earlier US battlewagons and made them far drier, especially in rough weather. Turbo-electric transmission pushed four screws and could make 21-knots. Keeping enough oil in her bunkers for an 8000-mile round trip at half that, she was capable of crossing the Atlantic without an oiler to keep close to her.

Colorado just after commissioning. Note the rakish bow.

Colorado just after commissioning. Note the rakish bow.

Up to 13.5-inches of armor (18 on turret faces) shielded her while eight powerful 16-inch guns gave her tremendous ‘throw’. In fact, these guns were among the heaviest afloat until marginally outclassed by the North Carolina-class in 1941.

World War One

The closest rival in any fleet around the world to her in 1923 was the British HMS Hood. Hood was bigger and faster (47,000-tons, 31-knots) but had thin armor and 8-15-inch guns. The Japanese Nagato-class were also slightly larger (38,000-tons), slightly faster (25-knots), and 8x 16-inch guns, but like the Hood had less armor.

As a hold back of pre-WWI thinking, she was the last class of US battleships commissioned with torpedo tubes and a four-turret main battery.

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Ordered just eight months before the U.S. entered WWI, she was laid down at New York Shipbuilding Corporation in Camden New Jersey after the end of that conflict. Slow going post-war construction meant that she did not join the fleet until 30 Aug 1923.

A happy ship in the days between the two great wars of the 20th century, she made a maiden voyage to Europe to show off the big guns in every large port from England to Italy and then headed to the Pacific, where she joined the blue water navy based in California and Hawaii. During this next two decades, she performed typical peacetime missions such as NROTC cruises, gunnery exercises, fleet problems, and testing new equipment.

USS Colorado, overhead view 1932

USS Colorado, overhead view 1932. Note the two Vought O3U Corsair float planes on her stern, which Colorado carried since just after she was commissioned. These would be replaced by Curtiss Seagulls in 1936 and in turn by Curtiss Kingfishers.

USS Colorado at 1934 New York naval review. While stationed for most of her career in the Pacific, she did reach the East Coast from time to time via the...

USS Colorado at 1934 New York naval review with three early float biplanes. While stationed for most of her career in the Pacific, she did reach the East Coast from time to time via the…

 

...Panama Canal. Click to bigup.

…Panama Canal. Click to bigup.

pancernik-uss-colorado-bb-45

Early 1920s photo with Colorado without her catapult mounted on C turret and seaplanes. These were fitted in ~1928.

When the drums of war in the Pacific started beating in 1941, she was sent to Puget Sound Naval Yard for a one-year refit and upgrade. This saved her from the fate suffered by her sistership USS West Virginia, who absorbed at least 7 Japanese torpedoes on Dec. 7, 1941 while resting on Battleship Row.

With Maryland, who, suffering only two bomb hits at Pearl and likewise escaped destruction on that day of infamy, she formed the tiny reserve of battleships in the Pacific while the Navy was on the defensive. Then in 1943, she went to hard work and proved those mother big twenty-year-old guns of hers weren’t just pretty hood ornaments.

Bow view, port side of the Colorado (BB-45) 2 October 1944.

Bow view, port side of the Colorado (BB-45) 2 October 1944. She wore this camouflage scheme through most of the war.

She participated in no less than ten protracted amphibious operations with the Japanese forces between Nov 1943 and the end of the war including Tarawa, Kwajalein, Eniwetok, the Marianas, Leyte, Mindoro, Luzon and Okinawa. In all she fired over 60,000 shells in anger including 5,495 rounds of 16-inch at shore targets, totally nearly 7,000-tons of ordinance.

Colorado off Tarawa 1943

Colorado off Tarawa 1943

During WWII, she spent a total of 204 days in active combat, steaming an impressive 161,879 miles. In addition to this, she downed 11 Japanese aircraft while suffering over 400 casualties during the war from kamikazes and enemy fire.

Many of these losses occurred in duals with Japanese shore batteries. In the worst instance, Colorado was hit by 22 confirmed shells off Tinian July 24, 1944. However, that island was cleared out successfully in part to the ship’s sacrifice and just over a year later, a B-29 carrying the first Atomic bomb to be dropped in warfare took off from that little piece of rock to strike Hiroshima.

USS Colorado off Tinian 24-July-1944 with hull damage, the result of 22 hits from shore batteries

USS Colorado off Tinian 24-July-1944 with hull damage, the result of 22 hits from shore batteries

Okinawa Landing, U.S.S. Colorado,1945 Painting By Anthony Saunders.

Okinawa Landing, U.S.S. Colorado,1945 Painting By Anthony Saunders.

Colorado holds the all-time record of 37 consecutive days of firing at an enemy and the record of 24 direct enemy air attacks in 62 days both while at Okinawa.

Colorado 1945 Okinawa

Colorado 1945 Okinawa.Note her seaplanes are not present, likely airborne to help correct shot.

Finishing the war in Japanese home waters, being awarded ten battlestars. She was decommissioned 7 January 1947, just shy of 23 years of hard service. Sadly, after a dozen years on Bremerton’s red lead row of mothball ships, she was stricken and sold to Todd Shipyard for disposal. The Maritime Administration recovered $611,777.77 in her value as scrap metal.

colorado scrap 1959

Today her memory is kept alive by the USS Colorado Association who maintain an excellent website.

Although scrapped, parts of her remain in a number of memorials across the country. A half dozen of her 5/51’s are on the decks of the USS Olympia, Dewey’s old flagship, in Philadelphia. These include the ships wheel and bell in Boulder and one of her 5-inch guns in Seattle at the Museum of History and Industry.

Also in Seattle, where she was scrapped at Todd, her beautiful teak-wood decking was re-purposed in 1959 and used to line the cafeteria at the Boeing Developmental Center, where it is still in use today helping to shelter those who build the country’s warplanes.

ColoradoPlaque

As a side, if you ever get to Tinian, the 6-inch shore gun that fired at the Colorado (BB-45) and the Norman Scott (DD-640) in 1944 is still there, in much rusted condition.

Specs:

uss_bb_45_colorado_1942-03652
Displacement: 32,600 long tons
Length: 624 ft. 3 in (190.27 m)
Beam: 97 ft. 4 in (29.67 m)
Draft: 38 ft. (12 m)
Propulsion:
Four screws
Turbo-electric transmission
28,900 shp (22 MW) forward
Speed: 21 knots (39 km/h)
Range: 8,000 nautical miles (15,000 km) at 10 knots (19 km/h) (design)
Complement: 1,080
Armament:

(1923)
8 × 16 inch 45 caliber Mark 5 gun (4 × 2)
14 × 5 inch/51 caliber guns
2 × 21 inch torpedo tubes

(1928) 8 × 5 inch/25 caliber guns added

(1942)
8 – 16″45 main battery; 8 – 5″51 secondary battery; 8 – 5″25 AA;
8 – Quad 40mm AA; 1 quad 20mm AA; 8 twin 20mm AA; 39 single 20mm AA.

Armor:
Belt: 8–13.5 in (203–343 mm)
Barbettes: 13 in (330 mm)
Turret face: 18 in (457 mm)
Turret sides: 9–10 in (229–254 mm)
Turret top: 5 in (127 mm)
Turret rear 9 in (229 mm)
Conning tower: 11.5 in (292 mm)
Decks: 3.5 in (89 mm)
Aviation: one catapult, 2 float planes

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 Nov. 5, Mr. Bond’s Blowpipe-carrying smoke boat

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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 Nov. 5, Mr. Bond’s Blowpipe-carrying smoke boat

HMS Aeneas S-72 seen in 1971 coming alongside HMS Forth A-187 at Devonport Photo from Maritime Quest

HMS Aeneas S-72 seen in 1971 coming alongside HMS Forth A-187 at Devonport Photo from Maritime Quest 

Here we see the His Majesty’s submarine HMS Aeneas (P427, then S-72), an A-class diesel boat of the Royal Navy coming alongside HMS Forth A-187 at Devonport. She is named after the ancient Trojan hero who fought his way out of the burning city state.

Trojan hero Aeneas and the god Tiber, by Bartolomeo Pinelli.

Trojan hero Aeneas and the god Tiber, by Bartolomeo Pinelli.

The pinnacle of British submarine development in World War II, the crown ordered 46 “A-class” vessels in the last months of that conflict to serve in the Pacific. These 1600-ton submersibles, at 280.5-feet oal, were smaller than American fleet boats of the time and were more in-line with German and Italian designs of the era. Capable of a 10,500-nm range at an economical 11-knot, these were deep divers, capable of over 500-feet dive depth. With half-dozen forward tubes and four rear ones, these subs could tote 20 torpedoes in addition to their modest topside armament of a single 4-inch gun and a smattering of AAA pieces. Capable of being constructed in 8-months or less due to their modularity and all-welded final assembly, the boats were an improvement over the RN’s pre-war T-class boats.

HMS Aeneas at Britsol 1946. Compare this image with the one above to see the differences between the 1960s streamlining and the WWII outline.

HMS Aeneas at Britsol 1946. Compare this image with the one above to see the differences between the 1960s streamlining and the WWII outline.

When peace suddenly broke out (remember that the Japanese were expected to resist for another year or two before the atom bombs changed their mind), 30 of the class were canceled and just 16 completed. Of these boats, most were constructed at Vickers or by the HM Dockyards with only three completed by Cammell Laird, Birkenhead. Of those three, HMS Aeneas, laid down during the war was launched 9 October 1945, just a month after the Japanese surrender.

Inside the HMS Alliance, H.M. Submarine Aeneas sister. Photo by Marine Photography.

Inside the HMS Alliance, H.M. Submarine Aeneas sister. Photo by Marine Photography.

Used mainly for overseas patrol, the class spent most of the next three decades in quiet service. In the late 1940s Aeneas, along with 13 of her sisters, were modified with pneumatic extending “snort mast” snorkel devices patterned after German examples to enable them to travel just under the surface with only their breathing tube breaking the waves. An example of this capability was displayed by sister ship HMS Andrew which covered the 2500 miles from Bermuda to the UK in 13 days while submerged– a record only bested by nuclear-powered submarines.

However, this modification was not without troubles as sister HMS Affray reported hers “leaked like a sieve” and was thought for years to be the cause of that boat’s loss in 1951 with all hands.

In 1953 a number of the class were present at the Coronation fleet review of Queen Elizabeth II to include Aeneas. In the late 50s, she was streamlined and given more up-to-date sensors and the new pennant number S72.

The 1953 Spithead Coronation Review. H.M. Submarine Aeneas was there along with about a half dozen of her sisters.

The 1953 Spithead Coronation Review. H.M. Submarine Aeneas was there along with about a half dozen of her sisters.

Besides holding the line against the ever-growing numbers of Soviet U-boats creeping around the world’s oceans, and forward deployment to Canada for the Cuban Missile Crisis, the only tense service the class saw was in enforcing the Indonesia–Malaysia confrontation in which they were used to counter blockade-running junks. It was during this long-running operation that sistership HMS Aurochs was machine-gunned by an aircraft unknown off the coast of Indonesia in 1958. In this type of service, the boats made port calls in remote Pacific islands that rarely if ever logged a visit from the RN in modern times. They also carried a mottled camouflage scheme while performing this duty.

HMS Aeneas S-72 after modernization in 1961. Note the lack of surface armarment and the new sonar dome. Photo by Maritme quest

HMS Aeneas S-72 after modernization in 1961. Note the lack of surface armament and the new sonar dome. Photo by Maritime quest

The class did make appearances a number of films, with Andrew filling in for a U.S. nuclear submarine in the 1959 post-apocalyptic film On the Beach. Sistership Artemis appeared in a RN training film entitled Voyage North, from which stock submarine footage was lifted and reused in movies and TV shows for decades.

Aeneas however, one-upped her sisters by appearing in the Bond film You Only Live Twice in 1967.

Enjoy two very relevant minutes of You Only Live Twice in which Commander James Bond, RN arrives on a British submarine by being disguised in a funeral casket. The boat, “M1” in the film, is actually the Aeneas in her film debut; this was after she had been “streamlined” during her second refit, which removed much of her WWII appearance.

This fits into a classic story from a jack aboard the sub at the time:

“Coming down from Hong Kong to Sydney on HMS AENEAS we were looking for the loom of the light at Darwin. Our navigator was a Lieutenant RNR and a noted tosspot and womanizer. “Bridge to control room” – “Control Room! Tell the Captain I have seen the light” – “Bridge! Message passed to the Captain, from the Captain, about time too!”

The A-class were the last class of British submarine to have deck guns, with most retaining them into the 1960s while Andrew kept hers as late as 1974. During this time, Aeneas, long stripped of her WWII-era gun battery, was armed with something new for a submarine– a surface to air missile system.

SLAM installed on sail of H.M. Submarine Aeneas

SLAM installed on sail of H.M. Submarine Aeneas

Vickers set up the aging smoke boat with a set of Shorts Blowpipe MANPADS style surface to air missiles that were fitted to a retractable mast on the submarine’s sail in 1972. Called the Submarine-Launched Airflight Missile (SLAM) system, it held 4-6 missiles and could ideally shoot down low-flying helicopters and other aircraft while the submarine remained at periscope depth. While carrying the SLAM system, she was pennant number SSG72.

SLAM Blowpipe missile mast

SLAM Blowpipe missile mast

The problem was that the visually guided Blowpipe never was very good at downing aircraft and was generationaly in-line with the U.S. Redeye and Soviet SA-7 Grail (which weren’t very good either). After a series of trials, the idea was scrapped.

SLAM

(Note the paying off pennant) and the crest on her sail under the SLAM system which is still fitted. And during this time her unit crest was also modified. In place of a spear, the warrior Aeneas carried a stylized missile.

The class was largely disposed of in the early 1970s, replaced by more modern O-class diesel boats, and augmented by nuclear-powered submarines and several of the class were loaned to the Canadian navy to help jump start that service’s sub branch. Aeneas was one of the last to go, 14-Nov-1974 sold, 13-Dec-1974 arrived Clayton & Davie Dunston for scrapping. By 1975 she was no more.

Only Andrew, scrapped in 1977, and Alliance, who served as a pier side trainer at the RN Submarine School until 1979, survived the Bond ship.

HMS Alliance on public display.

HMS Alliance on public display.

Today Alliance is preserved as part of the National Historic Fleet on land and on display at the Royal Navy Submarine Museum in Gosport, as a memorial to Her Majesty’s 4 334 RN submariners lost in both World Wars and the 739 officers and men lost in peacetime accidents.

Aeneas‘s 4″ Mk XXIII deck gun, removed in 1960, is preserved at the Royal Navy Armament Museum at Priddy’s Head, Gosport, near HMS Dolphin.

Specs

Fgallery7-2
Displacement: 1,360/1,590 tons (surface/submerged)
Length: 293 ft. 6 in (89.46 m)
Beam: 22 ft. 4 in (6.81 m)
Draught: 18 ft. 1 in (5.51 m)
Propulsion: 2 × 2,150 hip Admiralty ML 8-cylinder diesel engine, 2 × 625 hip electric motors for submergence driving two shafts
Speed: 18.5/8 knots (surface/submerged)
Range: 10,500 name (19,400 km) at 11 kn (20 km/h) surfaced
16 nmi (30 km) at 8 kn (15 km/h) or 90 nmi (170 km) at 3 kn (5.6 km/h) submerged
Test depth: 350 ft (110 m)
Sensors (1946) 291, ‘handraulic’ Radar Set with a double di-pole aerial with only an ‘A’ Scan and no PPI
Complement: 5 officers 55 enlisted, up to 75 could be carried to include commandos and MI6 agents as needed.
Armament: 6 × 21″ (2 external) bow torpedo tube, 4 × 21″ (2 external) stern torpedo tube, total of 20 torpedoes,
Mines: 26
Guns: 1 × 4″ main deck gun, 3 × 0.303 machine gun, 1 × 20 mm AA Oerlikons 20 mm gun (removed 1960). Missiles: SLAM system fitted 1972-74.

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