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Warship Wednesday, June 19th Carriers Under the Sea

Posted on June 19, 2013 by laststandonzombieisland 3 comments

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

– Christopher Eger

Warship Wednesday, June 19th

Here we see the Sen Toku I-400-class (I-yonhyaku-gata Sensuikan) giant submarine aircraft carrier I-401 at sunset. It’s an appropriate picture as the submersible was at the time one of the last remaining units of the WWII Imperial Japanese Navy left afloat in the world. The IJN’s battle flag was the now-infamous Rising Sun, and this beautiful picture was taken of the I-401 at sunset, as a captured prize ship of the US Navy, sitting in Pearl Harbor in 1946.

In 1942, the war in the Pacific was still winnable for Japan, and Admiral Isoroku Yamamoto conceived of a class of huge submersible warships, 18 overall, that could carry an armada of 54 submarine-launched attack floatplanes to attack far off strategic US targets such as the Panama Canal, or fuel manufacture/storage facilities on the West Coast, or logistical hubs like American Samoa. Furthermore, the ships would be capable of circumnavigating the earth 1.5 times (37,000 miles!) on one full load of fuel, which would enable even targets on the US East Coast within the reach of the Japanese Navy.

To make such a capable submarine in 1942 under wartime conditions was a challenge. Nevertheless, you have to admire the audacious plan. Each of these I-400 boats had to be some 400-feet long with a very wide beam to be able to carry and launch up to three combat airplanes. This gave them a displacement of some 6700 tons and an immense crew of over 140, including air wing. When you compare this to the subs of the time, they are super-sized. Even looking at today’s HY-80 steel nuclear propelled boats, the I-400s are larger than many of the modern hunter-killer of the sea. For example, the backbone of the US Navy since 1976, the “688 Boats” of the Los Angeles class SSNs have a length of 362 feet and a surfaced displacement of 6.082-tons.

The Germans helped a lot with the design, giving the Japanese the plans for the aircraft catapult as well as supplying them with snorkels and periscopes. Unlike many subs of the day, the I-400s had both air and surface search radars as well as a primitive radar warning receiver and sonar absorbing anechoic tile.

The I-400s had a huge armament punch. Not only could they carry a trio of M6A1 Seiran (Mountain Haze) attack planes, each of which could carry a 1800-pound bomb or torpedo load out to 300-miles from the submarine and return, but the ship itself carried 8 21-inch torpedo tubes, with 24 Type 95 torpedos, a 140mm deck gun and a number of 25mm cannons for small surface ships and aircraft defense. The Type 95 is considered by many to be the best torpedo of WWII, being an advanced design of the famous Long Lance, it had a 51-knot speed and a 1200-pound warhead, a performance envelope that is still formidable today.

The Seirans were to be launched via a 85-foot long compressed-air catapult mounted on the forward deck. A well-trained crew of four men could roll a Seiran out of its hangar on a collapsible catapult carriage, attach the plane’s pontoons and have it readied for flight in approximately 7 minutes. Although to get all three airplanes off the boat took up to 30-minutes.

The Gatun Locks at the Panama canal were supposed to be the I401s first target

Well, all did not go as planned for the I-400s. After Yammoto was killed in 1943, the Japanese Navy saw little use for the program and started slowly canceling the ships. Just three I-400s were finished and only two, I-400 and I-401, ever went to sea. Their primary reason for being, the Seiran float-plane, had only 28 examples made.

Commissioned 8 January 1945, I-401 was a late comer to the war. Already the US Navy had recaptured the Philipines and was breathing hard on the Japanese home islands. By June the two boats and a crew of float plane pilots were practising on wooden mock-ups of the Panama canal locks in preparation for their first attack. At the last-minute, the plan was halted and the two I-400s were sent to attack Ulithu Atoll, the forward base of the US Navy’s fast carriers. At any given time the US Navy had up to a dozen carriers there on “Murders Row”, taking a break from the war. To give the six Seirans a fighting chance against up to 2000 US aircraft and thousands of anti-aircraft guns in the atoll, they were painted in US markings and refitted as kamikaze aircraft.

Murderers Row at Ulithi atoll was the target of two submarines and six floatplanes.

Murderers Row at Ulithi atoll was the target of two submarines and six Seiran floatplanes.

While at sea on the way to the atoll, the war ended and the I-400 and 401 surrendered to US forces. Both ships shot away their torpedoes, threw their artillery shells overboard, and shot their unmanned floatplanes off the deck into the deep ocean. I401 surrendered to the USS Segundo (SS-398), a Balao-class submarine less than half her size.

The floatplanes on the I400 and 401 were given US markings and looked almost like a P-51 with a set of floats.

Both the I400 and I401 were taken to Pearl Harbor by prize crews where they were inspected at length by the US Navy. Odds were they would have been kept for years, and one of them may have even still been around as a trophy ship had the Soviets not wanted to inspect them. To prevent the Russkis from getting to the amazing Japanese-German hybrid tech of the I400s, the Navy sunk them as targets off Hawaii in 1946.

The US navy had these ships for almost nine months, and they would probably be gracing a museum somewhere, had it not been for the Russians.

The US navy had these ships for almost nine months, and they would probably be gracing a museum somewhere today, had it not been for the Russians.

The I-401 was rediscovered in 2005 about a mile off Barber’s Point in 2600-feet of water. A few of her parts were saved prior to sinking, including the 140mm gun sight which is currently displayed at the Yokohama WWII Japanese Military Radio Museum.

The only remaining Seiran floatplane, captured intact at the Aichi Aircraft Factory following the end of the war in August 1945, is at the Smithsonian Air and Space Museum on current display.

True to Yammaoto’s vision, at least one Seiran made it all the way to Washington DC, just not how he thought it would.

In a twist of fate, the USS Segundo (SS-398), captor of the I-401, was herself sunk as a target by the USS Salmon (SSR/SS/AGSS-573), a Sailfish-class submarine, in 1970, her usefulness past. It should go without saying that the Salmon likewise was sent to the bottom 5 June 1993, as a target by the US Navy. History is funny like that.

Specs

Displacement:    5,223 long tons (5,307 t) surfaced
6,560 long tons (6,665 t) submerged
Length:    122 m (400 ft)
Beam:    12 m (39 ft)
Draft:    7 m (23 ft)
Propulsion:    Diesel-electric
4 diesel engines, 7,700 hp (5,700 kW)
Electric motors, 2,400 hp (1,800 kW)
Speed:    18.75 knots (21.58 mph; 34.73 km/h) surfaced
6.5 kn (7.5 mph; 12.0 km/h) submerged
Range:    37,500 nmi (69,500 km) at 14 kn (16 mph; 26 km/h)
Test depth:    100 m (330 ft)
Complement:    144
Armament:    • 8 × 533 mm (21 in) forward torpedo tubes
• 20 × Type 95 torpedoes
• 1 × 14 cm/40 11th Year Type naval gun
• 3 × 25 mm (0.98 in) 3-barrel machine gun
• 1 × 25 mm machine gun
Aircraft carried:    3 × Aichi M6A1 Seiran sea-planes

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

They are possibly one of the best sources of naval lore http://www.warship.org/naval.htm

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

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

I’m a member, so should you be!

Warship Wednesday, June 12 The Tsars Lost Eagle

Posted on June 12, 2013 by laststandonzombieisland Leave a comment

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

Warship Wednesday, June 12, 2013

Here we see the Tsar’s mighty new battleship Orel (Russian for Eagle) in all of her black-painted brooding majesty as she sat at Krondstadt harbor in 1904. She looks like a ship in morning and for good reason, her country is at war with upstart Imperial Japan and she was soon to sail to the far-off Pacific to put things right.

Built at the Galerniy Island Shipyards, Saint Petersburg, she was brand new, only completed finally in October 1904. A Borodino-class battleship, she was the pinnacle of pre-dreadnought design. Weighing in at nearly 15,000 tons full load, she was armed with four 12-inch guns and a dozen six inchers besides a huge battery of smaller 75 and 47mm rifles to ward away torpedo boats. She could make 18-knots which was pretty fast for these types of ships. The thing is, to get this fast, she was comparatively lightly armored. It had long been a rule of thumb to armor battleships against the same size cannon they carried in inches (example, since she had 12-inch guns, her main belt should be 12-inches thick, with turrets and conning tower a little heavier). Instead, the Orel had a belt that ran 5-7 inches and her strongest armor was on her two main turrets of just 10-inches.

Oh well, you can’t have everything. At least it was good German Krupp armor and not that junk Harvey stuff. Trust me, where she was going, she was gonna need it.

The Orel's path was the long blue line. Sucks to be a Baltic battleship wih short legs on an 18,000 mile shakedown cruise

The Orel’s path was the long blue line. Sucks to be a Baltic battleship with short legs on an 18,000-mile shakedown cruise

Still, with her paint wet and her crew largely as new as the ship itself, her shakedown cruise was epic. She joined the 27 other Baltic fleet ships in the force designated as the 2nd Pacific Squadron (the first was trapped at Port Arthur by the Japanese) and set sail 18,000 miles to break the siege of that far off port. During the epic voyage, which predated that of the Great White Fleet by a half-decade, Orel was overloaded with coal at all times which made keeping sea hard and limited the vital underway training her crew needed to simply shovel coal.

Some 2000 tons overloaded with coal piled on deck, stacked in every compartment, and even piled around the shells in the magazines, this is how the Orel looked for most of her first and final voyage for the Tsar. Pretty safe freeboard!

Two months at sea and still more than 10,000 miles away, Port Arthur surrendered to the Japanese. Instead of logically turning back for the Baltic, the fleet under Admiral Zinovy Rozhestvensky pressed on, coaling at French ports around the world. By May 1905 the Russian fleet was trying to run the Straits of Tsushima between Japan and Korea. With a sneak attack preceded by seven months of foreshadowing, Japanese Admiral Tōgō Heihachirō met the 28 Russian ships with 89 of his own, a great tactical position, and all guns and tubes loaded.

The Orel had a pivotal part in the worst naval defeat in history.

The resulting battle, known as the ‘Battle of Tsushima’ in most of the world and ‘Holy Shit We Just Lost a Whole Fleet’ in Imperial Russia, was possibly the most one-sided naval engagement in history. Of the 8 Russian battleships in the line, 7 were sent to the bottom along with over 4300 brave Tsarist sailors. The Japanese lost a couple torpedo boats and 117 sailors.

But what about the 8th battleship?– well, that’s Orel‘s story.

She was itching to get into the fight and fired the first shots of the battle. She got her licks back from the Japanese. During the battle, Orel was hit by no less than five 12-inch, two 10-inch (254 mm), nine 8-inch (203 mm), 39 six-inch shells, and 21 smaller rounds or fragments. Although the ship had many large holes in the unarmored portions of her side, she was only moderately damaged as all of the four (one 12-inch and three 6-inch) shells that hit her side armor failed to penetrate.

The left gun of her forward 12-inch turret had been struck by an eight-inch sell that broke off its muzzle and another eight-inch shell struck the roof of the rear 12-inch turret and forced it down, which limited the maximum elevation of the left gun. Two six-inch gun turrets had been jammed by hits from eight-inch shells and one of them had been burnt out by an ammunition fire. Another turret had been damaged by a 12-inch shell that struck its supporting tube. Splinters from two 6-inch shells entered the conning tower and wounded Captian Nikolay Viktorovich Yung badly enough he was unconscious for the rest of the battle and later died of his wounds. Casualties totaled 43 crewmen killed and approximately 80 wounded.

Seven-month-old battleship…slightly used.

A battered wreck that had taken tremendous punishment, the remaining crew pulled down her flag to stop the fight. Captain Yung’s body was buried at sea with full military honors after the surrender. As far as I can tell, it was the last time in Naval history that a capital ship was captured at sea after a battle.

The Japanese took her into service as the battleship Iwami although she needed nearly two years in a shipyard before she could serve again under her new flag. Her British made Bellville boilers were replaced by Japanese-built Miyabara boilers as well as her whole above-deck superstructure rebuilt. As her secondary armament was French made by Canet, the Japanese replaced it as well.

She continued to be used as a coastal defense ship throughout World War One and then as the flagship of the 90,000 man Japanese Army force that landed in Vladivostok during the Russian Civil War (1917-21)– just to rub the Russians faces in it a little further.

Odds are the Japanese would have kept her around as a trophy till this day but the battered and rebuilt warship’s tonnage counted against her in the Washington Naval Agreement, and she was disarmed used as a target ship for aircraft (see December 1941 for how that worked out) and her remains scrapped in 1925. Ironically, her service with the Japanese Navy was for almost twenty years while her service with the Russians was only seven months, and she spent most of her time in Russian waters flying the banner of the Rising Sun.

Specs
Displacement:    14,151 long tons (14,378 t)
Length:    397 ft (121.0 m)
Beam:    76 ft 1 in (23.2 m)
Draft:    29 ft 2 in (8.9 m)
Installed power:    15,800 ihp (11,782 kW)
20 Belleville boilers
Propulsion:    2 shafts, 2 Triple-expansion steam engines
Speed:    18 knots (33 km/h; 21 mph)
Range:    2,590 nmi (4,800 km; 2,980 mi) at 10 knots (19 km/h; 12 mph)
Complement:    28 officers, 826 enlisted men
Armament:    2 × 2 – 12 in (305 mm) guns
6 × 2 – 6 inches (152 mm) guns
20 × 1 – 75 mm (3 in) guns
20 × 1 – 47 mm (1.9 in) guns
4 × 1 – 15 in (381 mm) torpedo tubes
Armor:    Krupp armor
Belt: 7.64–5.7 inches (194–145 mm)
Deck: 1–2 inches (25–51 mm)
Turrets: 10 inches (254 mm)

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

They are possibly one of the best sources of naval lore http://www.warship.org/naval.htm .

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

I’m a member, so should you be!

Warship Wednesday, June 5 The Graf

Posted on June 5, 2013 by laststandonzombieisland Leave a comment

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

– Christopher Eger

Warship Wednesday, June 5

Here we see the Panzerschiff Admiral Graf Spee as she looked at her finest at the Coronation Review for English King George VI at Spithead in May 1937. Just 17-months old in this picture, she would become one of the most hunted of all German ships in the beginning of World War Two just two years later– by the very fleet she steamed with on this day.

Laid down at Reichsmarinewerft, Wilhelmshaven on 1 October 1932, she was the first new German ‘battleship’ since the 1919 Treaty of Versailles to replace the 30-year old pre-dreadnought battleship SMS Braunschweig. Officially weighing just 10,000-tons (the treaty limit) and classified simply as a ‘Armored ship’ (Panzerschiff), she was portrayed as simply a really big cruiser.

However her full load displacement was nearly 17,000-tons (the same as an early WWI battle cruiser) and she carried a half-dozen 280mm (11-inch) SK C/28 naval guns, whereas most cruisers had nothing larger than 8-inches. Western media called her and her other two Deutschland class sisters ‘pocket battleships’ as they could effectively sink any warship but.

The ship’s hull was constructed with transverse steel frames; over 90 percent of the hull used welding instead of the then standard riveting, which saved 15 percent of her total hull weight. This savings allowed the armament and armor to be increased. The hull contained twelve watertight compartments and were fitted with a double bottom that extended for 92 percent of the length of the keel. Four sets of 9-cylinder, double-acting, two-stroke diesel engines further saved weight over huge oil-fired turbines while also giving the ship an amazing 10,000-mile range. This made her the perfect long range surface raider.

When the clouds of war started to form in 1939, Admiral Raeder sent the Graf Spee out to the Atlantic so that she would not be caught in the Baltic and bottled up by the Royal Navy. For the first four months of the war she ranged the South Atlantic, sinking nine Allied merchant ships as a surface raider. She was encountered by the three British cruisers: HMS Exeter (10,000-tons, 6×8-inch guns), HMNZS Achilles and HMS Ajax (9700-tons, 8×6-inch guns). In the resulting running Battle of the River Plate on 13 December 1939, the Spee gave better than she got. All three British smaller British cruisers were badly mauled, suffering over 100 casualties.

However one of Exeter‘s 8 inch shells had penetrated two decks before exploding in Graf Spee’s funnel area—destroying her raw fuel processing system and leaving her with just 16 hours fuel, insufficient to allow her to return home. With her legs cut off, her desalination plant wrecked, her kitchen burnt and 70% of her 11-inch shells expended, Spee made for Uruguay where she hoped to either make repairs or be interned. However the Uruguayans ordered her to sea in 72 hours into the waiting arms of the British fleet. British Intelligence deceived the Germans into believing that a much larger force lay just offshore, ready to destroy the battered Graf Spee when she emerged.

Rather than suffer outright defeat to a seemingly superior force, the ship’s captain, Hans Langsdorff ordered her evacuated and scuttled. After all, the ship herself was named after a German admiral who was killed at sea in defeat by a larger British force in the First World War. Landing most of his crew ashore, he sailed her to the edge of Montevideo harbor and blew her magazines.

More than 1000 of her crew were interned in Argentina during the war while Hans Langsdorff himself shot himself while wearing his dress uniform.

She has been slowly salvaged by various countries and teams since 1939 but most of the ship is still in Montevideo. Her 660-pound, nine foot wide eagle figurehead was recovered from the stern of the ship in 2006 by a team of divers who loosened 145 bolts to free the ornament.

Odds are, no one has seen the last of the Graf.

Specs
Displacement: Design:
14,890 t (14,650 long tons; 16,410 short tons)
Full load:
16,020 long tons (16,280 t)

Length:    186 m (610 ft 3 in)
Beam:    21.65 m (71 ft 0 in)
Draft:    7.34 m (24 ft 1 in)
Propulsion:

Eight MAN diesel engines
Two propellers
52,050 shp (38,810 kW)

Speed:    29.5 knots (55 km/h)
Range:    8,900 nautical miles (16,500 km; 10,200 mi) at 20 knots (37 km/h; 23 mph)
Complement:    As built:

33 officers
586 enlisted

After 1935:

30 officers
921–1,040 enlisted

Sensors and
processing systems: 1940:

FMG 39 G(gO)

1941:

FMG 40 G(gO)
FuMO 26

Armament: As built:

6 × 28 cm (11 in) in triple turrets
8 × 15 cm (5.9 in) in single turrets
8 × 53.3 cm (21.0 in) torpedo tubes

Armor:

main turrets: 140 mm (5.5 in)
belt: 80 mm (3.1 in)
deck: 45 mm (1.8 in)

Aircraft carried: Two Arado Ar 196 seaplanes
Aviation facilities: One catapult
If you liked this column, please consider joining the International Naval Research Organization

(INRO)

They are possibly one of the best sources of naval lore http://www.warship.org/naval.htm The International Naval Research Organization is a non-profit corporation dedicated to the encouragement of the study of naval vessels and their histories, principally in the era of iron and steel warships (about 1860 to date). Its purpose is to provide information and a means of contact for those interested in warships.

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

I’m a member, so should you be!

Warship Wednesday, May 29 First US Torpedo Boat

Posted on May 29, 2013 by laststandonzombieisland 2 comments

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

– Christopher Eger

Warship Wednesday, May 29

Here we see the first US torpedo boat, USS Cushing (TB-1). Torpedo boats were a daring new concept in the late 18th century. These small Davids were thought capable of using their amazingly fast speed (23knots!) to leap out of the narrows in a littoral and pumping a locomotive powered torpedo into the hull of a Goliath battleship, sending the ship of the line to the bottom for its troubles.

She originally carried a white paint scheme and was in 1898 changed to a dark green for camouflage. Note the framework for her canvas deck awning. The awning is shown installed in the picture below.

Cushing was the first of her type in US service and one of the first in the world. She was preceded by the HMS Lightning in 1876. The Lightning, a 87-foot long steamship that could do 18-knots didn’t look like much but she carried a pair of Whitehead torpedoes. This sent tremors across the seas and the USN’s answer to this was Cushing.

Authorized in August 1886, Cushing was completed and commissioned 22 April 1890, given the name of one of the most famous of all swashbuckling bluejackets of the Civil War. She spent most of her career at the Naval Torpedo Station in Newport where she raised a young crop of the US Navy’s first destroyer-men. Only 140-feet long, she could float in just 4-feet of water. Her two dozen officers and men were used to man the 2 6-pounder guns and fire her three above water torpedo tubes. From 1890 to 1897 she carried Howell Mk1 locomotive torpedoes (one of which was just found last week off the California coast) and after 1897 she carried the more effective Whitehead type.

Cushing at speed with her dark green paint scheme. Note how low she sat to the water. In February 1898 she lost Ensign John Cable Breckenridge overboard in heavy seas. These were not boats that you wanted to be above deck on in a good sea state.

When the Spanish-American War erupted in 1898, Cushing performed picket patrol in the Florida Straits and courier duty for the North Atlantic Fleet. She captured five small Cuban ships during the war and escorted them into harbor. She was decommissioned later that year after the peace had been declared.

Truth be told, this innovative ship was already made obsolete by ever faster TBs of bigger size and with larger armament. The entire torpedo boat concept itself was largely negated by 1905 when heavy gun-armed Torpedo Boat Destroyers could make mince meat of the smaller TBs before they could close on the battleships, spoiling their shots. Indeed in the world’s largest use of steam-powered torpedo boats, the 1904-1905 Russo-Japanese war, some 300 torpedoes were launched by both sides yet only 21 hit their target.

From 1898 to 1920 this is how Cushing spent most of her time.

With all this in mind, Cushing was kept around as a second-string reserve ship. A partially dismantled dockside trainer for testing and evaluation purposes for two decades. Finally in 1920 she was towed out to sea and sunk, as a target.

Specs
Type:    Torpedo boat
Displacement:    116 long tons (118 t)
Length:    140 ft (43 m)
Beam:    15 ft 1 in (4.60 m)
Draft:    4 ft 10 in (1.47 m)
Installed power:    1,600 ihp (1,200 kW)
Propulsion:    2 × vertical quadruple-expansion reciprocating steam engines
2 × Thornycroft boilers
2 × screws
Speed:    23 kn (26 mph; 43 km/h)
Complement:    22 officers and enlisted
Armament:    2 × 6-pounder (57 mm (2.24 in)) guns
3 × 18 in (460 mm) torpedo tubes (3×1)

If you liked this column, please consider joining the International Naval Research Organization (INRO) They are possibly one of the best sources of naval lore http://www.warship.org/naval.htm
The International Naval Research Organization is a non-profit corporation dedicated to the encouragement of the study of naval vessels and their histories, principally in the era of iron and steel warships (about 1860 to date). Its purpose is to provide information and a means of contact for those interested in warships.

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

I’m a member, so should you be!

Warship Wednesday, May 22 The Mighty Miss

Posted on May 22, 2013 by laststandonzombieisland Leave a comment

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

– Christopher Eger

Warship Wednesday, May 22

Mississippi as a brand new battleship in WWI complete with lattice masts and disruptive anti-U boat camouflage

Here we see the New Mexico class battleship USS Mississippi (BB-41) in about 1918. The Mighty Miss had a career much longer than most other WWI-era battleships and gave good service for over forty years.

Laid down just a few months after the start of WWI in Europe, she was commissioned 18 December 1917 some eight months after the entry of the US into the Great War. Built as a oil-fired ship (most other warships of the era were coal burners), her WWI career was spent largely in US waters, a fleet in being along the US East Coast should the High Seas Fleet of Kaiser Wilhelm ever make a sortie to New York. In 1931 she was overhauled and modernized, spending almost all of the time period from 1919-1941 in the Pacific.

(Notice the much lower masts and more streamlined look. She was one of the most modern battleships of WWI, but sadly was pushing obsolescence by 1940)

She would have been at Pearl Harbor more than likely alongside her sisters New Mexico and Idaho, but all three ships were sent to the Atlantic in June 1941 to help enforce the neutrality patrol against Nazi U-Boats. Once the Japanese struck in the Pacific however, Mississippi and her sisters were sent racing back to the Pacific. For the first several months of the war she protected convoys up and down the West Coast as California braced for invasion. In 1943 she helped protect the landings in the Aleutian Islands. After conducting shore bombardments in Peleiu, Makin Island, Kwajalein, and others, she found herself in the last Battleship vs Battleship action– the Battle of Suriago Strait. There, Mississippi herself fired the final salvo in history by a battleship against other warships– contributing to the sinking of Japanese battleship Yamashiro.

(Again with the camouflage. During WWII her armament of anti-aircraft guns steadily increased)

More shore bombardments in the Philippines and Okinawa took place before she witnessed the surrender of Japan in Tokyo Bay, winning a total of eight battle stars. In 1946, while most of the rest of the pre-1938 US battleships were laid up and/or scrapped, Mississippi was reclassified from BB-41 to AG-128 (auxiliary, gunnery training/guided missile ship) and spent the next decade as a platform for development of surface to air and surface to surface missiles. For this her rear turrets were removed to give a platform of missile launchers. Without her, the RIM-2 Terrier and Petrel missiles would never have been adopted.

Mississippi firing Terrier missiles in 1955. This hybrid missile/gun arrangement was a wet-dream for battleship advocates for the next fifty years. When the Iowa class were eventually recommissioned in the early 1980s, they were given 16 harpoon anti-ship missiles and 32 Tomahawk cruise missiles in place of a few of the 5-inch twin mounts, but never a large SAM complement as envisioned earlier.

Stricken in 1956, at the time she was the last pre-WWII battleship in active service with the US Navy. Of the 12 WWII era US dreadnoughts, only three of the Iowa class were on active duty when Mississippi was decommissioned. The other 9 much newer North Carolina, SoDak, Alaska, and Iowa-class battleships and battle cruisers all being laid up in red lead row as members of the mothball fleet. Within a few years all of these except the Iowas would be pulled from mothballs and sent either to live the rest of their lives as museum ships, or broken up.

Mississippi herself was scrapped without ceremony at the end of 1956, just shy of her 40th birthday. Today knick knacks of the ship sail beneath the sea with the modern Virgina-class submarine USS Mississippi, after being carried for a while by a large nuclear-powered guided missile cruiser of the same name while her bell and silver set are on display in her home state.
Specs
Displacement: 32,000 long tons (32,500 t)
Length:    624 ft (190 m)
Beam:    97.4 ft (29.7 m)
Draft:    30 ft (9.1 m)
Speed:    21 kn (24 mph; 39 km/h)
Complement: 55 officers, 1,026 enlisted
Armament:     (1917)
12 × 14 in (360 mm) guns,
14 × 5 in (130 mm)/51 cal guns
4 × 3 in (76 mm) guns, and
2 × 21 in (530 mm) torpedo tubes
Armor:
Belt: 8–13.5 in (203–343 mm)
Barbettes: 13 in (330 mm)
Turret face: 18 in (457 mm)
Turret sides: 9–10 in (229–254 mm)
Turret top: 5 in (127 mm)
Turret rear 9 in (229 mm)
Conning tower: 11.5 in (292 mm)
Decks: 3.5 in (89 mm)

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

They are possibly one of the best sources of naval lore http://www.warship.org/naval.htm

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

I’m a member, so should you be!

Warship Wednesday, May 15 The First Night Carrier

Posted on May 15, 2013 by laststandonzombieisland 2 comments

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

– Christopher Eger

Warship Wednesday, May 15

Here we see the light carrier USS Independence (CV/CVL-22). Began as the light cruiser USS Amsterdam (CL-59) in 1940, she was converted while still at New York Shipbuilding Corp., Camden, N.J to help fill the urgent and pressing need for fast carriers after Pearl Harbor. A 30/30 ship, she could make 30+ knots and carry 30+ aircraft while having legs long enough to cross the Pacific and operate on her own for a few weeks before she needed to find an oiler. While she was much smaller than a regular fleet carrier such as the Enterprise that could carry 80-90 aircraft, she could still put a few squadrons in the air.

In effect, she was good-enough.

Above you see a scale model of the USS Duluth (CL-87) compared to the USS Belleau Wood (CVL-24) both are directly related to the Indy. The Duluth is a Cleavland-class cruiser and is what the Indy was originally ordered to be. The Belleau Wood underwent to same conversion that Indy did. Notice the similarity in the hull. Both ships only differed above the 01 deck.

When Independence was commissioned on January 14th 1943, the only other carriers in the fleet of the original 8 that started WWII were the Enterprise and Saratoga who were fighting for their lives off the Solomons, and the small USS Ranger which was up to her ass in U-Boats in the Atlantic. The new USS Essex had commissioned just a couple of weeks earlier and was in shakedown. The old carrier Langley, converted to a seaplane tender, had been lost early in the war, the huge Lexington was sent to the bottom at the Battle of the Coral Sea, Yorktown lost at Midway, Wasp and Hornet (stricken literally the day before Independence was commissioned from the Naval List) lost in the Solomons.

In short, the Indy came just in time and she was put to hard work fast. Before the year was out she was conducting raids off Marcus Island, Rabaul, and the Gilberts– tying down Japanese forces needed elsewhere. It was in these raids that the Indy picked up a torpedo (one of a half-dozen fired at her) in her starboard quarter. As this was repaired, she received a new air-group, an additional catapult, and a new mission– that of a night carrier.

The first full-time night Air Group was Air Group 41, established through the drive and persistence of Lt. Commander Turner F Caldwell. He commissioned VF(N)-79 in January 1944, training at NAAF Charlestown, Rhode Island. While at Charlestown Caldwell sold his idea of an ‘pure’ night air group to anyone who would listen. With the availability of the CVL Independence Caldwell got his wish. VF(N)-75 was dissolved and reformed as VF(N)-41, with an enlarged TBM contingent designated as VT(N)-41. Total size of the Air Group was 14 F6F-5N’s, 5 F6F-5’s and 12 TBM Avengers. Independence sailed for Eniwetok at the end of July 1944 to join Task Force 38. Air Group 41 finished it’s tour in January 1945. In that time it had claimed 46 kills, but lost ten of it’s 35 night fighter pilots in action, A further three were lost to operational causes – a tribute to the high training standards and skill of the group. The CVL Independence was the only light carrier to be completely equipped with a Night Air Group. Later in 1945 several large carriers and even a much smaller Jeep Carrier (CVE-108 Kula Gulf) went to Night Groups including Enterprise, Saratoga and Bon Homme Richard— but the Indy was the first.

By the end of the war she held 8 battlestars.

The Japanese couldn’t sink her, so the Navy decided to use her for testing. Since the USN had dozens of brand new fleet carriers of the Essex types, it didn’t need the old Indy anymore. Therefore, she was only 1/2 mile from ground zero on 1 July 1946 when the A-bomb went off in the Bikini Atoll tests. When she didn’t sink, they used her again for another A-bomb test three weeks later. Still afloat, she was only scuttled in 1951 off the coast of San Fransisco. Five of her remaining sisters pressed on and were used during the Cold War as transports, anti-submarine carriers, and as the first modern carriers that the French and Spanish navies had– one, the former USS Cabot, even tested the first Harriers at sea.

Indy is just to the right of the giant column of water that is much wider than she is long….

In the end you can say that the Indy had a hard life in her eight years above water to say the least.

Today, even after being under 3100-feet of seawater for 60 years, she is still on the job. You see ,she took down 70,000 sealed barrels of 1940s radioactive materiel with her which she is guarding in the forever night of the deep ocean and is forbidden to dive on using any means.

In a way, she is still a night carrier, with a very dangerous cargo.

Specs:
Displacement: 11,000 tons standard; 15,100 tons full load
Dimensions (wl): 600′ x 71′ 6″ x 26′ (max) / 182.9 x 21.8 x 7.9 (max) meters
Dimensions (max.): 622′ 6″ x 109′ 2″ / 189.7 x 33.3 meters
Armor: no side belt (2″ belt over fwd magazine); 2″ protective deck(s); 0.38″ bridge; 5″/3.75″ bhds; 5″ bhds, 2.25″ above, 0.75″ below steering gear
Power plant: 4 boilers (565 psi, 850°F); 4 geared turbines; 4 shafts; 100,000 shp (design)
Speed: 31.6 knots
Endurance (design): 12,500 nautical miles @ 15 knots
Armament: 2 single 5″/38 gun mounts (soon removed); 2 quad 40-mm/56-cal gun mounts (in place of 5″ mounts); 8 (soon 9) twin 40-mm/56-cal gun mounts; 16 single 20-mm/70-cal guns mounts
Aircraft: 30+
Aviation facilities: 2 centerline elevators; 1 hydraulic catapult
Crew: approx. 1,560

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

They are possibly one of the best sources of naval lore http://www.warship.org/naval.htm

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

I’m a member, so should you be!

Warship Wednesday May 8- Baked Alaska

Posted on May 9, 2013 by laststandonzombieisland One comment

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

– Christopher Eger

Warship Wednesday, May 8

Here we see the lead ship of an odd class of warships, the USS Alaska (CB-1). This ship would have made an impressive World War One batttlecruiser, but she was designed some 20-years too late and was underutilized.

Designed in the late 1930s, she was authorized under the Fleet Expansion Act on 19 July 1940. These ships were never intended to be battleships, but instead just really big cruisers with 9x 12-inch guns (most heavy cruisers only had 8-inch guns) and a standard displacement of 29,000-tons. Her mission was to mix it up with such large overgrown cruisers as the German Deutschland-class pocket battleships, the twin 29,000 ton/9×11-inch gunned Scharnhorst class large cruisers, the 18,000-ton Admiral Hipper class and the huge 15,000-ton Japanese Mogami/Tone class. Her overall layout was similar to the South Dakota class battleships only smaller (or alternatively similar to a scaled-up Baltimore class heavy cruiser) using the same below-deck machinery as the Essex-class aircraft carriers

Laid down ten days after Pearl Harbor, where a number of battleships that were more heavily armored than this compromise cruiser design hit the bottom, no one really knew what to do with this ship. This delayed her commissioning until the last half of 1944, at which point all of the Mogami, Tone, Scharnhorst, and Deutschland class pocket battleships had been withdrawn or sunk.

Without a mission, Alaska found herself as a fast carrier escort where her 102 20/40/127mm AAA guns helped keep kamikazes at bay and her 12-inch main battery could be used on shore targets if needed.

She served in 1945 off Iwo and Okinawa then was placed in reserve status and decommissioned in February 1947 after less than three years service. Her sisterhip USS Guam was completed September 1944 and only served for 11 months in WWII while the follow-on ships Hawaii, Philippines, Puerto Rico, and Samoa were never finished (and indeed the last three were never even laid down). Hawaii was broken up on the ways when over 80% complete and her machinery was cannibalized and placed in storage for the Alaska and Guam.

In 1960, along with the six mothballed North Carolina and South Dakota class battleships, the Alaska and Guam were disposed of. Big gun ships in an age of missile armed boats seemingly obsolete. Both of these large cruisers were scrapped.

Specs:

Displacement:

29,771 tons
34,253 tons (full load)
Length:    808 ft 6 in (246.43 m) overall
Beam:    91 ft 9.375 in (28.0 m)
Draft: 27 ft 1 in (8.26 m) (mean) 31 ft 9.25 in (9.68 m) (maximum)
Propulsion:    4-shaft General Electric steam turbines, double-reduction gearing, 8 Babcock & Wilcox boilers
150,000 shp (112 MW)
Speed:    31.4 knots (58.2 km/h; 36.1 mph) to 33 knots (61 km/h; 38 mph)
Range:    12,000 nautical miles (22,000 km) at 15 knots (28 km/h)
Complement:    1,517–1,799–2,251
Armament:

9 x 12″/50 caliber Mark 8 guns(3×3)
12 x 5-inch (127 mm)/38 caliber dual-purpose guns[4] (6×2)
56 ×40 mm (1.57 in) Bofors (14×4)
34 × 20mm Oerlikon (34×1)
Armor:

Main side belt: 9″ gradually thinning to 5″
Armor deck: 3.8–4.0″
Weather (main) deck: 1.40″
Splinter (third) deck: 0.625″
Barbettes: 11–13
Turrets: 12.8″ face, 5″ roof, 5.25–6″ side and 5.25″ rear
Conning tower:10.6″ with 5″ roof
Aircraft carried: 4× OS2U Kingfisher or SC Seahawk

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

They are possibly one of the best sources of naval lore http://www.warship.org/naval.htm

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

I’m a member, so should you be!

Warship Wednesday, May 1 The Michigan Wolverine

Posted on May 1, 2013 by laststandonzombieisland Leave a comment

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

– Christopher Eger

Warship Wednesday, May 1

Here we see the US Navy’s first iron warship, the gunboat USS Michigan as she appeared around 1905. In the image above, she was already sixty years young.

In 1841 Congress authorized the construction of a side-wheel steam man-of-war for use on the Upper Lakes, to match the British naval strength in those waters. This craft, launched in 1843 was the made using iron as a substitute since in the Lake Erie region at the time quality shipbuilding timber was at a premium.

In the 1860s, she carried a standard dark scheme until the 1890s when she was repainted white

From a 1940s USNI article:

“Practically nothing was known at that time in this country about designing an iron ship, or the technique of fabricating the unfamiliar material. Nor were other than the most primitive construction facilities available at Erie. As a result, the lines adopted for the Michigan were those of the sailing ship of the period, and the frame was designed to afford the requisite structural strength without recourse to the strength available in the hull plating, providing a hull so strong that, despite years of abuse, it is structurally sound today. [100 years later]

I-beams being unknown at the time, the ribs were made from T-bars, and the longitudinals were built-up box structures about 12 inches by 24 inches in cross-section. In all there were five longitudinals, the keel being the only one projecting beyond the skin of the ship. Three of the longitudinals ran the full length of the ship and two were beneath the machinery spaces. The hull plates were all shaped by hand, and the rivet holes were punched by the same means.

The hull material was wrought iron made by the charcoal process in Pittsburgh and carted to Erie. The purity of this material is attested by the fact that the metal is still in excellent condition…The original two-cylinder direct-acting condensing engine, which develops 170 horsepower, still remains in the ship. It has a bedplate that is a cast iron slab 22 feet long, 2 feet wide, and 2 inches thick which carries the two 36-inch by 8-feet cylinders. The engine is secured to 14-inch timbers that are inclined at an angle of 22 ½ degrees. Transporting the heavy bedplate 130 miles from Pittsburgh over the roads of that day must have presented a problem to the teamsters.”

When commissioned she was a steamer whose giant paddle-wheel turned enough to give her a speed of 8-knots with an auxiliary sail rig. Planned with twelve 32-pound carronades and two Paixham 8-inch pivot guns, she was to be the most heavily armed craft on the Great Lakes. This brought a protest from Great Britain and instead she was completed with a single (1) 18-pounder.

The Michigan steamed the Great Lakes for 68-years conducting patrols that included intercepting would be crooks, revolutionaries and assassins in the Timber Rebellion, the Beaver-Macinack War, Civil War draft riots in Detroit and Buffalo, the Fenian Raids, the Niagra Raids and the Philo Parsons Affair. She was up-armed during the Civil War with a 30-pounder Parrott rifle, five 20-pounder Parrott rifles, six 24-pounder smoothbores, and two 12-pounder boat howitzers– mainly due to the potential of British intervention in the Civil War, but she did not have to fire a shot in anger. After the war ended her armament was changed to 6 3-pounders, which were more than sufficient for her freshwater duties.

In 1905 the familiar ship was stripped of her name, the Michigan moniker going to a new battleship, and dubbed USS Wolverine (IX-31). In 1912 she stricken from the active Navy List and transferred (still armed) to the Pennsylvania Naval Militia. These naval reservists used her for another 11 years before her engineering plant, then more than 70-years old, gave out. She was kept by the City of Erie, PA as a floating museum and gathering place until her poor condition won over and by the 1940s she was a derelict, settled on the harbor bottom. In January, 1943, the ship was left nameless through transference of its name to an aircraft carrier.

In 1949 she was scrapped, her keel some 107 years old. Of that time she spent 68 years on active duty and another 11 as a reserve training ship. She was the only armed US Navy ship to regularly patrol the Great Lakes.

Today her foremast remains in Fairport Harbor, Ohio, made into a flagpole and erected in 1950. Her cutaway iron prow, showing impressive construction techniques, is at the Erie Maritime Museum and her anchor is on public display at a park

Specs:
Displacement:    685 tons
Length:    163 ft (50 m)
Beam:    27 ft (8.2 m)
Draft:    9 ft (2.7 m)
Propulsion:    2 × 330 ihp (250 kW) steam engines
Speed:    10.5 kn (12.1 mph; 19.4 km/h)
Capacity:    115 tons of coal
Complement:    88 officers and men
Armament:

As Michigan:
Original: 1 × 18-pounder
American Civil War: 1 × 30-pounder Parrott rifle, 5 × 20-pounder Parrott rifles, 6 × 24-pounder smoothbores, 2 × 12-pounder boat howitzers
As Wolverine: 6 × 3-pounders (47 mm (1.9 in)), 2 one-pounder rapid fire

If you liked this column, please consider joining the International Naval Research Organization (INRO) They are possibly one of the best sources of naval lore http://www.warship.org/naval.htm

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, April 24 Surcouf!

Posted on April 24, 2013 by laststandonzombieisland 4 comments

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

Warship Wednesday, April 24, 2013

Here we see one of the most peculiar types of ships– the cruiser submarine. These big gun submersibles were seen as the most logical extension of the commerce raider after World War One. During the Great War, gun-armed auxiliary cruisers with long ranges circled the globe. These ships, like the Mowe and the Wolf, took dozens of prizes while submarines on all sides took hundreds– but had short legs. So, after 1919, the thinking was that you could take a large submarine with an extended cruising range, add a few large guns and some extra equipment, and bingo: the cruiser submarine. This particular example is the French Surcouf.

Named after Robert Surcouf, the Napoleonic French pirate (err….make that privateer, let’s be PC here!), this huge sub was built to be a swashbuckler. The namesake privateer and his brother Nicolas between 1789 and 1808 captured over 40 British and Portuguese prizes while flying the French flag alongside his own banner. Napoleon even offered him a Captain’s rank in the French Navy and command of a pair of new frigates, but Surcouf couldn’t take the pay cut.

Statue of Surcouf in Saint-Malo by Alfred Caravanniez, built in 1903. Swashbuckler complete with cutlass...

The Statue of Surcouf in Saint-Malo by Alfred Caravanniez was erected in 1903. Swashbuckler complete with cutlass…

In one notable action, Surcouf, in command of the privateer Hasard (4×6-pdrs, 26 men) engaged and captured the larger and much more powerful East Indiaman Triton (26 12-pdr guns, 150 men) after a 45-minute hand-to-hand engagement that went cabin-to-cabin and deck-to deck.

January 29, 1796: The Corsair Cartier, 4 cannons and 19 men commanded by the famous Surcouf, at age 16, on the approach of the British East Indian Triton, 150 men, 26 cannons, in the Indian Ocean. Painting by Leon Tremisot

“You French fight for money, while we British fight for honor,” a captured English officer reportedly once told the French privateer.

“Sir, a man fights for what he lacks most,” Surcouf retorted.

The submarine that carried the name of this often-forgotten sea dog was ordered in December 1927, after the Washington Naval Treaty placed a limit on cruisers. Skirting the treaty by adding cruiser-sized guns to a submarine, the London Naval Treaty of 1931 limited both the overall displacement of and the size of guns carried by submarines moving forward, making Surcouf the only submarine of her class.

The British were so impressed with Surcouf that the big cruiser submarine was the front piece of the 1931 edition of Jane’s Fighting Ships

French submarine Surcouf

Over 361 feet long and 4400 tons when at a full load submerged, she carried an impressive armament of 12 torpedo tubes and two 8-inch (203mm) naval guns.

A side view of the 8-inch guns on the submarine. Note the muzzle tampinions.

The guns, 203mm/50 Modèle 1924 weapons just like the kind mounted on the Duquesne and Suffren classes of heavy cruisers as the main battery, were among the largest ever placed aboard a submarine. (The top prize goes to the three WWI-era British Royal Navy M Class submarines fitted with a deck-mounted 30.48-cm (12-in) gun taken from battleship stores. These subs were all out of service by 1932). On Surcouf, two guns were mounted in a sealed turret ahead of the conning tower.

Surcouf dock

Fitted with mechanically actuated tampions to allow quick diving, these guns could open fire 2.5 minutes after surfacing and fire approximately 3 rounds per minute. The maximum elevation of 30 degrees limited the maximum range to 21 nmi/39 km with a 270-pound shell. Of course, only 60 rounds were carried for these great guns (hey, it’s a submarine!) but these 8-inchers were pretty amazing.

The rear of the conning tower held the cutest little seaplane. This is similar to the Dry Deck Shelter (DDS) used by the US Navy since 1982 at least in overall concept anyway.

To help spot the guns a small 2500-pound Besson MB.411 seaplane, specifically made just for the sub, was carried. This plane could putter at around 100 knots for two hours, allowing its pilot and onboard observer to correct the artillery of the sub.

Her Besson MB.411 floatplane with wings folded for storage. Looks like a tight fit

Her Besson MB.411 floatplane with wings removed for storage. Looks like a tight fit

French submarine Surcouf in Casablanca, Marocco, 1938 note embarked floatplane

For seizing prizes at sea during commerce raiding missions, the Surcouf had space for 60 prisoners and held a 15-foot motor whaleboat in a sealed well deck.

Compared to other submarines of her day, where the standing room was almost unheard of unless the submariner was 5′ 2″, Surcouf is massive on the inside.

While not specified, it’s conceivable that the large submarine with extra space could have been used for commando-type missions.

French cruiser submarine Surcouf in 1939

The French boat is almost a dead ringer in size to the USS Argonaut, the submarine used to carry 120 of Carlson’s Marine Raiders to hit Makin Island in 1942.

Sailors man the 6 inch53 deck gun aboard USS Argonaut SS-166 (formerly the V-4) during her shakedown cruise off Provincetown, MA on June 21, 1928

As pointed out this image is of the submarine depicted in the fictional Japanese 2005 film “Lorelei: The Witch of the Pacific Ocean”. The featured ship is a sub, design inspired by Surcouf by definitely not identical. Thanks, Eric!

Alas, for all her potential, this huge and well-armed submersible never had a combat career. Commissioned in May 1934 on the eve of WWII, she suffered from mechanical issues. She narrowly escaped capture in France in 1940 by limping away to England where she became part of General de Gaulle’s tiny Free French Navy.

Her only service was in escorting an occasional Atlantic Convoy and in seizing (liberating?) the Vichy French colony of Saint-Pierre and Miquelon in 1941 without a shot. During this operation, Surcouf served as flagship for ADM Muselier and his three small gunboats, which combined were less than half the warship that the submarine was.

Free French Naval Forces submarine Surcouf in Halifax Harbour (closest to depot ship) in 1941. Here, Royal Navy Depot Ship HMS FORTH with the Free French submarine SURCOUF and two other Royal Navy submarines rest in Halifax Harbour. Original Kodachrome via Library and Archives Canada

From World at War :

“Christmas Eve, 1941

     The predawn blackness over the frigid waters of the Gulf of Saint Lawrence is broken by the flash of signal lamps, “Execute the mission ordered.”. A Free French task force slips past the undefended entrance to the harbor of Saint Pierre. A lookout reports no signs of life on shore. His Captain replies, “They sleep and dream of us for Christmas.”. The mail boat to Miquelon approaches and is ordered to turn about and follow alongside. It complies. A fishing dory emerges from the mist and passes the flotilla unmolested. The corvettes near the snow-covered coal wharf. A solitary figure, an ancient Breton fisherman, spies the Cross of Lorraine and races down the Quai de Ronciere. The click-clack of the old man’s sabots on the icy pavement and his bilingual curses, “Petain, le sacre bleu cochon, le old goat!” can be heard across the whole of the island. Sailors on the first of the ships to brush the dock toss him the bowline. As he secures it to the bollard the man exclaims again, “Vive de Gaulle, at last, I can say it. Vive de Gaulle!”.

     Free French sailors and marines in full battle dress race from their ships. By now a crowd of bleary-eyed Saint Pierrais has gathered to cheer them on with shouts of Vive de Gaulle!, Vive Muselier! Homemade banners, Tricolors emblazoned with Croix de Lorraine, flutter in the chill North Atlantic breeze. The assault force, intent on seizing the town’s key administrative centers; the town hall, post office, telegraph station, and radio transmitter, seems oblivious to their welcome. They meet no resistance. The island’s 11 gendarmes surrender their Vichy-supplied machine guns and offer to assist in rounding up the usual suspects. Not a shot is fired nor a drop of blood spilled.

     The operation is over in half an hour.”

When the Japanese came into the war, it was thought that Surcouf could live up to her name sinking Nippon Maru’s in the Pacific but she disappeared en route.

It is thought she was sunk on or about February 18. 1942 after a collision near Panama. Her wreck is thought to lie more than 3,000 feet deep and has never been found. She was announced lost on April 18, 1942, and stricken from the French Naval List the next year.

The plaque to the submarine’s honor at Cherbourg, her original WWII home port. It lists the names of the 130 officers and men whose fate to this day lies somewhere on this lost warship.

The French Navy, of course, still has a great love of Surcouf.

Specs

Displacement:    3,250 long tons (3,300 t) (surfaced)
4,304 long tons (4,373 t) (submerged)
2,880 long tons (2,930 t) (dead)
Length: 361 ft
Beam: 29 ft 6 in
Draft: 23 ft 9 in
Installed power:    7,600 hp (5,700 kW) (surfaced)
3,400 hp (2,500 kW) (submerged)
Propulsion:    2 × Sulzer diesel engines (surfaced)
2 × electric motors (submerged)
2 × screws
Speed:    18.5 knots (surfaced)
10 kn (submerged)
Range:    Surfaced:
10,000 nmi at 10 kn
6,800 nmi at 13.5 kn
Submerged:
70 nmi at 4.5 kn
59 nmi at 5 kn
Endurance:    90 days
Test depth: 260 ft
Boats & landing craft carried:    1 × motorboat in watertight deck well
Capacity:    280 long tons (280 t)
Complement:    8 officers and 110 men
Armament:    2 × 203 mm (8 in) guns (1×2)
2 × 37 mm (1.46 in) anti-aircraft guns (2×1)
4 × 13.2 mm (0.52 in) anti-aircraft machine guns (2×2)
8 × 550 mm (22 in) torpedo tubes (14 torpedoes)
4 × 400 mm (16 in) torpedo tubes (8 torpedoes)
Aircraft carried:    1 × Besson MB.411 floatplane

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

They are possibly one of the best sources of naval lore http://www.warship.org/naval.htm

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, April 17, Bring your Red Cap

Posted on April 17, 2013 by laststandonzombieisland 3 comments

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

– Christopher Eger

Warship Wednesday, April 17

Here we see that most ignored class of naval warship, the humble minesweeper. This particular one had more of a history that others. With a war coming in 1941, the US Navy designed and ordered built a huge class of auxiliary minesweepers to help keep the harbors, coasts, and sea lanes clear from those infernal devices. Dubbed the YMS-1 (Yard Mine Sweeper) class, they were simple 136-foot long boats with twin GM disels, sweep gear, and a 3″ gun for those special moments. A 32-man crew of bluejackets would man the rails. In all some 481 of these boats would be ordered from 1941-45 from 35 different yacht makers around the country. Eighty YMS minesweepers were ordered from US yards for transfer under lend-lease to the UK as the BYMS-class minesweeper, and one of these is the subject of this article.

The simple wooden hulled ship was ordered in 1941 from Ballard Marine Railway Co., Inc., Seattle, WA. Commissioned as HM J-826 in February 1943, she served in the Royal Navy. Renamed HM BYMS-2026 in 1944, she finished the war in the Med before being decommissioned in 1946 and laid up at Malta. Struck from the Royal Navy Register 10 June 1947, she was returned to U.S. custody 1 August 1947. The US Navy disarmed her and removed her sweeping and communication gear then sold her to a British businessman the same year. I mean Uncle Sam already had hundreds of these wooden boats, why bring back another one?

Her sistership, USS YMS-328, one of the few YMS ships still around was bought after the war by a fellow named John Wayne who is considered to be something of a classic actor or sorts. Rechristened the Wild Goose, she still plies the California coastline.

The businessman named her Calypso and after use as a ferry in the Malta area, leased her to a former French Naval officer named Jacques-Yves Cousteau for one British pound per year in 1950. Over the next 47 years Cousteau made several improvements to the minesweeper including changing the accommodations to include 27 in Captain’s Quarters, Six Staterooms & Crew Quarters, adding Photo & Science Labs, an underwater observation chamber, a small helicopter landing pad (on a 136 foot ship!), a Yumbo 3-ton hydraulic crane, and waterscooter and minisub storage holds.

Calypso

After decades of wandering the world’s oceans in Cousteau’s real life aquatic, Calypso was sunk in a January 1996 accident in Singapore where she lay on the harbor floor for 8 days before being raised and salvaged. Sadly she has not sailed under her own power since then.

Jacques Cousteau speaking about life on Calypso, the search for on Atlantis and cognac in a great Blank-on-Blank 1978 interview by Roy Leonard on WGN Radio, from the Roy Leonard Audio Archive.

Jacques-Yves Cousteau died on 25 June 1997 and for the past 16 years the Calypso has been in turns neglected and then restored, then neglected again while legal battles over which group owned the ship ensued. Currently it is owned by the Equipe Cousteau Association who is raising money for a restoration and conversion to a museum ship.

The impossible missions are the only ones which succeed. – Jacques Cousteau

original plans, YMS class sweepers

Specs:
Displacement 270 t.
Length 136′
Beam 24′ 6″
Draft 8′
Speed 15 kts.
Complement 32
Armament: One 3″/50 dual purpose gun mount, two 20mm mounts and two depth charge projectors (removed in 1947) (Post 1950- Spearguns and swagger)
Propulsion: (as designed) Two 800bhp General Motors 8-268A diesel engines, Snow and Knobstedt single reduction gear, two shafts.

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

They are possibly one of the best sources of naval lore http://www.warship.org/naval.htm

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

I’m a member, so should you be!

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

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Warship Wednesday, June 12 The Tsars Lost Eagle

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Warship Wednesday, June 5 The Graf

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Warship Wednesday, May 29 First US Torpedo Boat

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Warship Wednesday, May 22 The Mighty Miss

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Warship Wednesday, May 15 The First Night Carrier

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Warship Wednesday May 8- Baked Alaska

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Warship Wednesday, May 1 The Michigan Wolverine

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Warship Wednesday, April 24 Surcouf!

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Warship Wednesday, April 17, Bring your Red Cap

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Tag Archives: coal fired ironclad

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