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Warship Wednesday Dec.9, 2015: His Majesty’s Enterprise

Posted on December 9, 2015 by laststandonzombieisland 5 comments

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

Warship Wednesday Dec.9, 2015: HM’s Enterprise

Here we see the Illustrious-class fleet carrier HMS Formidable (R67) of the Royal Navy. This war baby flattop, completed in the darkest days of World War II when Britain stood alone, was used hard during the war, rushed from fight to fight, and at times was the only carrier in the region. In many ways, she was HM’s equivalent to the USS Enterprise (CV-6).

During WWII, the Royal Navy saw the writing on the wall in the respect that, to remain a first-rate naval power with a global reach, it needed a fleet of modern aircraft carriers. Entering the war in 1939 with three 27,000-ton Courageous-class carriers converted from battlecruiser hulls, the 22,000 ton battleship-hulled HMS Eagle, the unique 27,000-ton Ark Royal, and the tiny 13,000-ton HMS Hermes (pennant 95, the world’s first ship to be designed as an aircraft carrier)– a total of six flattops, within the first couple years of the war 5/6th of these were sent to the bottom by Axis warships and aircraft.

Luckily two 32,000-ton Implacable-class and four 23,000-ton Illustrious-class carriers, laid down before the war, were able to join the fleet to help make good those losses until the follow-on Colossus-class light fleet carriers, and Audacious-class, Malta-class supercarriers (57,000-tons), and 8 planned Centaur-class carriers could be built (although most weren’t).

The Illustrious-class, designed before the war, was limited by the restrictions of the Second London Naval Treaty in displacement (much like the pre-war U.S. carriers). With concerns about the vulnerability of flattops in the 1930s to air attack– the Brits were forward-thinking in this– the “Lusties” were laid out with their hangar in an armored box, with 3-inches of steel plate on the roof and 4.5 on the side to protect against either 5-inch naval shells or 1,000-pound iron bombs. This and the fact the Brits refused to keep aircraft stored on deck limited their air wing to just 36 aircraft.

The 740-foot/23,000-ton Lusties were comparable to the 824-foot/25,000-ton U.S. Yorktown-class aircraft carriers though the Brits had twice the AAA battery with 16 QF 4.5-inchers while the Yanks had 8×5-inchers and other small pieces. Likewise, the two classes had comparable speed (30~ knots) and range (over 10,000 nm) for overseas operations. However, the Yorktown trio (Yorktown, Hornet, Enterprise), while they did have an armored tower and belt, lacked the deck/hangar armor of the Lusties but, due to their huge hangar and doctrine to store planes on “the roof” could accommodate as many as 90 in their air wing.

All of the Illustrious-class carriers were ordered and laid down in 1937 before the start of the war, with three of the four at Vickers with the oddball being Formidable, who was laid down at Harland and Wolff in Belfast– builders of RMS Titanic among others.

HMS Formidable was the 5th (or 6th depending on if you count a French Téméraire class 74-gun third rate ship of the line captured during the Napoleonic Wars with the same name) vessel in the RN to carry the name and between 1759-1953 there were only about 40 years of which the name did not appear on HM’s Naval List, with the last before our WWII flattop being the unlucky battleship torpedoed twice by German submarine U-24 and sunk, 1 January 1915.

Our particular HMS Formidable was commissioned on 24 November 1940 and rushed into service.

Armed with two squadrons of Fairey Albacore biplane torpedo bombers and one of Fairey Fulmar fighters, she engaged in covering convoys searching for German surface raiders for her first few months of the war.

HMS Formidable of the Illustrious-class underway, date, and location unknown.

Chopping to the Mediterranean Fleet in 1941, she started with a bang by sinking the Italian merchantman SS Moncalieri and, during the Battle of Cape Matapan, torpedoing the Italian battleship Vittorio Veneto and cruiser Pola.

During the evacuation of Greece and Crete, she covered the fleet and kept the German and Italians land-based bombers under thumb with repeated air attacks, accounting for several aerial kills and destruction of aircraft on the ground– although her own air wing dwindled to as low as a dozen operational aircraft at some times.

On 26 May she shrugged off two hits by Stuka dropped 1,100-pound bombs which caused little damage but sent her to Norfolk in the States for repair.

Back in the fight in early 1942, she swapped out her Fulmars for Grumman Martlets (F4F Wildcats) and spent most of the year playing cat and mouse games with the Japanese as part of Admiral Sir James Somerville’s Force A in the Indian Ocean.

HMS Formidable, as part of Force A of the Eastern Fleet returning to Kilindini from Colombo, 2nd July 1942.

HMS Formidable underway in the Indian Ocean off Mombasa, Kenya, 1942

Then in October, she transferred back to her familiar waters of the Med as part of Force H, covering the Torch Landings in North Africa where her planes (with Supermarine Seafires augmenting and later replacing her Martlets) provided air cover, downed some random German aircraft and scratched the German submarine U-331 on 17 November.

Martlet fighters aboard HMS Formidable in the Mediterranean Sea, 1942

Force H warships HMS Duke of York, Nelson, Renown, Formidable, and Argonaut underway off North Africa, November 1942.

She was the sole Allied carrier in the Med for nearly six months and the first one to enter Malta in over 30 after helping cover the Allied invasion of Sicily. In this respect, she emulated the Enterprise‘s lonely experience as the sole operational Allied carrier in the Pacific between the sinking of the USS Wasp (CV-7) in Sept. 1942 and the commissioning of the USS Independence (CVL-22) in January 1943 while Saratoga was in dry-dock undergoing repair from a Japanese torpedo.

Revenge-class battleship HMS Resolution and Illustrious-class aircraft carrier HMS Formidable

Vought Corsair fighters and Fairey Barracuda bombers on the deck of aircraft carrier HMS Formidable during an operation off Norway, July 1944

Vought Corsair fighters and Fairey Barracuda bombers on the deck of the aircraft carrier HMS Formidable during an operation off Norway, July 1944

In late 1943, Formidable found herself in the frigid North Atlantic with a new air wing of 18 Vought Corsairs and 24 Fairey Barracuda torpedo bombers. She spent the rest of the year as well as most of 1944 escorting convoys and throwing good pilots and brave aircrews at the SMS Tirpitz in a series of air attacks (Operations Mascot and Goodwood) in her lair in a Norwegian fjord which produced few results.

After refit to expand her hangar deck to accommodate 54 aircraft (including a few topside), upgrading her torpedo planes to 18 Grumman TBF Avengers with three dozen Corsairs providing cover, and upping her AAA suite, she sailed for the newly formed British Pacific Fleet of Admiral Sir Bruce Fraser in early 1945 as the need for carriers in the European Theater at that time was waning.

RN carriers Victorious, Formidable, Unicorn, Indefatigable, Indomitable, TF57, Leyte Gulf, Apr 1945. Never again has the Royal Navy been this powerful.

This force would be the largest modern fleet the RN ever assembled post-1918, consisting of four battleships and six fleet aircraft carriers, 15 smaller aircraft carriers, 11 cruisers, and a host of escorts, subs, and auxiliaries. It announced Britain’s re-entry into the huge ocean from which it was chased in early 1942. The force sailed with Spruance’s Fifth Fleet as Task Force 57 (TF-57) and then with Halsey’s Third Fleet as TF-37.

Formidable arrived in the Philippines in April 1945, as the war in Europe was in its last days, and was soon in hot action in the Kamikaze-rich waters off Okinawa.

The famous image of Formidable on fire after the kamikaze hit on 4 May, photograph A 29717 from the collections of the Imperial War Museum

On 4 May, she was struck by a Mitsubishi A6M Zero “Zeke” carrying one 550-pound bomb, which created a two-foot square hole and a 24 x 20-foot depression in the armored flight deck.

“No place to land” by Michael Turner. Royal Navy Corsairs return to their carrier HMS Illustrious to find a blazing flight deck following a Kamikaze attack in the southwest Pacific, during the BPF deployment against the Japanese 1945. The print is widely available https://www.studio88.co.uk/acatalog/No_Place_to_Land.html

While splinters penetrated into her engineering spaces and her speed was reduced to 18 knots, she only lost eight men to the attack– though 11 of her aircraft were destroyed in the resulting blast. After a patch job, she was able to operate aircraft by the next morning.

Imperial War Museum picture A29312.

Damage to HMS Formidable's deck after the impact of a 550lb-bomb-carrying Kamikaze amidships

Damage to HMS Formidable deck after the impact of a 550lb-bomb-carrying Kamikaze amidships

Just five days later she was struck by a kamikaze into the after deck park which killed one and wounded eight. The armored deck was depressed 4.5 inches but seven aircraft were destroyed and 11 damaged. Her crew brushed off the deck and was able to launch and land aircraft 50 minutes later but only had a paltry four Avengers and 11 Corsairs left serviceable.

A Pacific Fleet report of May 1945 stated, “Without armored decks, TF 57 would have been out of action (with 4 carriers) for at least 2 months,” a recommendation that was key to adding armored flight decks to all U.S. carriers built after the war.

After some repairs in Australia, she was back in action of the Japanese Home Islands in July.

HMS FORMIDABLE passing through the Sydney Harbour anti-submarine boom net in 1945

HMS FORMIDABLE passing through the Sydney Harbor anti-submarine boom net in 1945

On 18 July, Lt. Wally Stradwick, a Fleet Air Arm fighter pilot from Clapham, south London, took off from Formidable in his corsair on a mission to strafe an airfield east of Tokyo.

Lt. Wally Stradwick

He was the first British aviator killed over Japan in the war.

From the Daily Mail:

The last entry had been made on July 14, 1945, four days earlier, when Stradwick knew he was about to attack mainland Japan for the first time.

‘We have been at sea for some time now, and for the last week have known where we are next striking – the absolute full, apart from getting out and saying “Hallo” to the yellow baskets,’ he had written.

‘I don’t know if it is a particular fault of this Air Arm or not, but we have been on the ship so long, with long periods between ops, that I feel the full twitch over this coming “do”.

‘The whole thing hinges on strafing. God knows I’m just as scared as anybody flying on any op, but that disappears once the fun starts.

‘However, I like the idea of fighting with brains and skill. Air to air fighting is the ideal. You have to use both whether the odds are for or against you.

Over the next few weeks, Formidable’s aircraft crippled or sank several small Japanese naval and merchant vessels and coasters including the Etorofu-class frigate Amakusa on Aug 9 (with a single 500-pounder dropped from Lt. Robert “Hammy” Hampton Gray’s Corsair, an act that earned the 27-year-old Canadian a posthumous VC, one of only earned by the Fleet Air Arm in the war).

Finale by Don Connolly in 1987, Beaverbrook Collection of War Art, CWM 19880046-001. http://www.warmuseum.ca/cwm/exhibitions/navy/galery-e.aspx?section=2-E-3-b&id=0&page=0 "On 9 August 1945, flying off the British carrier HMS Formidable, Gray led a flight of Corsair fighter-bombers into Onagawa Bay, Japan. With his aircraft riddled by anti-aircraft fire from the shore and from warships in the bay, Gray pressed home an attack on the Japanese ship Amakusa. Flying to within 50 meters of the ship, Gray sank it with a 500-pound bomb, but his badly damaged and burning aircraft crashed moments later, killing him."

Finale by Don Connolly in 1987, Beaverbrook Collection of War Art, CWM 19880046-001. “On 9 August 1945, flying off the British carrier HMS Formidable, Gray led a flight of Corsair fighter-bombers into Onagawa Bay, Japan. With his aircraft riddled by anti-aircraft fire from the shore and from warships in the bay, Gray pressed home an attack on the Japanese ship Amakusa. Flying to within 50 meters of the ship, Gray sank it with a 500-pound bomb, but his badly damaged and burning aircraft crashed moments later, killing him.”

During this time, her aircraft also left the escort carrier Kaiyō a smoking ruin though later attacks by U.S. Army Air Force bombers and the carrier Ticonderoga ended her career for good.

When the end of the war came, Formidable’s days as a carrier were numbered. She spent the next 18 months shuttling Indian, British, and Dutch troops and personnel around the Pacific and back and forth to Europe, carrying up to 1,500 at a time. Her wartime service earned her seven awards.

Aircraft carrier HMS Formidable at Leyte, Philippines late in the war. Note the high elevation of her forward twin 4.5-inch QFs.

In 1946 she received a young replacement gunner, a Scot by the name of Sean Connery who served in the weapons department on HMS Formidable into 1947 though he was released from duty on a 6s pension a year later due to chronic stomach ulcers.

Sean Connery during his time with the Royal Navy in 1946

It was planned to refit and keep the battered old girl who had sunk Italian, Japanese, and German ships and received punishment from Axis aircraft in return, but it was found that she was in poor material shape on inspection in 1947. Paid off, she was sold for scrap in January 1953 and towed to Inverkeithing from breaking. Her American counterpart, Enterprise, was laid up at the same time and sold for scrap in 1958.

In all, she carried aircraft from over 20 Air Arm squadrons in her brief seven years of service as a carrier. Of these, 17 have been disbanded while three, No. 820, 829, and 848 remain in service today– all chopper units flying Agusta-Westland Merlin HM.2s. During the war, all three flew torpedo planes (Albacores or Avengers) from Formidible‘s deck.

Formidable was the first of her sisters to meet the torch. Class leader Illustrious and sister Indomitable, also showing severe trauma from wartime service, followed within three years while Victorious, who also survived kamikazes off Okinawa, was extensively reconstructed to operate jets in the 1950s and later carried Gannets, Scimitars, Sea Fury’s, Sea Hawks, Sea Vixen, and Buccaneers until she was put out to pasture in 1969.

Victorious in Grand Harbour, Malta en route back to the UK following her 1966–67 Far East cruise, image via Wiki

Since 1953, the name Formidable has not graced the Royal Navy.

Her legacy is kept alive by sites including Armoredcarriers.com and the veteran’s group hmsformidable.com as well as in maritime art.

HMS Formidable off Sakishima Gunto, 1945 via armoredcarriers.com

HMS Formidable, 1942 – Seafires returning by Gordon Frickers

Specs:

Formidable, WWII configuration, via ship bucket

Displacement: 23,000 long tons (23,369 t) (standard)
Length:
740 ft. (225.6 m) (o/a)
710 ft. (216.4 m) (waterline)
Beam: 95 ft. 9 in (29.2 m)
Draught: 28 ft. 10 in (8.8 m) (deep load)
Installed power:
111,000 shp (83,000 kW)
6 Admiralty 3-drum boilers
Propulsion:
3 shafts
3 geared steam turbines
Speed: 30.5 knots (56.5 km/h; 35.1 mph)
Range: 10,700 nmi (19,800 km; 12,300 mi) at 10 knots (19 km/h; 12 mph)
Complement: 1,299
Sensors and
processing systems: 1 × Type 79 early-warning radar
Armament:
8 × twin QF 4.5-inch dual-purpose guns
6 × octuple QF 2-pdr anti-aircraft guns
Armour:
Waterline belt: 4.5 in (114 mm)
Flight deck: 3 in (76 mm)
Hangar sides and ends: 4.5 in (114 mm)
Bulkheads: 2.5 in (64 mm)
Aircraft carried: 36–54
Aviation facilities: 1 catapult

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Warship Wednesday Dec.2, 2015: The Brass Tiger Fish of the Lifeguard Service

Posted on December 2, 2015 by laststandonzombieisland One comment

Warship Wednesday, Dec.2, 2015: The Brass Tiger Fish of the Lifeguard Service

Photo via Navsource. Courtesy of John Hummel.

Here we see the Tench-class diesel-electric submarine USS Tigrone (SS-419/SSR-419/AGSS-419), at the Philadelphia Navy Yard sometime circa 1964 as she is preparing for her next role in the fleet after her first two had proved remarkably different.

With the brilliant success of the Gato-class fleet boats in the first part of the war in the Pacific, the Navy soon ordered 84 follow-on Tench-class boats to an improved design starting in 1944. The same 311-feet long overall as the Gatos, the Tenches were slightly heavier and had longer legs, being able to cover 16,000 nautical miles over their predecessor’s paltry 11,000. This meant they could roam further and stay away longer if needed.

While the Gatos were finished in time to bloody the Japanese fleet, few craft worthy of a torpedo were still around when the Tench class began to reach the Pacific. In fact, just 10 of the class were completed during the war and a further 55 were canceled just after.

Of the 10 that made it to the fight, one is the hero of our little tale.

Named after a species of the tiger shark, USS Tigrone (SS-419) was laid down at Portsmouth Naval Shipyard, Kittery, Maine just a month before D-Day. Her crew nicknamed her the Tiger Fish and she is the only ship on the Naval List to have carried the moniker.

Commissioned on 25 October 1944, she got her first combat patrol underway from Guam on March 21, 1945, with three other U.S. fleet boats in a Yankee wolf pack. Although they spent the better part of two months in Japanese waters, they found few targets and her only brush with combat was to bombard a reef with her rear 5″/25 deck gun (she had a 40mm Bofors single forward).

Her second patrol was more exciting.

On May 25, she took up a lifeguard station off the coast of Honshu, Japan, and by end of the week had a full house, picking up the crews of two B-29s that had ditched as well as three fighter pilots. U.S. submarines rescued 504 downed airmen– to include future President George Bush– during WWII lifeguard duty.

“TIGRONE has saved the Air Force and is now returning to Iwo Jima with 28 rescued zoomies,” radioed her skipper, CDR. Hiram Cassedy, USN.

Back on station by June 26 and then soon had to set course for Guam, arriving on 3 July to disembark another 23 waterlogged aircrews plucked from the water. These 52 airmen Tigrone returned to land throughout the patrol constituted a new submarine-force record.

The Commander Submarine Force, Pacific Fleet extended his congratulations to, “the commanding officer, officers, and crew for this outstanding patrol” and commended them for “the excellent judgment, splendid navigation, and determination displayed by the TIGRONE in effecting these rescues….”

The Tigrone‘s lifeguard service patrol was so inspiring that she received her own episode of the 1950’s documentary series The Silent Service (season 1, episode 8) “Tigrone Sets a Record” which aired on 06 May 1957 and is below in its entirety.

On her third patrol, she came within sight of the Japanese home islands on lifeguard duty and saved an aviator as well as breaking out her big gun again on Aug. 13 when she bombarded Mikomoto Island (Pearl Island), scoring 11 hits on a radio station and lighthouse tower in one of the last exchanges of hate in the war as the Empire sued for peace on the 15th.

When peace came, she was part of the massive armada in Tokyo Bay on Sept. 2, 1945, and received two battle stars for her service.

There she is, all the way to the end…

Soon after, she found herself in red lead row in Philadelphia.

Dusted off in 1948, Tigrone was designated SSR-419 (radar picket submarine) and given the MIGRAINE I conversion that included AN/BPS-2 search radar sprouting from the after portion of the sail, and the height finder mounted on a freestanding tower just abaft it.

Tigrone, left, after refitting as SSR. Her sister ship USS Thornback has been GUPPY’d. Thornback would later serve 28 years in the Turkish Navy and is preserved there as a museum ship today.

This put the 15-foot search antenna some 40 feet above the water, with the height finder only a little below. Also came a below deck CIC for the radar, an extra generator to help push the volts needed to run it all, and guidance equipment for mid-course control of Regulus cruise missiles. In exchange, the boat sacrificed her stern tubes and surface armament.

Tigrone (SSR-419), underway in Grand Harbour, Valetta, Malta, c1952.

Between 1948-56 no less than 13 SSRs– including several Tench-class boats– were put into service, roughly split between Atlantic and Pacific with Tigrone spending her time as a picket boat with the Second Fleet in the Caribbean and North Atlantic, with regular participation in NATO exercises and periodic deployments to the Mediterranean as part of the Sixth Fleet.

By 1 November 1957, a decade as a radar boat had ended, replaced by more modern vessels, and Tigrone again found herself a member of the Atlantic Reserve Fleet, Philadelphia.

However, the Navy wasn’t through with her by a long shot.

The Tigrone (AGSS-419) underway in a channel, between conversions

The Tigrone (AGSS-419) is underway in a channel, between conversions

Recommissioned 10 March 1962 and reclassified Auxiliary Research Submarine (AGSS-419), for the next decade Tigrone operated in conjunction with the Navy Underwater Sound Laboratory (part of the Naval Undersea Warfare Center at Newport), conducting underwater systems tests, and evaluating new equipment. The information provided by these tests, utilizing experimental transducers, would prove invaluable in sonar development.

In late 1963, the Bottom Reflected Active Sonar System (BRASS) II Transducer and system were installed on Tigrone, and, after 1965, the much-upgraded BRASS III system was installed.

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Note the unique side-facing rear sonar rack near the sail that came with the BRASS III conversion

While conducting her tests, she was often trailed by Soviet intelligence collection ships, which on at least one occasion felt the full force of the BRASS rig.

From a bubblehead who served on her during these tests

I cannot tell you how many watts the BRASS was capable of transmitting into the water, but suffice it to say it far exceeded anything else in anybody’s Navy at that time and maybe even today’s Navies for all I know. To give you an idea of the sound level it produced, all hands forward of the engine rooms were required to wear enginemen’s hearing protection when it was operating!

The overhead of that boat was festooned with enginemen’s earmuffs, hanging from every possible location to be readily available when the word was passed: “Now rig for BRASS Ops!” There were no torpedo tubes on the Tigrone at that time.

The after room had been turned into a bunkroom and held tier after tier of racks for the crew. The forward room was dedicated to the sonar system including its very own MG set to power that monster. The sonar men stood their watches on standard AN/BQR-2B passive sonar set which was in a little corner up forward where the tubes used to be. The Port half of the forward room was all the equipment the civilian USN/USL personnel used to operate the BRASS. It was a very sophisticated system, capable of varying both the amplitude and duration of the pulses it generated and if I can attach the picture, you will note a huge “shit can” mounted where the bow should be. Inside that huge and cumbersome protrusion was a transducer which looked like a huge log lying on it’s side atop a round table. The round table could be rotated, thereby presenting the horizontal length of the “log” in whatever direction was desired. In addition to the horizontal training, this transducer “log” was constructed in staves (like a barrel) and the operators could select which staves were to be used, giving them the ability to direct the transmitted beam in whatever direction they would like it to go.

We would go to test depth off the Azores and transmit a pulse in a South Westerly direction so that it could be received by the USS Baya [SS/AGSS-318, a Balao-class submarine modified in 1958 to accomidate LORAD, an experimental long-range sonar and 12 scientists] who would be operating off the Tongue of the Ocean in the Bahamas!!!!

Like I said, BRASS put a LOT of power into the water. Needless to say our activities drew the attention of the Russians and one of those ‘fishing boats’ brisling with antenna, would follow us around, undoubtedly listening to and recording every transmission we made. Well one day we were pounding away with the BRASS when one of the civilians asked me where the Russian fishing boat was. I was standing a regular passive sonar watch and I need to explain that whenever the BRASS transmitted a relay in my sonar set would cut out my audio for the duration of the pulse and then cut back in. When the audio returned, I could hear the reverberations from the transmission bouncing off the bottom, off waves, off thermoclines and maybe off the Azores themselves for several minutes, it was deafening!

I reported that the ‘fishing boat’ was dead astern making 80 RPM’s, just enough to keep up with our three knot submerged speed. “Keep us posted if anything changes.” I was told and I sat up to pay closer attention. Pretty soon I noticed a decrease in the amplitude (power) of the transmitted pulses from the BRASS. The same was true of the pulses following that and so on, until the BRASS was barely making a ‘b-e-e-p’ for each transmission. “He’s picking up speed and closing,” I announced to the civilians who were twisting the dials on the BRASS equipment and watching me to see if their efforts were producing the desired results. “Tell us when he’s directly overhead,” was the request as the pulses became weaker still. Evidently, the Russian figured that we had sped up and were leaving him behind; as the very loud transmissions we had been making were now so weak, he could hardly hear them. “He’s making 220 turns and coming right up our stern,” I reported. The USN/USL boys made some more adjustments to their equipment, “Is he overhead yet?” they asked, “Almost”, I said, wondering what in hell they were going to do. Just then, he came out of our baffles and I could hear his diesel engine roaring above the sound of his cavitating propeller blades, as he picked up speed.

“HE’S OVERHEAD NOW NOW NOW!!” I shouted and just then, the relay in my audio circuit cut my sound. It didn’t matter, I could hear the prolonged blast of a BRASS transmission coming right through our hull, it seemed that it would never end. I didn’t realize they could extend the pulse length so long! The operators had turned the transducer table until the ‘log’ was crosswise to the length of our hull, then they had selected just the top staves so that all that transmitted energy went straight up to the Russian Trawler who listening equipment was undoubtedly turned up has far as it would go in an effort to hear our previously weaken signals over their own ships noise. You guys know what test depth was in those old boats, so you know just how far away his receiver was from probably a million or more watts being aimed directly at him. We fried his sonar system . . . cooked it . .. blew every transistor . . . toasted every tube . . . Probably rendered the operator deaf for life. You’ve heard the old saying, “That noise was ten dB above the threshold of pain” well can you imagine what sound level BRASS could produce at that short a distance? It was a wonder we didn’t blow a hole in his hull and sink him.

For the next week, the only time that ‘Fishing Trawler’ caught up with us was when we surfaced after a day’s work. He could still pick us up when we were on the surface with his radar, but he couldn’t find us when we were submerged and BRASS was transmitting. After about six or seven days, a second trawler showed up and relieved him. They would follow us, but never got real close to us. Once burned, twice shy….

USS Tigrone (AGSS-419) with experimental bow sonar, off Ponta Delgada, Azores, 1967

April 1970 USS Tigrone (419) leaving Halifax after Exercise Steel Ring

Tigrone continued her quiet Cold War service until 27 June 1975 when she was decommissioned after more than 30 years with the fleet– all but about six of those in active service.

She was the last active submarine in the Navy that had served in WWII, which is something of a record in and of its own right.

USS Tigrone by William H. RaVell III

While she was expended as a torpedo test target on 25 October 1976 in deep water off the North Carolina coast at 36deg. 05.2′ N x 71deg. 15.3′ w, she is remembered at Submarine Force Museum and the Arkansas Inland Maritime Museum as well as by an active veterans group.

Of her sisters, 14 were transferred to 9 foreign navies and one, ex-USS Cutlass (SS-478) remains semi-active in Taiwan’s Republic of China Navy as Hai Shih (meaning “sea lion”) at age 70.

Three are maintained as museum ships:

USS Requin as a museum ship is about as close as you can get to Tigrone. Image via Wiki.

-USS Requin (SS-481) at the Carnegie Science Center in Pittsburgh, PA. This ship was also converted to an SSR in the late 1940s and served with Tigrone in the Second and Sixth fleets during the 1950s.

-USS Torsk (SS-423), moored at Pier Three, Baltimore’s Inner Harbor, (alongside the National Aquarium in Baltimore) in Maryland.

-TCG Uluçalireis (S 338) (ex-USS Thornback (SS-418)), on display at Rahmi M. Koç Museum, Golden Horn in Istanbul. She is shown above in the comparison shot next to sister Tigrone.

Specs:

Tench class, WWII configuration, via ship bucket

Displacement:
1,570 tons (1,595 t) surfaced
2,414 tons (2,453 t) submerged
Length: 311 ft. 8 in (95.00 m)
Beam: 27 ft. 4 in (8.33 m)
Draft: 17 ft. (5.2 m) maximum
Propulsion:
4 × Fairbanks-Morse Model 38D8-⅛ 10-cylinder opposed piston diesel engines driving electrical generators
2 × 126-cell Sargo batteries
2 × low-speed direct-drive Elliott electric motors
two propellers
5,400 shp (4.0 MW) surfaced
2,740 shp (2.0 MW) submerged
Speed:
20.25 knots (38 km/h) surfaced
8.75 knots (16 km/h) submerged
Range: 16,000 nautical miles (20,000 km) surfaced at 10 knots (19 km/h)
Endurance:
48 hours at 2 knots (3.7 km/h) submerged
75 days on patrol
Test depth: 400 ft. (120 m)
Complement: 6 officers, 60 enlisted as designed. Up to 90 when used for SSR/AGSS duties
Armament:
(1945)
10 x21-inch (533 mm) torpedo tubes, 6 forward, 4 aft, 24 torpedoes
1 x 5-inch (127 mm) / 25 caliber deck gun
1 x Bofors 40 mm
1 x Oerlikon 20 mm cannon
2 x .50 cal M2 (detachable)
(1948)
6 x 21-inch (533 mm) torpedo tubes, forward, 12 torpedoes
2 x .50 cal M2 (detachable)
(1963)
Soundwaves, baby, yeah

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Warship Wednesday Nov. 25, 2015: The enduring monitor of the Amazon

Posted on November 25, 2015 by laststandonzombieisland Leave a comment

Warship Wednesday Nov. 25, 2015: The enduring monitor of the Amazon

Note the sat dish and Jet Ranger

Here we see, stationed deep in the Mato Grosso region of the Amazon Rainforest around Morro da Marinha, near Fort Coimbra, is the unique inland river monitor Parnaíba (U17).

Laid down in 1936 on the Isle of Snakes at the Brazilian Naval Yard (Arsenal de Marinha do Rio de Janeiro) as part of the Brazilian Navy’s modernization program on the eve of WWII, Parnaíba is a traditional name for that fleet with no less than four predecessors carrying it back well into the 19th Century.

Parnaíba was an important vessel, with President Getulio Vargas himself attending the keel laying.

Pre-1960, note the 6″ forward mount. That’s a big gun for a 180-foot riverboat. She also has a very British tripod mast and fire-control tower.

She was built with English assistance, her power plant included 2 Thornycroft triple expansion boilers while her armament consisted of a single 6″/50 (15.2 cm) BL, a pair of Royal Ordnance QF 25-pounder (3.45″/13cal) howitzers and, for defense against small boats, a pair of 47mm (3pdr) Hotchkiss singles. Some 180-feet long, Parnaíba could float in 5-feet of freshwater. To protect her topside she was given 38mm of armor on deck and around her bridge while a 3 inch belt protected the engine room, waterline and machinery spaces.

Commissioned 4 March 1938, Parnaíba proceeded inland to join the Flotilha de Mato Grosso as the fleet flag.

Peaceful riverine service ended in late 1942 when she was rushed to the coast upon Brazil’s entry into World War II.

Her armament updated with four single 20/70 Mk 4 Oerlikons and some depth charge racks, Parnaíba was used extensively for coastal patrol, then as the guard ship at Salvador-Bahia, and escorted at least five coastal convoys on the lookout for German U-boats and surface raiders which, gratefully, she never encountered. Her hull was thought too shallow to catch a torpedo, she was considered strong enough to fight it out in a surface action if push came to shove.

On 29 Nov 1943, Parnaíba greeted the fresh new battleship USS Iowa on a brief visit to Bahia just days after that leviathan dropped President Roosevelt off at Oran, Algeria. The next day she escorted Iowa back out after a night of festivities.

The rest of her wartime experience were even more quiet though she did sortie out ready for action and to search for survivors when the Brazilian cruiser Bahia was lost in July 1945. Thought sunk at first by a rogue German U-Boat but later confirmed Bahia was destroyed in a freak accident by her own depth charges.

Landing her depth charges and sailing back up river in October of that year, Parnaíba has maintained her place in the Amazon area ever since.

In 1960, she was overhauled and a U.S. 3” /50 Mk 22 and two 40 mm/60 cal Mk 3 Bofors replaced her dated 25-Pounders and 6-incher though her Oerlikons were saved as they were still useful and her Hotchkiss popguns kept for saluting.

A subsequent series of overhauls between 1996-99 saw her six decades-old engineering suite removed (and put on museum display), replaced by a more modern set of GM twin diesels. Racal Decca and Furuno 3600 radars were fitted as were more modern 40/70 Bofors in the old positions. A helicopter platform was also added for a light Jet Ranger or A350-sized whirlybird.

She also carries multiple 7.62 and 12.7mm machine gun mounts as well as 81mm mortars to drop it like its hot in a region that sees a good bit of smuggling and the occasional excitement.

Note the 20mm over the fantail, right out of the Battle of Midway. Also note that Brazilian LSOs wear the same color float coats and everything as in the USN

Her current fodder of 76mm and 40mm rounds. Her crew still drills with both and her WWII-era Mk 22, other than on some ships of the Thai and Philippine navies, is the last in functional use on a warship

Her current fodder of 76mm, 40mm and 20mm rounds. Her crew still drills with her WWII-era Mk 22, and other than on some ships of the Thai and Philippine navies, is the last in functional use on a warship

Ahh, don’t these belong as hood ornaments for WWII submarines? How many thousands of man hours have been put into polishing that bright work over the past half century?

A 40mm will still make mincemeat of a low-flying plane or helicopter as well as ruin a small boat (or ashore guerrilla hangout). Note the old school Hotchkiss in the far left of the picture.

If past history is any indicator of future events, odds are Parnaíba will be in service another several decades and she is regarded as the oldest commissioned naval ship still in active fleet use and not in museum status.

Celebrating her 75th year in service in 2013

Below is a 2015 VERTREP operation where you get a pretty good view of the old girl

Most of these images in the post are courtesy the excellent Brazilian warship site, Naval Brazil and Defesa Aérea & Naval which have more information about this interesting vessel.

Specs:

Image via Shipbucket

Displacement:
620 tons – Standard
720 tons – full load
Length: 55 m (180.4 ft.) oa
Beam: 10.1 m (33.1 ft.)
Draught: 1.6 m (5.2 ft.)
Propulsion:
Two VTE engines, two 3-drum Thornycroft boilers, 70 tons fuel oil (As built)
Two 650shp GM 8V92 diesel engines, 90 tons diesel
Two propellers
Speed: 12 knots (22 km/h)
Range: 1,350 mi (1,170 nmi; 2,170 km) (2500 km) 10 knots (19 km/h)
Complement: 60-90
Armament:
(As built)
1x 6″/50 (15.2 cm) BL,
2x 1 QF 25-pounder (3.45″/13cal) howitzers
2x 1 47mm (3pdr) Hotchkiss
(1945)
1x 6″/50 (15.2 cm) BL,
2x 1 QF 25-pounder (3.45″/13cal) howitzers
2x 1 47mm (3pdr) Hotchkiss
4x 1 20mm/70 Oerlikons
Depth charges
(1960)
1x 3″/50 Mk.22
2x 1 47mm (3pdr) Hotchkiss
2x 1 40/60 Mk 3
6x 1 20mm/70 Oerlikon
(1999)
1x 3″/50 Mk.22
2x 1 47mm (3pdr) Hotchkiss
2x 1 40/70 M48
2x 1 20mm/70 Oerlikon
2 × 81mm mortar
Various machine guns

Aviation facilities: Helipad for IH-6B Bell Jet Ranger III or H-12 Squirrel (after 1996)

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Warship Wednesday Nov. 18, 2015: The Brooklyn Stinger of the Calico King

Posted on November 18, 2015 by laststandonzombieisland 3 comments

Warship Wednesday Nov. 18, 2015: The Brooklyn Stinger of the Calico King

Here we see the steam gunboat USS Scorpion (PY-3) in her gleaming white scheme in an image taken in 1899. She may not look it, but when the Detroit Photographic Co. snapped this photo, the mighty Scorpion was already a killer.

Mr. MCD Borden (not Franz Ferdinand)

Ordered by Massachusetts textile magnate Matthew Chaloner Durfee Borden, commonly referred to at the time as “the Calico King” due to his huge factories in the Fall River area, Scorpion began life in 1896 as the very well-appointed steam yacht Sovereign built by the private yard of John N. Robins in South Brooklyn, New York to a design by J. Beaver Webb.

The rakish vessel, a 212-footer at the waterline (250-foot oal) with twin masts and twin screws powered by 2500shp of triple expansion engines, she could touch 15 knots with ease and, when running light in just ten feet of seawater, surpass that when needed.

The New York Times wrote she was, “supposed to be the fastest craft of its size on the Atlantic seaboard, and all the Jersey Central Railroad commuters between Seagirt and Atlantic Highlands know all about it.”

Borden entered her into the New York Yacht Club, where he was an esteemed member and she sailed under his care with the Seawanhaka Yacht, South Side Sportsmen’s, and Jekyll Island Clubs as well.

When war with Spain came, Borden did the patriotic thing and placed his yacht at the Navy’s service, who promptly hauled her to the New York Navy Yard, painted her haze gray, added a quartet of 5″/40 guns located on her sides, fore and aft of the superstructure– the heaviest battery fitted to any yacht converted for service during that conflict, and commissioned her four days later as USS Scorpion on 11 April 1898.

While only a yacht, her powerful 5″ guns, typically reserved for cruisers, made her a brawler able to dish out some heavy blows and the Navy Department had just the man to conn her. You see Scorpion’s skipper was German-born LCDR Adolph Marix (USNA Class of 1868) and the former executive officer of the battleship USS Maine whose explosion in Havana four months earlier had sparked the war.

By May she was off the coast of Cuba and spent an eventful ten weeks capturing lighters, assisting with landings, enforcing blockades and patrolling the shallows and high seas alike with the Flying Squadron.

On July 18, she was part of a 7 ship attack force, including two gunboats of shallow draft—Wilmington and Helena; two armed tugs—Osceola and Wampatuck; and two converted yachts—Hist and Hornet that sailed into the heavily fortified Spanish base at Manzanillo and, with using her big 5-inchers to good effect, kept the Spanish coastal batteries tied down while the smaller ships destroyed five Spanish gunboats, three blockade runners and one pontoon in less than four hours with little damage to themselves.

When the war ended, Scorpion was recalled to New York, painted white and refitted with a smaller armament while Marix left on his way to become a Vice Admiral. He wasn’t the only one. Over the course of her 31 years in the Navy, she had a staggering 21 skippers to include a Medal of Honor winner and no less than five who went on to become admirals.

In October 1900. Description: Catalog #: NH 2742 Copyright Owner: Naval History and Heritage Command

Another Detroit Publishing Co. shot, this one from 1903, with her laundry hanging. LOC

View of officers and men circa 1904. Note the six-pounder Description: Catalog #: NH 83748

Photograph of ship, with diary entry and roster of officers. Lieutenant Commander Richard G. Davenport was aboard as passenger. Description: Catalog #: NH 43803

As you may have guessed, Borden never got the Scorpion back and the Navy paid good money for her. She spent six years with the North Atlantic Squadron as a dispatch ship and flag waver small enough to venture into backwater ports around the Caribbean and protect U.S. interests.

Speaking of which, by 1908 she was on her way to Europe. Keeping the svelte gunboat with her 60-70 man peacetime crew in semi-permanent anchor in the Bosporus near the Dolma Bagtchi Palace, she became the station ship in Constantinople. There she remained, leaving to take the occasional Black Sea or Med cruise, for a decade.

Several times she took part in international actions, helping to assist earthquake victims in Messina, Italy; landing armed sailors to guard the U.S. Legation in Constantinople during riots in the city; and venturing into the disputed Balkan ports during the tumultuous events that led up to the Great War.

USS Scorpion (PY-3) in Constantinople, circa 1912 NHHC UA 04.01 Margaret Duggan Collection

Speaking of which, when the U.S. entered WWI on the side of the Allies, the humble Scorpion faced the might of the German-cum-Ottoman battlecruiser Goeben and, a suddenly a stranger in a strange land, was peacefully interned on 11 April 1917 without a fight, her breechblocks removed and a guard posted.

View taken at Constantinople, Turkey, in 1919 of ship’s officers. Front row (L-R): Lieutenant Samuel R. Deets, USN; Commander Richard P. McCullough, USS; Lieutenant Leonard Doughty, USN. Back row: Lieutenant George P. Shields (MC), USN; Paymaster Clarence Jackson, USN; Lieutenant William O. Baldwin, USN; Lieutenant Gale A. Poindexter, USN. Description: Courtesy of LCDR Leonard Doughty, 1929 Catalog #: NH 50276

When the war ended, she rearmed and remained as the flag of the U.S. High Commissioner to Turkey, keeping her place in now-Istanbul until 1920 when the influx of White Russian exiles and tensions with Greece forced her relocation to Phaleron Bay, Greece, where she remained on station until recalled back to the states 16 June 1927.

In the early 1920s, the Black Sea was an American lake, as the Russian, Bulgarian, Romanian and Ottoman fleets had largely ceased to exist while the British and French fleets, facing near bankruptcy and mutinous crews, respectively, were keen to send only a few vessels to Constantinople and Odesa and withdraw them as soon as possible. At its height, the U.S. fleet in Constantinople included over 26 warships including the battleships Arizona and Utah, a dozen destroyers, heavy and light cruisers, floating repair shops, and transport ships.

Anchored off the Dolma Bagtche Palace, Constantinople, probably during the early 1920s. Description: Original negative, given by Mr. Franklin Moran in 1967.Catalog #: NH 65006 Copyright Owner: Naval History and Heritage Command.

1925

Decommissioned, Scorpion sat on red lead row for a couple years, a Spanish-American War vet in a fleet of 1920s modern marvels.

On 25 June 1929, she was sold for her value in scrap. Very few artifacts remain from her other than some postal covers.

Her name has gone on to become something of an albatross for the submarine force. USS Scorpion (SS-278), a Gato-class submarine, was lost in 1944 to a mine in the Yellow Sea while USS Scorpion (SSN-589), a Skipjack-class submarine, was lost in an accident in 1968. In each case there were no known survivors and her name has been absent from the Naval List for 47 years.

As for Borden, he passed away in 1912 at age 69 while his beloved Sovereign/Scorpion was in Europe. His leviathan American Printing Company outlived them all, but by 1934 was shuttered because of the Great Depression.

Specs:

Displacement: 775 long tons (787 t)
Length: 212 ft. 10 in (64.87 m)
Beam: 28 ft. 1 in (8.56 m)
Draft: 11 ft. (3.4 m)
Installed power: 2 × WA Fletcher Co, Hoboken NJ triple expansion steam engines; 2500 IHP total; powered by twin Babcock and Wilcox 225# boilers. (as built) later Four Yarrow boilers, two 1,400ihp vertical inverted triple expansion steam engines, two shafts.
Propulsion: Twin screw
Speed: 14 kn (16 mph; 26 km/h)
Complement: 35 (civilian service) 90 (1898) 60 (1911)
Armament:
(1898) – Four 5″/40 guns
(1905) – Six 6-pounder (57mm) guns and four 6mm Colt machine guns
(1911) – Four 6 pounders in rapid fire mounts

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Warship Wednesday Nov.4th, 2015: HMs long-lasting welterweight sluggers

Posted on November 4, 2015 by laststandonzombieisland One comment

Warship Wednesday Nov.4th, 2015: HMs long-lasting welterweight sluggers

IWM photo

Here we see the head of her class, the Royal Navy monitor HMS Erebus at a buoy in Plymouth Sound in early 1944, as she was prepping to pummel the jerries overlooking Normandy. Though a cruiser-sized hull with a destroyer’s draft, this ship and her sister, HMS Terror carried a very impressive set of battleship 15-inchers and her crew knew how to use them.

Rushed into service in the darkest days of World War I, these ships were built not to slug it out with the Kaiser’s High Seas Fleet (as the whole rest of the RNs battle line was!) but rather to close into old Willy’s stormtroopers along the French and Belgian coasts and plaster them but good.

As such, these 405-foot/8,450-ton ships, with a shallow 11 foot draft, carried an impressive armament but very little armor (just 4-8 inches, enough for splinter protection from German destroyers and field artillery), and were very slow, at a very pedestrian 12 knots.

Huge anti-torpedo bulges were fitted to these squat ships to allow them to suck up German fish and keep punching (These proved so effective that when Erebus was attacked by a German Fernlenkboote remote controlled boat carrying a very serious 1550-pound charge, all it did was cave in 50 feet of her bulge and knock loose a lot of equipment– but failed to sink her. Terror likewise survived German torpedo boat love while in service).

Named after the two ships, HMS Erebus and Terror, of the 1839-43 expedition to Antarctica of Sir James Clark Ross which resulted in mapping most of the Antarctic Coastline (and for whom the Ross Sea is now named) and later of the ill-fated expedition of Rear Admiral Sir John Franklin, their namesakes were tiny 100~ foot long “bomb vessels” with huge 13 and 10 inch mortars– which in the end was surprisingly fitting. (As a footnote, the “bombs bursting in air” part of the Star Spangled banner comes from the 1814 mortaring of Fort McHenry, for which bomb vessel Terror was on scene).

‘Erebus’ and the ‘Terror’ in New Zealand, August 1841, by John Wilson Carmichael, via wiki

As with any monitor, its the guns that steal the show and both 1916 Erebus and Terror carried a pair of huge 15″/42 (38.1 cm) Mark I naval guns, which proved to be among the most popular and hard-service type carried by HMs battleships throughout WWI and WWII, being carried by everything from the Queen Elizabeth to Vanguard classes, as well as being fitted as giant coastal artillery pieces at Dover and Singapore.

These were really big guns: Worker being helped out of a BL 15 heavy gun after she had finished cleaning the rifling, Coventry Ordnance Works, England, United Kingdom .

Terror's 15s, these ships had thier turret set so high to enable her shallow draft

Terror’s 15s, these ships had their turret set so high to enable her shallow draft. Note the observation tower.

From the same shoot: A female worker cleans the rifling of a 15-inch gun after being lifted inside the barrel in the Coventry Ordnance Works, Warwickshire during the First World War. (Source -IWM Q 30135) Colorized by Doug

These beasts could fire a 1,920 lb. shell (of which the stubby monitors carried 200 in their magazine) out to 29,000 yards. It should be noted that the monitors were able to elevate their guns to an amazing 30 degrees (most of the battleship fittings were limited to 20 degrees, with only HMS Hood able to match the monitors’ arc), giving them about 5,000 yards more range. Later SC super charges boosted this to 40,000~ yards, which is downright impressive for guns designed in 1912!

Erebus‘s guns came from the 355-foot monitor HMS Marshal Ney (and were originally built for the Revenge-class battleship Ramillies) while the smaller Ney was given a more appropriate single 9.2-inch mount. Terror‘s guns came from a spare turret left over from the Courageous-class battlecruiser HMS Furious that was finished as an aircraft carrier and didn’t need them.

Both ships were laid down at Harland and Wolff yards, Erebus at the concern’s Govan, Scotland site, Terror at H&W’s Belfast site (the same yard that had just three years before completed RMS Titanic) in October 1915.

By the fall of 1916, they were both in commission with their abbreviated 204-man crews and headed to the Continent.

They proved their worth at bombarding German naval forces based at Ostend and Zeebrugge as part of the Long Range Bombardment force for the Zeebrugge raid and in plastering the Kaiser’s forces on shore during the Fourth Battle of Ypres.

Erebus kept slugging into 1919-20 when she participated in the British Intervention in Northern Russia, sailing around the White Sea as needed and popping off shots at the Bolsheviks around Murmansk and Archangel.

Terror at Malta, 1930s

After the war, while other monitors were laid up or went to the breakers, T&E remained somewhat active, flexing their guns in a series of tests against captured German armor and serving as gunnery training ships, guard ships and depot vessels as needed.

Oh the fate of peacetime service! Note the school house/barracks on Erebus in this 1930s photo.

Terror at Singapore, early 1939, with camo added

When the next war came, the aging monitors were stripped of their peacetime housing, given an updated AAA suite, and called back to service, first in the Mediterranean Fleet, where Erebus‘s shallow draft enabled her to become a blockade-runner into besieged Tobruk and Terror stood to in Malta to provide a floating anti-air battery against incessant Axis air attacks.

Speaking of which, Terror was severely damaged in attacks by German Junkers Ju 88 bombers on 22 February 1941 off the coast of Libya and sank while under tow the next day, gratefully with very few casualties.

Erebus finished her Second World War, returning to French waters where she helped bombard British beaches at Normandy. Suffering a detonation that crippled one of her guns, she nevertheless continued the war into late 1944, advancing with the land forces along the coast into Belgium and Holland.

Decommissioned at the end of hostilities, she was scrapped in 1946 although her single good 15-incher left was kept as a spare for the RN’s last battleship, HMS Vanguard.

Hard serving, indeed.

Specs:

Displacement: 7,200 long tons (7,300 t)
Length: 380 ft. (120 m) (p/p); 405 ft. (123 m) (o/a)
Beam: 88 ft. (27 m)
Draught: 11 ft. 8 in (3.56 m)
Installed power: 6,235 ihp (4,649 kW) (trials); 6,000 ihp (4,500 kW) (service)
Propulsion:
2 × triple expansion reciprocating engines,
Babcock boilers
2 × screws
Speed: 13.1 kn (24.3 km/h; 15.1 mph) (trials); 12 kn (22 km/h; 14 mph) (service)
Capacity: Fuel Oil: 650 long tons (660 t) (normal); 750 long tons (762.0 t) (maximum)
Complement: 204 WWI, 315 WWII
Armament:
(1916)
2 × 15-inch /42 Mk 1 guns in a single turret
2 × single 6-inch (150 mm) guns
4 × single 3-inch (76 mm) anti-aircraft (AA) guns
(1939)
2 × 15-inch /42 Mk 1 guns in a single turret
8 × single mount 4-inch (102 mm) BL Mk IX guns
2 × single mount 3-inch (76 mm) anti-aircraft guns
2 × quadruple .50-inch (12.7 mm) Vickers machine gun AA mounts
6 × .303 Vickers

Armor:
Deck: 1 in (25 mm) (forecastle); 1 in (25 mm) (upper); 4 in (100 mm) (main, slopes); 2 in (51 mm) (main, flat); .75 to 1.5 in (19 to 38 mm) (lower)
Bulkheads: 4 in (100 mm) (fore and aft, box citadel over magazines)
Barbettes: 8 in (200 mm)
Gun Houses: 4.5 to 13 in (110 to 330 mm)
Conning Tower: 6 in (150 mm)
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Warship Wednesday Oct. 28, 2015: The Rime of the Ancient marine research ship

Posted on October 28, 2015 by laststandonzombieisland One comment

Warship Wednesday Oct. 28, 2015: The Rime of the Ancient marine research ship

Image via Navsource

Here we see the 30-year old United States Fish Commission Steamer (and past/future warship) USS Albatross in the Mare Island Channel on 14 February 1914.

That’s not a misprint, the USFC was founded back in 1871 as the United States Commission of Fish and Fisheries and transitioned through a number of names until 1940 when it became part of the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service and when NOAA was established on 3 October 1970, took over the Bureau’s assets and lives on today as part of that agency– leading the one of the primary reasons that NOAA has a commissioned officer corps (trained at the U.S. Coast Guard Academy).

The hearty little 234-foot steel hulled steamer with a brigantine auxiliary sail rig, USS Albatross was laid down at Pusey and Jones, Wilmington, Delaware in March of 1882 and by November of that year was commissioned into service, a Navy-manned (by a 70 man crew) and commissioned ship loaned to the USFC.

USS Albatross. View was possibly taken onboard USS Albatross when she traveled in the Pacific Northwest to study Alaska.

Upper laboratory on the U.S.S. Albatross, 1900

Albatross was designed from the outset as a research vessel, and in fact was the first of its kind, though she had weight and space reserved for armament and could be used as an auxiliary cruiser if needed (more on this later). As such,she was the first research vessel ever built especially for marine research.

Taking soundings

Dredging for soil and sea life. She did this tens of thousands of times all over the world. Its not glamorous, but her body of research is still being digested nearly 100 years later.

Her crew working a sounder as USFC gentlemen observe

Albatross was very futuristic for 1882, being equipped with full service on-board laboratories, storage space for specimens, and sophisticated dredging equipment. The first U.S. government vessel to be wired for electric interior lighting, she could process specimens and conduct research around the clock.

1901. Note her partial sail rig in use.

She was also equipped with provision to drop “dynamite stations” to perform the first underwater acoustic experiments.

Dredging 1901

She spent all but three of her 39 years of service to the government in the employ of the USFC and journeyed from the Bahamas to the Philippines and everywhere in between.

As noted by the Smithsonian Institution, who have most of her collected specimens, Albatross‘s work was groundbreaking:

The Albatross occupies an important place in history, as her life spanned a period of growth in the marine sciences. Some well-known naturalists served on the Albatross and many young men trained on the research ship became eminent scientists. Over the course of her career, the Albatross collected more marine specimens than any other ship. Most of the material collected was deposited at the Smithsonian Institution, but some can also be found at other museums. These specimens have formed the basis of many scientific papers and are still being studied today.

War Service

As a naval vessel, Albatross had to close up her labs, pull in her sounding machines and dredges, and get to the business of high seas combat twice during her service.

As she appeared early in her career. The house shown in the 1914 image at the top was installed in 1898– for her first war service

From 21 April- 8 September 1898 Albatross was reclassified as an auxiliary cruiser during the Spanish-American War, landing her USFC personnel, and taking on extra bluejackets to man two 20-pounders, two 37mm guns, one 53mm gun, and two Gatling guns. Her coal bunkers expanded, she served in the quiet Pacific and never fired a shot, and her guns were traded back in for fish doctors.

Then during WWI Albatross chopped back to the Navy’s operational control on 19 November 1917, taking on four 6-pounders and one Colt automatic gun and served first with the 12th Naval District, then transferred to the East Coast. Stationed at Key West on coastal patrol against German U-boats and surface raiders, she participated in the epic but fruitless search for the lost collier USS Cyclops in 1918. Her active service with the fleet ended with transfer back to Fisheries control on 23 June 1919.

Albatross in poor state, 1920

Following her Great War service, she clocked back in for a couple years but by 1921 was decommissioned and sold soon after. Acquired by a Boston concern, she lived on very briefly as a school ship but by 1928 was high and dry in Hamburg Germany, “under attachment for indebtedness.”

Her final fate is unknown, however being a worthless ship in Wiemar Germany; she was likely broken up on the cheap.

Remembered in this portrait, “Albatross” by maritime artist Eugene Voishvillo

The government kept the name alive as a research vessel, literally tacking on suffixes to the original as a sign of respect.

RV Albatross II, formerly the USS Patuxent (Fleet Tug No. 11) carried the name from 1926 to 1932.

RV Albatross III saw service with the United States National Fish and Wildlife Service from 1948 to 1959 (and with the Coast Guard in WWII).

NOAAS Albatross IV (R 342) was commissioned for USFWS in 1963 and served with NOAA until 2008. She now is inactive in NOAA ‘s Atlantic Fleet.

NOAAS Albatross IV

Specs:
Displacement: 638 long tons (648 t)
Length: 234 ft. (71 m)
Beam: 27 ft. 6 in (8.38 m)
Draft: 16 ft. 9 in (5.11 m)
Propulsion: Steam engine
Speed: 10 knots (19 km/h; 12 mph)
Complement: 70 USN, up to 25 scientists and research civilians. 110 USN in wartime.
Armament:
(1898)
2 × 20-pounder guns
2 × 37 mm guns
1 × 53 mm (2 in) gun
2 × Gatling guns
(1917-19)
4× 6-pounder guns
1 × Colt machine gun

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

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Warship Wednesday Oct. 21, 2015: The humble yet resilient Frenchman

Posted on October 21, 2015 by laststandonzombieisland 6 comments

Warship Wednesday, Oct. 21, 2015: The humble yet resilient Frenchman

Photo colorized by irootoko_jr

Here we see the French aircraft carrier Bearn, the only one of her kind, in pre-WWII aircraft operations. She was too young for WWI and too old for WWII, but she remained with the fleet for some 50 years.

In 1912, the Republic ordered five brand new battleships to augment the (26,000-ton, 10 × 340mm/45 Modèle 1912 guns in five twin turrets, powered by four direct-drive steam turbines) Bretagne-class.

These new ships, Normandie, Flandre, Gascogne, Languedoc, and Béarn, would carry a full dozen 340mm guns in three quadruple turrets (the French loved that arrangement, using it on all their later battleships) and be powered by a hybrid powerplant of two turbines and two reciprocating engines, each on their own shaft. Insulated by up to 12 inches of armor, they were thought to be comparable to the latest Italian, Austrian, and German designs of the 1911-era and fast enough at 21 knots to make due.

To speed up construction, the five ships were to be built around the country at three different yards with class leader Normandie laid down 18 April 1913 at St Nazaire and her four sisters likewise started over the next eight months with Bearn, begun 10 January 1914 at F C de la Méditerranée, La Seyne, the last of the class.

However, when the Great War began in August 1914, France, allied to the mighty Royal Navy and soon to that of the Italian Regina Marina, was good in the battleship department with both the Austrians and Germans bottled up in their respective harbors and unlikely to sail on Toulon or Brest any time soon.

This meant that the five new battleships were suspended and the first four of their hulls, able to float but not much else, launched to clear the ways for other more pressing projects. Bearn, even less along than the other four, was left on the ways. Several of the battleships’ intended 340mm and 138.6 mm guns were mounted as railway artillery instead and went to pounding the Kaiser’s thick gray line along the Western Front and then lingered as coastal artillery emplacements into the 1940s. (Some of these coastal guns saw action in August 1944 during the Allied invasion where they were fired upon by USS Nevada (BB-36))

At the end of the war, the prospect of a financially strapped France completing five 1911-era battlewagons whose hulls were already covered with enough kelp and sea growth to make an instant reef was slim. In the end, it was decided to scrap the four floating leviathans and launch Bearn‘s own incomplete hull in April 1920 and figure out what to do with her later.

The French hit upon the idea to do what the Brits, Japanese, and Americans were doing with their likewise unfinished battleship/cruiser hulls– turn them into an aircraft carrier. You see the RN did that with the three 27,000 ton Courageous-class carriers (converted from battlecruiser hulls), the 22,000 ton (battleship-hulled) HMS Eagle; the Japanese followed course with 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), while the Americans rolled with former 36,000-ton battlecruisers Lexington and Saratoga in 1927.

To be fair, the French beat the Japanese and Americans to the punch and started converting Bearn in 1923, with her shakedown complete and entering service with the fleet in May 1928.

Interesting arrangement of the flight deck and hanger elevator on French aircraft carrier Bearn

An interesting arrangement of the flight deck and hangar elevator on French aircraft carrier Bearn

Covered with a 590-foot flight deck, she had two below-deck hangars served by three elevators (all in the center of the deck) and could carry about 40 aircraft.

Close up of her pre-war. Note the two casemated 6.1-inch guns Photo colorized by irootoko_jr

Like other carriers of her day, she was equipped largely with the same suite as a decent-sized cruiser, with eight 6.1-inch guns mounted in casemates (!) for surface action, a host of modest anti-aircraft guns, and a quartet of 22-inch torpedo tubes (unique in carrier development). She also had a modicum of armor above the waterline but no torpedo blisters.

French carrier Béarn viewed from another warship, date unknown

Her peacetime role in the 1930s saw her sprout the flower of French naval aviation.

With news that the Germans were going flattop (with their never finished 32,000-ton Stuka-carrying Graf Zeppelin), in 1937 the French authorized a pair of new 20,000-ton Joffre-class carriers which, with a 774-foot flight deck and a capability to carry at least 40 combat aircraft were about the size as the USS Ranger. The first vessel, Joffre, was laid down in 1938 and was about 25 percent complete when the Germans marched into Paris while the second vessel, Painlevé, never even had her keel laid.

The planned French Aircraft carrier Joffre

As Bearn was somewhat stubby (with a 590-foot flight deck, far outclassed by the big Lexington and Akagi), the newer carriers would go almost 800 feet long, which was thought ideal.

When those two carriers joined the fleet, she was to convert to a seaplane depot ship in 1942.

However, when the next war started, Bearn was all the French had as the other two carriers were still under construction (and never completed). This left Bearn as the sole French carrier headed into WWII.

“Le porte-avion Bearn et un latecoère 298″by Albert Brenet

In 1939, Bearn was assigned, alongside the new battleship Dunkerque (with quadruple turrets!) and three cruisers to go and hunt down German surface raiders, which turned out to be uneventful.

French battleship Bretagne and Lorraine in heavy seas, circa 1939. Bearn in the background

In May 1940, with things not going so well for the French Army, she was ordered to Toulon where she secretly took aboard the 3880 boxes of the Republic’s gold reserves (over 250 tons) and, escorted by the 6500-ton school cruiser Jeanne d’Arc and the new 8,400-ton light cruiser Émile Bertin, sailed for Canada under the command of Rear Admiral Rouyer.

In early 1940, 50 former USN Curtiss SBC Helldivers were taken out of the reserve, given French machine guns and camo patterns, then flown to Nova Scotia to be loaded onto Béarn and the light cruiser Jeanne d’Arc. Because of space limitations, only 44 of the SBC-4s could be carried on Béarn as she also had 25 Stinson 105s, 17 former USAAF P-36s, and 6 Brewster F2A-2 Buffalos aboard for the Belgian Air Force. Jeanne d’Arc carried 14 crated, unassembled aircraft: 8 Stinson 105s and 6 Curtiss P-36s.

French Helldivers delivered to RCAF Station Dartmouth, Nova Scotia for carrier Béarn

Sailing from Halifax on 16 June 1940 bound for Brest, the news came that France fell and the ships diverted to the colony of Martinique.

Six Belgian Brewster Buffalo's aboard the French aircraft carrier Béarn during the journey, which would end on Martinique. Besides the Buffalos, she was carrying 27 Curtiss H-75s (P-36s), 44 SBC Helldivers and 25 Stinson Voyagers.

Six Belgian Brewster Buffalo aboard the French aircraft carrier Béarn during the journey, which would end in Martinique. Besides the Buffalos, she was carrying 27 Curtiss H-75s (P-36s), 44 SBC Helldivers, and 25 Stinson Voyagers.

Unwilling to join the Free French forces, the three-ship task force offloaded their gold and planes on the island and made ready to defend it against any invader, be they British or German, and remained on this footing for almost two years.

Original Kodachrome of French Aircraft Carrier Béarn at Martinique, Feb 1941, LIFE- David E. Scherman

Finally, after pressure from the Americans, on 16 May 1942, they were ordered by the Vichy authorities to be immobilized and interned.

With the fall of Vichy France following the invasion of North Africa, the ships joined the Free French forces in June 1943, when the local government recognized De Gaulle’s.

At that point, Jeanne d’Arc immediately left for the Med where she participated in the capture of Corsica and helped the Allied fleets for the rest of the war. Bearn and Émile Bertin, in need of a refit, sailed for the U.S.

French carrier Béarn, date unknown, seen in the May 1963 issue of US Navy publication Naval Aviation News

After modernization at the Philadelphia Naval Shipyard, Bertin joined Jeanne d’Arc in the Med in time for the Allied invasion of southern France (Operation Dragoon) in August 1944 and later bombarded Axis positions along the Italian Riviera.

As for the aircraft Bearn left in the Caribbean, they were shipped from the West Indies to Morocco during 1943-44, placed in flying condition, and used for training, with some of the Stinsons reportedly remaining in service as late as the 1960s.

For Bearn, her refit took far longer due to her size, complex engineering suite, and the fact that her pre-war AAA suite was considered wholly inadequate by 1943 standards for a ship her size.

She traded in her 6-inch casemates, 13.2mm machine guns, and 75mm low-angle pieces for 4 5″/38s, six quads 40mm Bofors, and 26 20mm Oerlikons, which sounds about right. Her flight deck was shortened, the central elevator was removed, modern electronic equipment was installed, and the complement was reduced to 650. Oh yeah, and her torpedo tubes, inactive since 1939 anyway, were deactivated.

Bearn after her WWII American refit. Note the casemates are empty and a number of AAA guns are fitted as are emergency rafts and liberal camo. Note stored planes on deck Photo colorized by irootoko_jr http://blog.livedoor.jp/irootoko_jr/

Bearn after her WWII American refit. Note the casemates are empty and several AAA guns are fitted as are emergency rafts and liberal camo. Note stored planes on deck Photo colorized by irootoko_jr

Emerging from Philadelphia in April 1945 and with the European war ending, she was sent with her old Martinique pier-mate Émile Bertin as part of the immense French Armada sailing to liberate Indochina from the Japanese, arriving there just after the end of the War in the Pacific.

A repurposed Japanese Aichi E13A “Jake” floatplane aboard Béarn, while at Ha Long Bay, Indochina.

Although the only French aircraft carrier from 1928 to 45, her final days were numbered. Instead of an air wing, she arrived at Haiphong loaded with troops and supplies.

French carrier Béarn, 1946

Bearn underway in Ha Long Bay, Indochina, March 1946

Serving as an aviation transport rather than a full-fledged carrier, (the French immediately after the war operated F6Fs, Bearcats, Douglas Dauntless dive bombers, Helldivers, and F4Us from loaned jeep carrier HMS Biter/Dixmude, the Independence-class light carriers Langley/Lafayette, and Belleau Wood/Bois Belleau as well as the British-built Arromanches and didn’t need Bearn‘s flattop anymore), she was recalled to Toulon and served as an immobile submarine accommodation and training ship.

Dutch submarine Dolfijn (3) moored alongside the French aircraft carrier Bearn, Toulon, Mar 1963

French carrier Bearn in port at Toulon, France, 1964. Note the moored submarines, lack of any armament, and helicopter landing zones marked on her deck.

Bearn continued this sad role until November 1966, when she was stricken. She was sold for scrap the following year. Although her hull had more than 50 years on it, she was only in active service in fleet operations for about 14 of those and reportedly never fired a shot in anger or launched a combat sortie.

Specs:

Image via Shipbucket

Displacement:
22,146 long tons (22,501 t) (standard)
28,400 long tons (28,900 t) (full load)
Length: 182.6 m (599 ft. 1 in) (o/a)
Beam: 35.2 m (115 ft. 6 in)
Draft: 9.3 m (30 ft. 6 in)
Installed power:
2 Parsons steam turbines, 2 VTE, 6 Normand du Temple boilers, 4 shafts
22,500 shp (16,800 kW) (turbines)
15,000 ihp (11,000 kW) (reciprocating engines)
Speed: 21.5 kn (39.8 km/h; 24.7 mph)
Range: 7,000 nmi (13,000 km; 8,100 mi) at 10 kn (19 km/h; 12 mph)
Complement: 865 as completed
Armament:
Original: 8 × 155 mm (6.1 in)/50 cal guns (8 × 1)
6 × 75 mm (3.0 in)/50 cal anti-aircraft guns (6 × 1) 8 × 37 mm (1.5 in) anti-aircraft guns (added 1935)
16 × 13.2 mm (0.52 in) anti-aircraft machine guns (6 × 1) (added 1935)
4 × 550 mm (22 in) torpedo tubes
After 1944 Refit: 4 × 127 mm (5.0 in)/38 cal dual-purpose guns
24 × 40 mm (1.57 in) anti-aircraft guns (6 × 4)
26 × 20 mm (0.79 in) anti-aircraft autocannons
Armor:
Main Belt: 8 cm (3.1 in)
Flight Deck: 2.5 cm (1.0 in)
Aircraft carried:
35-40 as designed
1939: 10 × Dewoitine D.373, 10 × Levasseur PL.7, and 9 × Levasseur PL.10

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Warship Wednesday Oct. 14, 2015: The great return of the hurricane Apache

Posted on October 14, 2015 by laststandonzombieisland Leave a comment

Warship Wednesday, Oct. 14, 2015: The great return of the hurricane Apache

Here we see the U.S. Revenue Marine Cutter Apache decked out with signal flags sometime after 1906 and before 1910.

In her 59 years of service to the nation, she saw three wars, served in three (five if you really want to argue the point) different branches of the military, and helped deliver one of the most remembered victory speeches in U.S. history.

Ordered from Reeder and Sons, Baltimore, Maryland in 1890, the new 190-foot iron-hulled revenue cutter was commissioned into the U.S. Revenue Marine on 22 August 1891. She was built for coastal operations, capable of floating in 10 feet of seawater, but with a 6:1 length to beam ratio and hardy steam plant with twin screws was able to operate in blue waters far out to sea if required.

She cost $95,650.

The new cutter had provision for an auxiliary sailing rig, although not equipped as such. Armed with a trio of small (57 mm, 6-pounder) deck guns and demolition charges, she could sink floating derelicts at sea which were a hazard to navigation, as well as hole smugglers who declined the offer to heave to and be inspected.

Named the Galveston in service, she shipped to that port for her home base in October 1891.

As Galveston, completed. Note the twin stacks and rakish bow. Click to embiggen and you will notice the wheel and compass station on her stern as well as an uncovered 57mm popgun way forward (the other two are under tarps amidships)

There, for the next 15 years, she was the Revenue Marine’s (and after 1894 the renamed Revenue Cutter Service’s) presence along most of the Texas coast. She participated in Mardi Gras celebrations, transported local students “for educational purposes to study Galveston Harbor,” patrolled regattas, enforced oyster seasons, and performed other USRM/USRCS functions as needed.

Revenue Service Cutter USRC Galveston, participating at Mardi Gras New Orleans 1900

When the Spanish American War broke out in 1898, instead of chopping to the Navy like most of the large cutters, Galveston was ordered to New Orleans where she took on field pieces from the local militia and stood to in the Mississippi River delta to assist in repelling a potential Spanish naval thrust to the Crescent City.

After the war, she went back to Galveston where she encountered the super-hurricane of 1900 that left some 8,000 dead.

Root, USCG Photo

Aboard the USRC Galveston during the storm was assistant engineer Charles S. Root, later founder of the USCG’s Intelligence Service, who volunteered to lead a rescue party in the destroyed coastal town. A call for volunteers went out to the ship’s crew and eight enlisted men stepped forward to accompany Root, but first had to round up the swamped and damaged cutter’s whaleboat.

From the USCG:

Within half-an-hour of volunteering, Root and his men deployed, performing a mission more common to Lifesaving Service surf men than to cuttermen. The small group overhauled their whaleboat, dragged it over nearby railroad tracks and launched it into the overflowing streets. The winds blew oars into the air, so the men warped the boat through the city using a rope system. One of the rescuers would swim up the streets with a line, tie it to a fixed object and the boat crew would haul-in the line. Using this primitive process, Galveston’s boat crew rescued numerous victims out of the roiling waters of Galveston’s streets.

At around 6:15 p.m., the Galveston Weather Bureau anemometer registered over 100 mph, before a gust tore the wind gauge off the building. Later, Weather Bureau officials estimated that at around 7:00 p.m., the sustained wind speed had increased to 120 mph. By this time, assistant engineer Root and his rescue party returned to the Galveston having filled their whaleboat with over a dozen storm survivors. By this time, even the cutter’s survival seemed doubtful, with demolishing winds stripping away rigging and prying loose the ship’s launch. Meanwhile, wind-driven projectiles shattered the cutter’s windows and skylights in the pilothouse, deckhouse, and engine room covers.

Not long after Root returned to the cutter, Weather Bureau officials recorded an instantaneous flood surge of 4 feet. Experts estimate that the sustained wind speed peaked at 150 mph and gusts up to 200. The howling wind sent grown men sailing through the air and pushed horses to the ground. The barometric pressure dropped lower than 28.50 inches, a record low up to that date. By then, the storm surge topped 15 feet above sea level. The high water elevated the Galveston so high that she floated over her own dock pilings. Fortunately, the piling tops only bent the cutter’s hull plates but failed to puncture them.

Within an hour of returning to the cutter, at the height of the storm, Root chose to lead a second rescue party into the flooded streets. Darkness had engulfed the city and he called again for volunteers. The same men from the first crew volunteered the second time. The wind still made the use of oars impossible, so the crew warped the boat from pillar to post. As the men waded and swam through the city streets, buildings toppled around them and howling winds filled the air with sharp slate roof tiles. But the boat crew managed to rescue another 21 people. Root’s men housed these victims in a structurally sound two-story building and found food for them in an abandoned store. The cuttermen then moored the boat in the lee of a building and took shelter from flying debris and deadly missiles propelled by the wind.

The hurricane remains the worst weather-related disaster in U.S. history in terms of loss of life. Root and his volunteer crew were (posthumously and only in recent years) awarded Gold and Silver Lifesaving Medals respectively for their actions in September 1900.

After the storm, Galveston was repaired and made ship-shape again before receiving a major refit in 1904, which included replacement of her entire engineering suite. Later her bowsprit was modified as after that time it was considered the 1891-designed provision for sail power was obsolete.

In 1906 she was renamed USRC Apache and reassigned to the Chesapeake region, based in Baltimore, the city of her birth.

After refit as Apache, note single stack

After refitting as Apache, note single stack and much-modified bowsprit and streamlined rigging.

Apache gave yeoman service enforcing customs and quarantine laws and saving lives. During the great blizzard of January 1914, she was credited with helping save 15 threatened fishing vessels trapped in ice and snow on the Chesapeake.

She participated in fleet drills with the Navy, transported D.C. politicians and dignitaries up and down the Bay, and generally made herself useful.

During World War I, she kept regular neutrality patrols with a weather eye peeled for U-boats and German surface raiders, becoming part of the new USCG in 1915.

When the U.S. entered the war in April 1917, she was transferred to the Navy along with the rest of the service. Painted haze gray, her armament and crew were greatly expanded in her service to the 5th Naval District.

In 28 months of Navy service, USS Apache continued her coastal patrol and search and rescue activities all along Hampton Roads, the approaches to the Potomac and the Chesapeake Bay in general.

Returned to the USCG in August 1919, she regained her standard white and buff scheme, landed most of her armament– keeping just a sole 3″/23 caliber deck gun– and went back to working regular shifts for another two decades.

Coast Guard cutter “Apache” firing salute of the unveiling of the statue of Alexander Hamilton, May 1923. LOC Photo

Finally, at the end of 1937, with 46 years of hard service to include two wars and a superstorm under her belt, USCGC Apache was decommissioned, replaced by a much newer and better-equipped 327-foot Treasury-class cutter.

However, Uncle still owned her and, while other lumbering old retired cutters were brought back for coastal patrol duties in World War II, Apache languished unused and unwanted at her moorings.

Then in 1944, the U.S. Army took over the old ex-Apache and utilized her as a radio transmission ship.

Sailing to Australia, she was painted dark green, refitted with generators, receivers, cables, antennas, and two 10kW shortwave transmitters to serve as a MacArthur conceived press ship to follow along on the invasions to Japan. She was manned by a crew of a dozen Army mariners, staffed by some 25 Signal Corps radiomen, and carried several civilian war correspondents, thus keeping them away from the Navy’s flagships.

This floating Army broadcasting station sailed north from Sydney in September 1944, arriving at General Douglas MacArthur’s headquarters at Hollandia, New Guinea on October 10. Two days later, U.S. Army Vessel Apache joined a flotilla of American war vessels for the return invasion of the Philippines.

For the next 18 months, little Apache relayed American Armed Forces Radio Service and the Voice of America via shortwave all over the Philippines, off the coast of Korea, and then further south off the coast of China.

She was the first to broadcast MacArthur’s “I have returned” speech in October 1944 to the island chain.

Following the fleet to Tokyo Bay, she stood near USS Missouri for the surrender and continued her radio programming operations until 20 April 1946 when she was replaced in service by the Army vessel Spindle Eye, a converted freighter with much more powerful transmitters.

Decommissioned, Apache was sold for scrap in 1950.

I cannot find any surviving artifacts from her.

Specs:

Displacement: 416 tons (700 full load, naval service)
Length: 190′
Beam: 29′
Draft: 9.3
Propulsion: Compound-expansion steam engine; twin screw with 1 propeller to each cylinder; 15.75”and 27” diam by 24” stroke, replaced with triple-expansion steam engine, 17”, 27”, 43” diam by 24” stroke with a single propeller in 1904.
Maximum speed: 12.0 knots
Complement: 32 officers and men as commissioned; 58 WWI USN service; 37 U.S. Army in WWII.
Armament: 3×6 pdrs as commissioned for derelict destruction as completed
(1918) Three 3″/23 single mounts and two Colt machine guns, one Y-gun depth charge launcher, stern-mounted depth charge racks
(1920) 3″/23
(1944) As Army vessel carried small arms which may have included light machine guns.

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Warship Wednesday Oct. 7, 2015: Los Submarinos!

Posted on October 7, 2015 by laststandonzombieisland One comment

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, Oct. 7, 2015: Los Submarinos!

Submarino S-01 leaving harbor, 1962. She looks remarkably like a Type VIIC U-boat. Hey, wait a minute...

Submarino S-01 leaving the harbor, 1962. She looks remarkably like a Type VIIC U-boat. Hey, wait a minute…

Here we see what could have very well been the last of old Adolph’s U-boat fleet in fleet operations, Submarino S-01 of the Armada Española.

Starting life as U-573, a Type VIIC U-boat built for Germany’s Kriegsmarine, she was laid down on 24 October 1939, roughly 76 years ago this month, at Blohm and Voss in Hamburg. As such, she was a war baby, with the German invasion of Poland beginning some two months before. She cost the Germans 4 million marks.

The Type VIIC design was the backbone and icon of the U-boat force, with 568 commissioned from 1940 to 1945. For instance, the submarine in Das Boot, U-96, was a VIIC.

These 800-ton, 220-foot long vessels had great range (8,500 nm), could make 17.7 knots on the surface which was faster than most merchantmen of the day, and carried 14 advanced torpedoes and an 88mm SK C/35 gun with some 200~ rounds for those ships not worthy of a torp.

Commissioned on 5 June 1941, on the cusp of the invasion of the Soviet Union, U-573 completed four combat patrols in eight months between 15 September 1941 and 2 May 1942. Spending 119 days at sea, her inaugural skipper, Kptlt. Heinrich Heinsohn, helmed the vessel the whole time.

U-573 in German service

The city of Landeck in Tyrol adopted the submarine within the then-popular sponsorship program (Patenschaftsprogramm), organizing gifts and holidays for the crew, earning her the honorary name “U-573 Landeck,” and she carried that town’s coat of arms briefly.

U-573′s four patrols produced lackluster results, only chalking up one kill, the 5,289-ton Norwegian flagged steamer Hellen, sunk by two of three torpedoes fired by the submarine about 4 miles off Cape Negro. The bow broke away and the Norwegian sank shortly after midnight without loss of life. All 41 crew members were picked up by the armed trawler HMT Arctic Ranger and landed in Gibraltar the next day.

SS Hellen

Speaking of Gibraltar, on April 29, 1942, U-573 was encountered on the surface by a Lockheed Hudson bomber (U.S. A-28) of RAF Sqdn. 233/M who promptly dropped 325-pound depth charges on her until she submerged.

Damaged, the submarine was again attacked by Hudsons from No. 233 the next day.

Lockheed Hudson of No. 233 Squadron RAF preparing for take-off in August 1942, with the Rock of Gibraltar in the background. Taken by Lt. G.W. Dallison, War Office official photographer – This is photograph GM 1405 from the collections of the Imperial War Museums; captioned A Royal Air Force Lockheed Hudson III of No. 233 Squadron RAF leaves its dispersal at Gibraltar for a reconnaissance sortie.

With one man killed, his batteries leaking, a crack in his hull that prevented submergence to more than 45 feet, and numerous other issues, Heinsohn made for the closest friendly harbor– that of neutral but pro-German Spain– arriving at Cartagena on 2 May.

There, under the howls of British diplomatic protests, the Spaniards allowed the sub 90 days to patch up and get back into the Med. However, the battered U-573 was too far gone for pierside ersatz repairs against a waiting British blockade. On 2 August 1942, Germany sold her to Franco for 180 million pesetas (1.5 million marks) in a warm handover, minus torpedoes and shells, which were destroyed to help keep the British happy. Her flag, books, code machine, and crests were given to the German ambassador.

Handover. Note the caps!

Her 43-man crew, officially to be interned for the duration, snuck back to the Reich in small groups and was replaced by a few civilian German naval technicians who remained with Spain’s new sub as advisers until well after the war.

(Note- One other German Type VIIC sub, U-760, was interned under the guns of the Spanish cruiser Navarra at Vigo harbor in 1943 and, her engines dismantled, was towed away by the British in 1945.)

While the war ended and Hitler was swept away with all of his legions of VIICs (Heinsohn himself and most of Crew 33, were killed on other U-boats after they returned home), U-573, rechristened G-7 by the Spanish, endured.

Why G-7? You see Franco had planned to build six of their own VIICs that were to be numbered G1 to G6, but that never happened.

G7 during her reconstruction

The thing is, the sole Type VIIC the Spanish did have was still a wreck. A floating wreck to be sure, but far from operational by any stretch of the imagination.

It wasn’t until 17 November 1947, after an extensive refit in dry-dock to include much German contract labor, salvaged gear from Hamburg, and new (American) batteries, that she was in active service.

Painted gray, she still carried her 88mm Rheinmetall Borsig forward although her 20mm AA gun was landed. The Armada had acquired 12 working 533mm torpedoes and mounted a 7.62mm MG3 on her tower when needed. Still, she was far in advance of the few smallish pre-WWII subs the Armada had been using.

Tested to 120 meters depth (half or original design), her Spanish crew consisted of a Commander, Deputy Commander, Chief Engineer, Deputy Engineer, three CPOs, 13 Cabos (NCOs), and 24 ratings.

Her 88mm was kept standard in working condition until 1970.

Across her tower was installed “Todo por la Patria” (All for the Fatherland) in place of the old Landeck crest.

The most modern Spanish submarine until the 1950s, she was the fleet’s pride and frequently appeared in period movies and film footage portraying German U-boats for obvious reasons.

“U 47 – Kapitänleutnant Prien,” a 1958 German film starring one U-573/Submarino G-7

In 1961, refitted with the help of the U.S., she was repainted black and renamed S-01.

Submarine (G-7) on its visit to the port of Alicante 1952

Los submarinos G-7 y D-2 petrolean el 6 de Mayo de 1953

Spanish submarine S-01 in Barcelona in June 1962. In the background is the famed circa 1903 Port Vell Port Authority Building, designed by Julio Valdés

Her skippers:
CC. D. GUILERMO CARRERO GARRE of –.–. 1947 to 26.9.1949
CC. D. Ayuso SERRANO JACINTO of 26/09/1949 to 27/11/1952
CC. Joaquín Florez of 27/11/1952 to 19/11/1954
CC. D. TOMAS NAVARRO CLAVIJO of 11/19/1954 to 17/04/1956
CC. Juan A. MORENO AZNAR from 04/17/1956 to 04/05/1960
CC.D. ENRIQUE ROMERO GONZALEZ of 05/05/1960 to 09/29/1961
TN. D. Luis Rodriguez Mendez-Nunez 09.29.1961 to 15.02.1965
CC. D. LUIS FERNANDO MARTI NARBONA of 15/02/1965 to 20/09/1966
CC. ENRIQUE SEGURA Agacino of 20/09/1966 to 04/16/1968
CC. JAVIER GARCIA CAVESTANY of 16/04/1968 to 05/10/1969
CC.D. AREVALO EMILIO Pelluz of 05/10/1969 to 02/05/1970

Docked for the last time in February 1970, she was stricken from the Armada on 2 May that year. Plans to preserve her as a museum fell through and she was sold for about $25,000, her value in scrap metal.

She was replaced in service 11 months later by USS Ronquil (SS-396), a Guppy’d Balao-class smoke boat that became SPS Isaac Peral (S-32)— with much of S-01‘s former crew aboard. Ironically, Ronquil was also a movie star, having appeared as the fictional USS Tigershark in the film Ice Station Zebra.

While numerous submarines are preserved in museums, including 9 in Germany, there is only one Type VIIC on public display– U-995 at Laboe, Germany. Like U-573/S01 she was a Blohm and Voss boat and is a near sister.

(Note, U-505 at the Museum of Science and Industry, in Chicago, Illinois is a type IXC).

Submarino S 01 Ex U573 y G-7 1941-1970 By Martin Garcia Garcia

Specs:

Displacement: 769 tonnes (757 long tons) surfaced
871 t (857 long tons) submerged
Length: 67.10 m (220 ft 2 in) o/a
50.50 m (165 ft. 8 in) pressure hull
Beam: 6.20 m (20 ft. 4 in) (o/a)
4.70 m (15 ft. 5 in) (pressure hull)
Height: 9.60 m (31 ft. 6 in)
Draft: 4.74 m (15 ft. 7 in)
Propulsion: 2 × supercharged 6-cylinder 4-stroke Germaniawerft diesel engines totaling 2,800–3,200 PS (2,100–2,400 kW; 2,800–3,200 shp). Max rpm: 470–490. Two Brown, Boveri & Cie GG UB 720/8 double-acting electric motors
Speed: 17.7 knots (32.8 km/h; 20.4 mph) surfaced
7.6 knots (14.1 km/h; 8.7 mph) submerged
Range: 8,500 nmi (15,700 km; 9,800 mi) at 10 knots (19 km/h; 12 mph) surfaced
80 nmi (150 km; 92 mi) at 4 knots (7.4 km/h; 4.6 mph) submerged
Test depth: 230 m (750 ft)
Calculated crush depth: 250–295 m (820–968 ft.)
Complement: 44-52 officers & ratings
Armament: 5 × 53.3 cm (21 in) torpedo tubes (4 bow, 1 stern)
14 × torpedoes or 26 TMA or 39 TMB mines
1 × 8.8 cm SK C/35 Rheinmetall Borsig naval gun with 220 rounds
1x Rheinmettal 20mm antiaircraft

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

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Warship Wednesday Sept. 30, 2015: The Deseret Battlewagon

Posted on September 30, 2015 by laststandonzombieisland 3 comments

Warship Wednesday, Sept. 30, 2015: The Deseret Battlewagon

Photo colorized by irootoko_jr http://blog.livedoor.jp/irootoko_jr/

Utah as she appeared in World War One (click image to big up). At the time she was the flag of the 6th Battleship Division and carried a unique camo pattern that included the white triangular veins shown here Photo colorized by irootoko_jr

Here we see the Florida-class dreadnought USS Utah (BB-31/AG-16) as she appeared during World War I. While she went “Over There” and was ready to fight the Germans yet never fired a shot, her follow-on experience in the next world war would be much different.

The period of U.S. battleship development from the USS Indiana (Battleship No. 1) in 1890, until Florida was ordered in 1908 saw a staggering 29 huge capital ships built in under two decades. While the majority of those vessels were pre-dreadnought Monopoly battleships (for instance, Indiana was 10,500-tons and carried 2 × twin 13″/35 guns), the U.S. had gotten in the dreadnought business with the two smallish 16,000-ton, 8×12 inch/45 caliber gunned South Carolina-class ships ordered in 1905, followed by a pair of larger 22,400-ton, 10×12 inch/45 gunned Delaware-class battleships in 1907.

The pair of Florida-class ships were better than the U.S. battleships before them but rapidly eclipsed by the 33 that came after and developmentally were sandwiched between the old and new era. Dimensionally, they were more than twice as heavy as the country’s first battleships and only half as heavy as the last commissioned in 1944.

At 25,000 tons, they carried roughly the same battery of 12 inchers (10x12″/45 caliber Mark 5 guns) in six twin turrets as the Delawares, which were equivalent to the period Royal Navy’s BL 12 inch Mk X naval gun and the Japanese Type 41 12-inch (305 mm) /45 caliber naval gun. Utah was the last battleship mounted with this particular model gun.

The crew of Turret I on USS Utah B-31 in 1913 U.S. Naval Historical Center Photograph # NH 103835 via Navweaps

Their belt, an almost homogenous 11-inches everywhere, was thick for the time and they could make 21-knots on a quartet of Parsons steam turbines powered by a full dozen Babcock & Wilcox coal-fired boilers.

Laid down 9 March 1909 at New York Shipbuilding Corporation, Utah was the first (and, until this week, only) ship named after the former State of Deseret.

Commissioned 31 August 1911, her early career was a series of training and goodwill cruises. Then the gloves came off.

In April 1914, Utah was heavily involved in Mr. Wilson’s intervention in the affairs of Mexico, ordered to seize the German-flagged steamer SS Ypiranga, and loaded with good Krupp and Mauser guns for old man Huerta.

This led to the battle for and subsequent occupation of Veracruz where Utah and her sistership Florida landed two provisional battalions consisting of 502 Marines and 669 bluejackets (many of whose white uniforms were dyed brown with coffee grounds) to fight their way to the Veracruz Naval Academy. Utah‘s 384 sailors gave hard service, pushing street by street and tackling the Mexican barricades. The fleet suffered ~100 casualties in the fighting while the Mexicans took nearly five times that number.

Formal raising of first flag of U.S. Veracruz 2 P.M. April 27, 1914 by sailors and Marines of the Utah and Florida

Formal raising of the first flag of U.S. Veracruz 2 P.M. April 27, 1914, by sailors and Marines of the Utah and Florida

As the crisis abated, Utah sailed away two months later for the first of her many refits.

When the U.S. entered WWI in 1917, Utah spent most of the conflict as an engineering school training ship in Chesapeake Bay. then in August 1918 sailed for Ireland where she was stationed in Bantry Bay to keep an eye peeled for German surface raiders.

Photo colorized by irootoko_jr

After her fairly pedestrian war service, she and Florida had their dozen coal eaters replaced with a quartet of more efficient White-Forster oil-fired boilers, which allowed one funnel to be removed. Their AAA suite was likewise increased.

Battleship Number 31, USS Utah, at rest in Guatanamo Bay, Cuba, January 1920.

Battleship Number 31, USS Utah, at rest in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, January 1920.

One bluejacket who served aboard her in 1922 Petty Officer 3rd Class (Machinery Repairman) John Dillinger, but he deserted after a few months when Utah was docked in Boston and was eventually dishonorably discharged before becoming Public Enemy No. 1.

dilenger aboard uss utah

Despite the cranky Mr. Dillinger, Utah was a happy ship in the 1920s, completing several goodwill cruises to South America and Europe including a trip in 1928 with President-Elect Herbert Hoover aboard.

While the ships survived the cuts of the Washington Naval Treaty, the ax of the follow-on London Naval Treaty fell, and when compared to the newer hulls in the battleship fleet, Utah and Florida were found lacking although they were only 15~ years old and recently modernized.

As such, class leader Florida was decommissioned in February 1931 and towed to the Philadelphia Naval Shipyard, where she was broken up for scrap.

As for Utah, she was decommissioned, pulled from the battle fleet, disarmed, and converted to a radio-controlled target ship, designated AG-16 on 1 July 1931. She was capable of being operated completely by remote control with a skeleton crew.

Her electric motors, operated by signals from the controlling ship, opened and closed throttle valves, moved her steering gear, and regulated the supply of oil to her boilers. In addition, a Sperry gyro pilot kept the ship on course.

Able to operate with her much-reduced crew buttoned up inside her protective armor with every hatch dogged, her decks were reinforced with a double layer of 6″x12″ plank timbers to keep inert practice bombs from damaging the ship. Her funnel likewise was given a steel cap. Sandbags and cement patches covered hard-to-plank areas.

Photographed by George Winstead, probably immediately after her recommissioning on 1 April 1932, when Utah (AG-16) departed Norfolk on to train her engineers in using the new installations and for trials of her radio gear by which the ship could be controlled at varying rates of speed and changes of course maneuvers that a ship would conduct in battle. USN photo courtesy of Robert M. Cieri. Text courtesy of DANFS. Via Navsource

No longer considered a capital ship befitting flag officers, her 102-piece silver service, purchased by a donation from 30,000 schoolchildren of Utah (and each piece with an image of Brigham Young on it), was sent back to the state for safekeeping.

While her main and secondary armament was landed, she was equipped with a battery of 1.1-inch quads and later some 5″/38 cal DP, 5″/25, 20mm, and .50 cal mounts to help train anti-aircraft gunners. To keep said small guns from being whacked away by falling practice bombs, they had to be dismantled and stored below decks when not in use or covered with timber “doghouses.”

Utah as target ship entering pearl harbor in 1939

This armament constantly shifted with the needs of the Navy. In August 1941 she was considerably re-armed for her work as a AAA training vessel.

She carried two 5in/25 mounts forward atop No.1 and No.2 turrets respectively. Two 5in/38 mounts to port atop the port aircastle with two 5in/25s in the same position on the starboard aircastle. (The `aircastles’ are the projecting casemates abreast the bridge area for the former secondary battery). On the 01 level abeam the bridge, a quad 1.1 inch gun was carried on both sides of the ship. Aft, came two more 5in/38s atop No.4 and No.5 turrets, this time enclosed with gun shields. Finally, four Oerlikon 20mm (later scheduled to be replaced by 40mm Bofors) and eight 0.50-calibre guns completed the ensemble. An advanced gun director and stereoscopic range-finder was mounted on the top of No.3 turret and anti-aircraft and 5-inch directors fitted on the foremast area

Note her missing guns and extensive decking

Note her missing guns, funnel cap, and extensive extra decking

She was in roughly this configuration on the Day that will live in Infamy. Note the 5/38s rear and 5/25s forward. These were covered with heavy wooden ‘dog houses’ on Dec. 7th

Used in fleet maneuvers in the Pacific for a decade, she was resting near Battleship Row on Dec. 7, 1941.

Ironically, she was scheduled to leave Hawaii for the West Coast on Dec. 8th.

The attacking Japanese pilots in the Pearl Harbor attack had been ordered not to waste their bombs and torpedoes on the old target ship, but it has been theorized some excited aviators mistook the gleaming wooden planks on her decking to be that of an American flattop. Further, she was berthed on the Northwest side of Ford Island where visiting aircraft carriers were usually tied up on the weekends.

Utah received two (perhaps three) Japanese torpedoes in the first wave of the attack.

Painting by the artist Wayne Scarpaci showing the Utah (AG-16) being torpedoed

Painting by the artist Wayne Scarpaci showing Utah (AG-16) being torpedoed

Not retrofitted with torpedo bilges as other WWI-era U.S. battleships were, the Emperor’s fish penetrated her hull and she soon capsized, taking 64 of her sailors with her– 54 of which were trapped inside her hull and to this day never recovered.

It went quick for the old battleship. The attack began at 7:55 a.m. and by 8:11 Utah was reported to have turned turtle, her masts embedded in the harbor bottom.

One of those 64 was Chief Watertender Peter Tomich, a Bosnian immigrant who served in the U.S. Army in WWI before enlisting for a career in the Navy. Tomich saved lives that day.

CPO Peter Tomich, MOH

From his MOH citation:

Although realizing that the ship was capsizing, as a result of enemy bombing and torpedoing, Chief Watertender Tomich remained at his post in the engineering plant of the U.S.S. UTAH (AG-16), until he saw that all boilers were secured and all fireroom personnel had left their stations, and by so doing lost his own life.

Navy hardhat salvage divers made 437 dives on the stricken ship during her attempted re-righting in 1944, involving 2,227 man-hours under pressure. However, she was never fully salvaged. She was stricken from the Naval List on 13 November 1944 and is currently preserved as a war grave. A further move to salvage her in the 1950s was stillborn.

Utah‘s ships bell is located on the University of Utah campus and is maintained by the campus NROTC unit.

Her silver service is maintained along with other artifacts in Salt Lake City at the Governor’s Mansion.

Utah persists to this day at her berth along Ford Island leaking oil into Pearl Harbor.

She is preserved as the USS Utah Memorial and the National Park Service, U.S. Navy and other stakeholders take her remains very seriously, mounting a color guard daily.

Underwater Photographer Captures Images of USS Utah Memorial. Shaan Hurley, a technologist from Autodesk, takes photographs of the USS Utah Memorial during a data-collecting evolution in Pearl Harbor, October 23, 2014. In a process called “photogrammetry”, the underwater photos will be inputted into computer software that will create 3D data models of the photographed areas. The National Park Service is working with several companies and agencies to gather data points to create an accurate 3D model of the ship. U.S. Navy video by Mass Communication Specialist 1st Class Brett Cote / RELEASED

Today she is remembered by a veteran’s group and survivors association of which there are only seven known remaining survivors. A number of those who have passed have been cremated and had their ashes interred in the wreck.

Members of the Navy Region Hawaii Ceremonial Guard march in formation at the conclusion of a ceremony in honor Pearl Harbor survivor Lt. Wayne Maxwell at the USS Utah Memorial on historic Ford Island. Maxwell was a 30-year Navy veteran and former crew member of the farragut-class destroyer USS Aylwin during the Dec. 7, 1941 attack on Pearl Harbor. He was 93.

Members of the Navy Region Hawaii Ceremonial Guard march in formation after a ceremony in honor of Pearl Harbor survivor Lt. Wayne Maxwell at the USS Utah Memorial on historic Ford Island. Maxwell was a 30-year Navy veteran and former crew member of the Farragut-class destroyer USS Aylwin during the Dec. 7, 1941 attack on Pearl Harbor. He was 93.

As for Chief Tomich, he was something of an orphan and his award is the only Medal of Honor since the Indian Campaigns in the late 1800s that has never been awarded either to a living recipient, or surviving family member. The state of Utah, who pronounced him a resident posthumously, long had custody of his award.

USS Tomich (DE-242), an Edsall-class destroyer escort, was named in his honor in 1942 and remained on the Naval List until 1972.

In 1989, the U.S. Navy built the Senior Enlisted Academy in Newport, R.I., and named the building Tomich Hall. Chief Tomich’s Medal of Honor is on display on the quarterdeck there.

Finally, this week, SECNAV Ray Mabus announced in Salt Lake City that SSN-801, a Virginia-class submarine under construction, will be the second vessel to carry the name Utah.

Specs:

1911 Via ship bucket

Plan, 1932 Via Navsource, notice one stack, no main guns

Displacement: Standard: 21,825 long tons (22,175 t), full load 25,000
Length: 521 ft. 8 in (159.00 m)
Beam: 88 ft. 3 in (26.90 m)
Draft: 28.3 ft. (8.6 m)
Installed power: 28,000 shp (21,000 kW)
Propulsion: Steam turbines, 4 screws. 12 Coal boilers were later replaced by 4 oil boilers in 1926.
Speed: 21 knots (39 km/h; 24 mph)
Range: 5,776 nmi (6,650 mi; 10,700 km) at 10 kn (12 mph, 19 km/h) and 2,760 nmi (3,180 mi; 5,110 km) at 20 kn (23 mph, 37 km/h)
Coal: 2,500 tons (2,268 tonnes)
Complement: 1,001 officers and men as designed, 575 after 1932
Armament:
(1931)

10 × 12 in (30 cm)/45 cal guns
16 × 5 in (127 mm)/51 cal guns
2 × 21 in (533 mm) torpedo tubes

(1941)

4×5″/38 DP in single mounts
4×5″/25 in single mounts
8×1.1″ AAA in two quad mounts
4x20mm/80 in singles
15x.50-cal singles, water-cooled

Armor:
Belt: 9–11 in (229–279 mm)
Lower casemate: 8–10 in (203–254 mm)
Upper casemate: 5 in (127 mm)
Barbettes: 4–10 in (102–254 mm)
Turret face: 12 in (305 mm)
Conning tower: 11.5 in (292 mm)
Decks: 1.5 in (38 mm), later reinforced with wooden planks, sandbags, and concrete.

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

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

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

I’m a member, so should you be!

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laststandonzombieisland

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

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