USS California (ACR-6)
 The USS California , from 1914 USS San Diego |
|
| Overview | |
|---|---|
| Order | March 3, 1899 |
| Keel laying | May 7, 1902 |
| Launch | April 28, 1904 |
| Commissioning | August 1, 1907 |
| Whereabouts | Sunk off Fire Island, New York City, on July 19, 1918 |
| Technical specifications | |
| displacement |
13680 tons |
| length |
153.59 m |
| width |
21.18 m |
| Draft |
7.34 m |
| crew |
825 men, 64 marines |
| drive |
16 Babcock & Wilcox boilers, 17,000 kilowatts , 2 three-cylinder expansion steam engines |
| speed |
22+ knots |
| Armament |
4 8 inch / 40 Mark 5 (203mm / L40) guns in two twin turrets, 16 6 inch / 50 Mark 6 BL (152mm / L50), 18 3 inch / 50 (76mm / L50) rapid fire guns, 12 3-pounder Diggs- Schroeder (47mm) guns, 2 torpedo tubes 450mm |
The USS California was an American cruiser of the Pennsylvania class that stood from 1907 to 1918 in service. The cruiser was initially called California . On September 1, 1914, it was renamed the USS San Diego . The cruiser sank off Fire Island , New York City , on July 19, 1918 , after being hit by a mine . It was the only major US warship that was lost to enemy action in World War I.
construction
The California was named "Armored Cruiser No. 6 ”built by the Union Iron Works shipyard in San Francisco . The launch was on April 28, 1904, patron was Florence Pardee, daughter of the Governor of California , George Pardee . On August 1, 1907, she entered service at the Mare Island Naval Shipyard , Vallejo , under Captain Thomas S. Phelps. She was assigned to the "Second Division" of the newly created Pacific Fleet in 1907 . Until the beginning of 1909, she mainly carried out trips for exercise and representation purposes. During tow test drives she towed a destroyer from the American west coast via Honolulu to Samoa .
renaming
According to the “General Order No. 112 ”of July 30, 1914, the ship was given its final name San Diego with effect from September 1, 1914 . It also became the flagship of the Pacific fleet. The renaming took place because the name California was intended for the new battleship No. 44 and, according to a congressional resolution, only battleships should bear the names of US states .
Mission history
The cruiser mostly operated off the American west coast, but also made several trips to East Asia, including the Philippines, Japan and China, in order to underline the US presence.
Nicaragua (1912)
In 1912 the cruiser took part in the US military intervention in Nicaragua from 1909 to 1925 . On August 21, 1912, he landed Marines in Corinto , Nicaragua . From August 31 to September 1, he participated in the landing of the 1st Provisional Regiment of the Marines under Colonel Joseph Henry Pendleton . On September 5, he brought another unit ashore in San Juan del Sur .
Mexico (1913-1914)
From August to December 1913, the California was off the Mexican coast to watch the Mexican Revolution and to show American presence. She called at several Mexican ports. From February 1914 she carried out the same order again.
First World War (1914-1918)
On January 1, 1915, the San Diego appeared to open the "Panama-California Exposition" on the occasion of the inauguration of the Panama Canal . On January 21, there was an explosion in boiler room 1, in which five sailors were killed and another was seriously injured. Two crew members received the Medal of Honor , the highest military distinction in the United States , for saving others . The repair work lasted from June 10th to September 15th. In late 1915, the San Diego returned to the Pacific Fleet. On November 15, 1915, she rescued 48 sailors from the schooner Fort Bragg , which had run into a reef northeast of Cabo San Lucas .
On February 12, 1917, the San Diego was assigned to the reserve and sent to the Mare Island Naval Shipyard for overhaul. On April 7, 1917, one day after the American declaration of war on the German Reich, she was taken back into active service under Commander Claude B. Price, although she was still missing 456 crew members at that time. These were added the following week. 200 recruits taken over by the San Diego from the Naval Training Station were taken to a quarantine station after measles was found among them . After the ship was fully checked and equipped, it set out on May 31, 1917 to escort a captured German ship from the Farallon Islands to Puget Sound .
After full ammunition and coaling, the San Diego was placed under the cruiser command of the Atlantic fleet. She passed the Panama Canal on July 29, 1917 and called at New York Harbor . On September 22, 1917, she took over the leadership of a convoy of troop carriers and supplies to Saint-Nazaire . On November 13, 1917, she escorted another convoy to Brest . On December 7th, she and another ship started the return trip to New York, where she arrived on December 15th.
In the first half of the year, the San Diego accompanied several convoys, both on the North American east coast and across the Atlantic, including the British convoys HK-26, HX-32 and HX-37.
Downfall
After an overhaul in Portsmouth (New Hampshire) , the San Diego ran out on June 18, 1918 under Captain Harley H. Christy with destination New York. At 11:05 a.m. on June 19, she ran into a mine. The explosion caused a leak amidships on starboard at frame 78, deformed the bulkhead , tore open hatch 142 and caused the starboard engine room and boiler room 8 to be flooded. There was a boiler explosion and co-detonation of ammunition. The ship was immediately listed 6-8 degrees. Captain Christy, who initially believed to have been torpedoed, considered the situation manageable until he received news of the failure of both engines. In the meantime, the list increased due to secondary flooding through a gun hatch and rose to 17.5 degrees. When Christy realized there was a risk of capsizing, he gave the order to leave the ship. Since the radio had failed due to the shock, he dispatched an officer to Long Island in a dinghy to request help. The evacuation of the ship was carried out in a disciplined manner. The gun crews fired another 30-40 rounds at a suspected periscope before disembarking. Christy and his first mate Gerard Bradford were among the last to leave the San Diego . The ship sank about thirty minutes after the explosion, 10.5 miles from Fire Island Lighthouse , at 40 ° 32 '26 " N , 73 ° 2' 29" W. . Six crew members went down with him and six others were injured. At first, about 30-40 fatalities were assumed.
The crew was picked up by the ships Bussum , Malden and SP Jones , who came to the rescue and drove to the sinking site despite the danger of mines. Four lifeboats reached land on their own. After the sinking, aircraft of the "First Yale Unit" flew over the area from their base on Long Island and dropped bombs on a shadow in the water. It wasn't a submarine, however, but the sunken ship. The next day, mine sweepers discovered six more mines near the site of the sinking.
On August 26, 1918, the San Diego was struck off the list of ships.
Cause of downfall
After the sinking, there had been numerous speculations about the cause of the explosion, including an act of sabotage by the German agent Kurt Jahnke . Investigations by divers had clearly shown an explosion outside, not inside the ship. The captain had noted a torpedo hit in the logbook. Due to the discovery of further mines in the immediate vicinity of the sinking site, the US Navy assumes a mine hit. It is believed that the mine was laid by the German U-cruiser SM U 156 . During the period in question, he had operated in this area, carried out the attack on Orleans and shot at, or seized and sunk some ships. SM U 156 got lost on the march back from the operational area off the coast of Scotland , probably in the North Sea mine lock . Therefore, its participation in the sinking is not guaranteed.
Whereabouts of the wreck
In the same year, the wreck was examined by marine divers. They found it lying keel up on the chimneys. Because of the shallow water depth at this point of around 30–35 meters on average and only around 11.5 meters of water above the wreck, salvage was considered in order to eliminate a possible danger to shipping. But as early as October it was found that it had sunk about 60 centimeters deeper, whereupon it was no longer considered dangerous even for ships with a greater draft . In 1921 a salvage company applied for the salvage and scrapping rights to the wreck, but no license was granted. It was not until 1957 that a salvage company acquired the right to scrap the ship. However, since this right was not exercised within a three-year period, the wreck became the property of the US Navy again. In 1962, another entrepreneur acquired the scrapping rights for $ 14,000. He planned to blow up the wreck in order to remove the scrap. There were massive public protests against this plan. After receiving financial compensation, the entrepreneur decided not to scrap it.
The US Navy repeatedly examined the wreck at long intervals. In the 1970s it was increasingly frequented by amateur divers. It has also been tried, each 37,000 pounds (about 16.7 tons ) heavy propellers to steal. The port propeller was dismantled and towed away without permission in 1965, but a rope tore in the process, so that it came to an unknown location in the Staten Island area . In 1974 a boat capsized while trying to salvage the starboard propeller that had fallen off or was dismantled in 1973. Increasingly, smaller items such as lamps, porcelain and personal effects of the crew were illegally removed from the wreck. In the increasingly risky dives of the amateur divers, there were six fatal diving accidents. When it became known in 1992 that amateur divers had recovered live ammunition from the wreck, the United States Coast Guard imposed a 500- yard exclusion zone (457 meters) around the sinking site. In June 1995 divers undertook 50 dives on behalf of the Navy, during which they recovered a high-explosive grenade, which turned out to be still explosive. In 1998 the wreck was added to the National Register of Historic Places . Since 2004 it has been under the protection of a law that forbids the unauthorized diving of sunken military watercraft and aircraft.
Archaeologists from the Naval History and Heritage Command re- examined the wreck from Nov. 11-15. September 2017 and presented their research results at an annual meeting of the American Geophysical Union . Unmanned diving robots found that the hull was still intact, but the structures inside were already badly deteriorated.
On the 100th anniversary of the sinking, a memorial service was held at the sinking site by the US Navy and a wreath was laid.
Web links
- California II (Armored Cruiser No. 6) , Naval History and Heritage Command
- The USS San Diego and the California Naval Militia , California Center for Military History
Footnotes
- ↑ a b c d Shipwrecks - USS San Diego Armored Cruiser No. 6. Naval History and Heritage Command, December 10, 2018, accessed January 28, 2019 .
- ^ A b c d e George J. Albert: California Naval History - The USS San Diego and the California Naval Militia. California Military Department - The California State Military Museum, accessed September 2, 2019 .
- ↑ a b c Christoph Seidler: The last secret of the "USS San Diego". In: Der Spiegel . December 12, 2018, accessed January 27, 2019 .
- ↑ Mark Briggs: Why She Sank. In: Endeavors. University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill , January 1, 1999, accessed September 2, 2019 .
- ^ A b Navy Commemorates 100th Anniversary of the Loss of USS San Diego. Naval History and Heritage Command, July 19, 2018, accessed January 28, 2019 .