Much as once a week I like to take time off to cover warships (Wednesdays), on Sunday, I like to cover military art and the painters, illustrators, sculptors, and the like that produced them.

Combat Gallery Sunday : The Martial Art of Richard Jack

Richard Jack, though born in Sunderland, England, in 1866, was Canada’s first official war artist.

In the late 19th Century he studied at a number of esteemed art schools including the York School of Art, the South Kensington Art School, the ARA, the Royal College of Art and the Académie Julian— almost all on academic scholarships for his submitted work.

Returning to London from the Julian, he became first a black and white illustrator for Cassells and other periodicals then switched to painting, winning silver medals for his work before the Great War.

The Passing of the Chieftain by Richard Jack, York Museums Trust. Supplied by The Public Catalogue Foundation

Pushing 50 when Word War I began and not having a military background, he still did his part and took to sketching soldiers passing through.

The Return to the Front Victoria Railway Station, by Richard Jack, 1916, via the York Museums, on display in Lincolnshire. Trust Supplied by The Public Catalogue Foundation

These were subsequently published and brought him the attention of the Canadian governor general’s office, who extended an offer in 1916 to commission Jack as the official war artist to cover Canadian exploits in the war to end all wars.

Heading to the Western Front as a Major, Canadian Forces, Jack took to his work in covering the heroic stand by the Canadians at Second Ypres for posterity. Unlike the British government commissions, which encouraged a modernist approach to war, the Canadians wanted Jack to produce recognizable ‘history’ paintings as realistic as possible– and he did, controversially including bodies of the broken and dying.

Though, naturally, not actually present at the fighting, Major Jack had carefully investigated and sketched the whole ground, and has spent some time with the units which took part in the engagement, collecting from officers and men all the details and facts needed for absolute accuracy. Some of the men who had been through the battle actually posed for the picture, whilst machine-guns and all manner of military accoutrements were temporarily placed at the artist’s disposal, whose studio assumed something of the appearance of a battlefield.

This time spent on the continent yielded two massive works, The 12-foot-by-20-foot canvases of The Second Battle of Ypres, 22 April to 25 May 1915, and The Taking of Vimy Ridge, Easter Monday, 1917.

The Second Battle of Ypres, 22 April to 25 May 1915

Official war artist Major Richard Jack poses by his painting. ‘The Second Battle of Ypres, 22 April to 25 May 1915′ depicting Canadian soldiers making a stand against a German assault He painted this enormous work of art, with the canvas measuring 371.5 x 589.0cm (12 x 20 foot), in his London studio, c.1917. Commissioned by the Canadian War Memorials Fund (CWMF), an organization established by Lord Beaverbrook to document Canada’s war effort. Sir Edmund Walker, who sat on the advisory board to the CWMF, felt that Jack captured the achievements of the Canadians during the battle, but felt the work would not resonate with Canadians, who, he felt, were “not likely to appreciate such realistic treatment of war.” He was wrong and Jack’s painting remains an iconic work from the First World War. (National Archives of Canada PA 4879)

The Taking of Vimy Ridge, Easter Monday 1917. The painting is a part of the Beaverbrook Collection of War Art at the Canadian War Art Museum in Ottawa, Ontario.

After the war, Jack, a civilian again, emigrated to Canada (why not, right?) and settled in the Montreal area. Jack became a renowned portrait artist, brushing depictions of royalty, statesmen and senior officers.

Lieutenant Colonel Lancelot Robson, CMG, DSO by Richard Jack, currently part of the collection of the Hartlepool Museums and Heritage Service. Supplied by The Public Catalogue Foundation. Robinson was commander of the Royal Artillery who responded to the raid on Hartlepool, commanding three BL 6 inch Mk VII naval guns mounted ashore against Hipper’s squadron

Muriel Elsie, née Hirst, (1895–1969), Lady Gamage painted 1950 by Richard Jack via St Johns Museum. Supplied by The Public Catalogue Foundation. Muriel Gamage was a prominent worker for public causes, and had served during WWI with the VAD (Voluntary Aid Detachment), organizing the military hospitals during the war, and was appointed D.J.ST.J.(Dame of Justice of the Order of St John of Jerusalem), in recognition of her service, whose badge appears on her uniform

Jack was later inducted to Royal Society of British Artists and the Royal Institute of Painters before his death in 1952, aged 86.

He spent the latter part of his life paining landscapes in his adopted country.

Richard Jack landscape, from the York Trust. Supplied by The Public Catalogue Foundation

You can find an in-depth study of his works here and the BBC has a collection of some 45 of his works online

His style of battle scenes has drawn much modern imitation.

Thank you for your work, sir.

Yay!

HMS M.33 coastal bombardment vessel from Gallipoli campaign. Credit National Museum of the Royal Navy NMRN. Click to big up

M33 Wheel with Victory and Mary Rose in view

Stern 1848×1230

If you are in England and have a chance, swing by the HMS Victory and check out M33. This humble little monitor of 568 tons with a shallow draft allowing it to get close-in to shore and fire at targets on land, carried two powerful and oversize 6” guns, but was a basic metal box lacking in comforts. The 72 officers and men who sailed for the Gallipoli Campaign were crammed inside and away from home for over 3 years.

She then saw active service in Russia during the Allied Intervention in 1919, narrowly escaping staying there the rest of her life, then was brought back to England where she served the RN up until 1984 as a hulk and floating office space.

The National Museum of the Royal Navy (NMRN) and Hampshire County Council (HCC) have worked as partners to develop the £2.4m project to conserve, restore and interpret HMS M.33  With a grant of £1.8m from the Heritage Lottery Fund (HLF) the ship will be made physically and intellectually open to all for the first time. The ship sits in No.1 Dock alongside HMS Victory in Portsmouth Historic Dockyard, and uniquely visitors will start with a 20-foot descent into the bottom of the dock before stepping aboard.

HMS M33 infographic jpeg

Hey, Mack, there is a screwdriver on the end of your Springer there…

Roosevelt, a conservationist and big game hunter who settled for being president after stints as New York City police commissioner, Assistant Secretary of the Navy and an Army colonel in the Spanish American War knew a thing or three about firearms. Good guy Teddy even used one of the first suppressors built and marketed in the U.S. so that he could target practice at home without bugging the neighbors.

So when he saw what the Army ordnance guys at Springfield Armory came up with for the original design of the M1903 rifle, a flimsy screwdriver looking rod bayonet, he wasn’t impressed.

More in my column at Guns.com

John Moses Browning’s first semi-auto handgun was one of the best ever made and, regardless of whether you call it the Browning No.1, the FN Mle. 1900 or the M1900, it has a very interesting (some would say infamous) story to tell.

Why was it born?

When Mr. Browning began to market his low-wall M1885 rifle, firearms giant Winchester stood up and noticed then promptly sent a lawyer to the inventor’s Utah shop with a contract to put him on the payroll with an exclusive contract. Throughout the next decade and change, Browning came up with the idea for some of the best lever action rifles and shotguns that Winchester ever sold, but by 1897 made a break from the company.

This put the Thomas Edison of American small arms into play and he branched out into designing not only lever action and pump action long arms but also semiautomatics, machineguns, and handguns– but needed someone to make them.

Going first to Remington, things didn’t work out, so Browning packed a steamer trunk and headed to the Belgian manufacturing town of Herstal to speak to the good folks at Fabrique Nationale (FN). Formed from the best gun minds in nearby Liege, renowned for firearms manufacture, FN was churning out Mauser bolt-action rifles by the thousands under contract for the Royal Belgian Army but was looking to expand.

Browning brought them his first semi-auto shotgun, which became famous as the Browning Auto 5, and a compact semi-auto pistol, which became best known as the 1900.

Read the rest in my column at Firearms Talk

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 Aug 19, 2015: The first of the bucking ‘165s

Image via ShipSpotting

Here we see a great color photo the U.S. Coast Guard Cutter Tallapoosa (WPG-52) at rear just before World War II while still in her gleaming white and buff scheme. She may not look like much, but she was the forerunner of a class of ships that did much of the heavy lifting for the Coasties through Prohibition and two world wars.

In 1914 the Revenue Cutter Service was looking to replace the 25~ year old 148-foot steel-hulled cutter Winona.

The aging Winnie was the galloping ghost of the Gulf Coast and roamed from Galveston to Key West pulling duty busting smugglers, responding to hurricanes, operating with the Fleet when needed and, of course, saving lives at sea. Armed with a single 6-pounder to give warning shots across the bow, Winona patrolled the East Coast during the Spanish American War but by the opening of the Great War was a bit long in the tooth.

This led the service to design a new vessel to replace her.

In November 1914, the government ordered at a cost of $225,000 ($5.3 million in today’s figures) from Newport News Shipbuilding in Virginia hull number CG27. This ship was based on lessons learned from Winona and was a bit longer at 165-feet, 10-inches and gave 912 tons displacement. A pair of oil-fired (most of the fleet was coal at the time, so this was advanced stuff here) Babcock & Wilcox boilers fed through a single center stack powered a triple-expansion steam engine that gave the little gunboat a 12 knot maximum speed. A 51,000-gallon load of fuel oil gave her a range of 6,000 miles, which is impressive for such a small vessel.

Tallapoosa, note the similarity to Winona, only longer. Also note the DF gear and crows-nest, both of which were used often. USCG photo.

She was one of the first ice-strengthened ships in any maritime force and was heavily armed for a cutter of the time, given literally four times the deck guns that Winona had before her.

One fat screw and a 1:5 length to beam ratio led these early 165s to hog in high seas

Able to float in just 11.9 feet of seawater, the new ship, named Tallapoosa, was launched on May Day 1915. She was commissioned on 12 August with Winona placed out of commission at Mobile, Alabama on 12 July and sold for $12,697 to a Mr. W. M. Evans of Mobile. Much of Winona‘s 39-man crew went to Virginia by train to operate the replacement vessel.

Sister USCGC Ossipee at launch, note the hull shape

A sistership to Tallapoosa, USCGC Ossipee, was laid down just afterward and built side by side with the new cutter and was commissioned 28 July 1915 at the Coast Guard Depot, Arundel, MD. Curiously, she was classified as a river gunboat though I can’t find where she operated on any.

As for Tallapoosa, she arrived at Mobile on 18 August, taking Winona‘s old dock at the L&N Railroad landing near Government Street and was assigned to patrol from Lake Pontchartrain, Louisiana to Tampa, Florida.

Tallapoosa soon rode out the epic July 4, 1916 Hurricane in Mobile Bay, narrowly avoiding three different collisions with ships that had broken their moorings in 104 mph winds then responded to check on Forts Morgan and Gains at the mouth of the Bay where U.S. Army Coastal Artillery units were stationed and cut off from commo.

Over the next few days, she ranged the Gulf looking for hurricane survivors and ships in need of assistance. As noted from a very interesting 17 page after action report filed at the time she assisted the schooner Henry W. Cramp, unnamed Russian and Norwegian barks, an unnamed British steamer, the three-master Laguna, the demasted schooner City of Baltimore, and the three-master Albert D. Mills, many of which were thrown high and dry on the barrier islands.

She then found the schooner Carrie Strong some 65 miles south of Mobile Bay, turned turtle but still afloat. After trying to sink the vessel with mines (!) which was unsuccessful due to the ship’s wooden construction and cargo of pine boards, Tallapoosa towed her to shore where the derelict was beached. While no survivors of Strong were found, the Tallapoosa‘s skipper did note that:

In light of recent news reports it may be of interest that when found, at least a dozen large sharks were found around this wreck and they were so bold that when the first boat was lowered they came alongside and struck the oars. A number were caught and killed while work was in progress.

When the U.S. entered WWI, Tallapoosa, now part of the Coast Guard, was assigned to the Naval Department on 6 April 1917. She landed her battery of 6-pounders, picked up a new one of a quartet of 3″/23 cal guns and for the next 28 months served as a haze gray colored gunboat for the Navy assigned to Halifax, N.S. (remember, she and her sister had their plating doubled around the bow and a steel waterline belt to enable them for light icebreaking, which surely came in handy in the Gulf of Mexico) as a coastal escort and search and rescue platform until 28 August 1919.

Tallapoosa‘s war record was quiet, as few U-boats popped up around Halifax, but sister Ossippee deployed to Gibraltar on 15 August 1917 and before the end of the war escorted 32 convoys consisting of 596 Allied vessels and made contacts with enemy submarines on at least 8 occasions, on one of these reportedly side-stepping a torpedo by about 15 feet.

While in open seas, they tended to roll and be generally uncomfortable, but nonetheless made great coastal boats and were generally used as such.

In 1919, both Tallapoosa and Ossipee traded their gray scheme and 3-inchers for more familiar white/buff and 6-pounders.

Tallapoosa 1924 via Janes via Navsource. Note the hot weather awnings for Gulf service and the lookout post has been deleted from the foremast

During Prohibition, Tallapoosa was back in the Gulf trying to stop rum-runners from Cuba while her sister was assigned to Portland, Maine and did the same for ships running good Canadian whiskey to thirsty mouths in New England and New York.

In 1930, they landed half their 6-pounders for a pair of new 3″/50s.

USCGC_Tallapoosa 1935 In Alaskan waters. USCG photo

These two ships, with the lifesaving, war, and bootlegger busting service proved so useful that a follow on class of 24 ships based on their design with some improvements were ordered in the 1930s to modernize the Coast Guard.

The follow-on 165s, note two stacks and twin screws for better seakeeping

The first of these new “165s,” USCGC Algonquin (WPG-75) was laid down 14 Oct. 1933 and the last was commissioned by the end of 1934– certainly some kind of peacetime shipbuilding record. Funded by PWA dollars, these ships carried slightly less oil but due to a better engine could make 12.5 knots instead of the slow 12 knots of their older sisters.

Note the 165 at bottom, with a slightly different layout from Tallapoosa/Osippee, showing two stacks and shorter masts

In the next world war, these 24 cutters proved their worth, splashing a number of German U-boats while escorting convoys, and performing yeoman service in polar areas. We’ve covered a couple of these later 165s before to include USCGC Mohawk and cannot talk these hardy boats up enough.

Tragically, one of these, USCGC Escanaba (WPG-77), was lost after encountering a U-boat or mine in 1943 with only two survivors.

Tallapoosa during WWII, note her extra armament and haze gray. USCG photo. Dig the early radar

Speaking of WWII, both Tallapoosa and Ossipee, along with their new kid sisters, chopped over to Navy service in November 1941– even before Pearl Harbor. Equipped with depth charges Tallapoosa was used as a convoy escort along the East Coast while Ossipee served her time on the Great Lakes as a plane guard for U.S. Navy carrier training operations while busting ice when able.

By 1943 the little Tallapoosa carried a SF-1 Radar, WEA-2A sonar, 2 Mousetrap ASW devices, 4 K-guns and 2 20mm Oerlikons besides her 3-inchers, with her crew doubling to over 100. She made at least two contacts on suspected U-boats but did not get credit for any kills despite dropping a number of depth charges that resulted in oil slicks.

However, with the war winding down, these older and smaller cutters became surplus with Tallapoosa decommissioning 8 November 1945 then was sold for her value as scrap the next July. She was bought by a banana boat company that specialized in shipping fruit from Central America to New Orleans and her ultimate fate is unknown, which means she very well maybe in some port in Honduras somewhere.

As far as Ossipee, she was scrapped in 1946 while the 23 remaining newer 165s were whittled down until the last in U.S. service, USCGC Ariadne (WPC-101), was decommissioned 23 Dec. 1968 and sold for scrap the next year.

Some went on to overseas service, including USCGC Thetis and Icarus, both of whom accounted for a German sub during the war and remained afloat into the late 1980s with the Dominican Republic’s Navy.

Two were briefly museum ships to include Comanche (WPG-76) who was at Patriot’s Point, South Carolina before being sunk as an artificial reef and Mohawk (WPG-78) in Key West, Florida before meeting her end as a reef in July 2012.

Mohawk in poor condition before being reefed. If you see a banana boat in Central America that looks like this, check to see if its the now-100 year old Tallapoosa.

Of the 26 various 165s that served in the Coast Guard and Navy from 1915-1968, a span of over a half century, just one remains in some sort of service.

Commissioned as USCGC Electra (WPC-187) in 1934, she was transferred to the US Navy prior to WWII and renamed USS Potomac (AG-25), serving as FDR’s Presidential Yacht. She was saved in 1980 and is currently open to the public in Oakland.

Ex-USS Potomac (AG-25) moored at her berth, the FDR pier, at Jack London Square, Oakland, CA. in 2008. Photos by Al Riel USS John Rogers.Via Navsource

Tallapoosa‘s bell is maintained in a place of honor in downtown Tallapoosa, Georgia while her christening board is on display at her longtime home port of Mobile at the City Museum.

Specs:

Profile of the 165 A class Cutter Escanaba, who was based on Tallapoosa and Ossipee. Image by Shipbucket

Displacement (tons): 912
Length: 165′ 10″ overall
Beam: 32′
Draft: 11′ 9″
Machinery: Triple-expansion steam, 17″, 27″, and 44″ diameter x 30″ stroke, 2 x Babcock & Wilcox boilers, 1,000 shp; 12 knots maximum degraded to 10 by WWII.
Complement 5 officers, 56 as commissioned
9 officers, 63 enlisted, 1930
100~ by 1945
Armament: 4 x 6-pounders (1915);
2 x 6-pdrs; 2 x 3″ 50-cal (single-mounts) (as of 1930);
2 x 3″/50 (single-mounts); 1 x 3″/23; 2 x depth charge tracks (as of 1941);
2 x 3″/50 (single-mounts); 2 x 20mm/80 (single-mounts); 2 x Mousetraps; 4 x K-guns; 2 x depth charge tracks (as of 1945).
If you liked this column, please consider joining the International Naval Research Organization (INRO), Publishers of Warship International

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

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

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

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Print shows a French zouave in 1853, wearing uniform and holding rifle, on cigarette card issued by Kinney Tobacco Company as an insert with the Sweet Caporal brand cigarettes.

When the French went into Algeria in the 1830s, they encountered the Zouaoua people, a Berber tribe along the Djurdjura mountains. Allying with these tough mountain people when possible, metropolitan French officers fell in amour with their costume of flowing colorful breeches, short jackets, turbans or fez, and capes– soon borrowing these for locally raised troops and even for European units.

By the Crimean War, French Zouave units were engaged in combat and, being the first modern European conflict since 1815, caught the imagination of those who were military minded on the other side of the Atlantic.

A French cantinière attached to a Zouave regiment during the Crimean War, 1855 – photo by Roger Fenton

Zouave of the 2nd French Zouave Regiment poses with battle standard after the Battle of Solferino, 1859

By the 1850s many fashionable “marching units” of militia in the U.S. were patterned on zouave gear which led to an explosion of units on both sides of the Civil War.

Zouaves of Company G, 114th Pennsylvania Infantry. Petersburg, Virginia.

Louisiana Tiger by Pierre Albert Leroux

Zouave de la Louisiane – Pierre Albert Leroux

Sergeant Henry G. Lillibridge of Co. H, 10th Rhode Island Infantry Regiment, in zouave uniform with saber bayoneted rifle

Manhattan Rifles recruiting poster, 1862

Colls Zouaves

Collis’s Zouaves

An unknown private, supposedly with the 114th Pennsylvania (Collis Zouaves)

It wasn’t just in the U.S, North Africa and France that the zouaves caught on. During the 1863 Polish Uprising against the Tsar, there was a unit of black-robed Death Zouaves in the free Pole forces.

How cool is a name like the Zouaves of Death?

The French, for their part, maintained zouave units, especially among North African troops, into the 1960s. While forces in other countries were very popular until as late as the early 1900s.

1888 French Zouave

French colonial Zouaves on maneuvers with M1886 Lebel rifles, in 1909

Posed shot of french zouaves firing hotchkiss machinegun note the assistant gunnner catching brass in canvas feedbucket

Autochrome of a French Zouave eating a meal, Valbonne, 1913. He is wearing medals for service in Tunisia and Morocco

Evolution of Zouave dress from 1830 to 1955

Today North African countries, to include Morocco and Algeria, still maintain zouave influence in certian dress uniforms while the Italian Bersaglieri, with a lineage of service that included Libya and Tunisia as well as Spanish paramilitary Regulares assigned to the country’s legacy enclaves of Céuta and Melilla, retain red fezes.

Italian soldiers stand guard at Chiaiano cave a quarter of Naples on 10 July 2008.  AFP PHOTO / FRANCESCO PISCHETOLA

North African-deployed Spanish Regulares

The Library of Congress has more than 270 vintage zouave images online covering not only U.S./Confederate units, but also French, Brazilian and Ottoman troops.

THE GERMAN SCIENCE OF ARSON: INCENDIARY DISKS CARRIED BY THE KAISER’S SOLDIERS—A SPECIMEN BEFORE AND DURING IGNITION.

“It is clear that the German incendiary outrages in Belgium and France were premeditated, and German scientists devised special apparatus for setting fire to buildings. Our informant, who bought some incendiary disks from a German soldier near Antwerp, states that every man carries twenty bags, each containing about 300 disks. Mr. Bertram Blount, the analyst, found the disks consist of nitro-cellulose, or gun-cotton. They may be lit, even when wet, with a match or cigarette-end, and burn for eleven or twelve seconds, emitting a strong five-inch flame, and entirely consuming themselves. The Germans throw them alight into houses. The photographs show (1) a bag of disks as supplied to German soldiers; (2) a disk burning; and (3) a disk, actual size, before being used.”

—Part of the The Illustrated War News, Number 15, Nov. 18, 1914 over at Project Gutenberg, which is well worth the read

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 Sept. 9, 2015: The (bad) luck of the Irish

Oil Painting by Kenneth King, National Maritime Museum of Ireland

Here we see the Irish Mercantile Marine-flagged schooner Cymric as she appeared during WWII. The hardy windjammer had a very hard luck life indeed.

Cymric, named after the extinct dark beaked, grey-eyed eagle sometimes termed Woodward’s Eagle, was built on the orders of William Thomas of Wales in 1893 as a 123-foot barquentine for South American and Australian trade.

By 1906, she was acquired by Irish interests in Arklow and re-rigged as a three master schooner.

Fast forward to 1915 and the Royal Navy was on the lookout to acquire some disposable ships to serve as well-armed bait for U-boats. The concept, the Q-ship (their code name referred to the vessels’ homeport, Queenstown, in Ireland) was to have a lone merchantman plod along until a German U-boat approached, and, due to the small size of the prize, sent over a demo team to blow her bottom out or assembled her deck gun crew to poke holes in her waterline.

At that point, the “merchantman” which was actually a warship equipped with a few deck guns hidden behind fake bulkheads and filled with “unsinkable” cargo such as pine boards to help keep her afloat if holed, would smoke said U-boat.

Something like this:

“The Q-ship Prize in action against U-93 on 30 April 1917”, painting by Arthur J Lloyd, from Scars of the Heart exhibition, Auckland War Memorial Museum

That’s when Cymric, along with her sistership William Thomas’s former Gaelic and a third Irish schooner, Mary B Mitchell, were acquired by the RN and put to work. They were given an auxiliary engine, armed with a 12-pounder and two 6-pounder guns (all hidden) as well as two Vickers machine guns and some small arms for their enlarged 50-man crew.

In all the Brits used 366 Q-ships, of which 61 were lost in action while they only took down 14 U-boats, a rather unsuccessful showing.

Mary B Mitchell claimed 2-3 U-boats sunk and her crew was even granted the DSO, but post-war analysis quashed her record back down to 0.

However, Cymric bagged a submarine of her own, literally.

First let’s talk about HM Submarine J6.

The seven 274-foot J-class boats built during the war were faster than most subs of the era (capable of 19-knots) but still not fast enough to keep up with the main battle fleet on extended operations, which relegated them to the 11th Flotilla at Blyth from their commissioning through the end of the war, stationed around the Hungarian freighter turned depot ship HMS Titania, rarely seeing action.

J6 (not U-6)

One of these was J6, commissioned 25 January 1916 for service in an uneventful war in her assigned neck of the woods. That was until her skipper Lt.Cdr. Geoffrey Warburton, while on the surface with her deck gun unmanned off Northumberland coast on 15 Oct. 1918 (just weeks before the end of the conflict) stumbled upon a non-descript schooner hanging out.

That’s when the HMS Cymric thought herself very lucky indeed.

From Lieutenant F Peterson RNR, skipper of the Q-ship:

“At about 15.30 on the 15th October a submarine was spotted on the surface steaming towards CYMRIC. Visibility at this time was about 6000-yards and when first spotted the submarine was from two and a half to three miles off. She continued on an opposite course to CYMRIC and I decided she was a friendly submarine…I recognized the bow of the ship as typical of the ‘J’ Class. When first sighted ‘action stations’ were sounded, but when I decided this submarine was friendly I told the gun crews, but ordered them to ‘stand by’.”

There was no obvious evidence that the submarine was hostile, because her gun was unmanned and men could be clearly seen on the bridge. Yet, Lt. Peterson was disturbed by the position of the gun, as it did not correspond to any of the friendly submarine silhouettes he had been issued with for training purposes. As the lettering on the submarine’s conning tower became clearer, suspicion grew that the submarine was an enemy. Some eyewitnesses from CYMRIC claimed that an object was partly obscuring the lettering on the conning tower.

Shortly after this, when the submarine’s letter and number could be seen clearly, it appeared to me to be ‘U 6’; the submarine at that time was still on the bow: I waited until the submarine was on the beam and still being convinced she was ‘U 6’, I gave the order for action. The White Ensign was hoisted on the mizzen truck of CYMRIC. There was a pause, but no recognition was shown by the submarine at that time.”

With that, the Q-ship dropped her bulkwarks and opened fire on “U6” at 1800 yards with her starboard 12-pounder, hitting the sub’s conning tower with the third shot, and thereafter firing for effect.

Although Lt.Cdr. Warburton of J6 fired no less than six flares off to signal the surface ship to stop the shelling. Tragically, the sub closed her hatches, sealing off eight sailors below decks to their ultimate fate while she continued ahead in course and speed– her control room shot to shit and unable to signal the engines to halt. The bombardment ended when J6 entered the sea fog again and disappeared.

The slower Cymric caught up to her dead in the water and, seeing RN sailors swimming for their lives, realized with horror what had happened.

A Cymric crewmember:

“The first thing I noticed was the marking ‘HM Submarines’ on the bands of the men’s hats. We had sunk a British submarine by mistaking the ‘J’ for a ‘U’. I can remember a big red headed chap who was badly wounded shouting at us from the boat ‘Come on you stupid ##### these are your own ###### side! Give them a hand’.

We pulled over to the sinking men. One man was holding up his commanding officer. He yelled come and help me save Mr Warburton. Others were drowning. We dived in and rescued all that we could. One we took out of the water was too far gone and died on board…We sent a signal to Blyth that we were making for the port with the survivors of J6 aboard. I will never forget entering the port. As we rounded the pier and worked our way into the basin where the depot ship TITANIA and the other submarines were moored, we could see the wives and children of the submarine gazing with anxious eyes to see if those dear to them were among the survivors.”

In all, some fifteen men were lost with HM S/M J6, the only member of her class of submarines to suffer a casualty in the war:

Armstrong, Ernest William M/12905 E.R. Artificer.3rd
Brierley, James Roger Ingham, Sub-Lieutenant
Bright, C.T. Artificer Engineer
Burwell, Herbert Edward Philip M/3779 E.R.Artificer.4th
Hill, Arthur Herbert J/5428 Able Seaman
Lamont, Athol Davaar M/14927 E.R. Artificer.3rd
Rayner, Edward George J/5764 Leading Seaman
Russell, William Thomas J/28769 Able Seaman
Savidge, Albert Edward K/19992 Stoker.1st
Stevenson, Percival James P/K 1628 L/Stoker
Tachon, Philip K/20794 Stoker 1st Class
Thompson, William Piper K/23871Stoker.1st
Tyler, Frank Andrew J/2116 Able Seaman
White, Henry Thomas J/13130 Able Seaman
Wickstead, George Herbert J/31563 Leading Telegraphist

A court of inquiry cleared Peterson and his crew, though some had reservations.

In the end, the court records were sealed until 1997 under the Official Secrets Act.

With the end of the war arriving, Cymric was disarmed and disposed of by sale in 1919 and later reacquired for the now-free Irish Merchant trade, spending most of her interwar career as a mail ship.

However her bad luck continued.

On November 28 1921, while waiting to move through the Grand Canal Docks in Dublin near Ringsend bridge, a stiff seaward wind came and pushed her forward suddenly, impaling her bowsprit in the side of a street tram, in one of the few instances in which a ship, technically still afloat at sea, was in a traffic accident with a city streetcar.

Nevertheless, Cymric‘s most unlucky day was still nearly 15 years off.

In 1939, neutral Ireland entered World War II and tried to walk a fine line to keep that neutrality in place, going so far as to intern both Axis and Allied servicemen found on her territory for the duration.

Isolated by a large degree, her 53 Irish flagged merchantmen continued their vital trade to other neutrals such as Portugal and Spain, trying to keep out of the war as best they could while saving 534 seamen from other countries lost upon the water in the period known in the service as “The Long Watch.”

Their only defense was their flag and national markings on their side, and that wasn’t much.

Oil painting by Kenneth King in the National Maritime Museum of Ireland depicting the moments after the SS Irish Oak, a 8500-ton steamer and one of the largest in Irish service, was torpedoed mid-Atlantic by U-607 in 1943– whose commander later told his bosses he targeted the vessel because he just knew it was a decoy Q-ship. Irony, thy name is the Irish Merchant service.

By the end of the war nearly a quarter of the Irish ships and men upon them were sunk by ships, planes and mines of both sides, but they kept the island country fed, warm and out of the dark.

As for Cymric, she sailed on the Lisbon Run for the last time in early 1944 and promptly vanished, never to be seen again.

The final crew of schooner Cymric (missing since 24 February 1944), were posthumously awarded the Irish Mercantile Marine Service Medal for the contribution to the war:

Bergin, P., Wexford
Brennan, J., Wexford
Cassidy, C., Athboy, Co. Meath
Crosbie,J., Wexford
Furlong, K., Wexford
Kiernan, B., Dundalk
McConnell, C., Dublin
O’Rourke, W., Wexford
Ryan, M., Dungarvan
Seaver, P ., Skerries
Tierney, M., Wexford

Their names are a part of both Wexford’s Maritime Memorial, where many of the men came from and their loss still lingers, as well as the larger Dublin City Quay Memorial to the 149 seamen lost on neutral Irish ships sunk or damaged by torpedoes, mines, bombs and aircraft strafing (by Luftwaffe & RAF) during WWII. In Dublin, a street is also named after this vanished ship.

J-6’s battered conning tower. Image via Divenet.

As for J6, her war grave was located in 2010 by divers from the UK by accident but has since been mapped and verified.

Specs:

Class and type: Iron barquentine
Tonnage: 228 grt
Length: 123 ft (37 m)
Beam: 24 ft (7.3 m)
Draught: 10 ft 8 in (3.25 m)
Propulsion: Sail, Auxiliary motor fitted in World War I
Sail plan: Three masted bark, then schooner
Armament: 1 12pdr, 2 6pdr, small arms (1915-1919)

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

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

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!

Today the U.S. military issues suppressors from SureFire, Gemtech, AAC and others almost routinely as they help with accuracy, flash reduction (very important in combat–especally at night) and, oh yeah, sound suppression. In fact the new Army Modular Handgun contract tender calls for a “suppressor kit” to include higher than normal sights and a threaded barrel as standard.

Well this isn’t really a brand new idea for the Army at least. You see the suppressor was invented in the U.S. with the Hiram Maxim’s design selling popularly over the counter.

Between 1908 and 1910, the Ordnance Bureau purchased 100 Maxim models in .30 caliber as well as another 100 from a chap named Mr. Robert A. Moore. Both of these were by default the M1910 Silencer.

The Moore (top) compared to the Maxim on a U.S. M1903

Tests of the Moore Silencer at Schofield Barracks in Hawaii indicated the following:

“There is a marked difference in the recoil; the recoil with the silencer being very little. The sound is lessened greatly with the Moore silencer but not as much with the Maxim silencer. There is a large reduction in the blast. In firing shots at 500 and 1000 yards range groups of 10 shots were fired which showed that there is no difference in the accuracy with or without the silencer and with or without the bayonet; with the bayonet attached to the silencer however the rifle is thrown out of balance making it harder to hold on the target. Also, the bayonet had to be put on again after each shot because the recoil threw the ring of the bayonet off the silencer, this on account of the fact that the muzzle of the silencer is too rounded.”

 
Tests of the Maxim at the School of Musketry found the Silencer gave the following advantages:

Firing the 03 Springfield with the Maxim silencer, 1910. From left to right Hiram Maxim, Lieut. Col. Richard J. Goodman, and Capt. Earl D Church

(1) The lesser recoil of the rifle with Silencer operated in two ways: It greatly facilitated instruction of recruits in rifle firing. It materially lessened the fatigue of the soldier in prolonged firing, such as would occur in modern battle, which is a distinct military advantage. (2) The muffling of the sound of discharge and the great reduction in the total volume of sound which permits the voice to be heard at the firing point about the sound of a number of rifles in action, greatly facilitate the control of the firing line, and extends the influence of officers and non-coIt was found where the tactical conditions required a quick opening of fire, a sudden cessation of the fire and several quick changes of objective – all of which are difficult with several rifles firing – that verbal commands could easily be heard, and that it was possible to give perfectly audible instructions when the Silencer was used.

Overall, the Army found the Moore was more accurate but the Maxim more durable. While the Ordnance Bureau advised two sharpshooters per company should be equipped with suppressed 1903’s, the money just wasn’t there.

However in 1917-1918, the Army did apparently move forward with a plan to acquire and issue some 9,300 star-gauged (tested accurate) Model 1903 Springfields fitted with the Model 1913 Telescopic Musket Sight and improved Model 15 Maxim Silencer.

1913 Warner & Swasey Musket Sight (telescopic sight) and Maxim M15 on star-gauge M1903. Note the carrying case for the sight and suppressor. These combinations were serial numbered together

While a few were acquired, most were disposed of through the Director of Civilian Marksmanship by 1925, with a few of both kind kept at Springfield Armory for reference, where most of these imaged are from.

Stunning new 3D scans have emerged from the largest naval battle in history showing the final resting place of a German Flagship.

Looking like a small ridge at the bottom of the North Sea these images actually show SMS Lützow, Admiral Franz von Hipper’s Flagship, scuttled during the Battle of Jutland in 1916.

The images were captured by the Royal Navy survey ship HMS Echo which has been visiting Jutland and has surveyed 21 of 25 historic wrecks there. Read more here

In the U.S. military’s more than 100-year flirtation with the Colt 1911, quite a few experimental variants were proposed but never adopted.

How many of these do you recognize?

The Colt 1911 Brastil “Golden Gun”

The sheet metal monstrosity made by GMs Guide Lamp Division

The Cabanne Device 1911– see that nob? Its the holster mount

The guns modded in 1917 to be full-auto-only for use in shooting down the Red Baron. See the sear?

And this guy, who we’ve talked about before.

Read the rest in my column at Guns.com

Here we have a Tula-made Mosin-Nagant M91/30 with a 1900 manufacture date that was reworked in the 1930s.

H/T Hickok45

A closer look at two U.S. Ordnance Prototype Pistol designs that competed in the epic 1900s pistol trials that led to the adoption of the Colt M1911. Both are extremely rare guns made in the single digits. First is the Pierce-Hawkins, one of just two created at Springfield Armory from a design by Army Major W. S. Piece and Lt. Wilford J. Hawkins. Then, there is the Phillips U.S. Ordnance Prototype, a .45ACP pistol designed by Captain W.A. Phillips at the Franklin Armory. Neither pistol went into commercial production.

With the new-fangled Springfield M1903 rifle being issued to replace the mechanically interesting but wanting Krag rifle, late of the Spanish-American War, the U.S. Army was interested in looking at a host of accessories for the rifles including suppressors, lights, cutting edge bayonets and, as seen here, recoil reducers.

The design of Mr. Samuel N. McClean’s device, which looked something like a vase, was for a steel brake that screwed onto the threaded muzzle of a M1903 and, through a series of six rows of perforations, reduce felt recoil by channeling the gas of the muzzle blast outward. According to McLean:

“These grooves are inclined to planes through the axis of the bore, and in such a direction that the pressure of the gases due to this inclination is opposed to the tendency to rotate caused by the rifling. The recoil is controlled by the pressure of the gases against the forward face of the spiral groove and by the reaction of the gases upon the air in their escape to the rear through the vents. The effect of the device is also to gradually lessen and very much reduce the blast of the gun, as well as the report of the discharge”

Several were acquired from the by the McLean Arms Co.by the Army for testing.

Why wasn’t it accepted?

Here’s an excerpt of the 1904 report from W.C. Brown, Capt. 1st Cavalry, Commanding Camp, San Antonio Arsenal (Fort Clark)

The ear splitting report with the device on, is particularly noticeable and dangerous to the hearing, not only to men in the vicinity of the marksmen firing, but to that marksmen as well. The recoil device formerly tested was objectionable enough – this is worse. The puff or blast of escaping gases striking the face of the marksmen is particularly annoying.

The heavy recoil of the U.S. Magazine rifle is only a minor objection, and able bodied men can readily be taught to hold the piece so that it can be fired without discomfort or inconvenience. No amount of training, however, can accustom the soldier to the sharp report with accompanies the use of this recoil device. Its use in ranks would be practically impossible, as men with sensitive cars simply could not endure the shock.

Its use would be simply to remove a minor objection (recoil) by introducing a defect so grave as to condemn the arm.

Tell us how you really feel, Cap!

What worth was the good captain’s report? Well in 1903 the spry 50-year old had 26 years service already! Contrast this against the more typical 6-8 years for today’s Army O-3.

William Carey Brown (USMA 1877), he was an interesting individual who served a dozen hard years in the Plains Wars in which he helped chase down the Apache Kid and served in the last tragic campaign against the Sioux in 1890.

5th U.S. Cavalry, the Black HIlls, 1877, photo by 2Lt. WC Brown. Yes, THAT WC Brown!

He wrote the Manual for the instruction of men of the Hospital Corps and Company Bearers in the 1880s that remained in service for a couple decades, served as the Adjutant of the U. S. Military Academy (1885-90), worked in the fledgling Bureau of Military Intelligence tasked with inspecting armaments in Europe, was on the board that designed the first Emergency Ration adopted by the U. S., invented a pipe shield for tent stoves, devised a method of folding tents to minimize wear that was adopted service-wide and helped the Army adopt the Barr & Stroud self-contained base range finder.

Then was back in the saddle, Commanding Troop E, 1st Cavalry, at battle of San Juan, July 1, 2 and 3, and participated in siege and surrender of Santiago de Cuba in the late war with Spain. Not content to sit aside, he turned in his horse in 1899 and sailed as commander (Bvt. Major) of the 1st Bn. and Cos. E and F, 42d Infantry (Volunteers) arriving Manila Bay, December 31, 1899. While in the PI he fought a number of what are termed “smart” engagements with rebels.

After the Philippines, he traveled more as an inspector for the Army (where he crossed paths with McLean’s brake) and continued his work with MI, being so well-versed in Latin American, Pacific and European jaunts that he wrote extensive tourist guides for Cook’s Travelers’ Gazette.

Once more into the breech, he was promoted to Colonel in 1914 and commanded the 10th Cavalry (Buffalo Soldiers) at the Siege of Naco. Then he rode into Mexico in 1916 with Pershing on the chase for Villa, leading an independent column of horse soldiers.

With WWI on the horizon and the tired Colonel turned down for promotion to general due to his age, he asked to go to France in his current rank when war erupted.

“Colonel Brown then made request to the Chief of Staff that if he could not be appointed a Brigadier General in the National Army, that he be permitted to go to France with the 42d Division in any capacity, announcing that if this were done he would ‘make good,'” reads his file.

And he did, serving in the  Inspector Quartermaster Corps attached to the division he traveled 64,000 miles in 1917-18 and was everywhere behind the lines making sure the AEF was taken care of. He was awarded the Distinguished Service Medal for his WWI service in 1922.

(Brown)

Forced out at mandatory retirement age of 64 on 19 Dec. 1918, he was recommended for promotion the day before he processed out for brigadier general but was not named one on the retired list until 1927.

He died in 1939, no doubt chomping at the bit to go to Europe to fight once more as the specter of a Second World War loomed.

The parade field on Fort Huachuca’s Old Post is named for him.

His photographic collection is preserved in the Army’s archives. Further, his papers at the University of Colorado Library are invaluable to researchers.

He’d probably like that more than he liked the McLean Muzzle brake.

While the British Isles suffered greatly in WWI, the Commonwealth nations of the larger Empire have something of an unsung history.

Portrait of an Indian cavalryman. Note the SMLE and saber

India (which at the time included modern Pakistan and Myanmar) had 74,000 soldiers killed in the war with a further 65,000 wounded.  The Government in India was pushed close to bankruptcy because of the war.  Besides the 140,000 on the Western Front, nearly 700,000 Indian troops then served in the Middle East, fighting with great distinction against the Turks in the Mesopotamian campaign. At the disastrous and badly-prepared Gallipoli Campaign in Turkey, which incurred a huge loss of life to Allied troops;  Indian, Gurkha, Australian and New Zealand troops fought side by side. The Indian Corps won 13,000 medals for gallantry including 12 Victoria Crosses.

photos show the aftermath of a successful Gurkha assault on a German trench in France, September 1915

Australian soldiers dressing the head wound of an injured comrade with his first aid field dressing, Gallipoli peninsula, Turkey, 1915.

Speaking of the ANZACs, 330,000 Australians saw active duty, of which over 60,000 died and 137,000 were injured. 100,471 New Zealanders fought in the war, with over 18,000 killed and more than 40,000 wounded.

West Indian soldiers cleaning their rifles

15,000 soldiers from the West Indies Regiment saw action in France, Palestine, Egypt and Italy during the First World War.  2,500 of them were killed or wounded.  Men from the West Indies won 81 medals for bravery, whilst 49 were mentioned in dispatches.

Canadians at the Second Battle of Ypres (Frezenberg) by artist William Barnes Wollen, 1915 in collection of Canadian Military Museum

Then there were the Canadians. Canada’s total casualties stood at the end of the war at 67,000 killed and 250,000 wounded, out of an expeditionary force of 620,000 people mobilized (39% of mobilized were casualties). Seventy Canadians were awarded the Victoria Cross during the First World War, many of them posthumously.

Rare and fascinating image of a South African fighting regiment in World War 1. Here South Africans from the 4th Regiment ‘South African Scottish’ perform a traditional ‘African Tribal War Dance’ with drawn bayonets and dancing in their distinctive ‘Murray of Atholl’ tartan kilts. The image was taken at the ‘Bull Ring’ in Etaples, France prior to the troops final deployment to trench warfare 18 June 1918. (Colourised by Royston Leonard from the UK)

55,000 men from Africa fought for the British during World War 1 and hundreds of thousands of others carried out the vital roles of carriers or auxiliaries. Contributing African countries included Nigeria, the Gambia, Rhodesia (now Zimbabwe), South Africa, Sierra Leone, Uganda, Nyasaland (now Malawi), Kenya and the Gold Coast (now Ghana). It is estimated that 10,000 Africans were killed.  African troops were awarded 166 decorations for bravery.

For more on the Commonwealth Contribution, click here

Much as once a week I like to take time off to cover warships (Wednesdays), on Sunday, I like to cover military art and the painters, illustrators, sculptors, and the like that produced them.

Combat Gallery Sunday: The Martial Art of Manuel García García

Spanish maritime artist Manuel García García specializes in taking period black and white photographs and plans of ships that have long-since sailed their last and transforming them into fully-fleshed out paintings.

Barcelona-based Garcia specializes in ships of the Spanish Navy and several of his superb watercolors have been turned into postage stamps both in Spain and abroad.

August 7, 1889, at Dock No. 1 Arsenal Cádiz, where the submarine Peral appears there with 6 crew members. She was actually the world’s first modern electric-powered torpedo armed military submersible and is currently preserved at the Naval Museum of Cartagena.

Knox-class FRAGATA CATALUNA F 73 by Manuel García García. Commissioned in 1975, she was sunk as a target in 2007.

This 9500-ton light cruiser was the head of her class, served on the Nationalist side in the Civil War and was present in most of the major battles. She was one of the last unaltered WWII-era all-gun cruisers in NATO service when she was stricken 31 August 1965.

 
Archives of his work are available here, and please take the time to visit his website and blog (Spanish) here.

Thank you for your work, sir.

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 Sept. 30, 2015: The Deseret Battlewagon

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) 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.

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 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. In the fighting, the fleet suffered ~100 casualties 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

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.

Utah was a happy ship in the 1920s, completing a number of 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 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 belowdecks when not in use or covered with timber “doghouses.”

This armarment 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, funnel cap and extensive extra decking

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

Tragically, 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.

As such, 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

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 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 campus of the University of Utah 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 “photogrametry” 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.

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 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/

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

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

I’m a member, so should you be!

The Great War Day by Day is an illustration blog about the First World War (1914-1918) that delves into the conflict daily with a graphic that takes the reader back in time to today’s date 100 years ago.

At the time known as the Great War but better known to history as World War I, the global conflict was one of the deadliest in history, claiming an estimated 37 million combined casualties on both sides. Spanning 4 years, 3 months and 2 weeks, the 100th anniversary of its battles and notable moments have been steadily ticking away since July 28, 2014 and will continue through Nov. 11, 2018.

And the blog, located on Tumblr and Facebook, is updated every day.

With that being said, lets look at some of the most notable 100ths in the past month.

In the 1860s, the Swiss government went looking for a rifle that would replace older percussion muskets and elevate them into the revolution in worldwide military arms ushered in with the U.S. Civil War. What they came up with saw extended service for the next 80 years in one form or another and was one of the most popular hunting arms in the U.S. for generations.

Why was it adopted?

In 1864, the standard Swiss Army rifle was the M1842/59 Milbank-Amsler, a gun that began life as a muzzleloader (M1842) then was modified over the years to a breechloader along the lines of the American Allin Springfield design of the same period. It was functional, but after the advent of rifles such as the Winchester and Spencer repeaters, and the French Chassepot and German Dreyse needleguns (both of whom shared a border with Switzerland), the Swiss needed to up their game if they wanted to remain quietly neutral.

This led to the one Friedrich Vetterli, a well-known firearms designer, joining with the Swiss gun maker Schweizerische Industrie-Gesellschaft Waffen-Department (SIG) to come up with a neat design for its time.

We give you: the Repetiergewehr Vetterli and its Italian cousin, the Vetterli-Vitali

Read the rest in in my column at Firearms Talk

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 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 in 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.

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 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 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 a number of 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.

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

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

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

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

I’m a member, so should you be!