Mystery Ship VIII Update!
In November of 2011, I put up a "Name This Mystery Ship" contest that proved to be one of my favorites.
The correct answer was the SS Mamari, aka "Fleet Tender C". A former passenger liner, she had been taken over by the Royal Navy and converted into a HMS Hermes decoy. As it turns out, I had not seen another picture of this erstwhile vessel until just about a week ago, when I also found out her fate. First, the second picture:
As it turns out, the Mamari was a very good decoy indeed. On June 3rd, 1941, she was attacked by German aircraft. In the process of evading them, she got stuck on the wreck of a tanker. While the Admiralty intended to refloat her, a few days later the E-boats came. After a couple of torpedoes, she ended up as you see her here. You can see just how skimpy that "flight deck" was. It couldn't even be used as a transport.
Something Strange And Wonderful
So the other day I was searching for pictures of the USS Liscome Bay when the contents of a thumbnail caught my eye and made me do a metaphorical doubletake. I simply could not for the life of me figure out what I was looking at. Of course I had to click on it.
Click the pic for much bigger
And then I started to laugh. The USS Thetis Bay, CVE-90, with deck-parked PBY Catalinas as she ferries them back to California in 1944. I've never seen anything like that before! I looked a little closer, and realized there was also a J2F Duck on deck, to boot! The Hellcats pale by comparison. I guess it makes perfect sense to ferry PBYs like this... it's not like they could fly the entire way on their own, particularly when they've been beaten up like these ones... but you just don't expect to see them dwarfing the carrier they're on.
1
Hmmm...I seen that picture before but never had the time to see which carrier it was. So that was LPH-6 was doing in its earlier incarnation?
Posted by: cxt217 at May 01, 2013 09:59 PM (A3Mut)
2
It really throws off one's sense of scale to look at that picture, man. Cool!
Posted by: GreyDuck at May 01, 2013 10:00 PM (xbP2x)
3
In terms of scale, these "jeep" carriers (CVE= "carrier, escort") were small and fairly fragile to begin with but punched waaaay above their weight in the closing years of WWII. Look what Capt. Gallery did with the USS Guadalcanal, or the incredible actions of "Taffy-3" at the Battle of Samar.
Posted by: JT at May 02, 2013 06:52 AM (iStSI)
4
Actually, three such task forces at Samar. TF-3 dumped off all its planes as early as it could, and to the extent that they continued participating in the battle it was operations from ground fields. Meanwhile, two other task forces of CVE's, which the Japanese never found and never even suspected were there, were flying off their planes as fast as they could, and in turn reloading and sending them out again as fast as they could. It was a terrifying day and came out better than they had any right to expect, but TF-3 doesn't deserve all the glory. (Even though they took most of the casualties.)
5
Exactly, Steven. I merely used TF-3 and Guadalcanal as probably the most visible examples of the type. To be honest, the kudos actually go to the sailors that manned these baby flattops and believed in the ship, themselves, and their training to the point they were able to do what they did.
Posted by: JT at May 03, 2013 06:54 AM (iStSI)
6
CVEs had respectable striking power, since they generally carried about half as many planes as a CV, or about as many as a CVL. The main thing CVEs gave away was speed. CVs and CVLs were about 10 knots faster. On the other hand they were a lot cheaper and quicker to build than CVs or CVLs, which is why so many of them got built during the war. And since they were built on cargo ship hulls, they were fast enough to escort convoys of cargo ships, which is what they were originally intended for.
Ahem - Officially, Taffy 1 to 3 were Task Units, conponents of Task Groups (Such as the four carrier task groups of Task Force 38.) that made up a Task Force (TF 77 in the case of the CVEs.), following USN practice. Yes, the scheme can also go smaller (Task Elements).
CVEs had respectable striking power, since they generally carried about half as many planes as a CV, or about as many as a CVL.
Depends on which navy and which CVE/CV. With the exception of RANGER, all USN CVs could carry about 2.5-3.0 or more aircrafts compared to a CVE. The Royal Navy was closer in respective capacity (And it is a sad testimony on the design limitations of the armored CVs built by the Brits that forced the majority of carrier-based British Corsairs to operate off their CVE instead of the big boy
The main thing CVEs gave away was speed. CVs and CVLs were about 10 knots faster.s.)
The USN concluded that speed was only advantage the INDEPENDENCE class CVLs had over the better escort carriers (The SANGAMON class, which were even pressed into emergency duty temping for fleet carriers during the CV shortage of 1943.) in terms of aircraft handling. The SANGAMON might have been more survivable, given their origins as fast tankers. The CVEs did lack armor especially around their munition storage, but so did the INDEPENDENCE class, which eventually forced a revision of the CVE's magazine space at the cost of carrying capacity.
The earlier CVEs were not nearly as good, but acceptable for the duties of convoy defense - hence the moniker the RN used when considering them pre-WW2 as 'trade protection carriers.'
Posted by: cxt217 at May 03, 2013 01:38 PM (A3Mut)
8
How roomy is the inside of a Catalina? Could you, say, furnish it and turn it into a flying houseboat? Cuz that would be cool.
Posted by: Wonderduck at May 03, 2013 09:14 PM (9jITs)
10
See! I knew it was a good idea! (The fact that it's already been done means it's a good idea, right?) As long as one stays away from Saudi Arabia, I suppose. And now I know the source of the "abandoned PBY on the beach" photos, which I didn't before.
I No Longer Need Any More MilHist Books...
...for I have just obtained the final word in Military History titles. My friends, cast your gaze longingly upon the newest, and perhaps final, addition to The Shelf:
If ever proof was needed that good things can come in small packages, Lake Michigan's Aircraft Carriers by Paul M Somers is that proof. Clocking in at 128 pages, over three-quarters of them photographs, LMAC tells the story of the USS Wolverine and USS Sable, the world's only fresh-water paddlewheel aircraft carriers. I first wrote about these two training carriers back in 2010, long before I knew about this valuable work, which was released in 2003. It's actually a little sparse on the actual history, beyond simple numbers, but that's okay. We're not here for the numbers, we're really here for the pictures, many of which I've never seen before, and all in excellent quality.
To be honest, however, I can't recommend that you rush out and purchase this book, because I really doubt that you're as insane as I am. If you are, well heck, go crazy... er... I mean... oh, you know what I mean. In any case, it's a fun little addition to The Shelf, and I'm happy I've gotten it. How many people do YOU know that can say they've got a book on freshwater paddlewheel aircraft carriers in their collection?
When Aircraft Carriers Flew
Over the years, I've written about all sorts of aircraft carriers. Tiny ones, small ones, big ones, bad ones, even aircraft carriers that were submarines. Today, though, I'm going to talk about what might be the strangest of them all: an aircraft carrier that could fly.
The USS Akron (ZRS-4) and her sister ship, the USS Macon (ZRS-5) were two of the largest things ever to fly, and the largest helium-filled airships ever at 785 feet long. Only the Hindenburg was longer, and only by 20 feet. Despite that immense size, they only weighed 110 tons and could make 72kts at maximum speed. Their role with the US Navy was to be that of reconnaissance. With a range of 12000 miles, more or less, crossed with their speed, they could easily scout ahead of the fleet. However, it was recognized that something that size was hardly invisible and made for one juicy target, even if their helium gasbags meant that they wouldn't go foom the way zeppelins did in WWI. Enter the Sparrowhawk.
Both the Akron and Macon could carry up to five F9C Sparrowhawk fighters, though four was the norm. These were carried inside the dirigibles, and were launched and recovered via a "trapeze" unit. Simply put, the hook on the top wing would engage the trapeze, which then hauled the plane up into the hangar. To launch, they were lowered via the trapeze, then the hook would be disengaged. The Sparrowhawk would then fall away, in yet another example of why pilots are insane.
The Sparrowhawks were not carried for local defense, though they could certainly perform in that role. Instead, they were to increase the scouting area of the mothership, and allow the Akron and Macon to stay a safe distance from the targets. On the whole, there's no reason why this wouldn't have worked, and test results were generally favorable. There was no terrible difficulty with the trapeze unit, other than the sheer ridiculousness of the concept.
Unfortunately, neither the Akron or the Macon had long careers in the Navy. Dirigibles are, as you can imagine, inherently somewhat fragile. On April 4th, 1933, a mere two years after her launching, Akron was lost when she flew into a storm front over the Atlantic. 73 of her crew of 76 were lost. Two years later, the Macon was struck by a severe gust of wind that carried away her upper tailfin (weakened by a previous accident and insufficiently repaired). She settled gently into the Pacific Ocean, and 74 of her crew survived.
But for a while, they were flying aircraft carriers.
1
I was really amazed the first time I learned just how fast blimps were. Blimps (smaller than these two) had active service in WWII acting as convoy escorts during the Battle of the Atlantic and were pretty successful.
Oh, airships! I have always had a soft spot in my heart for them, even though they were incredibly fragile and vulnerable, with limited utility. The classic photo of USS LOS ANGELES standing near vertical from the top of the mooring tower is still one of the most memorable photographs ever taken.
Blimps (smaller than these two) had active service in WWII acting as convoy escorts during the Battle of the Atlantic and were pretty successful.
Blimps in WW2 also produced the famous 'blimp that came without its crew' incident. At least one blimp was shot-down in a fight with a U-Boat as well.
Posted by: cxt217 at April 06, 2013 05:36 PM (6/RCS)
3K-74 made a reckless attempt at divebombing a
U-Boat, had a bomb-shackle hang-up, had a 105mm shell detonate inside
the gas bag and was able to make a controlled landing. The only crewman
lost was eaten by a shark.
L-8's crew was abducted by aliens. (I don't know how that could have
been avoided).
The blimps did a superb job and were considered 1st rate ASW platforms
until the early 60's when McNamara decided they were too old fashioned.
As ASW platforms or AEW they still have considerable potental.
Posted by: Brickmuppet at April 06, 2013 10:17 PM (9jITs)
4
There's been beardmuttering about returning airships to active service for long-term surveillance purposes. They have loiter times on the order of weeks rather than hours. Nothing actually built to my knowledge, although the idea of an airship drone tender strikes me as a wonderful dieselpunk SF idea.
Posted by: Mitch H. at April 08, 2013 08:25 AM (jwKxK)
Airships were mooted for ASW use towards the end of the Cold War, but the fall of the Berlin Wall and the disappearance of the Soviet Union put an end to those discussions.
IIRC Aerostats were used for anti-drug smuggling interdiction, though I seriously doubt they can truly replace an AEW aircraft for most purposes - and certainly not AWACS.
Posted by: cxt217 at April 08, 2013 07:45 PM (aDysA)
6
DARPA and Lockheed are working on an unmanned concept right now - google ISIS Blimp
Posted by: Bill Anderson at April 10, 2013 06:58 PM (eREoE)
ISIS blimp sounds like a DARPA idea, but there has been no new updates in about a year, and the official DARPA site on the project does not say much. So it is alive, but no much beyond that.
This may be one of the 'pie in the sky' - pun unintended - that is less interested in coming up with the intended system but more in proofing concepts that can be applied to other applications and developing other ideas that spring from it.
Posted by: cxt217 at April 11, 2013 04:26 PM (dv0V3)
"...and Screw This Whole Area In Particular."
It's hard for a ship to look proud when painted in Measure 32, but somehow the USS Aaron Ward (DM-34, ex DD-773) pulls it off in this picture. Like James Bond, martini shaken not stirred, dressed in a clown costume.
Originally a Sumner-class destroyer, the Ward was taken in hand right after launching and converted to the last of 12 Robert H Smith-class minelayers. All the conversion did was remove the torpedo tubes and add minelaying equipment (which, it might be noted, was never actually used by any of the Smiths in WWII). Otherwise, they were treated as any other destroyer. Joining the fleet at Pearl Harbor on February 2nd, 1945, she received additional training in and around Hawaii before joining TF 52 at Okinawa on March 22nd. She served there for around a month, leaving station occasionally for supplies and such. On April 30th, 1945, she took station at Radar Picket #10 off the coast of Okinawa. She beat off one attacker early in her stay, but bad weather kept Japanese aircraft out of the sky for a few days. That all changed late on the afternoon of May 3th. From roughly 4pm to around 730pm, she was attacked by at least a dozen kamikazes. Of those, she was hit by six.
Gone was the neatly turned-out destroyer-minelayer. Left behind was a legend.
27 of her crew were killed in the attacks, but the ship was saved. Arriving in New York under her own power in August of 1945, she was judged not worth repairing. She was decommissioned in September of that same year, and scrapped in 1946.
1
Why did they float that all the way to New York? Were there no closer scrapping yards? I'm amazed it didn't sink or roll over in the next significant storm.
Posted by: Mitch H. at March 26, 2013 09:10 AM (jwKxK)
The Navy problem sent her to New York because they wanted to keep the West Coast yards available for priority jobs (Read: relatively fast repair, and normal overhaul work.). Any ship that looked like it require long term reconstruction would be sent to the East Coast yards, especially since space was opening up with the cancellation of a lot of new construction. The Navy made the same decision with USS FRANKLIN - there is at least one photo, taken from the FRANKLIN's flight deck (Or what remained of it.) as she arrived in New York.
The decision to declare the WARD a constructive total loss later was almost certainly after the shipyard had a detailed look at her, and Navy could compare what the repair would require versus the number of destroyers they had...
C.T.
Posted by: cxt217 at March 26, 2013 02:20 PM (6/RCS)
3
Another reason is that the war was over, and everyone knew the navy was going to be shrinking. A ship in that kind of condition wasn't worth saving when ships that hadn't seen combat were going to be getting decommissioned.
A number of destroyers under repair when the war ended were scrapped on the dock for the same reason. The ready availability of replacement also help determine matters (The Royal Navy, as well as the USN, had even during the worst periods of WW2, decided that some ships just were not worth the time and effort to repair.).
One thing that has arisen from reading my copy of Nelson to Vanguard is why the USN bothered using the machinery plant from CASSIN and DOWNES after they were more or less destroyed at Pearl Harbor. Reusing their reduction gears would have been very worthwhile, and the weapons would have reduced the cost, but their power plants were noticeably inferior to the destroyers being launched at the time.
C.T.
Posted by: cxt217 at March 29, 2013 01:50 PM (6/RCS)
5
I think it's important to point out that not all shipyards are created equal. There were cases in the war where American subs in the Pacific took tremendous damage without being lost, and they sailed to Connecticut for repairs.
There were cases in the war where American subs in the Pacific took tremendous damage without being lost, and they sailed to Connecticut for repairs.
Given that only 4 yards participated in the fleet boats program for the US Navy during WW2, none on the West Coast - and one was too much of a hassle to reach for repair work - that is not surprising.
IIRC, there was only two yards on the West Coast engaged in the construction of destroyers or larger warships, but quite a few more that could essentially rebuild a warship - and did.
C.T.
Posted by: cxt217 at March 29, 2013 04:04 PM (6/RCS)
Oops, I forgotten that Mare Island was part of the fleet boat program. That meant that fleet boats that could be repaired relativerly quickly and regular overhauls would have been done on the West Coast, but any subs needed extended yard work would have been sent to points east.
C.T.
Posted by: cxt217 at March 29, 2013 04:09 PM (6/RCS)
The Ugliest Warship In Any Fleet
You may remember a few months ago, I wrote about a pair of ships named the HMS General Wolfe and the HMS Lord Clive, a pair of Royal Navy monitors that shipped 18" guns. That little post sent me on a quiet search for more monitors, coastal defense ships, that sort of thing. And oh, but did I find some fun ones! For example, which would you rather have, a 7000ton ship with 11" guns or a 4000ton ship with 10" guns? Just wonderfully mind-altering designs flowed to me.
And then I stopped. I stopped because I encountered a ship that was far and away the ugliest thing I've ever seen afloat... and that includes bifurcated ships and French aircraft carriers. Ladies and gentlemen, I found a 3000ton ship carrying 15" rifles. Ladies and gentlemen, I found the Italian Faa di Bruno.
Technically a monitor, in truthfully this tremendously ugly thing was a barge with a bow tacked on. Her hull, not seen here because it had about two inches of freeboard, had a concrete cofferdam ten feet thick. It had a top speed of 3kts if the tide was behind it, driven by a 450hp engine. And it is hideous.
If you know of any ship uglier, leave it in the comments. Then gouge out your eyeballs.
2
I can't decide if I think the French battleship Massena is really ugly, or totally awesome in a steampunk sort of way. -
Picture 1 -
Picture 2 -
Not any uglier than Faa di Bruno, though.
Posted by: flatdarkmars at March 24, 2013 12:31 PM (I55Es)
3
That's actually a sort of flattering angle for that thing. It looks worse from above, when it becomes even more apparent how much it looks like the roof of a barn. In a flood. With a squatter camp.
Posted by: andy at March 24, 2013 12:43 PM (R9Rm2)
Faa di Bruno still has to contend with the Russian Novgorod-class monitors for the ugliest dogs to ever be sent to sea. At least the Bruno did not look like the lid to a container of cream cheese when viewed from above. The round hull Novgorod, on the other hand...
C.T.
Posted by: cxt217 at March 24, 2013 04:14 PM (6/RCS)
5
I looked at that beast and immediately thought "Heavy weapons Dalek." By the way, there was one of the latter in the Doctor Who episode where they introduced the new companion (not the Christmas one, the first time they had her.)
Posted by: RickC at March 27, 2013 05:19 PM (WQ6Vb)
Name This Mystery Ship XXIII
Here ya go, the first Mystery Ship of 2013:
Take your best shot! Remember, no cheating... winner gets a post of their very own (no pr0n, religion or politics, though). One guess per customer. Post no bills. Winners warm up with Malt-o-Meal.
It's an educated guess: Steven inadvertently gave me the clue. It was that odd tapered mast; I knew I'd seen it before. And it's obviously pre-Dreadnaught, but just barely so, as it already has turrets.
A glass of wine with lunch helped: Tom McCall Waterfront Park in Portland, Oregon. A million years ago, I lived about five miles from where Steven lives now. Every summer, during the Rose Festival, my folks would take me to that park to see the ships during Fleet Week. On land, there was a monument to the USS Oregon... consisting of that odd mast.
1+1=3. Indiana Class.
Posted by: Tiberius at March 03, 2013 11:55 AM (97M8h)
7
It's not "Name This Mystery CLASS," Tiberius, it's "Name This Mystery SHIP." Got a guess on the name of the ship?
Posted by: Wonderduck at March 03, 2013 12:26 PM (8xjaN)
That is a replica of the Indiana class Battleships that was built for the Chicago Worlds Fair. The ship was designed using the then current plans for the ships which were finished yet, so it still had the conical turrets that were replaced with roomier models in the final design and it had higher freeboard the ships were designed with before extra armor and drafting errors reduced the actual ships freeboard to about 12 feet.
HA!
Wait...
It's NAME that ship.
You want a name.
IT HAD A NAME?
.....
.....
.....
It was the Columbia exposition and 'Columbia' was the 19th century equivalent of "America-Tan" and ...I'm going to go with Columbia.
Posted by: The Brickmuppet at March 03, 2013 02:41 PM (EDjsP)
10
The main turrets aren't right for USS Oregon. They have slanted walls, and the Oregon's turrets were cylinders. But you're right that the mast is the same.
12
I'm sorry, Muppet, you're not correct on the name.
Posted by: Wonderduck at March 03, 2013 02:45 PM (8xjaN)
13
(One of the reasons it looks pre-Dreadnaught is that the hull is longer at the waterline than it is at the deck. That was something that changed in the post-Dreadnaught era.)
14
@ Steven: That was due to two things. The hulls had tumblehome which increased their stability in normal conditions and the bows were designed to be used as Rams.
Posted by: The Brickmuppet at March 03, 2013 02:58 PM (EDjsP)
This is a stretch for me, but since Brickmuppet suggested it was a replica of the INDIANA-class battleships, that it was named INDIANA?
C.T.
Posted by: cxt217 at March 03, 2013 05:21 PM (3sPDg)
16
Okay guys. After reading half of the Internet, I know what this is. I haven't been able to find the picture itself, but the story is sooooo juicy that I am absolutely certain that it would tickle Wonderduck's fancy.
This ship is not actually floating.
Posted by: Pete at March 03, 2013 07:01 PM (RqRa5)
17
CT, your stretch fell short. This is not the Indiana.
Pete, go on...
Posted by: Wonderduck at March 03, 2013 07:42 PM (8xjaN)
20
Very well. With our host's permission, I'm declaring Illinois: a 1:1 exhibition replica of a battleship.
At first I thought that one of Indiana-class battleships was later refit with conical turrets. However, it proved not the case. And the naval history sites said that there was no space.
Posted by: Pete at March 03, 2013 08:28 PM (RqRa5)
21
I have a certain aversion to Wikipedia, so I didn't look there initially. But if you go to the article about Illinois, the picture is right there. As CXT says, it should take less than a minute.
Posted by: Pete at March 03, 2013 08:31 PM (RqRa5)
22
*ding* We have a winner! Made of bricks, concrete, chicken wire and 2x4s, I actually found out about it via Wikipedia's article on the Indiana (BB-1)... there at the bottom of that page is a link to Battleship Illinois (replica).
So yeah, not exactly a ship... so sue me.
Pete, whatcha want?
Posted by: Wonderduck at March 03, 2013 08:48 PM (8xjaN)
Posted by: Wonderduck at March 03, 2013 10:04 PM (8xjaN)
25
Funnily enough, it would be much easier if I actually read the comments, because Brickmuppet called it precisely - except the name. But I only glanced diagonally to see if the contest was already won and Brick's comment slipped my attention. I do remember weird formatting. ^_^
This is a big prize and I recall Ken going a bit beyond what I anticipated. I don't know squat about U.S. Navy, and Russian/Soviet Navy seems somewhat insignificant by comparison, lacking bright episodes. Sinop? Deep in 19th century. Survival Sch-303? U-boats saw the same. F1 is sort of played out as a topic. So, anime then. But I don't want to hoist something that is not appreciated, like GA. I'm going to punt on it a bit. How about go down your favourites and review a series that wasn't yet featured? Anything goes, like Library War or whatever.
Posted by: Pete at March 03, 2013 11:27 PM (RqRa5)
26
I can do that... a personal favorite that I've not yet reviewed. Got it.
Posted by: Wonderduck at March 04, 2013 04:42 AM (8xjaN)
Buffalo or X-Wing?
I'm sure that by now most of my readers have seen this photoshop job at least once before:
When I saw it for the first time, I just laughed... then took a much closer look at it, and was amazed at the job the person behind the 'shop had done. It really looks like an Incom T-65 X-Wing wound up on an escort carrier in 1942. What never crossed my mind, however, was to try and find the original. Well, tonight while browsing ww2db.com, I accidentally stumbled across it!
Bravo, Mr Photoshop Person, bravo.
Posted by: Steven Den Beste at February 07, 2013 06:09 PM (+rSRq)
3
It isn't until you see the two side-by-side (okay, bottom-by-top) that you start to notice the little things he missed. Like the arresting cable in the foreground that the X-Wing couldn't have caught like that. Or the wire attached to the Buffalo's right wing that just sorta... floats there above and behind the X-Wing.
But if THAT'S the worst I can come up with...
Posted by: Wonderduck at February 07, 2013 06:47 PM (lzVVx)
Pass Of Balmaha
In 1888, a 245 foot tri-masted windjammer was handed over to those who commissioned it, the Harby Steamship Company. Built in Scotland, it was nevertheless an American vessel, weighing in at 1571 tons. Operated by a Boston-based cotton company as a freighter, this vessel was named the SS Pass of Balmaha. She mostly sailed the Atlantic trade routes, her steel hull serving her well when the weather became violent.
A proud ship, and one that well-served its masters into the 20th Century. It was something of a pleasant-looking anachronism as World War I began... a ship of sail in a world of Dreadnaughts and armored cruisers. However, as the First Great Mistake got cranking, the United States was neutral and non-aligned, and King Cotton had to be moved, so the Pass of Balmaha kept at it... until June of 1915.
I always been partial to the RMS Carmania and her encounter with SMS Cap Trafalgar myself, especially since said encounter was the main topic of the opening chapter of The Great War At Sea.
Then we have the interesting end of the commerce raider Michel in Big Mistake Number Two.
Posted by: cxt217 at December 29, 2012 11:07 PM (A2Cof)
3
I hadn't heard of this ship. What an amazing story!
Posted by: Steven Den Beste at December 29, 2012 11:14 PM (+rSRq)
Posted by: jon spencer at December 30, 2012 08:40 AM (hFoyt)
5
One of my favorite ships, ever since I read about her in Blaine Pardoe's "The Cruise of the Sea Eagle." Her captain, Felix von Luckner, later inspired Reinhard Heydrich to join the Reichsmarine, but as a Freemason, he was not generally popular with the Nazis. They eventually condemned him to death for his role in negotiating the surrender of the town of Halle to the Americans in 1945, but he avoided the sentence and lived in Sweden until his death in 1966.
CXT, I hadn't heard of the RMS Carmania before... amusing that she and the Cap Trafalgar were disguised as each other!
Posted by: flatdarkmars at December 31, 2012 08:09 PM (I55Es)
As I mentioned, I first read about Carmania versus Cap Trafalgar in the school library's copy of A.A. Hoehling's The Great War at Sea: History of Naval Action, 1914-18, which had its first chapter dedicated about the battle between the two ships and the events leading up to it. Robert Massey was probably still in the early stages of writing Castles of Steel (If that.), at the time, which probably does a good job of dating me...
They are not merchant cruisers (Though the latter was armed almost as heavily as one.) but the Ondina and the S.S. Stephen Hopkins also had run ins with merchant cruisers/commerce raiders, with interesting results.
...And if this is the same Blaine Pardoe as I am thinking - sounds like the guy who wrote some novels and sourcebooks for Battletech back in the day, which has its own share of interesting stories.
Posted by: cxt217 at December 31, 2012 11:37 PM (or2/m)
Name This Mystery Ship XXII
I found out about this particular vessel a little over two years ago,
and have been keeping it under wraps for a time when I've needed a
mystery ship. Now is the time. THIS:
...is
the ship. As is always the case, I've photoshooped out any obvious
recognition marks, but otherwise left the picture alone. The unofficial
rules, as always, apply: no imagesearching or anything like that.
That's cheating and makes Wonderduck cry. One guess per customer.
Don't be a jerk. I am the Law. CXT and FDM, you two are in the
Master's Level so no guesses from you until I give the say-so. The
winner gets a post on a topic of their choosing from your humble
owner/proprietor of The Pond, moi. No politics, religion or pr0n,
however... this here's a fambly blog.
Get to guessin'!
UPDATE: Brickmuppet has already guessed that the ship was the HMS Zubian. Unfortunately, my response broke the formatting of my "edit comments" page, so when the latest wave of spam came through, I couldn't delete them. So, instead, I deleted the original post, which corrected the problem. Yay me.
Ah, a long time since I made mention of HMS Zubian and it finally appears in a Mystery Ship photo. She was truly one of the odder naval mash-ups, especially since the two 'sister ships' she was built out of were not identical...
C.T.
Posted by: cxt217 at December 28, 2012 11:34 PM (bfPz2)
2
I get to pick a post right?
Do one on the influence of the lobbying of protestant interest groups upon legislation regulating burlesque shows in the late 1920s.
...or
Pass of Balhama.
Posted by: brickmuppet at December 29, 2012 02:16 AM (vp6an)
3
CXT, I didn't want to mention the REAL reason you couldn't play.
Muppet, really? *siiiiiiiiiiiighhhh*
Posted by: Wonderduck at December 29, 2012 03:04 AM (cymHZ)
90 Years
There are ships from World War II whose names ring down through the ages for their great deeds. Names like Enterprise, names like Samuel B Roberts, names like Tang and Wahoo. Then there are ships who have generated a legend for other reasons. Ships like Yamato, or Bismarck, or the lamented Arizona. But there are other ships, ships that are known only to historians and grognards. Ships that left a lasting legacy that only the truly attentive would be aware of, ships like the one that was commissioned 90 years ago today.
If you've read The Pond for any length of time, you know that I'm a fan of the underdog, and much more interested in the "supporting cast" than the star actors. Everybody knows about the big carriers, for example, but nobody pays any attention to the escort carriers. The Mustang, Spitfire and Zero get the headlines, but the Vindicator is what I'll be happy to read about for hours. Which is why this ship is one of my favorites. Ladies and Gentlemen, I give you the the first aircraft carrier designed and built from the ground up, the Hosho.
Commissioned December 27th, 1922 into the Imperial Japanese Navy, the Hosho was never to be a top-of-the-line fleet carrier, even when brand new. She could only carry 15 planes in 1922, that number decreasing rapidly as aircraft size and weight increased. Only 552 feet long from bow to stern, she was only slightly longer than an average American escort carrier built 20 years later. She was also very lightly built, weighing in at under 9700 tons at full load. For comparison, the USS , a light cruiser commissioned in 1938, weighed in at 10000 tons.
But her size was not to be her main value to the Imperial Japanese Navy.
Name This Mystery Plane XXI
Well, the F1 season is over, which means I'll have more time to do other things here on The Pond... but until then, here's a new Mystery Ship Plane!
Since I suspect this is gonna be easy, there's no prize this time. In this case, being first is its own reward, eh? I've been fond of this one ever since I first found out about it some 20+ years ago. Now, I can't stop you from cheating, but you're just losing any joy and thrill you might have gotten from winning clean. So just don't do it, 'k? K. Have fun, and GUESS THAT MYSTERY SHIP PLANE!
Posted by: flatdarkmars at November 28, 2012 12:03 AM (I55Es)
3
It's a Ryan Fireball, indeed... the first plane to land on a carrier using jet power only.
Posted by: Wonderduck at November 28, 2012 07:36 AM (LbiZL)
4
Where's the intake for the jet engine? On the other side?
Posted by: Ed Hering at November 28, 2012 11:17 AM (7I+sl)
5
Ed, there are ducts in the wing roots. They're small and covered by shadow in the picture above, but you can see them in this picture.
Posted by: flatdarkmars at November 28, 2012 11:52 AM (I55Es)
6
That picture is strange. It took me a couple of times to notice that the prop isn't turning.
Posted by: Steven Den Beste at November 28, 2012 05:55 PM (uNl21)
7
That's why I chose it, Steven. If you don't know what you're looking at, you just think "high-speed camera," or something like that... when the truth is something much cooler.
Posted by: Wonderduck at November 28, 2012 07:17 PM (LbiZL)
Oddly enough, the first time I read about the FR Fireball was in Fine Scale Modeling magazine. I was quite impressed by the aircraft, probably more than the US Navy was.
As Wonderduck noted, it was the first aircraft to land on a carrier using using only jet power. It turns out that was an unintentional necessity, since the piston engine had flared out. The legendary Eric Brown, RN and FAA, made the first intentional landing using solely jet power in a Sea Vampire not long afterward.
C.T.
Posted by: cxt217 at November 28, 2012 07:23 PM (FAoVy)
9
Armament was only four .50s... I'm sure they had weight issues, but that is just unsatisfactory regardless.
Posted by: flatdarkmars at November 28, 2012 08:11 PM (I55Es)
10
I imagine it wasn't intended to see combat in that configuration.
Posted by: Steven Den Beste at November 28, 2012 08:48 PM (uNl21)
11
The Fireball was designed to be a kamikaze interceptor. It would cruise on piston power, then kick in the jet engine and use both piston and jet to get to where it was needed in a hurry. For its job, the 4 x .50cal would do the trick well enough. Not every plane can be a P-47, after all.
Posted by: Wonderduck at November 28, 2012 08:59 PM (LbiZL)
Just four .50 HMGs would not have been enough to take on German aircraft, which would not have been a problem for the likely mission of the Fireball, but would have been a problem for its wider employment.
The truly sad thing is that it took the US years after WW2 to move away from the love of the .50 caliber HMG in favor of cannons on their fighters, which had consequences in the aerial fighting in Korea.
C.T.
Posted by: cxt217 at November 28, 2012 11:29 PM (FAoVy)
13
CT, the Fireball was a Navy plane. Its chances of encountering German planes was somewhere between nil and none, particularly since its first flight wasn't until June of 1944.
As far as "wider employment" goes, it was also designed as a stop-gap until planes of all-jet propulsion were considered powerful enough (and successful enough) to go to sea. It wound up taking a lot less time for that to happen than expected, which is why it was gone from service in 1947.
Well, that and an annoying propensity for its nose gear to collapse on landing.
Posted by: Wonderduck at November 28, 2012 11:56 PM (LbiZL)
14
Any aircraft used by the US Navy would, at some point, had been considered by the British for procurement via Lend-Lease. But the Brits would not have wanted a fighter with only 4 HMGs, which was requirement that came from years of fighting German aircraft. And given how armored frontline combat aircraft were by 1945, I doubt anyone else would have asked for the Fireball either.
Posted by: cxt217 at November 29, 2012 12:17 PM (Crvik)
15And given how armored frontline combat aircraft were by 1945, I doubt anyone else would have asked for the Fireball either.
The US Navy did. Or did you mean other than them?
Posted by: Wonderduck at November 29, 2012 07:41 PM (LbiZL)
When The Cherry Blossoms First Fell
Ensign Jimmy Green stared at the horizon... nothing. There'd been
nothing there for nearly ninety minutes, and he finally began to feel
like he could relax, just a bit. Below him, in one of the gun tubs, he
could hear shell humpers joking about how the Jap fleet had gotten away,
but Green knew in his bones that he and his ship were alive only by the
Providence of fortune, a confusing decision by the Japanese to break
off, and the White Plains' position towards the front of Taffy 3's formation. At least, he thought ruefully, it became the front when the collection of Kaiser Coffins turned away from the Japs.
Yet that was the difference between him being there on the tiny island
of an Escort Carrier... and being in the Pacific with his ship sitting
on the bottom. Like the Gambier Bay,
he thought glumly. He was pretty sure he'd seen her roll over and go
down, with a Jap cruiser standing a few miles off throwing shells at her
the whole time. Now, though? Nothing at all. It was like the Japs
had never been there, except for the smoke coming from Kalinin Bay, that is.
He'd overheard one of the pilots saying that her flight deck looked
like swiss cheese from all the holes in it. Green didn't like the sound
of that very much at all. Why in the world had the Japs turned around,
anyway? It didn't make sense. When I saw that big bastard come over the horizon, I was sure I was dead, he thought to himself, and it sure ain't that they were scared off by a handful of destroyers and some Wildcats. Then those big battleship shells started to splash around him, and Cap'n Weller kept the White Plains dancing between the salvos. Well, lumbering at least;
nobody ever accused a CVE of being nimble. Well, some coffee might be
nice. It was only after he got the cup that he realized his hands were
shaking.
Why MilHist Weeps
Today was laundry day, and I took my dual bags of dirty stuff to the laundromat near Pond Central instead of doing them here in the provided laundry room. See, there's currently only one working dryer, and I had a week's worth of clothes and about a dozen towels and various assorted things to wash. When I go to this particular laundromat, I always take a dense book with me. Today's selection was the newly acquired US Aircraft Carriers: An Illustrated Design History by Norman Friedman. If Japanese Cruisers of the Pacific War is the ultimate book on that particular topic, Friedman's work is arguably the ultimate on the planning, design, use and upgrading of American carriers. I've learned a lot from it, and I've only read a couple of chapters disjointedly. So this was my entertainment whilst the laundry spun and tossed.
Even better, when I got there there was only one other person in the place, and they were carrying their laundry out the other door! I had a peaceful hour-and-some-minutes ahead of me!
The laundry was in the rinse cycle when a guy, probably in his fifties, came in. He got his laundry going, then started jabbering at the attendant. Seemed to be a nice enough guy, just refused to shut up. Still, he wasn't bothering me so I continued to read, and you probably know where this is going by now.
Yep, after a few minutes, he walked up to me and said "I'm going to be nosy, what are you reading?" I've had this happen once or twice before at the laundromat, and the usual result when I've showed them whatever book I'm reading has been a bemused "oh," followed by quickly finding some other place to be. To be fair, it's hard to blame them; mine is an esoteric hobby these days, and it's not like there's much interest in the British Pacific Fleet in WWII anymore.
Not this guy, though. He immediately began talking about how he visited the USS Lexington a few years ago. This was interesting, until he said it was originally built as a battleship in 1924. Ah, they must tell the visitors about the history of the name, because that's really the first carrier named Lexington (CV-2) he's talking about. I pointed this out to him, and he disagreed; he visited the first one. I quickly flipped through Friedman's book and found a picture of a post-war upgraded Essex-class carrier and asked him if that's what his ship looked like? He replied in the affirmative, angled deck and everything. I told him he was looking at a picture of CV-16 taken in 1962. Still he refused to believe it; he went so far as to say it was the book that was wrong.
I smiled at that. I did a bit of flipping through the book, found a picture of CV-2, and pointed out that that was the ship he was saying he'd visited, and that it was totally impossible that he had walked upon its decks. He was actually beginning to get angry when he asked why that was. "Because the first Lexington was sunk during the Battle of the Coral Sea. It's under about 10000 feet of water to the northeast of Australia."
"Are you sure?"
"Pretty darn."
"Oh." He then kind of walked away and began talking to the attendant again.
1
What carrier is that on the cover of the book? The bow looks very odd.
Posted by: Steven Den Beste at October 13, 2012 10:57 PM (+rSRq)
2
That's because it's actually the stern of a Casablanca-class escort carrier... I think. The book doesn't say what the cover illo is. It IS the stern of an CVE, though.
Posted by: Wonderduck at October 13, 2012 11:45 PM (O7Ufu)
Heh, so a mention of The British Pacific Fleet made it into a post? I would note to anyone interested in getting the book that the cover for the book you get is different from what Amazon pictures.
Second the notion about US Aircraft Carriers. Actually, anything by Norman Friedman is well worth the time.
C.T.
Posted by: cxt217 at October 14, 2012 03:59 PM (Pr3/z)
Name This Mystery Ship XX
My internet connection has been gone for most of the past two days, so now that I'm back, it's time for a Mystery Ship in celebration... and it may be a doozy.
FDM and CXT, don't sprain your hands diving for the keyboard... you two can't play for 24 hours (or 1130pm Central Pond Time on Saturday). Everybody else, no image searching or the like, one guess per person, have at it! Winner gets a post of your choice. Good luck!
Posted by: Brickmuppet at September 15, 2012 12:35 PM (e9h6K)
8
Muppet's the winner! The ship is the Regia Marina's Aquila, a mostly-finished-but-never-completed aircraft carrier, converted from a passenger liner. Near as anybody could tell, it would have been a decent enough carrier with 40-50 fighter/bombers that were actually considered better than the Bf109T the Germans were planning for the Graf Zeppelin.
Posted by: Wonderduck at September 15, 2012 01:11 PM (OS+Cr)
Looking over all the passenger-liner-conversion-to-carrier proposed or started (I do not think any Navy other than IJN ever finished a conversion.), I amazed at how slow the Junyo and Hiyo were, even in the original civilian incarnation. I guess that is a result of not having any ships involved in the North Atlantic passenger trade, with a shot at the Blue Riband.
C.T.
Posted by: cxt217 at September 15, 2012 02:05 PM (juwHe)
10
I did notice how narrow the flight deck was. I guess that should have cued me to the fact that it was a mutant.
Posted by: Steven Den Beste at September 15, 2012 04:34 PM (+rSRq)
11
Funny, Mauser... BUT USE THE FERSHLUGGNER LINK BUTTON.
Posted by: Wonderduck at September 15, 2012 11:44 PM (yqnY1)
I did notice how narrow the flight deck was. I guess that should have cued me to the fact that it was a mutant.
I think that is more a matter of perspective from where the photo was taken.Most Japanese fleet carriers had narrow flight decks on par with what the Aquila was converted with. Quite a few carriers in other navies of roughly the same displacement had flight decks of fairly similar width - heck, there were carriers with significantly larger displacements that had decks only slightly wider.
C.T/
Posted by: cxt217 at September 16, 2012 11:41 AM (juwHe)
13
It's the nose that confused me with the CV-4 Ranger.
Posted by: Tom Tjarks at September 16, 2012 11:46 AM (6+fmF)
Posted by: Mauser at September 16, 2012 01:01 PM (cZPoz)
15
Master Duck, just do your stuff. Any researched artictle from you is excellent. (Yes, I'm still sort of searching for my old man's LST number....) My bad. But you go, bro!
Posted by: The Old Man at September 17, 2012 01:28 PM (dBz2M)
I Have Joined An Elite Group.
Every hobby has a "holy grail." For us American rubber duck collectors, it's usually the Tolo Duck. For those who collect baseball cards, it's the American Tobacco Company's T206 Honus Wagner. Car collectors have different tastes... for one, it'll be a cherry '68 Mustang fastback, but another will only look at Dinos... for whatever reason. But when you're an amateur military historian of the Pacific War like I claim to be, what's the goal? Kaigun, Sunburst, Shattered Sword, The First Team, A Glorious Page In Our History... all of these are on The Shelf. In the comments of that post, CXT mentioned a title I wasn't familiar with. I looked into it and immediately began salivating: it seemed like it pushed every activation button in my brain at once. Full of histories and detailed to the extreme, it was exactly what I look for in a mil-hist book. That it's also considered one of the best references of all time helped a lot, too... until I took a look at the prices.
Holy jumpin' guacamole on a stick, $300??? Yeah, not so much. However, I kept an eye on the Amazon price listing... every now and again, it'd drop to $200, and I vowed to myself that if I had the cash on hand if the price fell to $150, I'd go for it. It still felt ridiculous spending that much on a book, but then I realized that college students spend twice that much and more on books all the time. Eh, whatever, it's only money. Last Friday, I clicked the link to Amazon, and...
Holy jumpin' frijoles in a hot tub, $150. I couldn't click on the purchasing link fast enough. Today, this Holy Grail that has been out of print for at least 10 years and had a list price of $75 in 1997... was delivered unto my hands.
And just what is this paragon of the mil-hist world?
You will probably want to kill me, but when I got Japanese Cruisers of the Pacific War, I paid less than $80 for it new. Falling asleep while reading it is not recommended, since it will probably hamper blood flow in whatever extremity it lands on after you doze off.
It does look great lined up next to my copy of Norman Friedman's US Cruisers.
C.T.
Posted by: cxt217 at August 15, 2012 10:54 PM (sNcHF)
3
...which is going for more than double this one. Used. I would enjoy having the whole series, but owning the US Carrier one is probably my next goal.
David, it is awesome indeed. It's dark in Pond Central right now, except for a golden light being cast by my copy. Also, a decent sized cut I had on my left wing (occupational hazard when one works with boxcutters on a regular basis) spontaneously healed when I turned to the first page. My voice dropped an octave, too.
Posted by: Wonderduck at August 15, 2012 11:08 PM (djyNz)
4
Please use the link button instead of the raw URL. Raw URLs make Wonderduck cry.
Posted by: Wonderduck at August 16, 2012 10:27 AM (OS+Cr)
Speaking of 'wonder'...I was curious enough about exactly how much it cost me, to locate the invoice for my copy of Japanese Cruisers of the Pacific War and...I paid an amount below $60 for a new copy. Granted that was a better part of a decade ago...
Related to Steve's post about his purchase - the best secondhand mil-hist book I ever purchased was a copy of Martin Middlebrook's Convoy, which I had been looking for everywhere before I got my copy.
C.T.
Posted by: cxt217 at August 18, 2012 12:18 PM (eUibq)
10
I was able to resist the siren call of the "buy" button on that one for about...4 hours. It arrived today, and I've just spent a happy four hours in my reading chair putting a dent in my lap. Thanks for the heads up! Now my copies of Cruisers and Battleships of the U.S. Navy in World War II look like children's books. Are there any references even close to this one that you'd recommend for the U.S. or British fleets?
Posted by: David at August 23, 2012 07:25 PM (vyRm+)
11
Actually, yes... Norman Friedman "US (ship type): An Illustrated Design History" series is in the same vein, though nowhere near as good. This is not a knock on Friedman's books; when you're being compared to Japanese Cruisers of the Pacific War, you're expected to come up short. Here's the link to the Carriers entry, but there's also Destroyers, Cruisers, Battleships, Submarines and Amphibious Ships. I've never read these books, but I've read other Friedmans, and they've been uniformly excellent.
Another series of books that I've not read but have heard good things about is the "Battleships" books by Dulin and Garzke. There are three: Axis & Neutrals, Allied, and United States. Here's the link to the Allied book.
So there's a ton of 'em... perhaps literally... out there! I lust after them all.
Posted by: Wonderduck at August 23, 2012 07:45 PM (LdbNL)
I have been working backwards in collecting Norman Friedman's references. As Wonderduck said, while each of his books are not as detailed as Japanese Cruisers, they are among the definitive sources on their subject (Friedman is a consultant to the Defense Department, so whatever is in his book is as close to Gospel as you can get unclassified.). He also has written books about the Royal Navy too, as well as a wide range of other subjects (His book on Operation Desert Storm, Desert Victory, has some rather amazing info not generally known even now.)
Friedman also has gone back and revised some of his books - the current version of US Destroyers is the 2003 edition, with extra info. I had to wait until Amazon started carrying the book again before I got it.
Garzke and Dulin's three books about US, Axis, and Allied battleships are, like Friedman's works, the definitive source on those topics short of a narrow subject reference. They have revised the volume about US battleships, but the Axis and Allied volumes have not been updated IIRC. Oddly enough, while it is possible to easily acquire a new copy of the volumes on US and Axis battleships, the Allied Battleships is out of print with no new printing run in sight. That is a pity since it had the most interesting and varied subject matter of the three (The proposed Dutch battlecruisers was my favorite part of the book, which also covered the Sovetsky Soyuz class.).
C.T.
Posted by: cxt217 at August 24, 2012 12:57 PM (sVB41)
All Along The Watchtower
The weather the previous few days had frankly been lousy. The ships had been pitching and rolling in a way destined to make everybody who wasn't either a natural sailor or possessing good sea legs rather uncomfortable. Alas, most of the men on board the fleet were neither. Still, nobody begrudged the weather; it kept them hidden from eyes that would be very interested indeed at their presence.
As the sun broke over the horizon that morning, the fleet broke into two task groups. TG Yoke headed to the north, while TG X-Ray steered south, towards the larger of the cluster of islands. Simultaneously, escorting ships raced ahead to deliver a short, sharp bombardment. Overhead, planes wheeled around the sky, swooping down to deliver their payloads, then return to their carriers. Below, the transport vessels began disgorging men and machines into landing craft for the run to the beach.
In the landing craft, the men were tense and prepared for everything. Everything, that is, except for what they got. While to the north resistance was remarkably heavy, to the south the landing craft and amtracks were pretty much unopposed. By the end of the first day, somewhere around 10000 men were well on their way to having landed on that island to the south. The main enemy being reported was a nigh-on impassable jungle. Still, nearly 1000 yards worth of progress had been made and the major objective was near at hand.
In the coming days and months the battle for this island would become a meatgrinder for both sides, chewing up men and machines and spitting them out with total disregard. On that first day, however, the landing on the southern island gave no indication of what was to come.
The day was August 7th, 1942. The island was Guadalcanal. 70 years ago, the War in the Pacific entered a new phase: the Allies went on the offensive. That phase would continue until the end of the War.
For some reason, I did not register what your post was about, despite the glaring 'Watchtower' in the subject title, until you mentioned 'Yoke' and 'X-Ray'.
Nicely played.
C.T.
Posted by: cxt217 at August 07, 2012 09:07 PM (MrRpw)
2
I have an M1 Garand that was born this month, in 1942. It always makes me think of Guadalcanal, although the Marines going ashore at this point were still carrying the M1903.
Posted by: flatdarkmars at August 08, 2012 07:41 PM (I55Es)
One of the veterans that I had the honor of meeting over the years had served with The Old Breed on Guadalcanal, and survived, among other things, The Bombardment. I still consider that one of the greatest experiences I had.
On less amusing topics, I also remember getting into an online argument with someone from New Zealand over the actions of the local longshoremen in the preparations for Watchtower (Something that was reported in firsthand accounts as well histories and official narratives.), culminating in the accusation against me that I was somehow prejudiced against working people. I found that strange then and even more so today.
Posted by: cxt217 at August 08, 2012 10:08 PM (MrRpw)
Stay To Port!!!
Like many monitors, the HMS Lord Clive and her sister ship HMS General Wolfe were armed in a ridiculous manner. Of course, that's pretty much the very definition of a monitor: heavy weaponry on a smallish hull. In the case of these ships, they weighed in at just under 6000 tons... bigger than a destroyer, smaller than a light cruiser. They were just over 330 feet long, had "meh" armor, and like most monitors, they were slower than molasses. Indeed, they could make a whopping seven knots at full power. A lot of that came down to her beam: 87 feet from side to side if you count the torpedo bulges. You could drop the engines from an Iowa-class into one of these ships and they still wouldn't be fast with a length:beam ratio of 4:1. Of course, speed isn't what a monitor is for... big ol' guns, that's what monitors are for.
The Lord Clive and General Wolfe looked like they were pretty heavily armed, what with that big honkin' turret up front, carrying two 12" rifles. That's pretty impressive on a 6000 ton hull, but that's not why they always said to stay to the port side of these ships, no no. No, there was a very good reason for that!
RUN AWAY!!! RUN AWAY!!!
That, my friends, is an 18" gun. Let me say that again: an EIGHTEEN INCH GUN. The gun on the General Wolfe came from the HMS Furious when she was converted to a seaplane carrier/aircraft carrier. The 18" gun on the Lord Clive was a spare built for the Furious in case of malfunction. On both monitors, the big'un was fixed to fire to starboard, and one can only imagine what it felt like onboard when it fired. In fact, when the General Wolfe fired her behemoth, the ship moved sideways, like people always claim the Iowas do when they fire a broadside. This was because she had a shallow draft of eight feet at the bow, 13 feet at the stern. They two monitors would roll like the dickens as well, lowering their rate of fire from one round/minute to one round every four minutes or so.
What appears to be a turret on the stern is really just a big blast shield with an open back. It couldn't rotate at all, though the gun could swivel within a 20° arc. It really wasn't intended for use against enemy shipping, but for shore bombardment. To be fair, the two ships weren't particularly good at their job, as their guns could outrange any sighting equipment on hand, save aircraft of course... which didn't carry any radio to speak of at the time. Still, there must be an incredible horror when you realize that someone is throwing 3000+ pound shells at you from well over the horizon.
After WWI ground to a halt, the General Wolfe was paid off and broken up in 1921, while the Lord Clive lasted until 1927 as a gunnery trials ship.
2
There were only three built, all for the Furious as designed, one spare and two in single turrets. One of those was done away with during building, so she could have a rudimentary hangar/flightdeck installed.
The Yamato's guns were actually 18.1" guns, larger bore than these, but the Furious guns fired a heavier shell. Of course, the Yamato-guns could fire twice a minute, had a longer range and better armor penetration. But the Furious did it first.
Posted by: Wonderduck at August 03, 2012 12:02 AM (bqvkh)
3
It's like someone stuck a Railroad Gun on a Barge.
Posted by: Mauser at August 03, 2012 04:15 AM (cZPoz)
It's like someone stuck a Railroad Gun on a Barge.
It is not like the original source of the 18" guns was much better (In concept, design, or appearance.). HMS Furious was one of Fisher's Follies, the three 'light' battlecruisers Jackie Fisher had designed and built for operations in the Baltic Sea, among other missions.
Her two half sisters, Courageous and Glorious, also had their main batteries reused to arm a new ship - HMS Vanguard got her 15" with their archaic-looking turrets from them.
C.T.
Posted by: cxt217 at August 03, 2012 08:24 AM (Loovc)
You BASTARD! I sure as hell did not need another time sink with great photos of armament or armored ships or naval history - but I do thank you muchly.
Have a good'un....
Posted by: The Old Man at August 03, 2012 01:12 PM (dBz2M)