USS Indiana (BB-1)

Source: Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.
For other ships with the same name, see USS Indiana.

USS Indiana between 1900 and 1908
History
United States
NameIndiana
Namesake
State of Indiana
Ordered30 June 1890
BuilderWilliam Cramp & Sons, Philadelphia
Laid down7 May 1891
Launched28 February 1893
Commissioned20 November 1895
Decommissioned24 December 1903
Recommissioned9 January 1906
Decommissioned23 May 1914
Recommissioned24 May 1917
Decommissioned31 January 1919
RenamedCoast Battleship Number 1 on 29 March 1919
Fate
  • Sunk as target on 1 November 1920
  • Sold for scrapping 19 March 1924
General characteristics [1][2][3][4]
Class and typeIndiana-class pre-dreadnought battleship
Displacement10,288 long tons (10,453 t) (standard)
Length
Beam69 ft 3 in (21.11 m) (wl)
Draft27 ft (8.2 m)
Installed power4 × Scotch boilers
Propulsion
  • 2 sets
    triple-expansion steam engines
  • 2 × screws
Speed15 knots (28 km/h; 17 mph)
Range4,900 nmi (9,100 km; 5,600 mi)[note 1]
Complement
  • 32 officers
  • 441 men
Armament
Armor
  • Belt: 18–8.5 in (457–216 mm)
  • 13" turrets: 15 in (381 mm)
  • Hull: 5 in (127 mm)
  • 8" turrets: 6 in (152 mm)
  • Conning Tower: 10 in (254 mm)
  • Deck: 3 in (76 mm)
General characteristics (Later refits)
Installed power
  • 8 ×
    Babcock & Wilcox boilers
    (1905)
  • 9,000 
    MW
    )
Armament

USS Indiana was the lead ship of her class and the first battleship in the United States Navy comparable to foreign battleships of the time.[5] Authorized in 1890 and commissioned five years later, she was a small battleship, though with heavy armor and ordnance. The ship also pioneered the use of an intermediate battery. She was designed for coastal defense[6] and as a result, her decks were not safe from high waves on the open ocean.

Indiana served in the

Plutón and Furor. After the war, she quickly became obsolete—despite several modernizations—and spent most of her time in commission as a training ship or in the reserve fleet, with her last commission during World War I
as a training ship for gun crews. She was decommissioned for the third and final time in January 1919 and was shortly after reclassified Coast Battleship Number 1 so that the name Indiana could be reused. She was sunk in shallow water as a target in aerial bombing tests in 1920, and her hull was sold for scrap in 1924.

Design

Main article: Indiana-class battleship

Indiana was constructed from a modified version of a design drawn up by a US Navy policy board in 1889 for a short-range battleship. The original design was part of an ambitious naval construction plan to build 33 battleships and 167 smaller ships. The United States Congress saw the plan as an attempt to end the U.S. policy of isolationism and did not approve it, but a year later, the United States House of Representatives approved funding for three coast defense battleships, which would become Indiana and her sister ships Massachusetts and Oregon.[7] The "coast defense" designation was reflected in Indiana's moderate endurance, relatively small displacement and low freeboard, which limited seagoing capability.[8] The ships proved to be disappointments in service, as they were badly overweight upon completion, their low freeboard hampered operations at sea, and they handled poorly.[9] Conway's All the World's Fighting Ships describes her design as "attempting too much on a very limited displacement."[10] They were nevertheless the first modern battleships for the American fleet.[9][10]

Plan and profile illustration of Oregon, one of the Indiana-class battleships

Indiana was 351 feet 2 inches (107.04 m)

cage mast in 1910–1911. She had a crew of 32 officers and 441 enlisted men, which increased to a total of 586–636 officers and enlisted.[10][11]

The ship was armed with a

18 in (457 mm) torpedo tubes in above-water mounts, though the number is unclear. According to Conway's, she was fitted with six tubes, though the naval historian Norman Friedman states she was ordered with seven but completed with five.[10][12]

Indiana's main

armored belt was 18 in (457 mm) thick over the magazines and the machinery spaces and was reduced to 4 in (102 mm) at the bow and stern. The main battery gun turrets had 17-inch (432 mm) thick sides, and the supporting barbettes had the same thickness of armor plate on their exposed sides. The 8 in turrets had 6 in of armor plating, and the casemate battery had 5 in (127 mm). The conning tower had 10 in (254 mm) thick sides.[2]

Service history

Construction and early career

Indiana early in her career

Construction of the ships was authorized on 30 June 1890, and the contract for Indiana—not including guns and armor—was awarded to

fitting-out in early March 1894, the ship undertook a preliminary sea trial to test her speed and machinery.[20] At this point, her side armor, guns, turrets, and conning tower had not yet been fitted,[21] and her official trials would not take place until October 1895 due to the delays in armor deliveries.[22][23]

Indiana was commissioned on 20 November 1895 under the command of Captain Robley D. Evans.[24] After further trials, the ship joined the North Atlantic Squadron under the command of Rear Admiral Francis M. Bunce, which conducted training exercises along the East Coast of the United States.[25] In late 1896, both main turrets broke loose from their clamps in heavy seas. Because the turrets were not centrally balanced, they swung from side to side with the ship's motion, until they were secured with heavy ropes. Heavier clamps were installed, but in February 1896, while conducting fleet maneuvers with the North Atlantic squadron, the Indiana encountered more bad weather and started rolling heavily. Her new captain, Henry Clay Taylor, promptly ordered her back to port for fear the clamps would break again.[26] This convinced the navy that bilge keels—omitted during construction because, with them, the ship could not fit in most American dry docks—were necessary to reduce the rolling,[27] and they were installed on all three ships of the Indiana-class.[28]

Spanish–American War

Indiana, painted white against a black sea, is steaming between and shooting at sinking and burning ships
Painting of the Indiana during the battle of Santiago

At the outbreak of the

Flying Squadron had found Cervera and was now blockading him in the port of Santiago de Cuba. Sampson reinforced Schley on 1 June[17] and assumed overall command.[30]

In an attempt to break the stalemate, it was decided to attack Santiago from land. A transport convoy was assembled in Key West, and Indiana was sent back to lead it.[31] The expeditionary force, under the command of Major General William Rufus Shafter, landed east of the city and attacked it on 1 July.[32] Cervera saw that his situation was desperate and attempted to break through the blockade on 3 July 1898, resulting in the battle of Santiago de Cuba.[17] The cruisers New Orleans and Newark and battleship Massachusetts had left the day before to load coal in Guantanamo Bay.[33] Admiral Sampson's flagship, the cruiser New York, had also sailed east earlier that morning for a meeting with General Shafter,[34] leaving Commodore Schley in command.[33] This left the blockade weakened and unbalanced on the day of the battle, as three modern battleships (Indiana, Oregon and Iowa) and the armed yacht Gloucester guarded the east, while the west was only defended by the second-class battleship Texas, cruiser Brooklyn and armed yacht Vixen.[35]

Occupying the extreme eastern position of the blockade,

Cristóbal Colón.[40]

Post Spanish–American War

Aerial view of the damaged Indiana following aerial bombing tests

After the war, Indiana returned to training exercises with the North Atlantic Squadron. In May 1900, she and Massachusetts were placed in reserve as the navy had an acute officer shortage and needed to put the new

Babcock & Wilcox boilers, counterweights to balance her main turrets, and electric traversing mechanisms for her turrets.[48] She was recommissioned on 9 January 1906 and manned by the former crew of her sister ship Massachusetts, including Captain Edward D. Taussig, commanding. Massachusetts had been decommissioned the day before to receive similar modernization.[49]

During her second commission, Indiana spent most of her time laid up in the reserve fleet,[50] occasionally participating in practice cruises.[17][51] In January 1907, she helped provide relief in the aftermath of the 1907 Kingston earthquake.[52] In 1908, the 6-inch (152 mm)/40 caliber guns and most of the lighter guns were removed to compensate for the counterweights added to the main battery turrets and because the ammunition supply for the guns was considered problematic. A year later, twelve 3-inch (76 mm)/50 caliber single-purpose guns were added midships and in the fighting tops. At the same time, a cage mast was added.[48] In early 1910, she was fitted with an experimental Lacoste speed brake, which would be deployed from the side of the hull to act as an emergency brake; the trials were inconclusive.[53] By 1913 it was speculated that the ship might soon be used for target practice,[54] but instead, the ship was decommissioned on 23 May 1914.[17] After the United States entered World War I, Indiana was commissioned for the third time and served as a training ship for gun crews near Tompkinsville, Staten Island, and in the York River, and placed under the command of George Landenberger.[55]

On 31 January 1919, she was decommissioned for the final time, and two months later, she was renamed Coast Battleship Number 1 so that the name Indiana could be assigned to the newly authorized—but never completed—battleship

Air Service Charles T. Menoher—who stated to Congress that the Air Service could sink any battleship. The conclusions drawn by the navy from the experiments conducted on Indiana were very different, as Captain William D. Leahy stated in his report: "The entire experiment pointed to the improbability of a modern battleship being either destroyed or completely put out of action by aerial bombs." The subject remained a matter of dispute between Mitchell and the Navy, and several more bombing tests were conducted with other decommissioned battleships, culminating in the sinking of SMS Ostfriesland.[56] Despite the navy's conclusions, Indiana sank during the test and settled in the shallow water, where she remained until her wreck was sold for scrap on 19 March 1924.[17] When the US Navy adopted hull numbers in 1920, Indiana was retroactively assigned the number "BB-1".[57]

Notes

  1. ^ Experimental data for Indiana and Massachusetts were lumped together, and the rounded average was calculated. See Bryan 1901.
  2. ^ Sources conflict on this. Reilly & Scheina 1980 claim six on p. 56, then four on p. 68. Friedman 1985 claims the contract called for seven tubes, but Indiana was completed with four.

References

  1. ^ Reilly & Scheina 1980, p. 68.
  2. ^ a b Friedman 1985, p. 425.
  3. ^ Reilly & Scheina 1980, p. 58.
  4. ^ Bryan 1901.
  5. ^ Reilly & Scheina 1980, p. 67.
  6. ^ Scientific American 1896, p. 297.
  7. ^ Friedman 1985, pp. 24–25.
  8. ^ Gardiner & Lambert 1992, p. 121.
  9. ^ a b Friedman 1985, pp. 17, 20–29.
  10. ^ a b c d Campbell 1979, p. 140.
  11. ^ Friedman 1985, pp. 83, 425.
  12. ^ Friedman 1985, p. 27.
  13. ^ The New York Times & 1 December 1890.
  14. ^ Reilly & Scheina 1980, p. 69.
  15. ^ The New York Times & 19 January 1901.
  16. ^ The New York Times & 14 May 1907.
  17. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m DANFS Indiana (BB-1).
  18. ^ The New York Times & 27 February 1893.
  19. ^ The New York Times & 28 February 1893.
  20. ^ The New York Times & 7 March 1894.
  21. ^ The New York Times & 9 March 1894.
  22. ^ The New York Times & 19 October 1895.
  23. ^ The New York Times & 20 September 1894.
  24. ^ The New York Times & 19 November 1895.
  25. ^ The New York Times & 18 June 1896.
  26. ^ Reilly & Scheina 1980, p. 59.
  27. ^ The New York Times & 5 February 1897.
  28. ^ Reilly & Scheina 1980, p. 60.
  29. ^ The New York Times & 1 April 1898.
  30. ^ Graham & Schley 1902, p. 203.
  31. ^ The New York Times & 12 June 1898.
  32. ^ Hale 1911, p. 286.
  33. ^ a b Graham & Schley 1902, pp. 299–300.
  34. ^ Hale 1911, p. 288.
  35. ^ Graham & Schley 1902, pp. 303–304.
  36. ^ Graham & Schley 1902, p. 316.
  37. ^ The New York Times & 26 August 1898.
  38. ^ Graham & Schley 1902, p. 317.
  39. ^ Graham & Schley 1902, p. 333.
  40. ^ The New York Times & 26 July 1898.
  41. ^ The New York Times & 14 April 1900.
  42. ^ The New York Times & 6 June 1900.
  43. ^ The New York Times & 20 August 1900.
  44. ^ The New York Times & 26 March 1901.
  45. ^ The New York Times & 8 April 1902.
  46. ^ "The Brandon news. (Brandon, Miss.) 1892-1961, December 24, 1903, Image 2".
  47. ^ The New York Times & 19 November 1903.
  48. ^ a b Reilly & Scheina 1980, p. 62.
  49. ^ The New York Times & 8 January 1906.
  50. ^ The New York Times & 10 November 1907.
  51. ^ The New York Times & 27 November 1909.
  52. ^ DANFS Williamson.
  53. ^ Smith 1916.
  54. ^ The New York Times & 31 March 1913.
  55. ^ The New York Times & 16 January 1936.
  56. ^ Correll 2008.
  57. ^ Tucker, p. 1143.

Sources cited

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Further reading

External links

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