USS Nashville (PG-7)
USS Nashville at the Norfolk Navy Yard, Virginia, 8 January 1898.
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History | |
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United States | |
Name | USS Nashville |
Namesake | Nashville, Tennessee |
Builder | Newport News Shipbuilding and Drydock Company, Newport News, Virginia |
Laid down | 9 August 1894 |
Launched | 19 October 1895 |
Commissioned | 19 August 1897 |
Decommissioned | 21 October 1918 |
Fate | Sold, 20 October 1921 |
General characteristics | |
Type | Gunboat |
Displacement | 1,371 long tons (1,393 t) |
Length | 233 ft 8 in (71.22 m) |
Beam | 38 ft 1 in (11.61 m) |
Draft | 11 ft (3.4 m) |
Installed power | 2,500 kW)[1] |
Propulsion | Screw steamer |
Speed | 16.3 kn (30.2 km/h; 18.8 mph) |
Complement | 180 officers and enlisted |
Armament |
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Service record | |
Operations: |
USS Nashville (PG-7), a gunboat, was the only ship of its class. It was the first of three ships of the United States Navy to hold the name Nashville.
Construction and commissioning
Nashville (PG-7) was
Service history
Pre-commissioning
The contract to build Nashville was awarded on Jan. 22, 1894, the first Navy construction contract won by the Newport News Shipbuilding and Drydock Company.[3]
The ship's originally planned sponsor was Miss Maria Guild, daughter of Nashville, Tennessee Mayor George Blackmore Guild. While Mayor Guild's party was en route to the christening ceremony, word was received that William Guild, Mayor Guild's son, was accidentally shot and killed. The party turned back immediately. Miss Emma Thompson, also from Nashville, christened the ship, with Joseph E. Washington standing in for Mayor Guild.[4]
Spanish–American War
Upon commissioning, Nashville joined the
Pre-World War I
The
Transferred to the Mediterranean, the gunboat arrived at Genoa, Italy on 22 September. After a year's patrol duty, Nashville left Gibraltar on 1 November 1902, arriving at Boston, Massachusetts on 16 January 1903. On the Caribbean Station from 26 May 1903 – 4 March 1904,[2] the Nashville was instrumental in preventing Colombian troops in Colón using the Panama railway thereby ensuring the success of the revolutionary junta in Panama and securing a treaty with the United States in building the Panama Canal.[7] She returned to Boston on 18 June and decommissioned on 30 June.[2]
Recommissioned on 8 August 1905 at Boston Navy Yard, Nashville sailed on 8 September for Santo Domingo, operating off Cuba, Puerto Rico, and Santo Domingo until 26 June 1906, when she returned to Boston to decommission on 23 July.[2]
After three years in reserve, Nashville was assigned to the Illinois Naval Militia on 29 April 1909. From May 1909 – July 1911, she trained militiamen on the Great Lakes, homeported at Chicago.[2]
USS Nashville caused an incident in 1909 when she was sent to the Great Lakes through the Canadian canal system unarmed. She was then later armed, along with four other ships, in contravention of the Rush–Bagot Treaty of 1817.[8]
After extensive overhaul and sea trials, she departed Boston on 7 January 1912, arriving Santo Domingo on 31 January to begin five years of patrol operations in the West Indies and off Central America, protecting United States interests. The ship participated in the United States occupation of Veracruz, proclaimed in April 1914 by United States President Woodrow Wilson, against the Mexican government of Victoriano Huerta. After a short period of reduced commission status from 10 May-8 July 1916 in New Orleans, the gunboat returned to Tampico, Mexico, where she remained until the U.S. entered World War I on 6 April 1917.[2]
World War I
After temporary duty off Tampico, Nashville sailed from Norfolk, Virginia on 2 August 1917, arriving Gibraltar on 18 August to patrol off the Moroccan coast. After serving as convoy escort off North Africa and in the western Mediterranean until 15 July 1918, Nashville departed Gibraltar, arriving on 1 August at Charleston, South Carolina.[2]
Fate
Nashville decommissioned on 21 October 1918 at Charleston, South Carolina, and was sold on 20 October 1921 to J. L. Bernard and Company, Washington, D.C.[2]
References
- OCLC 47731326
- ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l "Nashville I (Gunboat No. 7)". Dictionary of American Naval Fighting Ships. Navy Department, Naval History and Heritage Command. Retrieved 1 June 2018.
- ^ Erickson, Mark St. John (27 April 2018). "Three famous warships sprang from the shipyard's first Navy contract in 1894". Daily Press. Archived from the original on 14 May 2018. Retrieved 1 June 2018.
- ^ "Tragedy Causes a Change in Pleasure Party's Programme". Saint Paul Daily Globe. Saint Paul, Minnesota. 19 October 1895.
- ^ "First Shot of War". The County Record. Kingstree, South Carolina. 28 April 1898. Retrieved 1 June 2018.
- ^ "Spanish American War MOH Recipients". Archived from the original on 16 December 2009. Retrieved 22 February 2010.
- ^ Scott, William Rufus (1912). The Americans in Panama (2 ed.). New York: The Statler Publishing Company. pp. 64–66.
- ^ Andrews, Paul Martin. (July 1981). Limits of Coexistince: the U.S.S. Nashville and the Presence of Armed American Naval Training Vessels on the Great Lakes. Montreal, Canada: Department of History, McGill University. Retrieved 1 June 2018.
External links
- Photo gallery of USS Nashville (PG 7) at NavSource Naval History