Submarine History

Commissioned on 2 December 1942 at Electric Boat Company in Groton, CT, USS HARDER (SS-257) set off from Pearl Harbor on her first war patrol just seven months later. What followed was a streak of incredibly successful patrols, notably the [...]

After nearly three years of construction, USS KENTUCKY (SSBN-737) was ready to be launched on 11 August 1990. But the ceremony that sent her into the waters of the Thames River had a bit of a twist, as detailed in [...]

At 0555 on the morning of 24 July 1943, Lieutenant Commander L.R. “Dan” Daspit, the commanding officer of USS TINOSA (SS-283), spotted the Japanese fleet’s largest tanker as it headed straight for his sub. Tonan Maru No. 3 weighed over [...]

On 14 September 1959, the keel of USS ETHAN ALLEN (SSBN-608) was laid down at General Dynamics Electric Boat in Groton, CT. Although she was the sixth of the “41 for Freedom” ballistic-missile submarines, she was the first specifically designed [...]

Commissioned on 23 September 1944, USS CHARR (SS-328) completed three war patrols before the end of World War II. By July of 1951, she had been converted to a fleet snorkel submarine, meaning she acquired, in addition to a snorkel, [...]

In August of 1945, USS CAVALLA (SS-244) was on lifeguard duty off the coast of Japan. On the fifteenth of the month, she found out the hard way that wars do not end for everyone at exactly the same time. [...]

Today marks the 69th anniversary of V-J Day, the date on which the Japanese officially surrendered. American submarines were a huge part of that defeat: although they made up less than two percent of the forces that fought in the [...]

On 11 July 1943, USS FLIER (SS-250) slid into the Thames River in Groton, CT. Built by Electric Boat Company, the vessel was 311 feet long and 27 feet in diameter; she displaced just over 2,400 tons submerged. After being [...]

Built by the Bethlehem Shipbuilding Corporation of San Francisco and commissioned in 1923, USS S-39 (SS-144) spent nearly all of her first two decades with the Asiatic Fleet and Submarine Division 17. After the attack on Pearl Harbor, she was [...]

On 25 October 1943, USS TILEFISH (SS-307) was launched at Mare Island Naval Shipyard in Vallejo, CA. The boat would go on to win five battle stars for her patrols during World War II and one for missions she undertook [...]