USS ''F-4'' (SS-23) was a

United States Navy The United States Navy (USN) is the maritime service branch of the United States Armed Forces and one of the eight uniformed services of the United States. It is the largest and most powerful navy in the world, with the estimated tonnage ...

F-class submarine. Her

keel The keel is the bottom-most longitudinal structural element on a vessel. On some sailboats, it may have a hydrodynamic and counterbalancing purpose, as well. As the laying down of the keel is the initial step in the construction of a ship, in Br ...

was laid down by the Moran Brothers of

Seattle Seattle ( ) is a seaport city on the West Coast of the United States. It is the seat of King County, Washington. With a 2020 population of 737,015, it is the largest city in both the state of Washington and the Pacific Northwest regio ...

Washington Washington commonly refers to: * Washington (state), United States * Washington, D.C., the capital of the United States ** A metonym for the federal government of the United States ** Washington metropolitan area, the metropolitan area centered o ...

. She was originally named ''Skate'', making her the first ship of the

named for the skate. She was renamed ''F-4'' on 17 November 1911. She was launched on 6 January 1912 sponsored by Mrs. M.F. Backus; and commissioned on 3 May 1913.

Service history

Joining the First Submarine Group, Pacific Torpedo Flotilla, ''F-4'' participated in the development operations of that group along the west coast, and from August 1914, in

Hawaii Hawaii ( ; haw, Hawaii or ) is a state in the Western United States, located in the Pacific Ocean about from the U.S. mainland. It is the only U.S. state outside North America, the only state that is an archipelago, and the only state ...

an waters out of

Naval Submarine Base Pearl Harbor file:Hawaii map new.png, Map of the List of counties in Hawaii, five counties of the Hawaii, state of Hawaii Naval Base Hawaii was a number of United States Navy bases in the Territory of Hawaii during World War II. At the start of the war ...

. During submarine maneuvers off

Honolulu, Hawaii Honolulu (; ) is the capital and largest city of the U.S. state of Hawaii, which is in the Pacific Ocean. It is an unincorporated county seat of the consolidated City and County of Honolulu, situated along the southeast coast of the island o ...

on 25 March 1915, she sank at a depth of , from the harbor. Despite valorous efforts of naval authorities at Honolulu to locate the missing boat and save her crew, all 21 perished. ''F-4'' was the first commissioned submarine of the U.S. Navy to be lost at sea. USS F-4 1913

A diving and engineering precedent was established with the Navy's raising of the submarine on 29 August 1915. Divers descended to attach cables to tow the boat into shallow water, Naval Constructor Julius A. Furer, Rear Admiral C.B.T. Moore, and

Lieutenant A lieutenant ( , ; abbreviated Lt., Lt, LT, Lieut and similar) is a commissioned officer rank in the armed forces of many nations. The meaning of lieutenant differs in different militaries (see comparative military ranks), but it is often ...

C. Smith were able to do this with the use of specially devised and constructed pontoons. Navy diver George D Stillson found the superstructure caved in and the hull filled with water. One of the divers involved in the salvage operation was

John Henry Turpin John Henry "Dick" Turpin (August 20, 1876 – March 10, 1962) was a sailor in the United States Navy in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. Turpin was one of the first African American Chief Petty Officers in the U.S. Navy. He is also notable ...

, who was, probably, the first African-American to qualify as a U.S. Navy Master Diver. Only four of the dead could be identified; the 17 others were buried in

Arlington National Cemetery Arlington National Cemetery is one of two national cemeteries run by the United States Army. Nearly 400,000 people are buried in its 639 acres (259 ha) in Arlington, Virginia. There are about 30 funerals conducted on weekdays and 7 held on Sa ...

. The investigating board subsequently conjectured that corrosion of the

lead Lead is a chemical element with the symbol Pb (from the Latin ) and atomic number 82. It is a heavy metal that is denser than most common materials. Lead is soft and malleable, and also has a relatively low melting point. When freshly cu ...

lining of the battery tank had permitted seepage of sea water into the battery compartment and thereby caused the commanding officer to lose control on a submerged run. Others believe that the bypassing of an unreliable magnetic reducer closed a

Kingston valve A Kingston valve is a type of valve fitted in the bottom of a ship's plating that connects the sea to the ship's piping and storage tanks. A Kingston valve is a type of seacock. It is arranged so that, under normal operating conditions, sea pre ...

in the forward ballast tank resulting in a delay. Based on other reported issues, there may also have been problems with the air lines supplying the ballast tank. ''F-4'' was stricken from the

Naval Vessel Register The ''Naval Vessel Register'' (NVR) is the official inventory of ships and service craft in custody of or titled by the United States Navy. It contains information on ships and service craft that make up the official inventory of the Navy from t ...

on 31 August 1915 and was taken from the dry dock in Honolulu Harbor in early September 1915 so the other three F-Class submarines could be dry docked as they had been rammed by the navy supply ship . The F-4 was moved, still hanging from the pontoons to Pearl Harbor and anchored in Magazine Loch until on or about 25 November 1915, when she was disconnected from the pontoons and settled into the mud at the bottom of the loch. She remained there until the expansion of the harbor in 1940, when the remains of ''F-4'' were re-buried in a trench dug in the loch bottom off the Submarine Base Mooring S14,

Pearl Harbor Pearl Harbor is an American lagoon harbor on the island of Oahu, Hawaii, west of Honolulu. It was often visited by the Naval fleet of the United States, before it was acquired from the Hawaiian Kingdom by the U.S. with the signing of the R ...

References

External links

PigBoats.COM F-Boats
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{{DEFAULTSORT:F-4 United States F-class submarines United States submarine accidents Lost submarines of the United States Shipwrecks in the Pacific Ocean Shipwrecks of Hawaii Maritime incidents in 1915 Ships built in Seattle 1912 ships 1915 in Hawaii