USS Connecticut was the fourth U.S. Navy ship to be named after the state of Connecticut. Her keel was laid on 10 March 1903; launched on 29 September 1904. She served as the flagship for the Jamestown Exposition in mid-1907. She was decommissioned on 1 March 1923, and sold for scrap on 1 November 1923.
About USS Connecticut (BB-18) in brief
USS Connecticut was the fourth U.S. Navy ship to be named after the state of Connecticut. Her keel was laid on 10 March 1903; launched on 29 September 1904. Connecticut was 456. 3 ft long overall and had a beam of 76. 9 ft and a draft of 24. 5 ft. She displaced 16,000 long tons as designed and up to 17,666 long tons at full load. The ship was armed with a main battery of four 12 inch 45 Mark 5 guns in two twin gun turrets on the centerline, one forward and aft. The secondary battery consisted of eight 8-inch 45 guns and twelve 7-inch 45 guns. For close-range defense against torpedo boats, she carried twenty 3-inch 50 guns mounted in casemates along the side of the hull and twelve 3-pounder guns. She was decommissioned on 1 March 1923, and sold for scrap on 1 November 1923. As Connecticut was only 55% complete when she was launched, most of her upper works, machinery and machinery was missing, including her main armored belt. Three attempts to sabotage the ship were discovered in 1904. On 31 March, rivets on the keel plates were found bored through. On 14 September, a 1 3⁄8 in bolt was driven into the launching way, where it protruded some 5 in. Shortly after Connecticut was launched a 1-in hole was discovered drilled through a steel keel plate. It was two years before the new battleship sailed out of the New York Naval Shipyard. Captain William Swift was the first captain of the new Connecticut when she sailed out in September 1906.
She served as the flagship for the Jamestown Exposition in mid-1907. She later sailed with the Great White Fleet on a circumnavigation of the Earth to showcase the US Navy’s growing fleet of blue-water-capable ships. Connecticut participated in several flag-waving exercises intended to protect American citizens abroad until she was pressed into service as a troop transport at the end of World War I to expedite the return of American Expeditionary Forces from France. The provisions of the 1922 Washington Naval Treaty stipulated that many of the older battleships, Connecticut among them, would have to be disposed of, so she was decomissioned in March 1923. The battleships Texas, Massachusetts, Iowa, Kearsarge, Illinois, Alabama, Maine, and Missouri were at the ceremony, along with the protected cruisers Columbia and Minneapolis and the auxiliary cruiser Prairie. A crowd of over 30,000 people attended the launch, as did many of Navy’s ships. She was sponsored by Miss Alice B. Welles, granddaughter of Gideon Welles,. Secretary of the Navy during the American Civil War. She had a crew of 827 officers and men, though this increased to 881 and later to 896. As was standard for capital ships of the period, Connecticut carried four 21 inch torpedo tubes, submerged in her hull on the broadside.
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