The Pennsylvania class Battleships, USS Pennsylvania (BB-38) & USS Arizona (BB-39) - Two sides of the same coin

[de Radio Demon@live 266]

                                             The Pennsylvania class Battleships, USS Pennsylvania (BB-38) & USS Arizona (BB-39) - Two sides of the same coin

                                                                                        

Basics:

The Pennsylvania class were a pair of super dreadnoughts as the design successors of the Nevada class, they were also the second class of Standard battleships ever built for US navy, and they were also the third class of Super Dreadnought in the US navy. The class would consist of USS Pennsylvania as lead ship of the class and her sister ship, the memorable USS Arizona. Both ships would end up suffering very different fates. As built they were armed with 12 14"/45 inch guns with 4 turrets with 3 guns for each turret (4x3), these turrets would be located with two forward in super firing positions with the other two at the stern section of the ship which were also placed in super firing positions, the secondary battery would consist 22 5"/51 inch guns each in casemates (22x1) located in the ships hull of the ship, they would also have a starting AA battery consisting of 4 3"/50 inch guns however both vessels would only receive 2 of these guns when completed, and to top it off they would also contain 2 533mm submerged torpedo tubes, over time however as the the class would participate in the Second World War their AA armament would dramatically increase over time as well as having the torpedo tubes removed like a majority of dreadnoughts from the US and other nations.

 

History:

(Note: Many who may read the History of these ships may be used to them being separated by the ships themselves however this will be different and rather be  separated their history will be mentioned, going over both ships at the same time and separate at other time as a way to pay respect to the ships and their crew)

 

Development

The class that would be known as the Pennsylvania class was ordered as the battleship class that would be started in 1913 which called for 12 14" inch guns as well as 22 5" guns while maintaining a speed similar to their predecessors as well as similar armor protection, these factors to the design can be contributed to the fact that the US Navy wished for standard class battleships which were battleships which were not a single class of battleship of sorts but rather battleships that had similar capabilities which would allow them fight in the same battleline with the rest. These types of ships would normally have a speed around 20 to 21 knots, all other them would have similar amor levels with all of them using the All or Nothing armor scheme, as for their primary weaponry most standard class battleships would use 14" inch guns with the exception of the Colorado class which used 16" inch guns. After the final design was approved USS Pennsylvania would then be ordered in late august, 1912, while her sister USS Arizona would be ordered in the beginning of March in 1913. USS Pennsylvania would be laid down late October 1913 and USS Arizona would be laid down in Mid March, 1914 with USS Pennsylvania being launched on the same day even though they were built by differ companies in different shipyards, as for they USS Arizona, she would be launched in mid to late June in 1915, USS Pennsylvania would be commissioned into the fleet in mid June 1916 which took place 1 week before her sister was launched, finally USS Arizona would be commissioned in mid October, 1916.

                                                                                        

World war I

By the time USS Pennsylvania was commissioned the 1st World war had already begun granted by the time USS Pennsylvania and USS Arizona had been commissioned, the United States was still neutral. USS Pennsylvania would undergo sea trials in late July of 1916, she would also be listed by the future US President Franklin Delano Roosevelt when he was assistant secretary of the navy in late August, in early October she would become flagship of the Atlantic Fleet, by the end of 1916 she would arrive the the New York naval yard to undergo maintenance and would rejoin the fleet in January, 1917. Following this she would join the US fleet in Naval exercises in the Caribbean during which time she would visit a number of Central America countries as well as once again have FDR onboard who would meet the president of Haiti at the time on the vessel.

                                                                                        

USS Pennsylvania would then return to the United States the same day the US joined the 1st World war on April 6th, 1917. Even though the US would join the war neither ship would be sent over to Europe as like their predecessor used oil for their power which Britain had a shortage of as they were already dealing with their own oil power ships i.e. the Queen Elizabeth class, however the older coal fired US dreadnoughts would be sent over due to the UK having large amounts of, and of course as a result neither ship would see action during this time, and both would conduct training exercises and as for USS Arizona she would have 8 5" guns removed to arm merchant ships and would also win the Battenberg Cup with her crew beating out the crew of the USS Nevadas crew during the race competition. During the war USS Pennsylvania would be visited by foreign naval officers including those from Russia and Japan before the end of the war, both ships would be present for the Paris peace conference with both ships escorting the ocean liner George Washington to the the French port of Brest in which they would arrive on December 13th, 1918, along with 8 other battleships and 28 destroyers, they would depart one day later and would arrive in New York in late December as apart of the Victory celebrations as well as being greeted with a full naval review by Secretary Daniel, USS Arizona would be at the front of the line of ships that would provide a 19 gun salute to the secretary, and then would anchored of New York City, open to the public for the following several weeks.

 

Interwar Period

Both ships would take part in naval exercises off Cuba on February 18th, 1919, once again Arizonas crew would win Battenberg Cup marking it 2 years in a row in which the ships crew won the competition.

USS Arizona would then be sent to the Mediterranean due to Greece and Italy one of their major warships to enforce their own interest after Greece received Smyrna thanks to the Paris peace conference. At the end of June, 1920 USS Arizona would be overhauled in New York in which she would have 6 more of the 5" guns removed and would have her fire control systems modernized, on her third time of participating in the Battenberg Cup her crew would lose to the Nevada. In 1921 both ships would transfer to the pacific fleet with both being based out of San Pedro, California. Both ships would take part in various exercises during this time, in early March 1924 a incident occurred on the USS Arizona where a Woman stowed away on the ship for a free voyage to San Pedro, offering sex in exchange, she would be discover on April 12th while the ship was anchored Panama, this would result in 23 of her sailors to be  receive courts martial  upon return to New York for the ships refit in which they would receive 10 year prisons sentences.

                                                                                        

In 1929 both ships would undergo major modernization which would replace the cage mast with the tripod mast, their main gun elevation was increased from 15 degree elevation to a 30 degree in gun elevation, the secondary battery for both ships was reduced to 12 of the 5" inch guns and were all moved up one deck, the 3" inch AA guns were replace by 8 5"/25 inch guns, both would receive 2 catapults for float planes, they received 6 new boilers, the deck armor and turret top armor would be increased, the torpedo tubes would be removed, they would receive torpedo bulges, their crew counts would increase now numbering 2,037 crew total, an expansion to their bridges to allow to be used a flagships, they would also receive during this time 8 12.7mm browning machine guns to top off the AA armament for the time. Following this they would continue to take part in. number of naval exercises with the ships now jumping back occasionally from the US west coast and Hawaii with ironically enough in 1932 Arizona would take part in a exercise in which Pearl Harbor was attacked by naval aircraft on a Sunday morning, and if not more ironic on the 7th, except it was in February. Both ships along with the other battleships would then be stationed at Pearl Harbor in order to deter Japanese aggression

 

Pearl Harbor, December 7th, 1941

USS Pennsylvania

On December 7th (December 8th in Japan), 1941 Japan would launch the infamous surprise attack on Pearl Harbor which would end up dealing major damage to the American fleet at the time and is considered the beginning of the 2nd world war for the US. During the attack USS Pennsylvania would prove to be the luckiest battleship during the attack, she was in dry dock along with 2 other destroyers and which left her immune to concept of sinking and would only receive minor damage since she was in dock, safe from torpedos, however she would take minor damage from the 2 destroyers which were also immune to the concept of sinking at the time but since they were destroyers were still very aware of the concept of exploding and the dock all three ships were in would be flooded to put the fire and the destroyers out. By the end of the attack USS Pennsylvania was found be be easily sea worthy and was then sent off to San Fransisco on the 20th of December and would arrive a little over a week later. 

                                                                                        

USS Arizona

USS Arizona unlike her sister was probably the least lucky out of all the ships in Pearl Harbor during the attack, she was in battleship row during the attack with the repair ship USS Vestal beside her when the attack began, she would however receive no torpedo hits (from what is known at least) however one would miss her, she would take damage from the modified 16" inch battleship AP rounds that were now bombs, she would receive multiple hits and misses from these bombs but none of these would cause major damage, then at 8:06 another bomb would hit the ship and successful penetrate between the first and second turrets on the bow of the ship and would end up reaching the magazines causing her bow to be completely destroyed from the Armor detonantion and the explosion would kill over 1,000 crew, the explosion was so powerful that the USS Vestal which was beside her and on fire had her fires put out from the sheer force of the explosion, by the end of the attack as the salvage efforts were underway the head of salvage operations as well as the evaluators were quick to write off USS Arizona as loss. They would salvage some of her important equipment and the ship remains would be designated as a war grave, as is now tradition each time a survivor of the USS Arizona dies or passes away they are to be cremated or have their ashes laid to rest within the ship to join their fellow sailors who died on the ship as well as other survivors.

                                                                                        

World War II

Now with America official in WW2 USS Pennsylvania was sent back to the West coast in order to update her AA battery like all the other ships that would return from Pearl Harbor would receive, this would result in her old AA battery being completely removed and in their place the dual purpose battery of 16 5"/38 guns found in the dual turret (8x2), the ship would also receive 10 quad 40mm Bofors (40 in total) (10x4), and to top it off she would receive 51 20mm Oerlikon in single mounts (51x1). Additionally her tripod mast would be removed and a deck house would be in place of the stump from the tripod mast and would have a new radar place atop of the deck houses cupola. She would be present for the Battle of Midway however would see no action, her first action in the second world war would be to support the Aleutian Island campaign during which time a Japanese submarine would try to torpedo her but thanks to the efforts of a friendly Catalina would take evasive action and avoid the torpedo, the submarine would then be hunted down by 2 destroyers over 10 hours before being destroyed the following day. USS Pennsylvania would continue to support the campaign and would suffer a fuel detonation during the time but failed to cause severe damage other than some structural damage.

                                                                                        

Through out the war she would continue to support landing forces taking part in the Marshalls and Marianas campaigns, in the Philippines and during this action would be apart of the fleet that sank Fuso and Yamashiro, following this she would continue to provide support in the form of shore bombardment. In 1945 while stopped at Wake island while in route for Okinawa she would be hit by a type 95 torpedo causing major damage. By the time she completed her repairs she the war had ended. 

                                                                                        

 

Post War

With the war over she would sadly be designated to be used as one of the ships in the Operation crossroad testing at Bikini atoll, she would not suffer from radiation from the air burst or test Able and the crew would return for 21 days, next in test Baker or the underwater detonation she would also survive this but now would be heavily irradiated as she was 1,000 meter from the explosion, she would be towed back  to Niagara, which took her to Kwajalein and she would be used to study radiation until early February 1948 in which she was scuttled off Kwajalein and would be removed from the naval register 9 days later. Her bell is still around today Pennsylvania State University as load by the department of the navy plus 2 of her 14 inch guns as well thanks in part to her guns being replaced in 1945.

                                                                                        

Statistics:

As Built (Both USS Pennsylvania and USS Arizona)

Displacement:Full load: 31,917 long tons (32,429 t)

Length:608 ft (185 m)

 

Beam:97.1 ft (29.6 m)

 

Draft:28.9 ft (8.8 m)

 

Installed power:

12 × Babcock & Wilcox water-tube boilers

34,000 shp (25,000 kW)

 

Propulsion:

4 × Curtis ungeared/Westinghouse steam turbines

4 × screw propellers

 

Speed:21 kn (24 mph; 39 km/h)

 

Range:7,552 nmi (8,691 mi; 13,986 km) at 12 kn (14 mph; 22 km/h)

 

Capacity:Fuel oil: 2,305 long tons (2,342 t)

 

Complement:

56 officers

72 Marines

1,031 enlisted men

 

Armament:

12 × 14 in (360 mm)/45 cal guns (4×3) (1200 rounds total, 300 per turret, 100 per gun)

22 × 5 in (127 mm)/51 cal guns (5,060 rounds total, 230 per gun)

2 × 3 in (76 mm)/23 cal anti-aircraft guns (planned to contain 4 originally)

2 × submerged 21 inch (533 mm)torpedo tubes (24 total)

 

Interwar Refit(1931) (changes only)(Both USS Pennsylvania and USS Arizona)

 

Displacement:

Standard: 34,400 long tons (35,000 t)

Full load: 39,224 long tons (39,853 t)

 

Installed power:6 × Bureau Express boilers

 

Armament:

12 × 14"/45 cal guns (4×3) (1200 rounds total, 300 per turret, 100 per gun) (Now has 30 degree gun elevation)

12 × 5"/51 cal guns (2,760 rounds total, 230 per gun)

8 × 5"/25 cal anti-aircraft guns

8 × .50-cal M2 Browning machine guns

 

Armor:

Belt: 13.5 in (340 mm)

Deck: 3 in (76 mm) (ends)

Turrets: 18 in (460 mm) (faces)

Conning Tower: 16 in (410 mm)

Aircraft carried:2 × floatplanes

Aviation facilities:2 × catapults

 

USS Pennsylvania (1942) (changes only)

 

Displacement

Standard: 36,500 long tons 

Full load: 40,000 long tons   

 

Armament:

12 × 14"/45 cal guns (4×3) (1200 rounds total, 300 per turret, 100 per gun)

40 x 40mm Bofors (10x4)

51 x 20mm Oerlikon (51x1) 

Note: One source indicates that their was at one point 22 20mm guns in dual mounts plus 27 20mm guns in single mounts however I doubt that the number of AA guns may have gone down, additionally their is no given date of when it was changed to that so I  won't include it as a option since it is 1 gun less that her 1942 configuration, if anyone can confirm if this is true that would be apricciated)

 

Sources:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/USS_Pennsylvania_(BB-38)

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/USS_Arizona_(BB-39)

https://www.naval-encyclopedia.com/ww1/us/pennsylvania-class-battleships/

https://ww2db.com/ship_spec.php?ship_id=136

Image sources:

http://www.researcheratlarge.com/Ships/BB38/BOGP/

https://historycollection.com/37-photographs-historic-uss-pennsylvania-battleship/

https://www.history.navy.mil/our-collections/photography/wars-and-events/world-war-ii/pearl-harbor-raid/battleship-row-during-the-pearl-harbor-attack/uss-arizona-during-the-pearl-harbor-attack.html

https://visitpearlharbor.org/the-ships-of-pearl-harbor-uss-downes/

https://www.worldwarphotos.info/gallery/usa/us-navy/pennsylvania/uss-pennsylvania-bb-38-underway-in-1943/

https://news.usni.org/2016/12/07/elvis-helped-save-uss-arizona-memorial

https://www.abc27.com/news/uss-pennsylvania-exhibit-at-state-museum/

https://twitter.com/ussarizona

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pennsylvania-class_battleship

https://www.pinterest.com/pin/361836151297499236/

https://www.the-blueprints.com/blueprints/ships/battleships-us/90984/view/uss_bb-38_pennsylvania_battleship_1917/

Edited May 12, 2021 by de Radio Demon@live

[Miki_Hoshii 2,449]

Open for discussion.

[Milocat 4,849]

Definite +1 from me, I would love to see both but if we can only get one I would choose the USS Arizona for her historical significance.  

 

(Also, sheesh, this is my 4000th post.  )

[Cabaen 183]

An interesting addition to the US naval power +1

[de Radio Demon@live 266]

On 02/02/2021 at 12:21, Milocat said:

Definite +1 from me, I would love to see both but if we can only get one I would choose the USS Arizona for her historical significance.  

 

(Also, sheesh, this is my 4000th post.  )

Congrats, actually something I forgot to mention that I’ll mention here is that not too long ago at the pear harbor aviation museums they had put a piece of the USS Arizona on display, I had remembered this because I heard about how they had just received a jet from the blue angles f-18 to be put on display their 

Edited February 4, 2021 by de Radio Demon@live

[Z3r0_ 4,127]

I'll support adding both, specifically I think USS Pennsylvania with her longer service career would be better main tree material, with USS Arizona as a premium.

[WayOfTheWolk 1,573]

I believe one could make the argument that the Arizona should be a premium and a portion of the sales profit should go directly to the USS Arizona Memorial in support of historical preservation. 

[Z3r0_ 4,127]

On 13/03/2021 at 19:16, WayOfTheWolk said:

I believe one could make the argument that the Arizona should be a premium and a portion of the sales profit should go directly to the USS Arizona Memorial in support of historical preservation. 

 

Not a bad idea, especially since I've heard that there are some concerns about the integrity of the wreck right now (in no small part because of some idiot running into it with their boat a while ago)

[de Radio Demon@live 266]

1 hour ago, Z3r0_ said:

 

in no small part because of some idiot running into it with their boat a while ago

That was around 6 years ago...

[Z3r0_ 4,127]

On 14/03/2021 at 22:13, de Radio Demon@live said:

That was around 6 years ago...

 

Like I said, a while ago.

[WreckingAres283 4,262]

+1

[CokeSpray 7,272]

Suggestion passed to the developers for consideration.

[leroyonly 4,310]

As the USS Arizona (BB-39) has been implemented as per 2.15 Wind of Change,

 

Moved  to Implemented Suggestions.