USS Squalus (SS-192) Memorial

 memorial, navy, submarine

Preserved on the grounds of the Portsmouth Navy Yard is the conning tower of the USS Sailfish (SS-192), a Sargo Class Submarine built at Portsmouth in 1937-38 and commissioned into the US Navy on March 1st 1939. At the time of her commissioning however, the USS Sailfish bore the name USS Squalus when she put to sea for trials shortly after her commissioning.

On May 23rd, 1939, while conducting diving exercises off of Portland, the Squalus experienced a severe mechanical failure while submerged and sunk in 240 feet of water. 23 members of her crew stationed in her Stern section drowned as a result, and the rest fled to the forward torpedo room where they awaited rescue for two days while a massive rescue and salvage effort was undertaken by the US Navy, which eventually succeeded in bringing the 33 surviving members of her crew to safety. Another four months of grueling salvage work eventually raised the sunken Squalus from the bottom in September 1939, and she was brought to Portsmouth and decommissioned.

Following extensive repairs and refit, the former Squalus was recommissioned on May 15th, 1940 as the USS Sailfish (SS-192), and promptly sailed for service with the US Pacific Fleet based out of Manila. Following the outbreak of World War Two, she shifted her homeport to Pearl Harbor and began an immensely active and successful war career prowling the Pacific, eventually sinking 20 Japanese merchant and warships totaling 83,769 tons. Included in this list were the Aircraft Carriers HIJMS Ryuho and HIJMS Chuyo.

Returning stateside at the conclusion of WWII with 9 Battle Stars and the Presidential Unit Citation, USS Sailfish decommissioned into reserve on October 27th, 1945 and remained in reserve until being sold for scrap in June 1948. Her conning tower was preserved and returned here to Portsmouth as a memorial to the lost crew of the Squalus and to the service of the Sailfish during the Second World War.

www.navsource.org/archives/08/08192.htm