USS Bowfin SS-287

The USS Bowfin has been the only ship to carry the name. The fish it's named after is a fresh water predator found in the Great Lakes and Mississippi River. She was launched out of the Portsmouth Naval Shipyard in Kittery, Maine on December 7, 1942 and was designed as a Balao-class submarine.

When she is on the surface, her displacement measures 1,526 tons and, when submerged, it measures 2,414 tons. She is driven by a combination of diesel and electric engines and can reach speeds of a little over 20 knots on the surface and a little under nine knots when submerged. Her crew consisted of ten officers and around seventy enlisted sailors. When she made contact with enemy, she had a total of ten torpedo tubes at the ready, six in the front and four in the back. She was able to carry 24 torpedoes at a time. She also had a four inch, 50 caliber gun and four machine guns on her deck for when she was surfaced. She had been tested for dives down to 400 feet.

When she made contact with the enemy, she had a total of 10 torpedo tubes at the ready, six in the front and four in the back. She was able to carry 24 torpedoes at a time. She also had a four-inch, 50 caliber gun and four machine guns on her deck for when she was surfaced.

During World War II

After performing shakedown maneuvers out of New London, Connecticut, she headed for the Pacific. She made it to Australia without incident and after refueling in Darwin, headed out for her first patrol on August 25, 1943. Her first assigned area was in the Mindanao Sea.

For the first three weeks, she spotted no enemy vessels. She later joined up with another sub to coordinate efforts and they were soon able to target an enemy convoy. She fired her six torpedoes from her front tubes and then turned around to release the other four.

Her salvo sank a large passenger cargo ship and caused damage to two other ships in the convoy. The submarine she traveled with, the USS Billfish, was able to hit the convoy and inflict further damage later in the day. Both subs lost the tattered remains of the convoy during the night. During the rest of her first patrol, the Bowfin and her crew came across enemy ships several more times. Almost every time, she was able to cause damage and get away unscathed.

Her next patrol, which started in November, took her to the South China Sea. Once again, the Bowfin wreaked havoc on enemy forces. During this patrol, she had 11 confirmed sinkings and damaged a large number of other ships. During one of her attacks, the enemy returned fire. The enemy managed to damage the sub, but the Bowfin was able to get off the last two torpedoes she was carrying. While her crew wasn't able to completely stop the water from entering the ship, they were able to make repairs effective enough to allow the sub to make port. She arrived in Australia during the second week of December.

The USS Bowfin ran seven more war time patrols that generally went as well as the first two. In a lot of cases, the end of one patrol was brought about because the sub had run out of torpedoes. The Bowfin was one of the subs that were using a then experimental type of torpedo. While her record was impressive, she would have probably been able to do more damage to the enemy if the torpedoes she was using had all worked properly. In one patrol, she had eight of her 24 torpedoes explode before reaching the target. Soon after, the military stopped trying to test the armaments in wartime vessels.

She was fitted with new technology that worked during her ninth patrol. She was one of nine subs that had been fitted with new sonar that could detect under water mines. She threaded her way through a minefield and entered the Sea of Japan. She didn't find the enemy shipping that was thought to be taking place there, but did sink two more enemy vessels.

After World War II

Overall, the USS Bowfin managed to sink almost 20 enemy vessels. She also damaged many other ships with both torpedoes and her deck guns. In July of 1945, she returned to Pearl Harbor for a refit. As she was heading back to the war effort, the Japanese surrendered and she reversed course, returning to Hawaii.

She then returned to the east coast of the United States where she was put in the reserve fleet in February of 1947. She was recommissioned in July of 1951 to assist with operations occurring in Korea. At the end of those operations, she returned to San Diego, California and spent the next two years as a training sub.

In October of 1953, she once again returned to the reserves. In 1960, she was moved to Seattle, Washington and spent the next 10 years as a Navel Reserve training submarine. She was struck from the Navy list on December 1, 1971 and taken to Pearl Harbor. She can still be found there in use as a war memorial. She was declared a National Historic Landmark in 1986.

In the USS Bowfin, as well as many other Navy vessels, asbestos was used as an insulator and was used in the production of many different components found on the ship. Asbestos dust is dangerous for people who are exposed to it and with poor ventilation found on most subs, the sailors who served aboard her were around asbestos dust quite often. If you or a loved one were exposed to asbestos while serving on a U.S. Navy vessel and have been diagnosed with an asbestos-related disease, please fill out the request form on this page to receive a free informational packet.

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