Sunday Battleship Blogging: USS Idaho

USS Idaho (BB-24) was obsolete by the time she was commissioned. Designed as a smaller, cheaper alternative to the Connecticut class, Idaho and her sister Mississippi had the misfortune to be almost exact contemporaries of Dreadnought. While Dreadnought displaced 19000 tons and carried 10 12″ guns, Idaho displaced 13000 and carried 4 12″ guns. Needless to say, this made Idaho virtually useless. In mid-1914, the United State Navy sold Idaho and Mississippi to Greece. The Greeks were interested in countering the Turkish naval buildup, which centered on two dreadnoughts under construction in British yards. The two Turkish ships would have made short work of the Greek fleet, but events intruded. Idaho became Lemnos. For the next thirty-seven years, Lemnos and Kilkis (as Mississipi became) served in the Greek Navy, including operations off Turkey in the chaos following World War I, before finally being placed in reserve shortly before World War II. Their reserve status was not appreciated by the Germans, however.

Much of the money paid by the Greeks for the first Idaho went to buy the second Idaho (BB-42), also known as the “Big Spud”. Idaho was a classic super-dreadnought, representing roughly the halfway point of American World War I battleship design. She displaced 32000 tons and carried 12 14″ guns in four triple turrets. The design compared favorably in battle characteristics to contemporary Japanese and British battleships, but the lack of speed (21 knots) would prove a serious disadvantage. Notably, in 1917 the incomplete Idaho was christened by Moses Alexander, first elected Jewish governor of an American state. Completed too late to serve in World War I, Idaho and her contemporaries formed the core of the interwar US fleet. Modernized in 1934-1935, Idaho served in the Pacific Fleet until June 1941, when she and her sisters (Mississippi and New Mexico) were transferred from Pearl Harbor to convoy escort duty based out of Iceland. Idaho, thus, avoided the December 7 Pearl Harbor attack.

Transferred back to the Pacific in January 1942, Idaho was employed mainly as a gunnery support ship for amphibious invasions all over the Pacific. Like many battleships of her era, Idaho never faced an enemy contemporary in battle. She missed the final battleship confrontation of the war at Leyte Gulf, when six American battleships destroyed two Japanese ships in several minutes. Nevertheless, her service was extensive. Idaho was placed in reserve shortly after the war, and scrapped in 1947.