USS Blackfin (SS-322), a submarine in commission from 1944 to 1948 and from 1951 to 1972, was a ship of the United States Navy named for the blackfin cisco.
During World War II, Blackfin completed five war patrols in the Philippine Islands, South China Sea, and Yellow Sea. She sank the Japanese destroyer , which until then was known for her legendary luck, surviving for most of the war and a number of important Japanese naval operations. Blackfin also sank a Japanese cargo ship. After World War II, Blackfin served in the United States Pacific Fleet, and saw service in the Vietnam War.
Construction and commissioning Blackfin′s keel was laid on 10 June 1943 by the Electric Boat Company at Groton, Connecticut. She was launched on 12 March 1944, sponsored by Mrs. Phyllis Irwin Lockwood, wife of Rear Admiral Charles A. Lockwood, and commissioned on 4 July 1944 with Lieutenant Commander George H. Laird, Jr., in command.
Service history World War II July–September 1944 After shakedown training in the waters off New London, Connecticut, Blackfin got underway to join the war in the Pacific on 14 August 1944. She transited the Panama Canal on 29 August and arrived at Pearl Harbor, Hawaii, on 11 September 1944. She spent the rest of September 1944 undergoing repairs and engaged in training in the waters of the Hawaiian Islands.
First war patrol
On 30 September 1944, Blackfin set out from Pearl Harbor on her first war patrol. She topped off her fuel tanks at Saipan in the Mariana Islands on 10 October 1944 and then continued on her way to her patrol area in the northern approaches to the Palawan Passage in the Philippine Islands.
Blackfin operated in Philippine waters as the Philippines campaign of 1944–1945 began with the U.S. invasion of Leyte on 20 October 1944, which led to the Battle of Leyte Gulf of 23–26 October 1944. She made her first contact with Japanese ships on 26 October and began an approach, but one of the Japanese ships began racing toward her and forced her to dive to evade an attack.
On the morning of 1 November 1944, Blackfin′s lookouts spotted smoke on the horizon. Shortly thereafter, a Japanese merchant ship — the 2,745-gross register ton cargo ship No. 12 Unkai Maru — with four escorts appeared on the horizon. Blackfin fired six torpedoes at No. 12 Unkai Maru and sent her to the bottom. On 3 November, Blackfin sighted a lighted Japanese ship but soon positively identified her as a hospital ship, and therefore immune from attack. On 7 November 1944, Blackfin sighted a large Japanese tanker with three escorts and attacked, observing two torpedoes hit the tanker, which was only damaged.
Blackfin continued her patrol uneventfully until she received orders on 18 November 1944 to conduct a special mission. Accordingly, on 24 November she rendezvoused off Mindoro′s northern coast with a United States Army commando team which had captured a small Japanese patrol boat carrying many current Japanese ciphers and codebooks. She picked up three bags of the classified material and proceeded south toward Morotai. Off Point Anna, she transferred the bags to the Royal Australian Navy corvette .
After parting company with Kiama, Blackfin headed for Australia. She paused briefly at Darwin in Australia's Northern Territory before concluding her patrol with her arrival at Fremantle, Western Australia, on 4 December 1944. She moored alongside the submarine tender there for a refit. Upon its completion, she carried out training activities.
Second war patrol
On 2 January 1945, Blackfin got underway for her second war patrol, assigned a patrol area in the South China Sea. Upon reaching her station off the eastern coast of the Malay Peninsula, she joined a coordinated attack group of U.S. submarines covering the area. In the early morning of 24 January 1945, she contacted a Japanese convoy consisting of a large tanker and four escorts, some of them destroyers. She soon gained position for an attack on the tanker, but shortly after she fired torpedoes from her bow torpedo tubes at it, one of the Japanese destroyers came dangerously close to Blackfin. Blackfin then attacked the destroyer, and one of her torpedoes hit it just abaft the bridge. The target, later identified as , was enveloped in a large cloud of white smoke and sank at . Until her encounter with Blackfin, Shigure had been known for her legendary luck, surviving a number of important Japanese naval operations since the beginning of the war in the Pacific in December 1941.
After torpedoing Shigure, Blackfin swung around to bring her stern torpedo tubes to bear on the tanker and scored one hit before another escort opened fire on Blackfin. Blackfin broke off her attack and cleared the area. She then reestablished contact with the convoy and later that night, while she prepared to renew her attack, she sighted a Japanese ship and an escort she had not seen before through her high periscope. She began closing in on this second group of Japanese ships to make an attack, but a Japanese plane arrived on the scene and forced her to dive.
On the afternoon of 25 January 1945, Blackfin made contact with the submarine . Since both Japanese convoys Blackfin had sighted were in shallow waters nearing Singapore, the commanding officers of the two submarines agreed to abandon the chase. Later that night, Blackfin came across a Japanese antisubmarine warfare group searching for American submarines. The Japanese ships began chasing Blackfin, but she escaped unharmed.
A few days later, Blackfin received orders to take station off Saigon in Japanese-occupied French Indochina for lifeguard duty in support of Allied airstrikes. No activity was seen in the area, so Blackfin moved to patrol the southern approaches to the Palawan Passage and Balabac Strait. She then moved farther west to join a submarine scouting line in an attempt to contact a large Japanese naval force heading north from Singapore to Japan. On the afternoon of 12 February 1945, she spotted a Japanese force consisting of two battleships, a heavy cruiser, and at least three destroyers. She headed north into heavy seas in order to get into position for an attack. As she closed the Japanese task force, one of the Japanese destroyers broke away from the formation and headed toward her, forcing her to open the range while trying to maintain contact. Faster than Blackfin, the Japanese ships gradually opened the range and disappeared.
Blackfin then received orders to proceed to Subic Bay on Luzon in the Philippine Islands, where she concluded her patrol on 15 February 1945. She was one of the first three American submarines to arrive at the newly established base, and U.S. Army forces were still fighting the Japanese for control of the town of Olongapo, the main seaport on Subic Bay, when she arrived. The base lacked its full complement of personnel, and the resulting manpower shortage meant that Blackfin′s crew carried out its own refit with some help from the crew of the submarine tender .
Third war patrol
On 6 March 1945, Blackfin set out from Subic Bay on her third war patrol. She was assigned a patrol area in the South China Sea off the coast of French Indochina near Camranh Bay as part of a large coordinated attack group of U.S. submarines.
Late in March 1945, the coordinated attack group received a report of a heavily escorted Japanese convoy moving up the coast of French Indochina. On the morning of 28 March, Blackfin spotted the masts of several ships north of Camranh Bay. Since the convoy was hugging the coastline to make submarine attacks more difficult, she had to enter shallow water to press home her attack. Just as she closed to within torpedo range of the largest ship of the convoy, one of the escorts began dropping depth charges. The first depth-charge attack nearly sank Blackfin and put most of her equipment out of commission. She stayed on the bottom in of water for several hours in the hope of shaking the Japanese escorts. The Japanese ships finally gave up the hunt, and Blackfin cleared the area and headed for the open sea to begin repairing her damage.
After Blackfin′s crew had more fully surveyed her damage, orders arrived for her to proceed to Fremantle for repairs. On 9 April 1945, she arrived at Fremantle and began repairs and a refit, completing her patrol.
Fourth war patrol
On 7 May 1945, Blackfin departed Fremantle to begin her fourth war patrol, assigned a patrol area in the vicinity of Singapore. After only two days on station, engineering failures forced her to proceed to Subic Bay for repairs. She moored alongside the submarine tender there, but Anthedon′s crew found the necessary repairs to be beyond their capacity. As a result, orders came sending Blackfin to Pearl Harbor. She made a fuel stop at Saipan on the way and reached Pearl Harbor in mid-June 1945.
June–August 1945 After three weeks of repairs at Pearl Harbor, Blackfin got underway on 17 July 1945 for the western Pacific. She stopped at Midway Atoll in the Northwestern Hawaiian Islands from 21 to 29 July 1945 for further repairs and training. She then departed for Saipan, arriving there on 7 August 1945.
Fifth war patrol On 11 August 1945, Blackfin got underway from Saipan to embark upon her fifth war patrol. She was in the eastern approaches to the Ryukyu Islands en route to her patrol area in the Yellow Sea when World War II ended with the cessation of hostiities with Japan on 15 August 1945. She nonetheless continued on to the Yellow Sea, where she began sinking floating naval mines. She sank 61 mines before receiving orders on 29 August 1945 set a course for Guam in the Mariana Islands. After weathering a typhoon, she concluded her patrol with her arrival at Guam on 5 September 1945.
1945–1948 After undergoing repairs and fueling at Guam, Blackfin proceeded to San Diego, California, where she joined Submarine Squadron 1 and began local operations off the coast of California. On 2 January 1946, she got underway for Guam with other units of the squadron. She remained at Guam until 20 February 1946, when she headed back to the United States West Coast.
After an overhaul at the Mare Island Naval Shipyard on Mare Island in Vallejo, California, Blackfin stood out of San Francisco Bay on 28 June 1946 to participate in Operation Iceberg. She paused at Pearl Harbor to top off fuel and supplies, and then left in company with the submarine bound for the Arctic Ocean. At Dutch Harbor on Amaknak Island in the Aleutian Islands, the submarines and joined the mission, and the group proceeded north through the Bering Sea and the Bering Strait to the Arctic Ocean and the Arctic ice pack. Blackfin crossed the Arctic Circle before leaving the Arctic Ocean on 30 July 1946 and heading for Guam. She reached Apra Harbor on Guam on 12 August 1946.
Blackfin provided antisubmarine warfare training services at Guam and also made a brief trip to Truk in the Caroline Islands. She returned to Pearl Harbor on 26 December 1946 and carried out independent ship's exercises and multiship maneuvers in Hawaiian waters through 8 July 1947, when she shaped a course for San Diego. On 23 July 1947, she arrived at San Diego and reported to Submarine Squadron 3 for temporary duty. She provided antisubmarine warfare training services in the San Diego operating area until 6 September 1947, when she got underway to return to duty with Submarine Squadron 1 at Pearl Harbor. In October 1947, soon after her return to Pearl Harbor, she entered the Pearl Harbor Naval Shipyard for an overhaul.
After the completion of her overhaul, Blackfin resumed local operations in Hawaiian waters in February 1948. On 21 May 1948, she left Parl Harbor on a simulated war patrol and stopped at Adak in the Aleutian Islands and at Kodiak on Kodiak Island before completing the patrol on 1 July 1948 at Mare Island Naval Shipyard, where she was scheduled for inactivation. She was decommissioned there on 19 November 1948.
1950–1955