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Photo # NH 102920:  USS Seadragon off the Hunters Point Navy Yard, 24 May 1945

Online Library of Selected Images:
-- U.S. NAVY SHIPS --

USS Seadragon (SS-194), 1939-1948

USS Seadragon, a 1450-ton Sargo class submarine built at Groton, Connecticut, was commissioned in October 1939. Sent to the Philippines in mid-1940, she was undergoing overhaul at the Cavite Navy Yard when, on 10 December 1941, Japanese bombs fatally damaged USS Sealion. Seadragon, tied up alongside, was also injured, and one of her officers was killed. However, her damages were not severe and, after initial repairs, she transported Asiatic Fleet staff members to the East Indies. Late in December the submarine began a combat cruise in the waters off Indochina and Luzon. Several attacks on enemy shipping were spoiled by torpedo failures, but she sank one enemy vessel and damaged another. This first war patrol ended in February with another mission to evacuate personnel, among them vital codebreakers, from the embattled Philippines. In March and April, now based at Fremantle, Australia, Seadragon carried supplies to Corregidor and picked up more passengers. Later in that patrol, more malfunctioning torpedoes ruined an attack on a Japanese destroyer.

Operating from Australia for nearly the rest of 1942, Seadragon eliminated four more cargo ships during her next two patrols. While on the second of these, her Pharmacist's Mate performed an emergency appendectomy on a fellow crew member, with very satisfactory results. On 21 November, on her fifth war patrol, she sank the Japanese submarine I-4, and damaged herself when one of her own torpedoes exploded soon after being fired. A West Coast overhaul interrupted Seadragon's activities in January-April 1943. Based thereafter in Hawaii, she made four anti-shipping cruises in the central Pacific between May 1943 and February 1944, damaging several ships, but sinking none.

Following another overhaul, Seadragon returned to action in April and May 1944 with a patrol into the waters between Japan and its central Pacific empire. That resulted in the sinking of one freighter and a patrol boat. She was refitted with new engines before beginning her eleventh cruise, made as part of a three-submarine "wolf pack", in September. A month later, during preliminaries for the Battle of Leyte Gulf, she unsuccessfully attacked a force of enemy warships, but a few days later cut a convoy to pieces, sinking three cargo ships.

Seadragon closed her combat career with a twelfth war patrol during December 1944 and January 1945. She was then transferred to training duty, initially off California and later in the waters off Florida and Cuba. With World War II's end in September 1945, Seadragon was scheduled for retirement. Though decommissioned in mid-November 1945, she was returned to commissioned status in February 1946 to support the inactivation of other submarines. This work lasted until October 1946, when she was again placed in reserve. USS Seadragon was stricken from the list of Navy ships at the end of April 1948 and sold for scrapping in early July of that year.

This page features all the views we have concerning USS Seadragon (SS-194).


If you want higher resolution reproductions than the digital images presented here, see: "How to Obtain Photographic Reproductions."

Click on the small photograph to prompt a larger view of the same image.

Photo #: NH 102911

USS Seadragon
(SS-194)

Photographed from directely ahead, while underway off the Mare Island Navy Yard, California, 17 April 1943.
Note the escort ship (DE) fitting out in the background.

Official U.S. Navy Photograph, from the collections of the Naval Historical Center.

Online Image: 62KB; 740 x 625 pixels

 
Photo #: NH 102912

USS Seadragon
(SS-194)

Photographed from directely astern, while off the Mare Island Navy Yard, California, 17 April 1943.

Official U.S. Navy Photograph, from the collections of the Naval Historical Center.

Online Image: 76KB; 740 x 620 pixels

 
Photo #: NH 102913

USS Seadragon
(SS-194)

At the Mare Island Navy Yard, California, 13 April 1943.
White outlines mark recent alterations to the submarine.

Official U.S. Navy Photograph, from the collections of the Naval Historical Center.

Online Image: 80KB; 740 x 620 pixels

 
Photo #: NH 102914

USS Seadragon
(SS-194)

At the Mare Island Navy Yard, California, 13 April 1943.
White outlines mark recent alterations.
YC-833 is in the right center background.

Official U.S. Navy Photograph, from the collections of the Naval Historical Center.

Online Image: 102KB; 740 x 625 pixels

 
Photo #: NH 102915

USS Seadragon
(SS-194)

Off the Mare Island Navy Yard, California, 5 August 1944.

Official U.S. Navy Photograph, from the collections of the Naval Historical Center.

Online Image: 61KB; 740 x 620 pixels

 
Photo #: NH 102916

USS Seadragon
(SS-194)

Seen from almost directly ahead, while off the Mare Island Navy Yard, California, 5 August 1944.

Official U.S. Navy Photograph, from the collections of the Naval Historical Center.

Online Image: 88KB; 740 x 630 pixels

 
Photo #: NH 102917

USS Seadragon
(SS-194)

Seen from astern, while underway off the Mare Island Navy Yard, California, 5 August 1944.

Official U.S. Navy Photograph, from the collections of the Naval Historical Center.

Online Image: 68KB; 740 x 630 pixels

 
Photo #: NH 102918

USS Seadragon
(SS-194)

Plan view, aft, taken at the Mare Island Navy Yard, California, 5 August 1944.

Official U.S. Navy Photograph, from the collections of the Naval Historical Center.

Online Image: 91KB; 740 x 620 pixels

 
Photo #: NH 102919

USS Seadragon
(SS-194)

Plan view, amidships looking aft, taken at the Mare Island Navy Yard, California, 5 August 1944.
White outlines mark recent alterations.
YF-198 is in the right background (second barge from right).

Official U.S. Navy Photograph, from the collections of the Naval Historical Center.

Online Image: 88KB; 740 x 620 pixels

 
Photo #: NH 102920

USS Seadragon
(SS-194)

Off the Hunters Point Navy Yard, San Francisco, California, 24 May 1945.

Official U.S. Navy Photograph, from the collections of the Naval Historical Center.

Online Image: 63KB; 740 x 495 pixels

 


In addition to the images presented above, the National Archives appears to hold at least one other view of USS Seadragon (SS-194). The following list features this image:

The image listed below is NOT in the Naval Historical Center's collections.
DO NOT try to obtain it using the procedures described in our page "How to Obtain Photographic Reproductions."



  • Photo #: 80-G-456123
    USS Seadragon (SS-194) off Provincetown, Massachusetts, during trials, 28 August 1939.
    Starboard broadside surface view. Seadragon does not appear to be underway. She is painted black overall, with the numerals "194" in white on the side of her fairwater.

    Reproductions of this image should be available through the National Archives photographic reproduction system for pictures not held by the Naval Historical Center.

    The image listed in this box is NOT in the Naval Historical Center's collections. DO NOT try to obtain it using the procedures described in our page "How to Obtain Photographic Reproductions."


  • If you want higher resolution reproductions than the digital images presented here, see: "How to Obtain Photographic Reproductions."


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    Page made 28 April 2005