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 Japanese Battleship Fusō |
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| Career (Japan) |  |
|---|---|
| Name: | Fusō |
| Namesake: | Fusō (Japanese: 扶桑, an old name for Japan) |
| Laid down: | 11 March 1912 |
| Launched: | 28 March 1914 |
| Commissioned: | 18 November 1915 |
| Struck: | 31 August 1945 |
| Fate: | Sunk in the Surigao Strait on 25 October 1944 |
| General characteristics | |
| Class and type: | Fusō-class battleship |
| Displacement: | 39,154 long tons (39,782 t) |
| Length: | 192 m (630 ft) (p.p.);205.13 m (673 ft) (o.a.) |
| Beam: | 30.61 m (100.4 ft) |
| Draught: | 9.68 m (31.8 ft) |
| Installed power: | 34,675.05 kW (46,500 shp) (trials); 29,828 kW (40,000 shp) (service) |
| Propulsion: | 4 × Brown-Curtis turbines, 24 × Miyabara boilers, 4 × shafts |
| Speed: |
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| Range: | 14,816 km (8,000 nmi; 9,206 mi) at 14 kn (26 km/h; 16 mph) |
| Capacity: |
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| Complement: | 1,400 |
| Armament: |
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| Armour: | |
| Aircraft carried: | 3 × floatplanes |
| Aviation facilities: | 1 × catapult |
Fusō (Japanese: 扶桑, an old name for Japan), was a battleship of the Imperial Japanese Navy, the lead ship of the Fusō-class. She was laid down by the Kure Kaigun Koshō on 11 March 1912, launched on 28 March 1914 and completed on 18 November 1915. Her 356 mm (14 in) main gun turrets were placed in an unorthodox 2-1-1-2 style (with her sister ship Yamashiro having her third turret reversed when compared to Fusō) and with a funnel separating the middle turret placement. This placement was not entirely successful as the armoured section was needlessly lengthened and the middle guns had trouble targeting. However, Fusō's relatively fine hull form allowed her to obtain a speed of 22 kn (41 km/h; 25 mph) as completed.
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Ship history
Fusō did not take part in any major action during World War I, as the majority of the Japanese Navy was engaged in escort duties and various other work which did not require the use of the battle line. Between the wars, Fusō and Yamashiro received major modifications, in common with all of the Japanese battleships in service. Fusō was lengthened by an additional 7.62 m (25 ft), the twin funnels trunked together, the original 24 mixed-firing boilers replaced by six new oil-fired Kampon boilers and the ships' control tops dramatically added to produce the characteristic "pagoda" foremast which typified Japanese ships of the period. Armour protection was both increased in quantity and improved in quality on both ships, especially over the machinery spaces and below the waterline, a response to British capital ships' experiences against torpedoes (for example, HMS Marlborough was almost sunk by a single German torpedo just after the Battle of Jutland). The improvements included heavier armour belting over the midships machinery spaces, made possible by the opening out of these areas when the original boilers were replaced, and the addition of an anti-torpedo bulge. The Fusō-class ships were capable of 25.4 kn (47.0 km/h; 29.2 mph) by the time these modifications were completed, a testament to the vastly improved efficiency of boilers in the 1930s.
Despite these modifications, the IJN considered that the Fusō-class ships were inadequately protected and too slow to be of any great use, and thus Fusō and Yamashiro were both kept in the Inland Sea as a strategic reserve force (which, as it turned out, was unnecessary) at the time of the Pearl Harbor attack and for some time afterwards, mainly being employed on training duties.
World War II service
However, Fusō was called to action before too long. She pursued but did not catch the American carrier force that had launched the Doolittle Raid on 18 April 1942, sortied as a screen for the Aleutian Force during the battle of Midway in May 1942, rescued 353 survivors of Mutsu when that ship exploded at Hashirajima on 8 June 1943, and took part in the reinforcements of Truk in August 1943 and Biak in June 1944.
Sinking
In October 1944, commanded by Rear Admiral Ban Masami, Fusō was part of Admiral Shōji Nishimura's Southern Force at the Battle of Leyte Gulf. In the battle of Surigao Strait on 25 October 1944 at 03:09, she was hit by one or two torpedoes fired by the destroyer USS Melvin and set afire. She withdrew from the action, but at 03:45 the magazines of turret C or Q (or possibly both) exploded and she broke into two sections. The bow section was sunk by gunfire from the heavy cruiser USS Louisville while the stern section sank off Kanihaan Island. Survivors in the water refused rescue so there were few, if any, of her 1,400 crew saved. There is some possibility that she was the largest vessel of any nationality to be sunk with all hands in World War II. She was removed from the Navy List on 31 August 1945. Yamashiro, having seen her crippled sister withdraw, elected to press on and steamed straight towards the American battle-line, which (having thereby "crossed her T") then pounded Yamashiro to ruin in less than 30 minutes. Yamashiro' was eventually sunk by torpedoes from a US destroyer as she attempted to withdraw from the battle site, with few survivors. Later investigations concluded that Melvin was the destroyer responsible.
Commanding Officers
- Capt. Kozo Sato - 8 November 1915 - 13 December 1915
- Capt. Yaichi Mukai - 13 December 1915 - 1 December 1916
- Capt. Toyokazu Yamaoka - 1 December 1916 - 1 December 1917
- Capt. Shigetoshi Takeuchi - 1 December 1917 - 1 December 1918
- Capt. Tarokazu Ikuno - 1 December 1918 - 1 April 1919
- Capt. Kanta Shimauchi - 1 April 1919 - 20 November 1919
- Capt. Koshiro Otani - 20 November 1919 - 20 November 1920
- Capt. Shokichi Oishi - 20 November 1920 - 1 December 1921
- Capt. Norikazu Kanna - 1 December 1921 - 1 December 1922
- Capt. Otohiko Kagara - 1 December 1922 - 1 December 1923
- Capt. Nobunari Shiraishi - 1 December 1923 - 18 July 1924
- Capt. Mitsumasa Yonai - 18 July 1924 - 10 November 1924
- Capt. Sankichi Takahashi - 10 November 1924 - 1 December 1925
- Capt. Eijiro Hamano - 1 December 1925 - 1 November 1926
- Capt. Masao Sugiura - 1 November 1926 - 20 August 1927
- Capt. Hisao Ichimura - 20 August 1927 - 10 December 1928
- Capt. Muge Ikeda - 10 December 1928 - 30 November 1929
- Capt. Tadashi Kurata - 30 November 1929 - 1 December 1930
- Capt. Teijiro Sugisaka - 1 December 1930 - 1 December 1931
- Capt. Shinichiro Machida - 1 December 1931 - 1 December 1932
- Capt. Sadaaki Araki - 1 December 1932 - 15 November 1934
- Capt. Seiichi Iwamura - 15 November 1934 - 15 November 1935
- Capt. Jinichi Kusaka - 15 November 1935 - 1 December 1936
- Capt. Tsunemitsu Yoshida - 1 December 1936 - 26 January 1937
- Capt. Takeo Takasaki - 26 January 1937 - 1 December 1937
- Capt. Hiroaki Abe - 1 December 1937 - 25 April 1938
- Capt. Ruitaro Fujita - 25 April 1938 - 15 November 1938
- Capt. Fukuji Kishi - 15 November 1938 - 1 November 1939
- Capt. Tsutomu Sato - 1 November 1939 - 15 October 1940
- Capt. Chimaki Kono - 15 October 1940 - 15 September 1941
- Capt. Mitsuo Kinoshita - 15 September 1941 - 5 December 1942
- Capt. Keizō Komura - 5 December 1942 - 1 June 1943
- Capt. / RADM Nobumichi Tsuruoka - 1 June 1943 - 23 February 1944 (Promoted to Rear Admiral on 1 November 1943.)
- Capt. / RADM / VADM* Masami Ban - 23 February 1944 - 25 October 1944 (KIA; promoted to Rear Admiral on 15 October 1944; posthumous promotion to Vice Admiral.)
References
- Jane's Fighting Ships of World War II. Studio. 1989. ISBN 0-851-70494-9.
- Taylor, Michael J.H. (1990). Jane's Fighting Ships of World War I. Studio. ISBN 1-85170-378-0.
External links
Media related to Battleship Fuso at Wikimedia Commons- Tabular record of movement from combinedfleet.com
- Article that attempts to decipher the fates of Fusō and Yamashiro
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