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NavSource Online: Mine Warfare Vessel Photo Archive

Wasmuth (DMS 15)
ex-DD-338



Call sign (1924):
Nan - Unit - King - Cast
Clemson Class Destroyer/Chandler Class High Speed Minesweeper:

  • Laid down 12 August 1919 at Mare Island Navy Yard, Vallejo, CA
  • Launched 16 September 1920
  • Commissioned USS Wasmuth (DD-338), 16 December 1921
  • Decommissioned 26 July 1922 at San Diego, CA and laid up in the Pacific Reserve Fleet
  • Recommissioned 11 March 1930
  • Reclassified and converted to a High Speed Minesweeper, DMS-15, 19 November 1940
  • Sunk by her own depth charges 27 December 1942 during a gale in Alaskan waters
  • Struck from the Navy Register 3 September 1943.

    Specifications:

  • Displacement 1,190 t.(lt), 1,308 t.(fl)
  • Length 314' 4"
  • Beam 30' 10"
  • Draft 9' 10"
  • Speed 35.8 kts.
  • Complement 122
  • Armament: Four 4"/50 mounts, one 3"/23 gun mount and two depth charge tracks
  • Propulsion: Four Yarrow/Thornycroft/White-Forster/Normand boilers, two 27,000shp geared turbines, two shafts.
    Click on thumbnail
    for full size image    		 Size Image Description Source
    Wasmuth 94k 24 July 1942
    Mare Island, CA
    Port bow view
    U.S. Navy photo 4237-42 from the National Archives    		 Jon Burdett
    Wasmuth 290k 24 July 1942
    Off Mare Island, CA
    Stern view. She was under repair at the yard from June 10 to July 24, 1942
    U.S. Navy photo 4239-42 from the collections of Vallejo Naval and Historical Museum    		 Darryl Baker
    Wasmuth 95k Underway off the Mare Island Navy Yard, California, 24 July 1942. Barrage balloons are aloft in the background
    U.S. Navy photo 4238-42
    Courtesy of the U.S. Naval Institute, Annapolis, Maryland. Collection of James C. Fahey
    Naval History and Heritage Command photo NH 78229    		 Robert Hurst
    View the Wasmuth (DMS-15)
    DANFS History entry located on the Haze Gray & Underway Website
    Additional Resources and Web Sites of Interest
    NavSource Destroyer Pages, USS Wasmuth (DD-338)
    Naval Minewarfare Association
    Association of Minemen
    Back To The Main Photo Index Back To the Mine Warfare Ship Photo Index Back To The High Speed Minesweeper (DMS) Photo Index
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