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Identification Numbered Ships Photo Archive

Lake Bridge (ID 2990)



Civilian call sign (1919):
Love - Jig - George - Pup

Cascade call sign (1933):
King - Dog - Interrogatory - Sail
Freighter:

  • Built in 1917 as War Rifle by the Toledo Shipbuilding Co., Toledo, OH
  • Launched 17 October 1917
  • Completed as Lake Bridge
  • Acquired by the Navy 12 December 1917
  • Commissioned USS Lake Bridge (ID 2990), 16 February 1918
  • Decommissioned 5 August 1919 and returned to the United States Shipping Board
  • Sold in 1923 to the E. K. Wood Lumber Co., of San Francisco, CA and renamed Cascade
  • Sold in 1941 to Cia Escandinava de Vapores SA (Scandinavian Steam Co.) of Panama
  • Sank in the Indian Ocean 22 August 1941 after catching fire 37 miles from Sandheads, India.

    Specifications:

  • Displacement 1,984 t.
    1933 - 1,852 t.
  • Length 261'
    1933 - 252'
  • Beam 43' 6"
  • Draft 18' 6"
    1933 - 18.9'
  • Speed 10 kts.
  • Complement 52
    1933 - 26
  • Armament: One 5"/51 and one 3"/50 mount
  • Propulsion: Two single ended boilers, one 1,200ihp verticle triple expansion steam engine, one shaft.
    Click on thumbnail
    for full size image    		 Size Image Description Source
    SS War Rifle
    Lake Bridge 135k War Rifle and S.S. War Bayonet in port, possibly in the New York City area when they were inspected by the Third Naval District on 26 December 1917
    Naval Historical Center photo NH 99509    		 Robert Hurst
    USS Lake Bridge (ID 2990)
    Lake Bridge 99k Lake Bridge (ID 2990) - center, marked by arrow. Photographed during World War I. The stern of the tug Leon Nuct (or Leon Muct), of Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, is in the
    left foreground
    U.S. Navy photo NH 101993    		 Naval Historical Center
    Commanding Officers
    01LCDR Magnus E. Broman, USNRF16 February 1918 - 9 August 1919
    Courtesy Joe Radigan
    Dictionary of American Naval Fighting Ships: USS Lake Bridge, a 1,984 gross ton mine carrier, was built as the civilian ship War Rifle at Toledo, Ohio. Renamed Lake Bridge by the United States Shipping Board, she was chartered by the Navy in December 1917 and placed in commission as USS Lake Bridge in February 1918.

    Initially employed carrying coal in the western Atlantic area, Lake Bridge began the first of three voyages to Scotland in May 1918. On all of these trips, she transported mines for deployment in the great North Sea Mine Barrage that was intended to hinder hostile submarine activities. On 5 June 1918, while on the return leg of her first mine-carrying run, Lake Bridge engaged the German submarine U-156 in a half-hour gun battle. Following the end of the war, she was again used as a cargo and coal carrier along the U.S. east coast and in the Caribbean.

    USS Lake Bridge was decommissioned and returned to the Shipping Board in August 1919. She later entered the west coast lumber trade as the S.S. Cascade. Sold to a Latin American shipping company in about 1940, she was lost in the Indian Ocean in August 1941.

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