Hampton Roads Naval Museum

47. USS Subchaser 136

Norfolk, VA

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As German U-boats came on the scene in WWI, the U.S. scrambled to put together the Sub Chaser fleet. The men who commanded the sub chasers trained in maneuvers with their new 100-foot wood-hulled boats, and their maneuvers were guided by a number of confidential documents outlining the strategy of chasing subs. This is a rough overview of the strategy of sub chasing, based on a Navy document, titled "Instructions and Doctrine for Sub Chaser Detachment One," marked CONFIDENTIAL and circulated by L.A. Cotten, Captain, U.S.N., Commanding. Note that there are several similar documents, and that the tactics are described somewhat differently at different periods. This is because chasing subs was a wholly new enterprise, and to a large extent the tactics had to be developed and honed on the fly. Subchaser-136 was the last hull number in the series built at Norfolk Naval Shipyard. Subchaser 136 was commissioned on March 13, 1918, at Norfolk, and served in the USS Jouett Special Hunting Group, engaged in antisubmarine patrols along the Atlantic coast. SC 136 was assigned to overseas duties, and crossed the ocean mid-1918, but arrived in Gibraltar just as the Armistice was signed, and promptly returned. The Navy designed and deployed subchasers as an inexpensive solution to the critical need for anti-submarine platforms. Built out of wood (as steel was scarce in the wartime economy), the ships were built for speed and equipped with 3-inch guns and depth charges. They often worked in groups, usually with a torpedo-boat destroyer accompanying them. American yards turned out over 400 of the ships and many of them were sold to Allied nations.