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| This double turreted monitor was contracted 19 October 1898 to Bath Iron Works; laid down 17 April 1899 as Connecticut; launched 24 November 1900; sponsored by Miss Grace Boutelle. She was renamed Nevada in January of 1901 while under construction and then commissioned 5 March 1903, Commander T. B. Howard in command. She was renamed Tonopah on 2 March 1909. |
| The USS Tonopah served periodically as Lt. Chester W. Nimitz's flagship when he was Commander, Atlantic Submarine Flotilla, from 20 May 1912 to 30 March 1913. |
| Assigned to the Atlantic Fleet's submarine foocer as a tender, Tonopah operated along the east coast from Massachusetts to Key West until January 1918. Then briefly assigned to Bermuda, she was ordered to Ponta Delgada, San Miguel, Azores in February. Between then and December she tended the submarines K-1, K-2, K-3, K-5 and E-1 and submarine chasers operating in the strategic area of the Azores. In December, she was towed to Lisbon, and upon her return to the United States was decommissioned January of 1919 in Philadelphia. Classified BM-8 on 1 July 1920, she was sold 26 January 1922, to J. G. Hitner, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. |
| Of the Arkansas class, she was one of the last group of monitors to be constructed for the U.S. Navy although the navies of Great Britain and Italy built and used monitors for shore bombardment during World War I and the former used them during World War II as well. Single turreted monitors, they mounted the most modern heavy guns in the U.S. Navy at the time they were built, 12 inch 40 caliber weapons. The Arkansas class did not see any combat during World War I and instead served as submarine tenders. |
| Alexander C. Brown, writing in the Society of Naval Architects and Marine Engineers Historical transactions noted in a penetrating comment that: |
"Monitors found their final employment as submarine tenders in World War I for which their low freeboard hulls made them well suited. It is significant to note, however, that in this humble capacity they were ministering to the needs of that type of craft which had logically replaced them for as initially envisaged monitors were designed to combine heavy striking power with concealment and the presentation of a negligible target area..." |
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James L. Mooney, Dictionary of American Naval Fighting Ships, (Washington, D.C.: U.S. Government Printing Office, 1964), Vol.1 -- A-B, p. 195 | |
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James L. Mooney, Dictionary of American Naval Fighting Ships, (Washington, D.C.: U.S. Government Printing Office, 1970), Vol.5: N-Q, p. 51 | |
