The Tucker class of destroyers was a ship class of six ships designed by and built for the United States Navy shortly before the United States entered World War I. The Tucker class was the fourth of five classes of destroyers that were known as the "thousand tonners", because they were the first U.S. destroyers over displacement.
The design of what became the Tucker class was the result of compromises between the General Board of the United States Navy and the U.S. Navy's Bureau of Construction and Repair. The General Board, tasked with creating an integrated battle fleet, wanted a larger ship that could serve in a scouting role and proposed a ship larger than the unique British destroyer of 1907, and more than twice the displacement of any previous U.S. destroyer. Input from Construction and Repair resulted in a design that was an incremental development of the , which itself was similar to the first of the thousand tonners, the (which displaced about a third more than the preceding ).
The ships were built by four private American shipyards—Bath Iron Works, Fore River Shipbuilding Company, New York Shipbuilding Corporation, and William Cramp & Sons—and were laid down between February and November 1914; launched between April and July 1915; and commissioned into the U.S. Navy between July 1915 and May 1916. The ships had a median displacement of , were just over in length, and had a beam of about . Most of the ships had two direct-drive steam turbines and a single geared cruising turbine; was equipped with two geared steam turbines only and, as the first U.S. destroyer so equipped, greatly influenced later U.S. Navy destroyer designs. All of the ships were designed for a maximum speed of and a range of at more economical speeds. As built, they were armed with four guns and had four twin 21 inch (533 mm) torpedo tubes with a load of eight torpedoes, but all were later equipped with depth charges.
All six ships operated in the Atlantic or Caribbean until the U.S. entrance into World War I in April 1917, when all six were sent overseas to Queenstown, Ireland, for convoy escort duties. Several of the ships rescued passengers and crew from ships sunk by U-boats, and several had encounters with U-boats themselves; was torpedoed and sunk by in December 1917. All five surviving members of the class had returned to the United States by early 1919 and been decommissioned by June 1922. Between 1924 and 1926, four of the five (all but Wadsworth) were commissioned into the United States Coast Guard to help enforce Prohibition as a part of the "Rum Patrol". They were returned to U.S. Navy custody between 1934 and 1936, and had all been sold for scrapping by 1936.
Background In September 1912, the General Board of the United States Navy asked the Navy's Bureau of Construction and Repair (C&R) to develop plans for the next class of destroyers. The General Board asked for a design with four guns, six twin torpedo tubes, and twenty floating mines, that could travel at up to with steaming radius of .Friedman, pp. 29, 31. C&R came back with a design for a long, displacement, triple-screw "super-destroyer" requiring to make the design speed of .Friedman, p. 31. The C&R design was similar to, but larger than the unique British destroyer of 1907, and more than twice the displacement of the largest U.S. destroyers.Gardiner, p. 122.The s then under construction had a displacement of .
The General Board, whose main concern was the integrated operation of the United States battle fleet,Friedman, p. 28. pushed for the design to provide more scouting capabilities for fleet operations.Friedman, p. 29. But the high cost of the design—$1,900,000 for hull and machinery vs. $790,000 for the ships—and the lack of operating experience with the —the first of the "thousand tonners" (destroyers exceeding displacement) which were just beginning to be launched—caused C&R to resist the much larger design. The Chief Constructor of the Navy, the head of C&R, pointed out that the British had not repeated the Swift design in the five years since her introduction, and noted that "a destroyer that gets too large loses many of the desirable features of the type".
In November 1912, the General Board offered several alternatives to reduce the size of the destroyer, and was convinced by C&R that the most practical solution was a design that shared much with the O'Brien class: matching that class' main battery and torpedo load but with a design speed of and the desired steaming radius. The General Board also specified that the ships be equipped with "two aeroplane guns, if they can be developed and installed", have provisions for laying thirty-six mines, and a strengthened bow for ramming. The C&R design for the Tucker class, DD-57 through DD-62,Although the United States Navy's hull classification system in which destroyers were assigned the hull code of DD was not adopted until July 1920, most sources retroactively apply the numbering system. So, for example, the lead ship of the class is referred to in sources as rather than as Tucker (Destroyer No. 57), even though the latter name is the one she was known by throughout most of her U.S. Navy career. Similarly, because was sunk in 1917, she was never known by DD-61 while afloat, but is referred to by that hull code in sources. was approved by the Secretary of the Navy in December 1912, and authorized by Congress in 1913.
Design As built, the Tucker-class ships were in length (overall), were between and abeam, and had a median draft of . The hull shape featured the distinctive high forecastle typical of U.S. destroyer classes since the 1908–09 , the first destroyers designed to be truly ocean-going vessels.Gardiner, p. 121. The ships displaced between with a median of .
The ships were equipped with two propeller shafts and two Curtis steam turbines fed by four Yarrow boilers, providing a minimum of to achieve the design speed of .Gardiner, p. 123. For all of the ships except , the pair of main turbines was supplemented with a cruising turbine geared to one of the shafts. Wadsworth had no cruising turbines, but instead had her twin turbines geared directly to the propeller shafts—the first American destroyer so outfitted. She served as a testbed, and had a considerable effect on U.S. destroyer design after her trials in July 1915.
The main battery of the Tucker class consisted of four /50 Mark 9 guns,The 50 denotes the length of the gun barrels; in this case, the gun is 50 calibers, meaning that the gun is 50 times as long as it is in diameter, in this case. The Mark number is the version of the gun; in this case, the ninth U.S. Navy design of the 4-inch/50 gun. with each gun weighing in excess of . The guns fired armor-piercing projectiles at . At an elevation of 20°, the guns had a range of .
The Tucker class was also equipped with four twin torpedo tubes, for a total load of eight Mark 8 torpedoes. Although the General Board had called for two anti-aircraft guns for the Tucker class, they were not originally outfitted with the weapons; the was the first American destroyer class so armed. Likewise, there is no record of any of the Tucker ships being outfitted with mine-laying apparatus. During World War I, most American destroyers were used in anti-submarine warfare roles, and were equipped with depth charges and delivery systems, such as Y-guns and depth charge racks.Gardiner, p. 121. Tucker-class ships were equipped with depth charges during the war, but no specific mentions of the types of depth charges used or delivery system are recorded in available sources.
Comparisons with other "thousand tonners" The "thousand tonners" were the 26 United States Navy destroyers of five classes—Cassin, , O'Brien, Tucker, and Sampson—so named because they were the first U.S. Navy destroyers to have displacements greater than 1,000 long tons.Gardiner, pp. 122–23.The is considered a part of the by Conway's All the World's Fighting Ships 1906–1921 (p. 122), but is classed separately by the United States Navy. See, for example, The Cassin class, the first of the thousand tonners, displaced about a third more than the preceding . The introduction of the thousand tonners led to the Pauldings and other older, smaller displacement destroyers of previous classes to be dismissively called "flivvers", a nickname also commonly applied to the Ford Model T.Cashman, p. 278.According to Cashman (p. 278), a flivver—a portmanteau of "for the liver"—was any small, inexpensive automobile that shook the liver while in motion.
The Tucker class was the fourth of the five classes of "thousand tonners". The earlier Cassin- (DD-43 to DD-46), Aylwin- (DD-47 to DD-50) and O'Brien-class (DD-51 to DD-56) ships were about shorter than the Tucker ships and had a lower displacement, between less than the median displacement of the Tuckers; the later Sampson-class (DD-63 to DD-68) ships were the same length and displaced more. All five classes were armed with four guns, but the torpedo size and complement varied. All were equipped with four twin torpedo tubes loaded with eight torpedoes except for the Sampsons (which had four triple tubes carrying twelve torpedoes), but the Cassin and Aylwin classes were armed with torpedoes; the rest with torpedoes. The Sampsons were the only group originally equipped with anti-aircraft guns, a pair of guns with a caliber of .
Construction
The construction of the six Tucker-class ships was allocated to four U.S. shipbuilders. The Fore River Shipbuilding Company and Bath Iron Works built one ship each, while William Cramp and New York Shipbuilding each constructed a pair of Tucker destroyers.Gardiner, p. 123. The keels for all six ships were laid down between February and November 1914, with Wadsworth being the first and the last.Bauer and Roberts, p. 171. All were launched between April and July 1915, with Wadsworth again being the first and being the last. Wadsworth was commissioned in July 1915, three months after her launch; the rest were commissioned between January and May 1916, with the final ship to enter service.
Ships in class All six members of the class served in the Atlantic throughout their U.S. Navy careers, and all were sent overseas to Queenstown, Ireland, for convoy escort and anti-submarine duties after the United States entered World War I in April 1917.Naval History & Heritage Command. "Conyngham" , "Jacob Jones" , "Porter" , "Tucker" , "Wadsworth" , "Wainwright" . Dictionary of American Naval Fighting Ships (DANFS). Retrieved on 6 May 2009. , Porter, Wadsworth, and Wainwright were in the first group of six American destroyers, arriving at Queenstown on 4 May;Naval History & Heritage Command. "Conyngham" , "Porter", "Wadsworth", "Wainwright" . DANFS. Retrieved on 6 May 2009. Tucker and followed as part of the second group, which arrived thirteen days later.Naval History & Heritage Command. "Jacob Jones" , "Tucker" . DANFS. Retrieved on 6 May 2009. Several of the ships had encounters with U-boats during the war: Conynghams commander was commended for what was thought a probable "kill" of one U-boat; Jacob Jones was sunk by in December 1917. All surviving ships of the class had returned to the United States by early 1919 and served in various roles over the next two years. Tucker was decommissioned in May 1921, followed by Wainwright in May 1922, and the remaining three in June 1922.
Between 1924 and 1926, four of the five ships—Conyngham and Porter in 1924, Tucker and Wainwright in 1926—were reactivated for service with the United States Coast Guard's "Rum Patrol". All were returned to the U.S. Navy in 1933 with the exception of Tucker, which followed in 1934. Conyngham, Porter, and Wainwright were sold for scrapping in 1934; the other two in 1936.
USS Tucker (DD-57)