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California (BB 44)

By A Mystery Man Writer

Last updated 23 Sept 2024

USS California, a 32,300-ton Tennessee class battleship, was built at the Mare Island Navy Yard, California, and commissioned in August 1921. During the 1920s and 1930s, she actively participated in the activities of the United States Battle Fleet, often acting as flagship. In 1925, California was one of the ships that conducted a major trans-Pacific cruise to Australia and New Zealand. With most of the fleet, California deployed to Hawaii in 1940 and was based there as tensions rose in the Pacific over the next year. When Japanese carrier planes raided Pearl Harbor on 7 December 1941, she was badly damaged by torpedoes and bombs, slowly settling to the harbor bottom over the next few days. Her salvage, repair and modernization represented a major undertaking by the Pearl Harbor and Puget Sound Navy Yards and was not completed until January 1944. Over two and a half years after she was sunk, California reentered combat, providing heavy gunfire support for the invasions of Saipan, Guam and Tinian during June and July 1944. In October and November, she took part in the Leyte Campaign, including the 25 October 1944 Battle of Surigao Strait, history