USS SC-27

USS SC-27, during her service life known as USS Submarine Chaser No. 27 or USS S.C. 27, was an SC-1-class submarine chaser built for the United States Navy during World War I. She later served in the United States Coast Guard as USCGC Richards.

Submarine Chaser No. 27 on 1 July 1918.
History
United States
Name:	USS Submarine Chaser No. 27 (1917-1919) USS SC-27 (retrospectively since 1920)
Builder:	New York Navy Yard, Brooklyn, New York
Commissioned:	8 November 1917
Fate:	Transferred to U.S. Coast Guard 13[1] or 14[2] November 1919
United States
Name:	USCGC Richards
Namesake:	A crew member of the Coast Guard Cutter USCGC Tampa killed in her sinking in 1918
Acquired:	13[3] or 14[2] November 1919
Fate:	Sold 29 January 1923
General characteristics
Class and type:	SC-1-class submarine chaser
Displacement:	77 tons normal 85 tons full load
Length:	110 ft (34 m) overall 105 ft (32 m) between perpendiculars
Beam:	14 ft 9 in (4.50 m)
Draft:	5 ft 7 in (1.70 m) normal 6 ft 6 in (1.98 m) full load
Propulsion:	Three 220 bhp (160 kW) Standard Motor Construction Company six-cylinder gasoline engines, three shafts, 2,400 US gallons (9,100 L) of gasoline; one Standard Motor Construction Company two-cylinder gasoline-powered auxiliary engine
Speed:	18 knots (33 km/h)
Range:	1,000 nautical miles (1,900 km) at 10 knots (19 km/h)
Complement:	27 (2 officers, 25 enlisted men)
Sensors and processing systems:	One Submarine Signal Company S.C. C Tube, M.B. Tube, or K Tube hydrophone
Armament:	1 × 3-inch (76.2 mm)/23-caliber gun mount[4] 2 × Colt .30 caliber (7.62 mm) machine guns 1 × Y-gun depth charge projector

U.S. Navy service

SC-27 was a wooden-hulled 110-foot (34 m) submarine chaser built at the New York Navy Yard at Brooklyn, New York. She was commissioned on 8 November 1917 as USS Submarine Chaser No. 27, abbreviated at the time as USS S.C. 27.

Submarine Chaser No. 27 was transferred to the U.S. Coast Guard on 13[3] or 14[5] November 1919 at Norfolk, Virginia.

The U.S. Navy adopted its modern hull number system on 17 July 1920, after Submarine Chaser No. 27 had left Navy service. Had she remained in Navy service at that date, she would have been classified as SC-27 and her name would have been shortened to USS SC-27, and she now is referred to retrospectively by this name.

U.S. Coast Guard service

The Coast Guard commissioned the submarine chaser as USCGC Richards. As of 1 January 1923 she was based at South Baltimore, Maryland.

The Coast Guard found Richards, like other SC-1-class submarine chasers, too expensive to operate and maintain, and sold her on 29 January 1923.

Notes

1. United States Coast Guard Historian's Office: Cutters and Craft: Richards, 1919 ex-SC-22
2. Dictionary of American Naval Fighting Ships at http://www.history.navy.mil/danfs/sc1/sc-1-sc-100v1.htm and NavSource Online: Submarine Chaser Photo Archive: USCGC Richards ex-USS SC-27
3. United States Coast Guard Historian's Office: Cutters and Craft: Richards, 1919 ex-SC-27
4. United States Coast Guard Historian's Office: Cutters and Craft: Richards, 1919 ex-SC-22 states that during her Coast Guard service Richards was armed only with one 1-pounder gun.
5. Dictionary of American Naval Fighting Ships at http://www.history.navy.mil/danfs/sc1/sc-1-sc-100v1.htm and NavSource Online: Submarine Chaser Photo Archive: USCGC Richards ex-SC-27

References

• This article incorporates text from the public domain Dictionary of American Naval Fighting Ships. The entry can be found here.
• NavSource Online: Submarine Chaser Photo Archive: USCGC Richards ex-USS SC-27
• The Subchaser Archives: The History of U.S. Submarine Chasers in the Great War Hull number: SC-27
• United States Coast Guard Historian's Office: Cutters and Craft: Richards, 1919 ex-SC-27
• Woofenden, Todd A. Hunters of the Steel Sharks: The Submarine Chasers of World War I. Bowdoinham, Maine: Signal Light Books, 2006. ISBN 978-0-9789192-0-7.