USS Olympia (C-6)

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Career
USS Olympia (before 1899). USS Olympia, port bow, 10 February 1902. USS Olympia, stern, 22 March 2003.
Ordered:
Laid down:	17 June 1891
Launched:	5 November 1892
Commissioned:	5 February 1895
Decommissioned:	9 December 1922
Fate:	Museum ship
Struck:
General Characteristics
Displacement:	5,586 tons
Length:	344 ft 1 in
Beam:	53 ft
Draught:	21 ft 6 in
Propulsion:
Speed:	20 kts
Range:
Complement:	411 officers and enlisted
Armament:	4 8-inch guns, 10 5-inch guns;, 4 6–pdrs., 6 1–pdrs., 6 18-inch torpedo tubes.

Philadelphia Portal

USS Olympia (C-6/CA-15/CL-15/IX-40) was a protected cruiser in the United States Navy during the Spanish-American War. She is currently a museum ship in Philadelphia.

Olympia was laid down 17 June 1891 by Union Iron Works, San Francisco, California; launched 5 November 1892; sponsored by Miss Ann B. Dickie; and commissioned 5 February 1895, Captain John J. Read in command.

Her initial service was as flagship on the Asiatic Station. In that role, she participated in Philippines area Spanish-American War operations, including the Battle of Manila Bay, and returned to the U.S. in September 1899. It was from her deck that Commodore George Dewey spoke the famous words "You may fire when ready, Gridley", which launched the attack that resulted in the sinking or capture of the entire Spanish Pacific fleet under Admiral Patricio Montojo y Pasarón and silenced the shore batteries at Manila, all within the space of six hours. The precise spot where Dewey is believed to have stood when he gave the order is marked off on the ship today.

From 1902 to 1906, Olympia was active in the Atlantic, Caribbean and Mediterranean. She also saw occasional service as a United States Naval Academy training ship into 1909. She was a barracks ship at Charleston, South Carolina, from 1912 to 1916, and recommissioned for sea duty in the latter year. Olympia spent World War I and the early post-war years in the Atlantic, the Russian Arctic and in the Mediterranean area. She was briefly reclassified as CA-15 in 1920, then CL-15 in 1921. In October-November 1921 she brought home the body of the "Great War's" Unknown Soldier.

Decommissioned on 9 December 1922, Olympia was preserved as a relic, being again reclassified IX-40 in 1931. Beginning in 1957 she was modified back to her 1898 configuration and became a museum ship at the Independence Seaport Museum in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, where she remains today as the sole floating survivor of the U.S. Navy's Spanish-American War fleet.