USS L-5 (SS-44)

Career
Name: USS L-5
Builder: Lake Torpedo Boat Company, Bridgeport, Connecticut
Laid down: 14 May 1914
Launched: 1 May 1916
Commissioned: 17 February 1918
Decommissioned: 5 December 1922
Fate: Sold for scrap, 21 December 1925
General characteristics
Type: L class submarine
Displacement: 456 long tons (463 t) surfaced
524 long tons (532 t) submerged
Length: 165 in (4.2 m)
Beam: 14 ft 9 in (4.50 m)
Draft: 13 ft 3 in (4.04 m)
Propulsion: Diesel-electric
Speed: 14 knots (26 km/h; 16 mph) surfaced
10.5 knots (19.4 km/h; 12.1 mph) submerged
Complement: 28 officers and men
Armament: • 4 × 18 in (457 mm) torpedo tubes, 8 torpedoes
• 1 × 3"/23 caliber deck gun

USS L-5 (SS-44) was an L-class submarine of the United States Navy. Her keel was laid down on 14 May 1914 by Lake Torpedo Boat Company in Bridgeport, Connecticut.

The L-boats designed by Lake Torpedo Boat (L-5 through L-8) were built to slightly different specifications from the other L-boats, which were designed by Electric Boat, and are sometimes considered a separate L-5 class.

L-5 was launched on 1 May 1916 sponsored by Mrs. Rosalind Robinson, and commissioned on 17 February 1918 with Lieutenant J. M. Deem in command.

Service history

After exercises along the Atlantic coast, L-5 departed Charleston, South Carolina, on 15 October 1918 with Submarine Division 6 and reached the Azores on 7 November. Following the Armistice with Germany on 11 November, L-5 headed west, arriving Bermuda on 1 December. She participated in exercises in the Caribbean Sea before steaming on to San Pedro, California, where she arrived 13 February 1919.

From 1919 to 1922, she remained on the West Coast experimenting with new torpedoes and underseas detection equipment. L-5 departed San Pedro on 25 July 1922, and, after visits in Mexico, Nicaragua, and the Panama Canal Zone, she arrived Hampton Roads, Virginia, on 28 September. The submarine remained there until she decommissioned on 5 December 1922. She was sold on 21 December 1925 to Passaic Salvage and Reclamation Company in Newark, New Jersey, and scrapped.

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