Modeling WW2 & Railroads

Hi Paul, that would be a very interesting flat car load in O gauge and one very easily accomplished with a 1/48 scale gun barrels from ship scale model outlets.  With my WW11 Army base modification to my layout in full swing I have been collecting old video's on military trains, Army camp/bases and Air Corps fields. 

Can you post any photo's of said flat cars with the Navy barrels on them?  These would go great with a flat car carrying a scale prototypical brass battleship propeller.

Steve, Lady and Tex

An O Scale model of that 3 flat car arrangement has already been produced, obviously in 2-Raol SCALE. I believe it was Rich Yoder Models who produced it.

I would like to learn more.

TexSpecial & Big Jim, Here is some more info. If you need help on reading these photos, let me know and I will try to help. Enjoy!

Paul, on page 40 it shows a depressed center flat car with the gun barrel.  That would be an easy build to do.  The multiple flat car consist is impressive and could be made to look more like the real things in O scale.  Thanks for posting article. 

Steve, Lady and Tex

Big Jim & TexSpecial, I guess I cut off some of the text on two pages. See how these work.

Paul

Paul,

Thank you very much.

Paul, that is a great article, thanks for taking the time to post pages.  This is a keeper for sure.

Steve, Lady and Tex

Very Interesting, thank you Paul.

Paul

Naval rifles shipped on the Milwaukee Road would have been traveling the the US Naval Ship Yard at Bremerton.  Does the article mention if the trip was completed by barge from the Milwaukee at Seattle or Tacoma or if the MILW handed them off to the NP for rail delivery to Bremerton?

USS MISSOURI barrel on flat car being shipped to Delaware

From the Milwaukee Road Color Guide to Freight and Passenger Equipment book: Milw  Series 601100-601117 FM These cars were built in 1942 at Milwaukee Shops. They were originally classed as FG gun flatcars, for hauling naval gun barrels. The Milwaukee served the Puget Sound Naval Yard at Bremerton via barge. P.S.N.Y. was the only west coast shipyard that could handle dry-dock battleships; therefor, the Pacific fleet's BB's were maintained there. These cars were re-designated FM's with 200 ton capacity in 1973. I don't see anything about KRL in the article I posted.

SWHi and Paul

Thank you very much for the information!  So those flat cars and barrels would likely have gone across the Milwaukee's Pier 27 in Seattle.  I wonder if the Milwaukee handled any 16 inch barrel shipments in the 1950s or 60s?

The Milwaukee served the Puget Sound Naval Yard at Bremerton via barge. P.S.N.Y. was the only west coast shipyard that could handle dry-dock battleships; therefor, the Pacific fleet's BB's were maintained there.

Other west coast yards did important repairs to battleships.  Mare Island could not only repair battleships they built the California.  One of the greatest innovations of the war came with the deployment of floating drydocks to forward areas so BBs and CVs could be repaired without having to travel back to Washington or California.

However, Bremerton was capable of doing the most complex work and extensively rebuilt most of the battleships damaged at pearl harbor.  I know a retired judge and naval reserve officer in Seattle who found the name boards off of the USS Nevada in an antique shop in Port Townsend decades ago.  They came off the Nevada when she was towed into Puget Sound on her way to Bremerton for refit after Pearl Harbor.  She came out of the yard with her main battery of 14" guns rairin' to go and a new secondary armament of radar directed 5" 38 cals equal to the South Dakota class.  After her refit she was a very capable ship for both fire support of Marines ashore and providing air defense for attack transports and escort carriers. 

The California, Tennessee, Maryland and West Virginia all received extensive modernizations at Bremerton after Pearl Harbor.  And all four of those battle ships fought in the last crossing of the T at Surigao Strait.  The Saratoga and the Enterprise also received important repairs and modernization at Bremerton.

Victory in many Pacific battles began with important work in Bremerton.  It is good to know that the Milwaukee Road had a hand in that. 

Thanks again for a great thread!

I believe the USS Wisconsin BB64 was in Korea and Vietnam. I'm not sure of USS New Jersey BB62 and USS Missouri BB63. I'm almost positive that both saw at least one of those two theaters of operations. If so, you could model the Milwaukee Road during either of those time periods for the barrel loading. Unfortunately, although they were beautiful, the battleship was a dinosaur by the time the Iowa class was built (61, 62, 63 & 64). The carriers and submarines became the "Big Dogs" by then. IMHO the carriers are going that way also.

All 4 Iowa Class Battleships saw service during Korea.  The New Jersey was the only Battleship in service for Vietnam, providing bombardment along with many 8 inch gunned Heavy Cruisers.   Many of the light cruisers and heavy cruisers from WW2 saw action in Korea and Vietnam.

Paul

All four of the Iowas saw action in Korea.

The New Jersey was reactivated and provided fire support to forces ashore in Viet Nam in 1968-69.  The New Jersey was the first of the four to be recommissioned in the 1980s and provided fire support to the Marines in Lebanon.

By the time of the Iraqi invasion of Kuwait the Iowa and New Jersey were headed for decomissioning.  The Missouri and Wisconsin both deployed to the Persian Gulf where they launched Tomahawk cruise missiles and conducted shore bombardments.  The Mighty Mo and the Wisconsin played an important role in the Gulf War.  Their presence off the shores of Kuwait was part of an operation to create a belief in Iraqi commanders that an amphibious invasion was eminent.  This helped to fix Iraqi forces in Kuwait while the main invasion force swung northeastward from the Saudi desert.

The naval bases on the Kitsap Peninsula include the shipyard at Bremerton and the Magazine/Polaris/Trident submarine base at Bangor.  They have a rail link to the outside world through the NP/BN/BNSF at Shelton.  Barge service from the Milwaukee at Pier 27 as well as shipments on the NP are interesting subjects meriting further study.

Here is a great site for US Navy Ships  - Lots of pictures and history of each ship.

http://www.navsource.org/

Go to the bottom of the page for each ship and look for the link DANFS History for the history for each ship   -  here is the link to BB 62 USS New Jersey http://www.navsource.org/archives/01/62a.htm

Steve

I doubt you could bring a 16" Naval rifle into Bremerton by rail at all, and you sure couldn't do it via MLW.

The rail line in there was NP at the time of WW2 and the clearances wouldn't have easily allowed for it once you got into Elma, WA from the connection to the joint NP/UP main at Centralia, where the line spilts between north to Bremerton/Bangor and West to Aberdeen. Today, it's owned by the G&W as a short line called the Puget Sound & Pacific. It runs within a short distance from my front door.

As for the guns themsevles, there was a lot of testing at the Dahlgren Naval Surface Warfare Center in Virginia. I'm told they once had an pre-Iowa class battleship turret with three 16" naval rifles mounted for weapons testing. I was there in the late 90s when I was an Army ordnance officer. I can't go into much of what I saw there as some of that is still classified but it's amazing what they still have there and how much of the old stuff still gets used. They have a ground mount for a 16" gun on their parade field, and I was told the tube and breech was never modified in any way and could be used again if ever needed.

Here are some of these guns back in the 70s, including a 18" rifle:

I doubt you could bring a 16" Naval rifle into Bremerton by rail at all, and you sure couldn't do it via MLW.

No, I sure you couldn't get to Bremerton via the Montreal Locomotive Works.

But the Navy did ship them on the MILWaukee Road.  Read above.

Naval rifles shipped on the Milwaukee Road would have been traveling the the US Naval Ship Yard at Bremerton.  Does the article mention if the trip was completed by barge from the Milwaukee at Seattle or Tacoma or if the MILW handed them off to the NP for rail delivery to Bremerton?

Barge.  The MRHA article doesn't mention it, but Doug Nighswonger's Morning Sun book on Milwaukee Road freight equipment says the barrels were barged over to Bremerton.

Back to T-6s for you! 

USS New Jersey was active in the 1980s and perhaps the early 1990s, I was aboard her in Seattle during that period when I was in the Naval Reserve. The Iowas were rebuilt with Gatling gun close in weapon systems and Tomahawk Cruise missles, they were awesome dinosaurs.   

It makes perfect sense to barge the gun tubes across Puget Sound.  The Navy is used to moving things on water and the heavy lift cranes at PSNS would swing these off a barge like a toothpick.  It is hard to say when the last gun tubes were shipped this way, most of the small docks and car floats in Seattle are long gone.

Yard Bull