USS Permit (SS-178)

USS Permit (SS-178) USS Permit (SS-178)
Career
Ordered:
Laid down:	6 June 1935
Launched:	5 October 1936
Commissioned:	17 March 1937
Fate:	sold for scrap
Stricken:	26 July 1956
General Characteristics
Displacement:	1330 tons surfaced, 1997 tons submerged
Length:	300 feet 7 inches
Beam:	25 feet 1 inch
Draft:	15 feet 3 inches
Speed:	19.5 knots surfaced, 9 knots submerged
Complement:	50 officers and men
Armament:	one three-inch/50-caliber gun, six 21-inch torpedo tubes

USS Permit (SS-178), a Porpoise-class submarine, was the first ship of the United States Navy to be named for the permit, a food fish, often called "round pompano," found in waters from North Carolina to Brazil.

Her keel was laid down on 6 June 1935 by the Electric Boat Company, Groton, Connecticut; launched on 5 October 1936 sponsored by Mrs. Harold G. Bowen, and commissioned on 17 March 1937 with Lieutenant Charles O. Humphreys in command.

Following shakedown, Permit operated out of Portsmouth, New Hampshire, until 29 November 1937, when she got underway for the Pacific. Transiting the Panama Canal on 10 December, she continued up the West Coast, and arrived at San Diego, California, 18 December to join Submarine Squadron 6 (SubRon 6). For the next 22 months, she cruised the Eastern Pacific, ranging from southern California to the Aleutian Islands and Hawaiian Islands. In October 1939, she got underway for the Philippines to join the Asiatic Fleet.

Permit’s first patrols were conducted in Philippine waters during 1940 and 1941. The two-year period of peace time activity gave the submarine's crew valuable training for later war activity. The ship conducted her first war patrol off the west coast of Luzon from 11 December to 20 December 1941. From 22 December to 27 December, she made a second patrol in the area. Permit embarked members of Admiral Thomas Hart's staff at Mariveles Harbor on 28 December, and evacuated them to the Netherlands' Submarine Base, Soerabaja, Java, arriving 6 February 1942. En route, she completed a third war patrol, scouting in waters of the southern Philippines.

The submarine departed Soerabaja for her fourth war patrol 22 February, as the Japanese began to close on Java. On 19 February, submarine Swordfish (SS-193) got through to Corregidor, which was still holding out against the Japanese. It was now Permit’s turn to penetrate the blockade to the "Rock." She rendezvoused off Corregidor with aircraft carrier Ranger (CV-4) the night of 15 March and 16 March, took on board 40 officers and enlisted men, and landed her ammunition on the shore. She headed for repairs at her new base, Fremantle, Australia, after minor damage suffered while eluding three enemy destroyers on 18 March.

Permit departed Fremantle on 5 May, and until 11 June was engaged in her fifth war patrol off Makassar, Celebes Island and in the enemy shipping route stretching towards Balikpapan, Borneo. The submarine made her sixth war patrol en route to Pearl Harbor, from 12 July to 30 August, and shortly departed for the United States, entering Mare Island Navy Yard on 9 September.

She conducted her seventh war patrol off the coast of Honshu, Japan, from 5 February 1943 to 16 March. Towards sunset on 8 March, she attacked a nine-ship convoy guarded by two escorts. Two hits sent 2742-ton cargo ship Hisashima Maru to the bottom. Permit departed Midway Island on 6 April for her eighth war patrol in the traffic lanes leading from the Mariana Islands to Truk Atoll, Caroline Islands, and after several encounters, returned to Pearl Harbor 25 May. On 20 July, she joined submarines Lapon (SS-260) and Plunger (SS-179) at Midway Island for the first wartime penetration into the Sea of Japan to attack shipping carrying raw materials to the Japanese war plants from Manchuria and Korea. On 7 July, Permit fired two torpedoes which sank 787-ton cargo ship Banshu Maru Number 33. Just after midnight, she spotted a two-ship convoy headed for the Korean coast-line, and with a salvo of two torpedoes sank 2212-ton cargo ship Showa Maru in five minutes.

After this highly successful patrol, Permit made her way via Dutch Harbor, Alaska, to Pearl Harbor, arriving 27 July. On 23 August, she departed for photographic reconnaissance of several atolls in the Marshall Islands. While off Kwajalein, she evaded aerial bombs on 3 September and depth charges on 9 September. She made attacks on enemy vessels, damaging several, before ending the patrol at Pearl Harbor on 24 September. Her next war patrol was in the Caroline Islands from early January 1944 until mid-March.

Her 12th war patrol was in the same region, on lifeguard station in support of the air strikes on Truk Atoll. She remained on station from 7 May until 1 June. Permit commenced her 13th war patrol with her departure from Majuro Atoll on 30 June, and ended it with her arrival at Brisbane, Australia, on 13 August. On 21 September, she departed to relieve submarine Tarpon (SS-175) on lifeguard duty off Truk, and on 11 November ended her 14th and last war patrol at Pearl Harbor.

After refit, she sailed for the United States on 29 January 1945, and entered the Philadelphia Navy Yard on 23 February. In mid-May, she sailed to the Submarine Base, New London, Connecticut, to serve as a schoolship until 30 October, when she entered Boston Naval Shipyard for inactivation.

Permit decommissioned 15 November 1945. Her name was struck from the Naval Vessel Register 26 July 1956; the submarine's hulk was sold for scrap to A.G. Schoonmaker, Inc., New York City, on 28 June 1958.

For her service during World War II, Permit received ten battle stars.

See also

See USS Permit for other ships of the same name.

References

This article includes information collected from the Dictionary of American Naval Fighting Ships.