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NavSource Online: Submarine Photo Archive
Contributed by Mike Smolinski

V-4 (SF-7)
Argonaut (SM-1 / APS-1 / SS-166)
Construction - Shakedown

Radio Call Sign: November - India - Charlie - Tango
To Additional Pages

Pre War Service
WW II Service - Loss

Argonaut Class Submarine : Laid down, 1 May 1925, at Portsmouth Navy Yard, Kittery, ME; Launched, 10 November 1927; Commissioned Fleet Submarine USS V-4 (SF-7), 2 April 1928; Renamed Argonaut, 19 February 1932; Redesignated Minelayer Submarine (SM-1), 1 July 1931; Redesignated Transport Submarine APS-1, 22 September 1942; Lost to enemy action, sunk by aircraft depth charge (582d Kokutai), and Japanese destroyers, Isokaze and Maikaze, 10 January 1943, between New Britain and Bougainville, south of St. George's Channel, in the Solomon Sea; Struck from the Naval Register, February 1943. Argonaut won two battle stars for her World War II service.

Specifications: Displacement, Surfaced: 2,710 t., Submerged: 4,164 t.; Length 381' ; Beam 33' 10"; Draft 15' 4"; Speed, Surfaced 15 kts, Submerged 8 kts; Depth Limit 300'; Complement 8 officers 80 enlisted; Armament, four 21" torpedo tubes forward, two mine launch tubes, 16 torpedoes; two single 6"/53 deck gun, two 30 cal. mgs.; Propulsion, diesel electric, Maschinfabrik - Augusburg- Nurnburg, New York Navy Yard diesel engines, hp 3175, Fuel Capacity, 173,875 gal., Ridgeway Dynamo and & Electric Co., electric motors, hp 2400, Battery Cells 240, twin propellers.
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SS 167 82k Portsmouth Navy Yard, Kittery, Maine. Waterfront and covered shipways, circa summer-fall 1927.V-4 (SF-7) and V-5 (SC-1) are under construction in inside shipways building.V-4 (later renamed Argonaut) is on the nearer way and appears to be nearly ready for her launching, which took place on 10 November 1927. V-5 (later renamed Narwhal) is in a much earlier stage of construction, having been laid down on 10 May 1927. S-13 (SS-118) and another "S"-type submarine are alongside the waterfront, at left. Note automobiles parked in the center and right.
U.S. Naval Historical Center Photograph # NH 70910. Courtesy of Lieutenant Gustave Freret, USN (Retired), 1970.
Argonaut58kV-4 (SF-7) "Ready for commissioning at Portsmouth, New Hampshire, April 1928" (quoted from the original picture caption). Though this view might show the ship when ready for commissioning (which took place on 2 April 1928), it is more probable that it shows V-4 immediately after she was launched, at the Portsmouth Navy Yard, on 10 November 1927.
 U.S. Naval Historical Center Photograph # NH 69136. Courtesy of the San Francisco Maritime Museum, San Francisco, California, 1969.
Argonaut113kV-4 (SF-7) was built specificlly as a minelayer. Her special mine stowage tube, compensating tank, and minelaying tube are visible aft in the inboard view. As a long-range crusier, she had special habitability features: just abaft the torpedo room forward was alarge crew's mess, with refrigerated stowage below it.
Abaft those spaces were officer's quarters above a 6-in magazine. Below the control room (directly below the conning tower) were pumps and forward (battery charging) engine rooms. Abaft them were CPO quarters and the maneuvering room above the after battery and the after 6-in magazine.
Mines were stowed above and abaft the motors. The space above the torpedo room was awindlass room. This was the first U.S. submarine design to have a horizontal cylindrical conning tower. This type later became standard. 		Drawing by Jim Christley, text courtesy of U.S. Submarines Through 1945, An Illustrated Design History by Norman Friedman. Naval Institute Press.
Argonaut80kV-4 (SF-7) ready for launching, at the Portsmouth Navy Yard, Kittery, Maine, 10 November 1927. At the time of her launching she was the fleet's largest submarine, as noted in the caption.
U.S. Naval Historical Center Photograph # NH 70911. Courtesy of Lieutenant Gustave Freret, USN (Retired), 1970.
Argonaut117kV-4 (SF-7) just before launching, at the Portsmouth Navy Yard, Kittery, Maine, on 10 November 1927. This view, taken from off the submarine's starboard quarter, shows the twin mine-launching tubes fitted to her stern, just below the waterline.
U.S. Naval Historical Center Photograph # NH 69136. Courtesy of the San Francisco Maritime Museum, San Francisco, California, 1969.
Argonaut69kV-4 (SF-7) in dry dock at Portsmouth Navy Yard in March 1928. Note how she dwarfs the smaller O-2 (SS-63). Photo from Conway's All The World's Fighting Ships, 1947-1995, and submitted courtesy of Robert Hurst. Photo added 07/18/07.
Argonaut84kV-4 (SF-7), crewman training the submarine's forward 6"/53" deck gun, during shakedown tests off Provincetown, Massachusetts, 21 June 1928.
U.S. Naval Historical Center Photograph # NH 69206. Courtesy of the San Francisco Maritime Museum, San Francisco, California, 1969.
Argonaut56kV-4 (SF-7) emerging from a crash dive, while making her shakedown tests off Provincetown, Massachusetts, 21 June 1928.
U.S. Naval Historical Center Photograph # NH 69163. Courtesy of the San Francisco Maritime Museum, San Francisco, California, 1969.
View the V-4 / Argonaut (SF-7, SM-1, APS-1, SS-166)
DANFS history entry located on the Haze Gray & Underway Web Site.
Crew Contact And Reunion Information
U.S. Navy Memorial Foundation
Fleet Reserve Association
Additional Resources and Web Sites of Interest
On Eternal Patrol
Through the Looking Glass, A Historic Look at Submarines.
Carlson's Raiders
HISTORIC SUBMARINE DOCUMENTARY AND TRAINING FILMS
Back To The Main Photo IndexBack To the Minelaying Submarine (SM) Photo IndexBack To the Submarine Index

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