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Identification Numbered Ships Photo Archive

Cap Finisterre (ID 4051)



Navy call sign (Early 1919):
George - Jig - Boy - Rush

Call sign (1919):
Nan - Item - Vice - Dog
Transport:

  • Built in 1911 by Blohm and Voss, Hamburg, Germany
  • Launched 8 August 1911
  • Acquired by the Navy 11 April 1919 at Southend, England and commissioned USS Cap Finisterre (ID 4051) the same day
  • Struck from the Navy Register 22 October 1919
  • Decommissioned 25 November 1919 at New York and returned to the United States Shipping Board
  • Transferred to the Shipping Controller, London, England
  • Allocated to the Japan in July 1920
  • Renamed Taiyo Maru in 1921
  • Sold in 1929 to Nippon Yusen Kaisha of Tokyo, Japan
  • She reconnoitred the route which the Japanese Fleet took to later attack Pearl Harbor, HI reaching Honolulu 1 November 1941
  • Torpedoed and sunk 8 May 1942 while en route from Mutsuren, Japan to Luzon, Philippines by USS Grenadier (SS 210), 85 miles south southwest of Nagasaki, Japan at 30° 45' N, 127° 40' E.

    Specifications:

  • Displacement 14,457 t.
  • Length 560'
  • Beam 65' 4"
  • Speed 16 kts.
  • Complement 450
  • Propulsion: Two 5,355.5hp quadruple reciprocating steam engines, two shafts
    Click on thumbnail
    for full size image    		 Size Image Description Source
    SS Cap Finisterre
    Cap Finisterre 91k
    Namesake:

    Cape Finisterre is a rock-bound peninsula on the west coast of Galicia, Spain

    		 Tommy Trampp
    Photo added 26 September 2020
    Cap Finisterre 326k Postcard dated 23 January 1917
    "Cap Finisterre passes over the Elb-Tunnel Hamburg-Steinwärder. This tunnel which was finished at the cost of 10 million marks under enormous difficulties is 450m long and ca. 20m in depth under sea level. Its diameter is ca. 6m
    Photo from the private collection of Wolfgang Sauber    		 Robert Hurst
    USS Cap Finisterre (ID 4051)
    Cap Finisterre 79k With her topsides crowded with troops returning to the U.S. from Europe, 1919
    Courtesy of Donald M. McPherson, 1976
    U.S. Navy photo NH 84664    		 Naval Historical Center
    Cap Finisterre 141k In port, 1919
    Donation of Dr. Mark Kulikowski, 2010
    Naval History and Heritage Command photo NH 107061    		 Robert Hurst
    SS Taiyo Maru
    Cap Finisterre 123k Painting by Ueda Kihachiro from combinedfleet.com Robert Hurst
    View the Cap Finisterre (ID 4051)
    DANFS history entry located on the Naval History and Heritage Command website
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