Pre Dreadnought Battleship: Illinois Class

[Brian James]

Illinois Class Pre-Dreadnought Battleship USS Wisconsin pictured in her new all gray livery post her 1909 refit.

[Brian James]

Illinois Class Pre-Dreadnought Battleship USS Wisconsin pictured at the 1912 New York Naval Review on October 12th.

[Brian James]

The first ship to use the newly constructed Drydock No 4 at Norfolk Navy Yard, Illinois Class Pre-Dreadnought Battleship USS Wisconsin on May 5th 1919.

[Brian James]

Illinois Class Pre-Dreadnought Battleship USS Alabama pictured in 1903.

[Brian James]

Lead Ship, Pre-Dreadnought Battleship USS Illinois pictured in 1918....Her keel was laid down in February 1897 at Newport News Shipbuilding & Dry Dock Company Shipyards and she was launched in October 1898. She was commissioned in September 1901. The ship was armed with a main battery of four 13-inch guns and she had a top speed of 16 knots.
Illinois served with the European Squadron from 1902 to 1903, and with the North Atlantic Fleet until 1907, by which time it had been renamed the Atlantic Fleet. From December 1907 to February 1909, she circumnavigated the globe with the Great White Fleet. From November 1912, she was used as a Training Ship. She was lent to the state of New York in 1919 for use as a Training Vessel for the New York Naval Militia. She was converted into a floating armoury at Brooklyn Navy Yard in 1924 as a result of the Washington Naval Treaty, and it was as a floating armoury, barracks and school that she served for the next thirty years. In January 1941 she was reclassified as IX-15 and renamed Prairie State so that her former name could be given to USS Illinois (BB-65), a new Iowa Class Battleship (never completed). Prairie State was ultimately sold for scrap in 1956.

[Brian James]

Illinois Class Pre-Dreadnought Battleship USS Alabama pictured off New York City in 1904.

[Brian James]

Illinois Class Pre-Dreadnought Battleship USS Alabama pictured c1904.

[Brian James]

Illinois Class Pre-Dreadnought Battleship USS Alabama pictured in Dry Dock No 2 at Brooklyn Navy Yard on November 12th 1907.

[Brian James]

Lead Ship, Pre-Dreadnought Battleship USS Illinois pictured in Dry Dock No 4 at Brooklyn Navy Yard on June 1st 1905.

[Brian James]

Close ups of Illinois Class Pre-Dreadnought Battleship USS Alabama pictured undergoing her major 3 year overhaul refit at Brooklyn Navy Yard, images taken on November 21st 1911.