USS Birmingham (CL-2)

Figure 1: USS Birmingham (originally Scout Cruiser # 2) running sea trials in March 1908. She is flying the flag of her builder, the Fore River Shipbuilding Company of Quincy, Massachusetts, from her mainmast. U.S. Naval Historical Center Photograph. Click on photograph for larger image.


Figure 2: USS Birmingham (Scout Cruiser # 2) underway in 1908, possibly during trials. U.S. Naval Historical Center Photograph. Click on photograph for larger image.


Figure 3: USS Birmingham (Scout Cruiser # 2) dressed with flags while at anchor, circa 1909. Collection of Chief Quartermaster John Harold. U.S. Naval Historical Center Photograph. Click on photograph for larger image.


Figure 4: First airplane takeoff from a warship, 14 November 1910. USS Birmingham (Scout Cruiser # 2) bound for Hampton Roads, after leaving the Norfolk Navy Yard, Virginia, with Eugene B. Ely's Curtiss pusher airplane on board, 14 November 1910. Ely took his plane off from Birmingham later that afternoon. U.S. Naval Historical Center Photograph. Click on photograph for larger image.


Figure 5: First airplane takeoff from a warship, 14 November 1910. Eugene B. Ely flies his Curtiss pusher airplane off the deck of USS Birmingham (Scout Cruiser # 2), in Hampton Roads, Virginia, during the afternoon of 14 November 1910. USS Roe (Destroyer # 24) is visible beyond Birmingham's bow, acting as plane guard. Note that Birmingham's anchor is in the process of being hoisted. Photograph from the Eugene B. Ely scrapbooks. U.S. Naval Historical Center Photograph. Click on photograph for larger image.


Figure 6: First airplane takeoff from a warship, 14 November 1910. Eugene B. Ely flies his Curtiss pusher airplane from USS Birmingham (Scout Cruiser # 2), in Hampton Roads, Virginia, during the afternoon of 14 November 1910. USS Roe (Destroyer # 24), serving as plane guard, is visible in the background. Photograph from the Eugene B. Ely scrapbooks. U.S. Naval Historical Center Photograph. Click on photograph for larger image.


Figure 7: First airplane takeoff from a warship, 14 November 1910. Eugene B. Ely takes his Curtiss pusher airplane off from the deck of USS Birmingham (Scout Cruiser # 2), in Hampton Roads, Virginia, during the afternoon of 14 November 1910. USS Roe (Destroyer # 24), serving as plane guard, is visible in the background. Photograph from the Eugene B. Ely scrapbooks. U.S. Naval Historical Center Photograph. Click on photograph for larger image.


Figure 8: Eugene B. Ely on board USS Roe (Destroyer # 24) on 14 November 1910, shortly after his flight off the deck of USS Birmingham (Scout Cruiser # 2). This was the first airplane takeoff from a warship. Photograph from the Eugene B. Ely scrapbooks. U.S. Naval Historical Center Photograph. Click on photograph for larger image.


Figure 9: USS Birmingham (Scout Cruiser # 2) off New York City during the 1912 Naval Review. U.S. Naval Historical Center Photograph. Click on photograph for larger image.


Figure 10: German Submarine U-53 at Newport, Rhode Island, on 7 October 1916. She subsequently attacked Allied shipping off the U.S. East Coast. USS Birmingham (Scout Cruiser # 2) is in the right distance. Note tall radio masts and German Navy flags on the submarine, and the interesting small boat tied up alongside. U.S. Naval Historical Center Photograph. Click on photograph for larger image.


Figure 11: USS Birmingham (Scout Cruiser # 2) moored in a harbor, circa 1918, probably in the Mediterranean area. Courtesy of Donald M. McPherson, 1969. U.S. Naval Historical Center Photograph. Click on photograph for larger image.


Figure 12: USS Birmingham (Scout Cruiser # 2) in Brest harbor, France, on 15 October 1918. During 1917-1918 she was flagship of U.S. Forces at Gibraltar and escorted convoys in the eastern Atlantic. Note her "dazzle" camouflage. Courtesy of John G. Krieger, 1966-1967. U.S. Naval Historical Center Photograph. Click on photograph for larger image.


Figure 13: USS Birmingham (Scout Cruiser # 2) in the Middle West Chamber, Gatun Locks, during the passage of the Pacific Fleet through the Panama Canal, 24 July 1919. Courtesy of the Naval Historical Foundation, Washington, DC, collection of Admiral William V. Pratt. Click on photograph for larger image.


Figure 14: USS Birmingham (Scout Cruiser # 2) at Seattle, Washington, in September 1919. U.S. Naval Historical Center Photograph. Click on photograph for larger image.


Figure 15: USS Birmingham (Scout Cruiser # 2) at anchor in San Diego Harbor, California, circa late 1919 or early 1920, when she was flagship of Destroyer Squadron Four. Note the pair of World War I "Overseas Service" chevrons painted on her forward smokestack. U.S. Naval Historical Center Photograph. Click on photograph for larger image.


Figure 16: USS Birmingham (now CL-2) leading destroyers out of a West Coast harbor (probably San Diego), circa 1919-1922. The ships directly behind her are USS Twiggs (DD-127) and USS Chauncey (DD-296). Courtesy of ESKC Joseph L. Aguillard, USNR, 1979. U.S. Naval Historical Center Photograph. Click on photograph for larger image.

Named after a city in Alabama, USS Birmingham (Scout Cruiser #2) was a 3,750-ton Chester class scout cruiser that was approximately 423 feet long and 47 feet wide, and had a top speed of 24.5 knots, and a crew of 359 officers and men. The ship was built by the Fore River Shipbuilding Company at Quincy, Massachusetts, and was commissioned on 11 April 1908. Birmingham was armed with two 5-inch guns, six 3-inch guns, and two 21-inch torpedo tubes.

After she was commissioned, Birmingham spent the next three years with the US Atlantic Fleet. But the ship’s most important contribution to naval warfare occurred in 1910. In October of that year, Captain Washington I. Chambers was given the task by the US Navy to investigate whether a relatively new invention, the airplane, could have any practical use on board a warship. In October 1910, Chambers attended the International Air Meet at Belmont Park, New York, to observe some of the fragile new aircraft that were being introduced to the public. While there, Chambers met with and was impressed by a demonstration pilot named Eugene Ely, who worked with the airplane builder Glenn Curtiss. A few weeks later, Chambers went to another air show near Baltimore, Maryland, and again ran into Ely. Chambers must have had a great deal of confidence in Ely because he discussed the possibility of having an airplane fly off a warship. Ely thought it was an excellent idea and volunteered for the job.

Chambers received the official backing from the Secretary of the Navy, Beekman Winthrop, to conduct the experiment. But since the US Navy didn’t think it was worth the cost to actually pay for the entire project, a wealthy aviation enthusiast named John Barry Ryan decided to donate the money needed to complete the experiment.

At the Norfolk Navy Yard, Virginia, a wooden platform was built in less than two weeks over the foredeck of the scout cruiser Birmingham. The platform was designed by Naval Constructor William McEntree and, at the cost of a few hundred dollars, was paid for by John Ryan. The platform sloped down five degrees from the Birmingham’s bridge and extended to the tip of the ship’s bow, providing a gravity-assisted 57-foot takeoff run for the Curtiss “pusher” airplane that was to be flown by Ely.

The plane was placed on board Birmingham on the morning of 14 November 1910 and its engine was installed by Ely and his mechanics as the ship left port. Shortly before noon, Birmingham steamed down the Elizabeth River and headed for Hampton Roads, where the flight was to take place. But terrible weather and heavy rain almost cancelled the entire experiment. By mid-afternoon, though, the weather began to clear a little. Ely was in his frail aircraft warming up his engine when he noticed that the weather looked like it was deteriorating again. He decided to act immediately rather than risk having the flight postponed because of rain. At 3:16 PM, Eugene Ely gunned his engine, gave the release signal, and rolled down the Birmingham’s ramp.

The airplane dropped off the ramp and briefly touched the water, damaging the propeller. But Ely managed to regain control of the aircraft and it gradually struggled into the air. The damage to the propeller made the engine vibrate heavily as the airplane climbed, but Ely kept the aircraft airborne for five minutes. Since Ely could not swim, he decided it would be wise to get the damaged plane down on dry land as soon as possible. After a two and a half mile flight, Ely landed on Willoughby Spit, a small peninsula not far from Norfolk. It was the first time in history that an airplane had taken off from a warship and, even though Ely didn’t realize it at the time, it was the birth of US Naval aviation.

The event received a large amount of publicity. On 18 January 1911, Eugene Ely repeated this remarkable achievement, only this time he took off and landed on the armored cruiser Pennsylvania while it was in San Francisco Bay. On the very next day, Lieutenant Theodore G. Ellyson began flight training and eventually became the US Navy’s first aviator.

After its historic experiment, Birmingham was placed in and out of commission over the next few years. After being re-commissioned on 1 October 1913, Birmingham carried the Panama-Pacific Exhibition Commissioners on a tour of South America from October to December 1913. Early in 1914, the cruiser served as the Atlantic Torpedo Flotilla flagship and then operated off the coast of Vera Cruz, Mexico, during that intervention in April and May 1914. In 1916, she became flagship of the Destroyer Force, Atlantic Fleet, and once the United States entered World War I in April 1917, Birmingham was assigned to patrol duty off the Atlantic coast. In June and July she escorted the first convoy transporting US troops to Europe. In August 1917, Birmingham began a long deployment as flagship of US Navy Forces operating out of Gibraltar. For the next fourteen months, until the end of the war on 11 November 1918, Birmingham escorted convoys between ports in Britain, France, and Gibraltar. After the war ended, she made a brief trip to the eastern Mediterranean.

In July 1919, Birmingham was sent to San Diego, California, where she served as flagship for the Pacific Fleet’s destroyer squadrons. While in this capacity, she was reclassified in July 1920 as a light cruiser and was given the hull number CL-2. Birmingham became the flagship of the Special Service Squadron from 1922 to 1923 and participated in operations off Central America and northern South America. Birmingham eventually was sent to the Philadelphia Navy Yard and was decommissioned on 1 December 1923. The old cruiser was sold for scrap on 13 May 1930.

USS Birmingham had an active and eventful career as both a warship and as a pioneer in naval aviation. On 14 November 1910, Eugene Ely, and visionaries like Captain Washington I. Chambers and John Barry Ryan, proved that an aircraft could be successfully launched from a warship and US Naval aviation was born. One wonders whether or not Ely or Chambers could have imagined that their efforts would eventually lead to today’s nuclear-powered aircraft carriers.