BLACKFISH SS 221

Ship Name and Designation History

This section lists the names and designations that the ship had during its lifetime. The list is in chronological order.

Gato Class Submarine Keel Laid 1 July 1941 - Launched 18 April 1942 USS BLACKFISH SS 221 Commissioned 22 July 1942 - Decommissioned 11 May 1946 Laid up in Atlantic Reserve Fleet BLACKFISH SS 221 Placed In Service as Naval Reserve Training Vessel 5 May 1949 Out of Service 2 February 1954 Laid up in Atlantic Reserve Fleet Struck from Naval Register 1 September 1958 Sold 4 May 1959 for scrap

Naval Covers

This section lists active links to the pages displaying covers associated with the ship. There should be a separate set of pages for each name of the ship (for example, Bushnell AG-32 / Sumner AGS-5 are different names for the same ship so there should be one set of pages for Bushnell and one set for Sumner). Covers should be presented in chronological order (or as best as can be determined).

Since a ship may have many covers, they may be split among many pages so it doesn't take forever for the pages to load. Each page link should be accompanied by a date range for covers on that page.

1. USS Blackfish SS-221 Covers Page 1     (1941-1942)

 

Postmarks

This section lists examples of the postmarks used by the ship. There should be a separate set of postmarks for each name and/or commissioning period. Within each set, the postmarks should be listed in order of their classification type. If more than one postmark has the same classification, then they should be further sorted by date of earliest known usage.

A postmark should not be included unless accompanied by a close-up image and/or an image of a cover showing that postmark. Date ranges MUST be based ONLY ON COVERS IN THE MUSEUM and are expected to change as more covers are added.
 
>>> If you have a better example for any of the postmarks, please feel free to replace the existing example.

 

Postmark Type --- Killer Bar Text	Postmark Date	Thumbnail Link To Postmark Image	Thumbnail Link To Cover Image

 

Locy Type 3z (BBT)

1942-07-22

Commissioning, cacheted. The killer text has been typed in after postmarked. From the Bob Govern collection.

 

Other Information

USS BLACKFISH earned the Asiatic-Pacific Campaign Medal w/ 7 Battle stars, the European-African-Middle Eastern Campaign Medal w/ 1 Battle star and the World War II Victory Medal during her Naval career.

NAMESAKE - Any one of several small, toothed whales.

The ships sponsor was Mrs. Henry de F. Mel, wife of Captain Henry de F. Mel (SC), USN (Retired), head of the Navy Purchasing Office in New York.

 

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If you have images or information to add to this page, then either contact the Curator or edit this page yourself and add it. See Editing Ship Pages for detailed information on editing this page.

 

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