USS Connecticut (BB 18)
USS Connecticut, lead ship of a class of six 16,000-ton battleships, was built at the New York Navy Yard. Commissioned in September 1906, she became flagship of the Atlantic Fleet in April 1907 and retained that role for some five years. During the rest of 1907, Connecticut took part in the Jamestown Tri-Centennial celebration and participated in fleet exercises. In December, she led the Atlantic Fleet's battleships out of Hampton Roads, Virginia, beginning a historic cruise around the World that lasted until February 1909.
Upon her return to the United States, Connecticut was modernized, receiving new "cage" masts, grey paint and numerous other alterations. Thereafter, she mainly conducted routine operations in the western Atlantic and Caribbean. However, in 1910-11 and in 1913 the battleship crossed the Atlantic to visit European waters. During World War I, Connecticut was employed as a training ship off the U.S. east coast and in the Chesapeake Bay. In the first half of 1919, she served as a transport, making four trans-Atlantic voyages to bring home veterans from France.
In 1920, the year she was given the hull number BB-18, Connecticut made a training cruise through the Panama Canal to the west coast. She made another training voyage in 1921, this time to Europe, then transfered to the Pacific Fleet. USS Connecticut decommissioned at the Puget Sound Navy Yard in March 1923 and was sold for scrapping in November of that year.
