Individual Submarine Boards > USS Marlin (SST-2)

A few photos of the Marlin

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Lance Dean:
I just wanted to thank Bill Lee for going out and getting these photos.  These are only a few of the many he took.  I think some good things are about to happen with the Marlin.

What an amazing little training sub.  It had a crew of 14!

Mark Sarsfield:
Any berthing areas or is strictly a one-day trainer?

Lance Dean:
It had a 14 member crew according to the sign.  I think I see bunks...looks about right.

Mark Sarsfield:
I didn't think it had a torpedo room.  I like the sign that they posted above the top bunk.  We should hang one of those at the bottom of the FTR stairwell on Batfish.

Viejo:
As you guys probably know these subs were built to give training to officers and also to be used as target boats by other boats. This freed up regular subs to do other duties. As some of you may have noticed, usually the only person on a sub that was good at shooting a torpedo was the skipper. So one of the things the Marlin and the others did after WWII was allow officers to come aboard and practice shooting torpedoes. They also had similar firing equipment so the people could practice setting up for shots also.
After the war, they were used as PR boats. They would travel up the Mississippi for aways and up the inland waterway on the East coast. They would stop at towns and give tours and helped out the recruiters. I had a shipmate on the Scorpion who had served on one of these and he said it was great duty.
The Marlin needs a lot of cleaning, but isn't in bad shape and most of the equipment is still there. Quite a unique museum boat that hopefully will be open again for the public someday. Not shown in these pictures is another space which had two bunks for officers. Sometimes, according to my shipmate, one officer was all that was onboard in the 50s with a senior enlisted acting as asst. Some of the spaces outboard the engines and equipment have to be navigated sideways.  The ship is quite similar in size and proportion to the USS Holland, our first sub.
Viejo

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