Sixty-four tons, 53 feet 10 inches long, a crew of seven and a single 18-inch torpedo tube. Those are the figures the Navy’s official ship history gives for USS Holland, the boat commissioned at Newport, Rhode Island, on Oct. 12, 1900, with Lt. Harry H. Caldwell in command. Oct. 12, 2026, marks 126 years since that commissioning.
The boat carried the name of its designer, John Philip Holland, and the Navy’s historians credit him with developing the first true submarine the service accepted. Her Navy career was spent proving the idea and training the people who would take it further.
The Dictionary of American Naval Fighting Ships entry for Holland, published by the Naval History and Heritage Command, calls her “the first submarine having power to run submerged for any considerable distance.” DANFS lists her builder as Crescent Shipyards of Elizabeth, New Jersey, and gives her speed as 5 knots. The entry says she “was purchased by the Navy after rigorous tests, and six more of her type were ordered.”
A $150,000 purchase in April 1900
The sale came six months before the commissioning. “On 11 April 1900, the United States government paid $150,000 for a submarine named Holland VI, which would soon become known as USS HOLLAND (SS-1),” the Submarine Force Library and Museum Association notes, adding: “Thus was born the nation’s submarine service.” The museum’s post, titled “Happy Birthday, Submariners!”, treats April 11 as the service’s birthday for that reason.
A Naval Historical Center page on the boat, preserved in the HyperWar online library, says the Navy bought her “with funds provided under an 1896 authorization.”
The man behind her had been at it far longer. According to DANFS, Holland was born in Liscannor, County Clare, Ireland, on Feb. 29, 1840, came to the United States in 1873, and spent 57 of his 74 years working with submersibles. His first submarine designs went to the Navy in 1875 and were “turned down as unworkable,” the entry says. He kept refining them through several experimental boats before the privately built Holland. He died in Newark, New Jersey, on Aug. 12, 1914.
No periscope, two folding masts
Holland’s crew worked with very little to see by. The U.S. Naval Institute’s Proceedings, in an April 2007 archive feature, described the arrangement: “Her two masts would fold down while she ran submerged. There was no periscope; the commander had to porpoise the boat for vision above water.” Porpoising meant briefly bringing the boat up near the surface so the commander could take a look, then going back down.
Annapolis classroom and a 166-mile run
Holland did not stay at Newport long. DANFS records that she left on Oct. 16, 1900, under tow for Annapolis, where she “trained cadets of the Naval Academy as well as officers and enlisted men ordered there to receive training.”
Between Jan. 8 and 10, 1901, she made a 166-mile surface run to Norfolk, Virginia, a trip DANFS says yielded performance data. Apart from training duty at the Naval Torpedo Station at Newport in mid-1901, she served at Annapolis as a training submarine until July 17, 1905. The Naval Historical Center page says she operated primarily in the Chesapeake Bay area on training and developmental duty.
Struck in 1910, scrapped under bond
Holland finished her career at Norfolk. Her name was struck from the Navy Register on Nov. 21, 1910, according to DANFS. On June 18, 1913, she was sold as scrap to Henry A. Hitner & Sons of Philadelphia.
The sale carried a condition. DANFS records that the buyers had to post a $5,000 bond guaranteeing the boat would be broken up rather than put back to use. The Navy’s first commissioned submarine was not to have a second career.
The hull did not survive, but the date she entered service is on the record: Oct. 12, 1900, at Newport, under Lt. Harry H. Caldwell.
Top image: The submarine Holland on the ways, starboard bow, in 1900. Image Credit: U.S. National Archives and Records Administration — Public domain / Wikimedia Commons
This article was produced with the assistance of AI and reviewed by Combat Rated editors prior to publication.