U.S.S. Rowan (1916)

U.S.S. Rowan (1916)
Hull Number:	DD-64
Builder:	Fore River
Laid down:	10 May, 1915
Launched:	23 Mar, 1916
Commissioned:	19 Aug, 1916
Decommissioned:	19 Jun, 1922
Stricken:	7 Jan, 1936
Sold:

U.S.S. Rowan was one of six Sampson class destroyers completed for the U.S. Navy.

Service

This article includes text from the public domain Dictionary of American Naval Fighting Ships

Rowan was commissioned in Boston on 22 August, 1916 under the command of Lieutenant William R. Purnell.

Following shakedown, Rowan, based at Newport, Rhode Island, operated along the Atlantic coast during the fall of 1916, then participated in winter exercises in the Caribbean and the Gulf of Mexico.

At Norfolk, Virginia, when the United States entered World War I, she patrolled off the mouth of the York River, and then underwent repair in New York. On 7 May 1917, she departed Boston for Ireland, arriving with Division 7 at Queenstown on the 27th.

Rowan conducted antisubmarine patrols and escorted convoys to both British and French ports through the remainder of the war. On 28 May 1918, she joined two other destroyers in attacking a U-boat, dropping fourteen depth charges and observing oil cover the surface in the attack area.

Rowan departed Queenstown on 26 December 1918 and reached New York on 8 January 1919. Into the summer, she conducted exercises along the east coast and in the Caribbean. On 29 August, she entered the Philadelphia Navy Yard and was placed in reduced commission.

Designated DD-64 the following summer, 1920, Rowan resumed operations with the Atlantic Fleet in March 1921 and continued them until March 1922. She then returned to Philadelphia where she was decommissioned on 19 June 1922. She remained inactive, laid up at League Island, until struck from the Navy list on 7 January 1936. Her hulk was sold for scrap on 20 April 1939.

Captains

• Lieutenant William Reynolds Purnell, 22 August, 1916
• Lieutenant Commander Douglas L. Howard, May, 1917 – after 1 March, 1918
• Commander Edmund S. Root, 3 July, 1918

See Also

• Wikipedia