The Great White Fleet Battleship Alabama

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USS Alabama (BB-8), Fourth Division

The second Alabama (BB-8) was laid down on 1 or 2 December 1896 at Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, by the William Cramp and Sons Ship and Engine Building Co.; launched on 18 May 1898; sponsored by Miss Mary Morgan, daughter of the Honorable John T. Morgan, United States Senator from Georgia; and commissioned on 16 October 1900, Capt. Willard H. Brownson in command.

Though assigned to the North Atlantic Station, Alabama did not begin operations with that unit until early the following year. The warship remained at Philadelphia until 13 December when she got underway for the brief trip to New York. She stayed at New York through the New Year and until the latter part of January 1901. Finally, on 27 January, the battleship headed south for winter exercises with the Fleet at the drill grounds in the Gulf of Mexico near Pensacola, Florida. Alabama's Navy career began in earnest with her arrival in the gulf early in February. With a single exception in 1904, each year from 1901 to 1907, she conducted Fleet exercises and gunnery drills in the Gulf of Mexico and the West Indies in the wintertime before returning north for repairs and operations off the northeastern coast during the summer and autumn. The exception came in the spring of 1904 after the conclusion of winter maneuvers when she departed Pensacola in company with Kearsarge (BB-5), Maine (BB-10), Iowa (BB-4), Olympia (C-6), Baltimore (C-3) and Cleveland (C-19) on a voyage to Portugal and the Mediterranean. After a ceremonial visit to Lisbon honoring the entrance of the Infante into the Portuguese naval school, she then cruised the Mediterranean with the three battleships paying goodwill calls at Corfu, Trieste and Fiumeuntil. She next steamed to Phaleron Bay, Greece, where she celebrated the Forth of July with the King, Prince Andrew and Princess Alice of Greece. From 3 August to 20 June the USS Abarenda filled the bunkers of the four battleships. Ending the Mediterranean cruise in mid-August, the squadron returned by way of the Azores arriving in Newport, Rhode Island, on 29 August.

Late in September, the warship entered the League Island Navy Yard for repairs. Early in December, Alabama left the yard and resumed cruising with the North Atlantic Fleet.

Near the end of 1907, Alabama set out on a special mission with Captain Ten Eyck DeW. Veeder in command. On 16 December 1907, as the flagship of Rear Admiral Charles S. Sperry, Second Squadron, Fourth Division, the battleship stood out of Hampton Roads in the company of what became known as the Great White Fleet. She accompanied the Fleet on its voyage around the continent of South American as far as San Francisco. On 18 May 1908 when the bulk of the Fleet headed toward the Pacific Northwest, Alabama remained at San Francisco for repairs at the Mare Island Navy Yard. As a consequence, the warship did not participate in the celebrated visit to Japan.

Instead, Alabama and Maine departed San Francisco on 8 June to complete their own, more direct, circumnavigation of the globe. Steaming by way of Honolulu and Guam, the two battleships arrived at Manila in the Philippines on 20 July. In August, they visited Singapore and Colombo on the island of Ceylon. From Colombo, the two battleships made their way, via Aden on the Arabian Peninsula, to the Suez Canal. Through the canal early in September, Alabama and Maine made an expeditious transit of the Mediterranean Sea, pausing only at Naples at mid-month. Following a port call at Gibraltar, they embarked upon the Atlantic passage on 4 October. They made one stop, in the Azores, on their way across the Atlantic. On 19 October as they neared the end of their long voyage, the two battleships parted company. Maine headed for Portsmouth, New Hampshire; and Alabama steered for New York. Both reached their destinations on the 20th.

Alabama was placed in reserve at New York on 3 November 1908. Though she remained inactive at New York, the battleship was not decommissioned until 17 August 1909.

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