USS Asheville (PG-21)

USS Asheville (PG-21), anchored in the Canal Zone in the late 1920s.
History
United States
Name	Asheville
Namesake	City of Asheville, North Carolina
Ordered	29 August 1916
Awarded	29 August 1916
Builder	Charleston Naval Shipyard, North Charleston, South Carolina
Cost	$851,145.37 (hull and machinery)[1]
Laid down	9 June 1917
Launched	4 July 1918
Sponsored by	Miss Alyne J. Reynolds
Commissioned	6 July 1920
Reclassified	PG-21, 17 July 1920
Stricken	8 May 1942
Identification	Hull symbol: PG-21 Code letters: NELV
Honors and awards	1 × battle star
Fate	Sunk by enemy action, 3 March 1942
General characteristics
Class and type	Asheville-class gunboat
Displacement	1,575 long tons (1,600 t) (standard) 1,760 long tons (1,790 t) (full load)
Length	241 ft 2 in (73.51 m)
Beam	41 ft 2 in (12.55 m)
Draft	11 ft 4 in (3.45 m)
Installed power	3 × Thornycroft Bureau Modified steam boilers 800 shp (600 kW)
Propulsion	1 × Parsons steam turbine 1 × propeller
Speed	12 kn (22 km/h; 14 mph)
Complement	159 (1921) 166 (1942)
Armament	3 × 4 in (102 mm)/50 caliber guns 2 × 3-pounder 47 mm (1.9 in) guns 2 × 1-pounder 37 mm (1.5 in) guns 4 × .30 cal. Lewis MG 2 × 3 in (76 mm) landing guns

USS Asheville (Gunboat No. 21/PG-21), the lead ship in her class of two United States Navy gunboats, was the first ship of the United States Navy named for the city of Asheville, North Carolina. The ship was built at the Charleston Naval Shipyard of North Charleston, South Carolina, from her keel laying in June 1918, her launching in July 1918, and her commissioning in July 1920.

Asheville began her career in the early 1920s on power-projection missions ("showing the flag") in Central America. After her 1922 conversion to oil power from coal, Asheville sailed through the Mediterranean and the Indian Ocean to join the Asiatic Fleet in the Philippines. She spent the rest of the 1920s protecting American interests and showing the flag in China. Between 1929 and 1931, Asheville protected American lives and property in Nicaragua. She returned to the Asiatic Fleet and protected American interests as the Second Sino-Japanese War began.

With increasing tensions with Japan, Asheville was withdrawn to the Philippines in the summer of 1941, where she performed local patrol duty. After the American entry into World War II and the Japanese attacks on the Philippines, Asheville, and most of the surface ships in the Philippines, moved to Java to defend the Malay Barrier against the Japanese advance. When the Allied defense crumbled in early March, the remaining American ships were ordered to retreat to Australia. Sailing alone, Asheville was spotted, attacked, and sunk south of Java by a Japanese surface force of a heavy cruiser and two destroyers on 3 March 1942.