Over a century after the USS Jacob Jones (DD-61) was sunk by a German U-boat off the British coast, a bell has been recovered from the destroyer. The operation to recover the artifact was a joint effort between the United States and the United Kingdom, involving the UK Ministry of Defence’s Salvage and Marine Operations (SALMO) unit and the US Naval History and Heritage Command (NHHC).
The USS Jacob Jones departed from either Southern Ireland for Brittany, France, or from Queenstown, Ireland for Brest, France (sources vary) on December 6, 1917. Following the US entry into the First World War, the destroyer was tasked with conducting patrols of the Irish Sea. This was a particularly dangerous job, given the German U-boats moving beneath the water’s surface, on the lookout for Allied vessels.
On her ill-fated trip, Jacob Jones‘ crew spotted a torpedo wake in the water. Efforts to avoid it were in vain, with the torpedo striking the starboard side. The impact ruptured the vessel’s fuel oil tank, and the destroyer began to sink.
As her stern went below the water, her depth charges detonated, prompting Cmdr. David W. Bagley to order the crew to abandon ship. Within eight minutes, Jacob Jones was gone, with the number of crewmen lost with her standing at 64. Those who survived escaped on rafts and were taken aboard the U-boat SM U-53, with British ships ultimately rescuing them from their predicament later that day and into the night.
The USS Jacob Jones was the first US Navy destroyer lost to enemy action. Over a century after she disappeared into the waters of the Atlantic Ocean, in August 2022, her wreck was found by a team of technical divers, approximately 60 nautical miles south of Cornwall, near the Isles of Scilly.
Since the wreck’s discovery, efforts have been made to map the site, to ensure its preservation. With concern arising over the illegal collection of the destroyer’s artifacts, the decision was made to use a remotely operated vehicle (ROV) to collect Jacob Jones‘ bell.
“The wreck of the ship is a hallowed war grave and is the last resting place for many of the 64 men who were lost in the sinking,” Retired US Navy Rear Adm. Sam J. Cox, the director of the NHHC, said in a media release. “U.S. Navy policy is to leave such wrecks undisturbed. However, due to risk of unauthorized and illegal salvaging of the ship’s bell, NHHC requested Ministry of Defence assistance.”
Following its recovery, the bell was temporarily held by Wessex Archaeology, a private firm that’s contracted by the NHHC. Later in 2024, it’ll be ceremonially handed over and sent to the NHHC’s Underwater Archaeology Branch for conservation efforts, after which it will be displayed at the National Museum of the U.S. Navy, in Washington, DC.
“The most recent chapter in the story of Jacob Jones is one of collaboration and mutual respect for the site,” Cox added in the release. “In addition to SALMO, we are also grateful to the Darkstar technical dive team that located the wreck, to the National Oceanography Centre for providing us with the first comprehensive data set of the site, and to Wessex Archaeology and Gray & Pape for supporting this effort throughout its evolution.”
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Along with recovering the bell from the USS Jacob Jones, the ROV laid a wreath and an American flag on the wreck, as a form of tribute to those who lost their lives in the 1917 sinking.