USS Grenadier (SS 210) - Seal Beach, CA - World War II Memorials / Monuments on Waymarking.com

The advancement of the submarine is a long and proud chapter in the history of the U.S. Navy. Through the efforts of the California Center for Military History and U.S. Submarine Veterans, a large memorial recognizes the name and crew of each submarine lost in World War II. The "World War II National Submarine Memorial - West" is located just outside the gate to the Naval Weapons Station in Seal Beach. Bronze plaques identify the officers and men that gave their lives during the war. The plaques surround a central display consisting of a torpedo, flag, and time capsule. Groundbreaking for the memorial took place on January 13, 1977.

USS Grenadier, a 1475-ton Tambor class submarine, was built at the Portsmouth Navy Yard, Kittery, Maine. Commissioned at the beginning of May 1941, she spent the rest of the year in the western Atlantic and Caribbean. Following an overhaul, in late December she left Portsmouth to go to the Pacific, where war with Japan had begun earlier that month. Her first war patrol, out of Pearl Harbor, took her to Japanese home waters in February and March 1942, but produced no positive results. On her second, in the East China Sea during April and May, Grenadier torpedoed and sank the 14,500 ton transport Taiyo Maru, then ended the cruise with picket line duty during the Battle of Midway in early June. She operated in the central Pacific during her third war patrol in the summer of 1942, then went on to her new base at Fremantle, Australia.

Grenadier laid a minefield off Haiphong, Indochina, during an otherwise fruitless fourth combat cruise in October-December 1942. She sank a couple of small enemy vessels during her next war patrol, in Indochina and northern East Indies waters in January and February 1943. Sent to the shallow Strait of Malacca for her sixth patrol, beginning in March, Grenadier was attacked by Japanese aircraft while approaching a convoy on 21 April and badly damaged by a bomb explosion after submerging. Her crew struggled to make her seaworthy, but her propeller shafts were so badly bent that she could not get underway, and she had to be scuttled when enemy ships approached on 22 April 1943. Grenadier's entire complement was picked up by the Japanese, who employed prolonged torture in an unsuccessful effort to extract intelligence information. Four of her men died as prisoners of war before the rest were freed following Japan's surrender more than two years later.

Property Permission: Public Access instructions: Park in the lot just off the main entrance to the Naval Weapons Station Access times: From: 12:00 AM To: 11:59 PM Website for Waymark: [Web Link] Location of waymark: 800 Seal Beach Boulevard Seal Beach, CA USA 90740 Commemoration: USS Grenadier Date of Dedication: Not listed

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Date Logged Log User Rating   04/18/2010 senoritafish visited it