page_title: Indiana-class battleship
section_title: Massachusetts (BB-2)
hierarchical_section_title: Indiana-class battleship / Ships in class / Massachusetts (BB-2)
caption_attribution_description: The former U.S. Navy battleship USS Massachusetts (BB-2) sinking in he waters off Pensacola, Florida (USA), after being scuttled, 6 January 1921.
context_page_description: The Indiana-class was a class of three pre-dreadnought battleships launched in 1893. They were the first battleships built by the United States Navy comparable to contemporary European ships, such as the British HMS Hood. Authorized in 1890 and commissioned between November 1895 and April 1896, they were relatively small battleships with heavy armor and ordnance that pioneered the use of an intermediate battery. Specifically intended for coastal defense, their freeboard was insufficient to deal well with the waves of the open ocean. Their turrets lacked counterweights, and the main belt armor was placed too low to be effective under most conditions.
  The ships were named Indiana, Massachusetts, and Oregon and were designated Battleship Number 1 through 3. All three served in the Spanish–American War, although Oregon—which was stationed on the West Coast—had to cruise 14,000 nautical miles around South America to the East Coast first. After the war, Oregon returned to the Pacific and participated in the Philippine–American War and Boxer Rebellion, while her sister ships were restricted to training missions in the Atlantic Ocean.
context_section_description: Between being commissioned in 1896 and the outbreak of the Spanish–American War in 1898, Massachusetts conducted training exercises off the eastern coast of the United States. During the war, she was placed in the Flying Squadron under Commodore Winfield Scott Schley. Schley went searching for Cervera's Spanish squadron and found it in the port of Santiago. The battleship was part of the blockade fleet until 3 July, but missed the Battle of Santiago de Cuba, because she had steamed to Guantánamo Bay the night before to resupply coal. The next day, the battleship came back to Santiago, where she and Texas fired at the Spanish cruiser Reina Mercedes, which was being scuttled by the Spanish in a failed attempt to block the harbor entrance channel.
  During the next seven years, Massachusetts cruised the Atlantic coast and eastern Caribbean as a member of the North Atlantic Squadron and then served for a year as a training ship for Naval Academy midshipmen until she was decommissioned in January 1906. In May 1910, she was placed in reduced commission as a training ship again before entering the Atlantic Reserve Fleet in September 1912, where she stayed until being decommissioned in May 1914. Massachusetts was recommissioned in June 1917 to serve as a training ship for gun crews during World War I. She was decommissioned for the final time on 31 March 1919, after being redesignated Coast Battleship Number 2 two days earlier so her name could be reused for Massachusetts (BB-54). On 6 January 1921 she was scuttled off the coast of Pensacola and used as an artillery target for Fort Pickens. The Navy attempted to sell her for scrap, but no buyer could be found and in 1956 the ship was declared the property of the state of Florida. The wreck is currently one of the Florida Underwater Archaeological Preserves and serves as an artificial reef.
caption: Massachusetts being scuttled off the coast of Pensacola
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