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USS Nicholas (DD-311), 1920-1923

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USS Nicholas, a 1190-ton Clemson class destroyer built at San Francisco, California, was commissioned in November 1920. For the next two years she was part of the "rotating reserve" scheme that tried to maintain a large fleet with minimal resources, and did not operate actively until February-April 1923, when she took part in exercises and the first of the inter-war Fleet Problems. Nicholas then served along the U.S. West Coast for the rest of the spring and most of the summer as a unit of Destroyer Squadron ELEVEN.

That squadron, including Nicholas, left San Francisco on the morning of 8 September 1923, bound down the California coast to San Diego. That evening, navigation errors on board DesRon 11's flagship produced a premature turn to enter the Santa Barbara Channel, and seven destroyers were wrecked on the rocky shore at Honda Point (more formally known as Point Pedernales). Nicholas, the fifth ship in the squadron column, turned to the left to try to avoid the pile-up, but grounded off the northern corner of the point. With her hull fatally ripped open by underwater rocks, she soon settled in shallow water and her crew spent a miserable night on board their wave-washed ship before they could be rescued. USS Nicholas, a total loss, was gradually pounded to pieces by the surf.

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