first was a torpedo boat commissioned in 1904. A subsequent would be commissioned, this one a . This third ship would also be named for Charles Adams Blakely. History Upon commissioning, Blakeley immediately joined the Atlantic Fleet. Blakeley patrolled along the East Coast of the United States until she was decommissioned on 29 June 1922, and returned to Philadelphia. She was recommissioned from 1932 to 1937 to serve with the Scouting Fleet, and then was again decommissioned at Philadelphia. Low military budgets were the cause of these periods of inactivity, as the Navy did not have the funds or manpower to maintain a number of ships, including Blakeley. Blakeley was again commissioned on 16 October 1939. She then joined the Neutrality Patrol until the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor and the U.S. entrance into World War II. She then began convoy duty in the Caribbean Sea, including a February 1942 mission to guard a convoy carrying troops to garrison Curaçao in the Netherlands West Indies. On 25 May 1942, Blakeley was on a patrol off Martinique, inspecting all incoming ships for evidence of activities by Vichy French collaborators alongside her sister ship . At 08:30 a.m., she altered course to pursue a sound ping on her sonar. Nothing was found at the site of the ping, and the crew assumed it was caused by a school of blackfish. As the ship turned to resume its course, it was struck by a torpedo fired by the unnoticed German submarine under the command of Werner Hartenstein. The torpedo struck between frames 18 and 24 at about below her water line. The force of the impact blew off of her forward bow and forecastle. After several minutes, the crew determined they could still operate the ship, and it was brought back under control and sailed for Fort-de-France. The ship was steered with a combination of rudder and varying shaft speeds, and four hours after the attack, she was moored in Fort-de-France. Six men died and twenty one were wounded during the attack. Hartstein radioed a U-boat headquarters in Lorient requesting permission to finish Blakeley off, but permission was denied. Destroyers , , and two PBY Catalina planes from VP-53 were scrambled to assist the stricken Blakeley. At Fort-de-France, she was fitted with a wooden bulkhead to cover the area blown off by the torpedo, and an anchor was improvised out of a truck's