, a Gato-class submarine, was the first ship of the United States Navy to be named for the finback. Nine of Finback's twelve World War II patrols in the Pacific were designated as "successful"; she received 13 battle stars for her service and is credited with having sunk nearly 70 thousand tons of enemy shipping. Construction and commissioning Finback was laid down on 5 February 1941 at the Portsmouth Navy Yard in Kittery, Maine. She was launched on 25 August 1941 and sponsored by Mrs. Genevieve G. Watson, wife of Rear Admiral Adolphus E Watson, Commandant of the 4th Naval District and the Philadelphia Navy Yard in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. She was commissioned on 31 January 1942. 1942 First and second patrols Finback reached Pearl Harbor from New London on 29 May 1942, and two days later, with the Japanese fleet on the move, was ordered out to patrol during the Battle of Midway. She returned to Pearl Harbor on June 9 to prepare for her first full war patrol. She cleared harbor, bound for the Aleutian Islands, on 25 June. Finback first contacted the enemy on 5 July, when she attacked two destroyers, and received a heavy return depth charge attack. Two special missions highlighted this first war patrol: a reconnaissance of Vega Bay, Kiska, on 11 July, and a surveying operation at Tanaga Bay, Tanaga, on 11 August. The submarine ended her patrol at Dutch Harbor on 12 August, and returned to Pearl Harbor 23 August to refit. Departing Pearl Harbor on 23 September 1942, Finback made her second war patrol off Taiwan. On 14 October, she sighted a convoy of four merchantmen, guarded by a patrol vessel. The submarine launched two torpedoes at each of the two largest targets, sinking one, the ex-French merchantman Ville De Verdun, rechristened the Teison Maru (7007 tons), returning empty to Japan, and went deep for the inevitable depth charging. When she surfaced, she found two destroyers in the area, preventing further attacks. With her tubes reloaded, Finback headed for the China coast. Four days later, on 18 October, she inflicted heavy damage on a large freighter, and on 20 October, made contact with three ships, en route to Yokohama, Japan from Saigon. She sank two: the passenger-cargo ship Africa Maru (9476 tons), carrying a cargo of rice and corn, 112 crewmen and 38 passengers including survivors of cargo ship Teibo Maru (4,472