The
keel for
Montana was laid down at the
Newport News Drydock & Shipbuilding Co. in
Newport News on 29 April 1905. Her completed hull was launched on 15 December 1906, and after
fitting-out work was completed, the new cruiser was commissioned into the
United States Navy on 21 July 1908. She was assigned to the
Atlantic Fleet and was transferred to
Norfolk, Virginia.
Montana steamed out of Norfolk on 5 August for a cruise off the eastern coast of the United States that lasted until 25 January 1909. On 8 October 1908 she put on a searchlight display as part of a fireworks display at
Philadelphia. During the display her searchlights blinded the operator of
Philadelphia Police Department steamer that then had a slight collision with a barge that "Visitor" was going to, to help put out a fire on board caused by malfunctioning fireworks. After a stop in
Charleston, South Carolina, she continued south through the
Caribbean Sea, arriving at
Colón, Panama on 29 January. There, she joined the
Special Service Squadron. This duty was interrupted twice; The second came in April, owing to instability in the
Ottoman Empire following the
Young Turk Revolution that threatened American interests.
Montana departed
Guantanamo Bay,
Cuba, on 2 April, when she was sent to the
Mediterranean to protect Americans in the region. She remained there until 23 July, when she left
Gibraltar, arriving in
Boston on 3 August. She thereafter returned to her normal operations patrolling the eastern coast of the United States. The ship left Argentina on 30 June and arrived back in Hampton Roads on 22 July. After resuming her normal peacetime routine for the following three months,
Montana was tasked with escorting President
William Howard Taft aboard
Tennessee for a trip to
Panama. The two ships departed Charleston on 10 November for the visit, which lasted a week. On 26 July 1911,
Montana was transferred to the
Atlantic Reserve Fleet and she began an
overhaul at the
Portsmouth Navy Yard that lasted until 11 November 1912. During the trip, which lasted until June 1913, she made stops in
Beirut,
İskenderun, and
Mersin. After returning to the United States, the ship resumed her peacetime routine of training cruises off the American east coast, as well as cruises to
Mexico, Cuba, and
Haiti, over the following year. Later that year, for a few days between 28 April and early May,
Montana took part in the
United States occupation of Veracruz, where the ship's commander,
Louis McCoy Nulton, led a landing party in the city during the occupation.
Montana also carried the remains on the seventeen sailors and marines who had been killed in the fighting back to New York City, arriving on 10 May. There, the Navy held a ceremony attended by President
Woodrow Wilson and
Secretary of the Navy Josephus Daniels.
World War I After the United States entered
World War I on 6 April 1917,
Montana initially was tasked with transporting men and materiel in the
York River area, along with conducting training exercises. On 17 July, she was assigned to the
Cruiser and Transport Force; she spent the majority of 1917 and 1918 escorting
convoys from Hampton Roads, New York City, and
Halifax, Nova Scotia to
France. In early 1918, she was briefly used as a
training ship for
naval cadets from the
United States Naval Academy in the
Chesapeake Bay. In September 1918,
Montana took part in another troopship convoy to France with the
battleship , the armored cruiser , and the destroyer . The convoy consisted of the transports , , ,
Rijndam,
Wilhelmina, British steamer
Ascanius. The following month she joined the battleship to escort twelve British
merchant ships bound for
Liverpool. Following the Allied victory in November 1918,
Montana was sent to France to begin the process of transporting American soldiers back from Europe. By July 1919, she had made six round trips between France and the United States, carrying a total of some 8,800 American soldiers. After the conclusion of the repatriation effort,
Montana was transferred to the west coast of the United States. She arrived in the
Puget Sound Navy Yard in
Seattle on 16 August, where she remained until 2 February 1921, when she was decommissioned. During this period of inactivity, she was renamed
Missoula on 7 June 1920 so her original name could be used for one of the planned
South Dakota-class battleships, and she reclassified with the
hull number CA-13. Though decommissioned in 1921, the ship remained in the Navy's inventory until 15 July 1930, when she was formally stricken from the
naval register, according to the terms of the
London Naval Treaty, which placed aggregate tonnage limits on the cruiser fleets of the signatory countries. She was sold to John Irwin Jr. on 29 September and was eventually broken up in 1935. ==Footnotes==