Thames River

Long Island Sound and the Thames River gave Connecticut a protected east-west waterway linked to north-south rivers, making the region important for transportation, industry, and naval defense. In 1776, Yale student David Bushnell created the Turtle, America’s first submarine used in combat, launched on the Connecticut River against the British Navy at New York City. Connecticut’s industrial capacity later produced major submarine builders along the Sound, including the Lake Torpedo Boat Company in Bridgeport and the Electric Boat Company in Groton. New London also played an early naval role during the American Revolution by sending the Navy’s first expeditionary force in a successful raid on the Bahamas, while Fort Trumbull and Fort Griswold guarded the eastern entrance to the Sound until British forces under Benedict Arnold overwhelmed them in 1781. During the War of 1812, the British blockaded New London but did not attack, and from the 1840s coastal fortifications expanded as part of Atlantic defense. In 1868, the U.S. Navy established the New London Navy Yard on the Thames River in Groton to strengthen defense of the Sound. In 1900, USS Holland became the Navy’s first commissioned submarine, and the Sound’s shallow protected waters made it well suited for training crews and reaching major coastal industrial centers. With the onset of World War I, Submarine Base New London became America’s first permanent submarine base and school; by October 1918, eighty-one new buildings supported more than 10,000 sailors and 20 submarines, and during World War II more than 24,000 men trained there in submarine operations. After the war, the base grew with the nuclear-powered submarine force launched by USS Nautilus, the world’s first nuclear-powered vessel, designed and built by Electric Boat in Groton, which made its maiden voyage on Long Island Sound on January 17, 1955, later set records for underwater speed and distance, and in 1958 became the first vessel to transit the North Pole. In the late 20th century, changing politics, technology, and military restructuring reduced the Sound’s strategic role, heavy industry declined, and by 1994 the Naval Underwater Systems Center in New London was consolidated to Newport, Rhode Island, but the area remained a center for research, higher education, and submarine work, and Submarine Base New London continued as the home of the U.S. Navy’s Submarine Force.

Conning Towers-Nautilus Park, Connecticut · United States