USS San Francisco (C-5) - Inter-war Period

Inter-war Period

San Francisco conducted minelaying operations until the Armistice on 11 November. Minesweepers then moved in, and San Francisco prepared to return home. She departed Inverness on 2 December and arrived in Hampton Roads on 3 January 1919. Overhaul followed, after which she cruised in the western Atlantic and Caribbean through 1921. Designated CM-2 on 17 July 1920, she was ordered inactivated in 1921; and on 6 October, she arrived at Philadelphia where she was decommissioned on 24 December 1921.

Remaining in reserve through the decade, CM-2 was renamed Tahoe, and then Yosemite, effective 1 January 1931, to allow the name San Francisco to be given to CA-38, then under construction. As Yosemite, she remained at Philadelphia for another eight years. Her name was struck from the Naval Vessel Register on 8 June 1937, but she was retained at the Navy Yard until sold for scrapping to the Union Shipbuilding Company, Baltimore, Maryland on 20 April 1939.