USS Sealion (SS-315)

USS Sealion (SS-315)

USS Sealion (SS/SSP/ASSP/APSS/LPSS-315), a Balao-class submarine, was the second ship of the United States Navy to be named for the sea lion, any of several large, eared seals native to the Pacific. She is sometimes referred to as Sealion II, because her first skipper, Lieutenant Commander Eli Thomas Reich, was a veteran of the first Sealion, serving on her when she was lost at the beginning of World War II.

Her keel was laid down on 25 February 1943 by the Electric Boat Company of Groton, Connecticut. She was launched on 31 October 1943 sponsored by Mrs. Emory Land, and commissioned on 8 March 1944.