laststandonzombieisland

Here at LSOZI, we are going to take out every Wednesday for a look at the old steam/diesel navies of the 1859-1946 time period and will profile a different ship each week.

– Christopher Eger

Warship Wednesday,  December 12

Here we see the USS Vicksburg (CL-86), a Cleveland-class light cruiser, off the U.S. East Coast, 17 October 1944. Photographed by from a blimp of squadron ZP-12, based at Naval Air Station Lakehurst, New Jersey. The ship is painted in Camouflage Measure 33, Design 6d. (Official U.S. Navy Photograph, from the collections of the Naval Historical Center #NH 98331.)

Vicksburg was first laid down as the cruiser Cheyenne in 1942 she was renamed before commissioning in June 1944 a week after the D-Day landings. She rushed to the Pacific and was soon in the midst of protecting the fast carrier task forces of the US Navy from Kamikazes in the push to the Japanese home islands. Although arriving late in the war she made her presence felt in Iwo and Okinawa, dropping six-inch shells on Japanese positions while bagging a number of kamikazes with her formidable battery of 40mm and 20mm guns as perhaps the most modern ship of her class.

After the war she served as the flag of Commander, 3rd Fleet before being placed into mothballs at the ripe old age of three-years old. There she remained for 15-years quietly waiting for a call that never came.

Like 26 of the 27 Cleveland class that were completed as cruisers, Vicksburg was scrapped.  Only one Cleveland-class ship remains, the CLG-converted Little Rock, which has since 1976 been a museum ship in Buffalo, New York. Elements of the Vicksburg were used to refurbish her.

Specs:
Displacement:     11,800 tons (standard), 14,131 tons (full)
Length:     600 ft (Waterline) 600 ft (180 m), 608 ft 4 in (Overall) 608 ft 4 in (185.42 m)
Beam:     63 ft (20.2 m)
Height:     113 ft (34.5 m)
Draft:     20 ft mean (7.5 m)
Propulsion:

4 Babcock & Wilcox, 634 psi boilers
4 GE geared steam turbines
4 Screws
100,000 hp (75 MW)

Speed:     32.5 knots
Range:     14,500 nm @ 15 kts
Complement:     992 officers and enlisted although by 1945 this grew to 1255 total.

Armament:     12 × 6 in (150 mm) guns (4×3), 12 × 5 in (130 mm) guns (6×2), 12 × 40 mm Bofors guns (2×4, 2×2), 10 × 20 mm guns (10×1)
Updated in 1945 with 28 × 40 mm Bofors guns (4×4, 6×2) and additional sensors

Aircraft carried:     4 OS2U Kingfisher scout planes
Aviation facilities:     2 launching catapults

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