Tag Archives: Battle of Cape Esperance

Warship Wednesday, Oct. 12, 2022: Stuck in the Middle

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Here at LSOZI, we take off every Wednesday for a look at the old steam/diesel navies of the 1833-1954 period and will profile a different ship each week. These ships have a life, a tale all their own, which sometimes takes them to the strangest places. – Christopher Eger

Warship Wednesday, Oct. 12, 2022: Stuck in the Middle

Official U.S. Navy Photograph, from the collections of the Naval History and Heritage Command. NH 97800

Above we see the camouflaged brand-new Gleaves (Bristol)-class destroyer, USS Duncan (DD-485), en route from her builder’s yard at Kearny, New Jersey, to be delivered to the Navy, on 15 April 1942. Note that her radar antenna has been edited out by a wartime censor. Commissioned the next day, her naval career would last but 179 tense days, and she would be forever retired into the shark-infested waters off Savo Island some 80 years ago today.

The Gleaves class is an unsung group of 66 destroyers and fast minesweepers who began construction pre-WWII and completed in the first stage of the war. With the huge building of the follow-on Fletcher– and Sumner-class destroyers, the Gleaves are often forgotten. What should never be forgotten is the sacrifice these ships made, with no less than 17 of the class lost during WWII or damaged to the point that they were written off as not worth repairing.

Slight ships of just 2,395 tons, and 348 feet of steel hull, they were packed with a turbine-powered 50K shp plant that gave them a theoretical speed of over 37 knots and a 6,500-mile range at an economical 12-knot cruising speed for convoy or patrol work. Armed with as many as five 5″/38 DP mounts, up to 10 torpedo tubes, ASW gear, and AAW batteries, they were ready for almost anything and could float in as little as 13 feet of seawater, leaving them able to get inshore when needed. With 269 berths and only 24 apprentice strikers out of their planned 293-man crew having to rig hammocks, the class was modern for their era, part of the “New Navy.”

USS Gleaves (DD-423): Booklet of General Plans – Inboard & Outboard Profile, 6/23/1939, as modified 1945. Note the SG and SC-3 radar rigged on the top of the mast as well as the Mk 28 radar antenna on the gun director atop the wheelhouse. National Archives Identifier: 167816741

Our Duncan was named for 19th Century naval hero Silas Duncan, who lost his right arm at Lake Champlain while assigned to USS Saratoga in 1814 but would go on to later serve on the Independence, Hornet, Guerriere, Cyane, and Ferret, then command the sloop USS Lexington on overseas stations in the 1830s. His name was honored previously by the Navy in the circa 1912 Cassin-class destroyer USS Duncan (DD-46) which earned a reputation on U-boat patrols in the Great War.

Laid down at the Federal Shipbuilding & Drydock Company in the Garden State on 31 July 1941, the second USS Duncan was launched just seven months later. Federal built several Gleaves and later Fletcher-class destroyers in World War II, setting records for both: 137 days on the 1,630-ton Gleaves-class USS Thorn (DD-647) and 170 days from keel to commissioning on the Fletcher USS Dashiell (DD-659).

USS Duncan (DD 485), keel being laid at Federal Shipbuilding and Dry Dock Company, Kearny, New Jersey, July 30, 1941. 19-LC-Box44-485.

Also launched on the same day were sisters USS Hutchins (DD 476) and USS Guest (DD 472) at Boston Naval Shipyard, and USS Lansdowne (DD 486) — the latter at Federal in the slip alongside Duncan.

USS Duncan (DD-485) en route from her builder’s yard at Kearny, New Jersey, to be delivered to the Navy, 15 April 1942. Note her stern depth charge racks. NH 97801

Commissioned 16 April 1942, just a week after the fall of Bataan in the Philippines, Duncan was placed under the command of LCDR Edmund B. Taylor (USNA 1925) a burly All-American who boxed, played football and lacrosse at Annapolis and had served almost all of his 17 years in a series of surface warfare assignments ranging from battleships to tin cans– interrupted in the early 1930s by a stint coaching ball and instructing gunnery back at the Academy.

Ducan raced through her shakedowns in the Caribbean while aiding in the escort of convoys between GTMO and Cristobal, then sailed for the South Pacific where the battle to take Guadalcanal was raging. She arrived at Espiritu Santo on 14 September and joined TF 17/18 to cover the transports carrying the 7th Marine Regiment to reinforce besieged Guadalcanal.

Duncan was next to the doomed aircraft carrier USS Wasp (CV-7) the next day when she was burning and listing Southeast of San Cristobal Island after being torpedoed by a Japanese submarine. The loss of Wasp was a hugely traumatic event to the Navy, having already seen Lexington and Yorktown sent to the bottom within the four months prior.

Loss of USS Wasp (CV-7), 15 September 1942. Sinking of USS Wasp (CV 7) after being torpedoed by Japanese submarine I-19 on 15 September 1942. She was engaged in covering the movement of supplies and reinforcements into Guadalcanal Island. Photograph released on 27 October 1942. 80-G-16352

Duncan picked up survivors from the carrier, transferring 701 officers and men to other ships, and 18 wounded and two bodies to the base hospital at Espiritu Santo the following day.

The Express

Less than three weeks later, Duncan would be steaming as part of the cruiser-destroyer force of RADM Norman Scott’s Task Force 64 (TF Sugar) consisting of the heavy cruisers USS San Francisco and USS Salt Lake City, the light cruisers USS Boise and USS Helena, along with the destroyers Farenthold, Buchanan, Laffey, and McCalla. The job? Stop the nightly Japanese resupply efforts to their garrison fighting in the jungles of Guadalcanal– the Tokyo Express.

USS Duncan (DD-485) underway in the south Pacific on 7 October 1942. Photographed from the escort carrier USS Copahee (ACV-12), which was then engaged in delivering aircraft to Guadalcanal. NH 90495

Sailing from Espiritu Santo and reaching the vicinity of Savo Island by 11 October, they were soon to contact the Express. At 1810, scout planes from the American cruisers spotted two enemy cruisers and six destroyers (actually the three heavy cruisers Furutaka, Aoba, and Kingusagasa, along with the destroyers Fubuki and Hatsuyuki, covering six destroyers and two seaplane tenders loaded with reinforcements and cargo).

By 2325, after creeping up on the Japanese force, Helena’s SG radar made contact at 27,000 yards out– heady stuff for the era. Just before midnight, Helena was requesting permission to fire, and, at 2346, both of Helena’s batteries opened on separate but unspecified targets while Salt Lake City joined in on a contact just 4,000 yards to her starboard. Soon after, the swirling scrap between the two surface action groups that went down as the Battle of Cape Esperance became disjointed and confusing– an understatement– with searchlights and gun flashes cracking across the night sky and torpedoes filling the water.

During the action, Duncan was one of the ships that may have plastered the cruiser Furutaka.

As noted by Combined Fleets:

At 2235, Rear Admiral Goto’s three cruisers and two destroyers are picked up by Captain Gilbert C. Hoover’s USS HELENA’s radar. Scott reverses course to cross the Japanese “T”. Both fleets open fire. ComCruDiv 6, Rear Admiral Goto, thinking that he is under “friendly-fire”, orders a 180-degree turn that exposes each of his ships to the Americans’ broadsides.

Flagship AOBA is damaged heavily. Admiral Goto is mortally wounded on her bridge. After AOBA is crippled, Captain Araki turns FURUTAKA out of the line to engage Captain (later Vice Admiral) C. H. McMorris’ USS SALT LAKE CITY. LtCdr E. B. Taylor’s USS DUNCAN (DD-485) launches two torpedoes toward FURUTAKA that either miss or fail to detonate. She continues firing at the cruiser until she is put out of action by numerous shell hits. At 2354, FURUTAKA receives a torpedo hit to port side that floods her forward engine room.

Destroyer FUBUKI is sunk and HATSUYUKI damaged. Captain E. J. Moran’s USS BOISE, USS SALT LAKE CITY and USS FARENHOLT (DD-491) are damaged.

About 90 shells hit FURUTAKA, jamming her No. 3 turret in train and starting several fires. Several shells penetrate the engine rooms. The Type 93 “Long Lance” torpedoes ignite as well. The fires draw more gunfire.

12 October 1942:

Around 0040 FURUTAKA goes dead in the water. After the battle flag is lowered, the order is given to abandon ship. At 0228 (local), FURUTAKA sinks stern first 22 miles NW of Savo Island, at 09-02N, 159-33 E. Thirty-three crewmen are killed and 225 counted as MIA. Captain Araki and 517 survivors are rescued by HATSUYUKI and by DesDiv 11’s MURAKUMO and SHIRAYUKI (of Admiral Joshima’s Reinforcement Group).

Duncan’s report, filed after the fact, details how at one point she was in the crossfire between the two battlelines, bracketed by cruisers at effectively point-blank distances on both sides of her beam:

In the end, wrecked by several large-bore shell hits at close range (thought to be from cruisers under both flags), the charred hulk of Duncan was abandoned and sunk just short of Savo Island just before noon on 12 October. McCalla, one of her sisters, managed to search for and save 195 men from the oil-soaked waters once dawn broke– with rifle parties on deck having to fire at sharks seen circling men in the water.

Some 48 of Duncan’s crew were lost with the ship and remain on duty. Due to the shell hits on her wheelhouse and chart room, of her 13 officers aboard during the battle, all but four were killed or seriously wounded. Of her enlisted, at least 35 of those rescued by McCalla, about one in five, were listed as wounded.

Duncan received just one battle star (Second Savo) for her brief, though eventful, World War II service.

Epilogue

Taylor, Duncan’s sole skipper, earned the Navy Cross for his actions during the Battle of Cape Esperance. His citation read:

For extraordinary heroism during action against enemy Japanese naval forces off Savo Island on October 11, 1942. Although his ship had sustained heavy damage under hostile bombardment, Lieutenant Commander Taylor, by skillful maneuvering, successfully launched torpedoes which contributed to the destruction of a Japanese cruiser. Maintaining the guns of the Duncan in effective fire throughout the battle, he, when the vessel was finally put out of action, persistently employed to the fullest extent all possible measures to extinguish raging fires and control severe damage.

Taylor would soon be given a second destroyer, the newly commissioned Fletcher-class tin can USS Bennett (DD-473), and the rank of captain. Taking Bennett into harm’s way, he soon earned a bronze star operating in the Bismarck Archipelago on a night raid to engage Japanese shore batteries and ammo dumps near Rabaul. He then went on to command DESDIV 90 and DESRON 45, adding a silver star to his salad bar in the Philippines. This consummate surface warrior would end the war as an aide to Forrestal. Post-war, he commanded the heavy cruiser USS Salem (CA-139), was commander of the ASW Force during the Cuban Missile Crisis, and retired in 1966 as a vice admiral.

His son, Capt. Edmund Battelle “Ted” Taylor Jr., was aboard a helicopter that developed engine trouble and crashed as it attempted to land on the cruiser USS Providence off Vietnam in the Gulf of Tonkin in May 1972 and is listed as missing in action. Vice Admiral Edmund Battelle Taylor passed the next year, aged 69, in Virginia Beach.

As for her sisters, the surviving Gleaves were slowly placed in mothballs or given away as military aid to overseas allies in the 1950s, with the last in active U.S. service, USS Fitch (DD-462/DMS-25), decommissioned in 1956. Most of those sent to the reserve was later scrapped or sunk as targets in the 1970s. Of those sent overseas, the last to be disposed of was ex-USS Lardner (DD-487), who finished her second life as the Turkish Navy’s Gemlik in 1982. No Gleaves-class destroyers are preserved.

The Navy, as it did often in the darkest days of WWII, quickly re-issued the name of the heroically lost destroyer. The third (and final) warship named in honor of Master Commandant Silas Duncan, a new Gearing-class destroyer, USS Duncan (DD-874), was commissioned on 25 February 1945. She was launched by the same distant cousin that launched “our” Duncan, would see brief service in WWII prior to D-Day, earning seven battle stars off Korea, picking up a FRAM II conversion, and standing guard on Yankee Station in Vietnam before she was retired in 1971.

USS Duncan (DD-874) at Pearl Harbor, circa the mid-1960s. Retired after a busy 26 years, she was disposed of in a 1981 SINKEX. NH 74033.

This latter Duncan maintains a veteran’s association that honors the memory of both destroyers.

Specs:

(As-built)
Displacement: 1,630 tons
Length: 348 ft 3 in
Beam: 36 ft 1 in
Draft: 13 ft 2 in
Propulsion: four boilers; two Allis Chalmers Turbines, 50,000 shp, two propellers
Speed: 37.4 knots
Range: 6,500 nautical miles at 12 kt
Complement: 208 designed. Wartime: 16 officers, 260 enlisted
Armament:
4 × 5 in/38 cal guns (1 deleted in 1945)
4 x 40mm Bofors in two twin mounts.
7 x 20mm Oerlikon in single mounts.
Torpedo Tubes: 5 x 21-inch in one quintuple mount (deleted in 1945)
ASW: 2 racks for 600-lb. charges; 6 “K”-gun projectors for 300-lb. charges, three Mousetrap devices.

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Warship Wednesday May 20, 2015: The destroyer with the heart of a battleship

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Here at LSOZI, we are going to take off 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. These ships have a life, a tale all of their own, which sometimes takes them to the strangest places. – Christopher Eger

Warship Wednesday May 20, 2015 The destroyer with the heart of a battleship

The Destroyer That Took on a Battleship by Peter DeForest. Click to bigup.

The Destroyer That Took on a Battleship by Peter DeForest. Click to bigup.

Here we see the U.S. Navy Benson-class destroyer USS Laffey (DD-459) going mano-a-mano with IJN Hiei, a Kongo-class battleship that has a slight weight advantage over her.

With war on the horizon in the mid-1930s as tensions with Nazi Germany and Imperial Japan were on the rise, the U.S. Navy realized that the old WWI-era four-stack destroyers, while still serviceable, just weren’t modern enough for what was likely to come in the far-flung South Pacific and windswept North Atlantic. This resulted in a series of no less than 10 classes of modern fast destroyers designed and built from 1932-43, which would form the backbone of the fleet in the first half of WWII, amounting to an impressive 169 surface combatants.

Each successive class, like today’s multi-flight Burke-class Aegis destroyers, were really just improvements on the prior, with better engines, sensors, and armament suites experimented with, which resulted in increasingly larger but better tin cans.

These ships included:

  • 8 1350-ton, 341-foot Farragut-class
  • 8 180-ton, 381-foot Porter-class
  • 18 1725-ton, 341-foot Mahan-class
  • 4 2219-ton, 341-foot Gridley-class
  • 8 2325-ton, 341-foot Bagley-class
  • 5 2130-ton, 381-foot Somers-class
  • 10 2350-ton, 340 foot Benham-class
  • 12 2465-ton, 348-foot Sims-class,

And– the last fully prewar design– the 30 vessel 2515-ton 348 foot oal Benson-class (followed by the 66 near-sisters of the only slightly different but mechanically identical Gleaves-class).

Class leader USS Benson DD-421. Note the five 5-innch mounts

Class leader USS Benson DD-421. Note the five 5-innch mounts and masterfully mounted fire control system above the bridge

The Benson/Gleaves class destroyers, capable of an impressive 37.5-knots on their quadruple superheated boilers driving twin turbines, were the top of the line in Allied destroyer design when the U.S. entered the war. Ten 21-inch torpedo tubes, in twin 5-tube deck mountings, were capable of sinking a capital ship if they got close enough. A pair of depth charge racks over the stern could drop it like its hot on enemy subs. But it was their guns that told the story.

Mark 30 single mounts on Gleaves-class USS Arron Ward DD-483 in May 1942 Note 5" (12.7 cm) propellant canisters on the left and Mark 37 FCS with "FD" Radar U.S. Naval Historical Center Photograph # 19-N-30722

Mark 30 single mounts on Gleaves-class USS Arron Ward DD-483 in May 1942 Note 5″ (12.7 cm) propellant canisters on the left and Mark 37 FCS with “FD” Radar U.S. Naval Historical Center Photograph # 19-N-30722

Their five (later reduced to four) Mark 12 5″/38 caliber deck guns, in enclosed Mk 30 mounts were the finest Dual Purpose gun of World War II. Coupled with the Mk 37 FCS, they could hit a high-flying enemy aircraft at altitudes of up to 37,000 feet while their 53-pound shell was effective on surface targets and in naval gunfire support to some 17,000 yards and capable of penetrating up to 5-inches of armor plate at close range (more on this later). Further, they could be fired fast– at up to 22-rounds per minute per tube, which means that a Benson-class destroyer carrying the standard 320 rounds per mount could empty her magazines in just over 15 minutes of maximum sustained fire.

The hero of our story USS Laffey, was named after one Irish-born (County Galway) Bartlett Laffey who, as a 23-year-old seaman attached to the sternwheel gunboat USS Marmoa in 1864 along the Yazoo River, went ashore with a 12-pound howitzer to support a group of trapped force of the 11th Illinois Infantry, and 8th Louisiana Colored Infantry (yes, that’s the real regimental name). At great personal risk, Laffey remained at his gun and helped save the day, earning the MOH for his service. DD-459 would be the first ship named for this naval hero, but not the last.

The man...

The man…

USS Laffey was laid down at Bethlehem Shipbuilding Corporation, San Francisco 31 Jan 1941 and her hull never touched any water other than the Pacific. Commissioned 31 March 1942, just fifteen weeks after Pearl Harbor, she rushed through her shakedown and soon was off to war.

USS Laffey (DD-459) steams alongside another U.S. Navy ship, while at sea in the south Pacific on 4 September 1942. Official U.S. Navy Photograph, from the collections of the Naval Historical Center. One of the few images of Laffey, as she was too busy killing Japanese admirals to have her picture taken.

USS Laffey (DD-459) steams alongside another U.S. Navy ship, while at sea in the south Pacific on 4 September 1942. Official U.S. Navy Photograph, from the collections of the Naval Historical Center. One of the few images of Laffey, as she was too busy killing Japanese admirals to have her picture taken.

Just days after the image above was taken, she was rescuing the stricken crew from the USS Wasp (CV-8), her first brutal introduction to the war.

Less than a month later, at the Battle of Cape Esperance, she came face to face with the heavy cruiser IJN Aoba (9,000 tons), flagship of Japanese Cruiser Division 6 (CruDiv6) and part of the high speed nocturnal “Tokyo Express” reinforcing Guadalcanal. In that harrying night action Laffey got close enough to rake that much-larger ship successfully with her 5-inch guns, hammering her numerous times, and killing Admiral Aritomo Gotō. While Aoba did not sink, she suffered enough battle damage that she was sent back to Japan for five months of repairs.

The heavily damaged Japanese cruiser Aoba off Buin, Bougainville on October 13, 1942 after the Battle of Cape Esperance. Photographed from the Japanese cruiser Chokai.

The heavily damaged Japanese cruiser Aoba off Buin, Bougainville on October 13, 1942 after the Battle of Cape Esperance. Photographed from the Japanese cruiser Chokai.

On Nov. 11 Laffey helped cover the U.S. Army’s 182nd Infantry regiment’s landings on Guadalcanal and her guns helped splash a force of 32 Japanese planes sent to plaster the soldiers on the beach.

No rest for the weary, Laffey, just seven-months old, next found herself as part of Rear Adm. Daniel “Uncle Dan” Judson Callaghan’s Task Group 67.4 for what became known as the Naval Battle of Guadalcanal on Friday the 13th November 1942.

This force of five cruisers and eight destroyers moved to stop Vice Admiral Hiroaki Abe’s much stronger force of 2 battleships, 1 cruiser, and 11 destroyers from running in between Savo Island and Guadalcanal in “the Slot” through what is (now) known as Iron Bottom Sound. Abe was a skilled surface warfare expert, having spent 26 years afloat in cruisers and battleships, and he had size on his side. Further, the IJN was adept at night fighting, having severely licked the Navy in several sharp surface warfare engagements in the area during the graveyard shift.

With no moon and a dark sky, the U.S. fleet used radar to close to within point-blank range until the Japanese fired off starshells and lit up their spotlights and the 1 a.m. battle was on– with the two fleets intermingling their battle line like a barroom brawl.

Laffey and her fellow destroyers and cruisers hammered the Fubuki-class destroyer Akatsuki (who soon sank with a loss of 197 crew) and then found themselves face to face with the 37,000-ton Kongō-class battleship Hiei (Abe’s flagship) while fellow tin cans Sterett (DD-407) and O’Bannon (DD-450) joined the fray.

While it would seem an uneven match, the Laffey got so close to the battlewagon (10 feet according to some reports) that the Japanese behemoth could not depress her guns low enough to get a hit on the plucky destroyer less than a 10th her size. However, this did not stop Laffey from pounding the Jap leviathan with 5-inch shells while her .50 caliber gunners, in close enough to make a difference, peppered everything that moved.

Laffey‘s crew paid close attention to the bridge of the flagship and almost claimed another admiral– severely wounding Abe and killing his chief of staff, Captain Suzuki Masakane.

Friday Nov. 13th, 1942, "Hiei vs. Honey Badgers" Click to big up

Friday Nov. 13th, 1942, “Hiei vs. Honey Badgers” Click to big up

However, the destroyer soon found herself surrounded by Hiei, the battleship Kirishima, and two Japanese destroyers. With over 80,000 tons of the Emperor’s warships pounding away with ordnance that included 14-inch shells and Long Lance torpedoes, it was over fast. Her magazines exploded as she was being abandoned and she suffered 59 officers and men killed and 116 wounded, over half her crew.

As reported in the video and book “The Lost Fleet of Guadalcanal,” Laffey is today upright at a depth of nearly a half-mile off Guadalcanal and largely intact from the bow to amidships, but her after third has disappeared. Both forward 5-inch guns are trained out to port, and her amidships superstructure is holed by a 14-inch projectile from a Japanese battleship.

In a battle that lasted just 40-minutes, both sides had taken a brutal beating and although the U.S. fleet was ravaged, only two American ships were still capable of fighting, and Adm. Callaghan had been killed on the bridge of his flagship, Abe broke contact and fled. Besides Laffey, her Benson/Gleaves sisters USS Barton (DD-599) and USS Monssen (DD-436) also rested on Iron Bottom Sound when dawn came while badly damaged sister USS Aaron Ward (DD-483), who had stood toe to toe with Kirishima, was limping but still firing at the Japanese as they withdrew.

As for the damaged Hiei, she sank while under tow on the evening on 14 November after taking her final hits from Army B-17s and Navy Avengers. Partly due to an attempt to help screen Hiei, Kirishima was caught the next day by the modern fast battleships USS South Dakota (BB-57) and USS Washington (BB-56) who beat the ever-loving shit out of her until by 15 November she was parked on Iron Bottom Sound as well.

Japanese battleship Kirishima takes hit after hit from Washington (BB-56). Click to big up

Japanese battleship Kirishima takes hit after hit from Washington (BB-56). Click to big up

The events of 13-15 November sealed the turning point in the waters off Guadalcanal and ended the Tokoyo Express. Further, it bought time for the new Essex-class carriers and legions of follow-on surface warfare ships to join the fleet as the Japanese licked their wounds and regrouped.

Admiral Abe, returning to Japan injured from Laffey‘s shells and whipped in a humiliating defeat by what Yamamoto considered a smaller force, was cashiered and died a broken man after the War– so we can count that as a combat effective kill for the destroyer as well.

Laffey in the end earned the Presidential Unit Citation

“For outstanding performance during action against enemy Japanese forces in the Southwest Pacific area, 15 September to 13 November 1942. Braving hostile file to rescue survivors in submarine-infested waters, the LAFFEY, after fighting effectively in the Battle of Cape Esperance, successfully repelled an aerial torpedo attack, and although badly crippled and set afire, inflicted severe damage on Japanese naval units off Savo Island. Eventually succumbing to her wounds after the enemy had fled in defeat, she left behind her an illustrious example of heroic fighting spirit.” For the President, James Forrestal, Secretary of the Navy.

She was soon to have her name recycled by an Allen M. Sumner-class destroyer, DD-724, who went on to make something of a name for herself as well in Naval history and is preserved at Patriots Point, Mount Pleasant, South Carolina.

USS Laffey, DD-724 as a museum ship today

USS Laffey, DD-724 as a museum ship today

The Benson and Gleaves classes gave extensively in WWII, with 16 lost during the war– five in the Guadalcanal campaign alone. After the war, they were mothballed with some reactivated for Korea. In the 50s a number were given to overseas allies to serve for another decade or so, but by the late 1970s, all of these hardy veterans were razorblades.

U.S.Navy Benson class Destroyers U.S.S Laffey and U.S.S Woodworth. Dragon model box art.

U.S.Navy Benson class Destroyers U.S.S Laffey and U.S.S Woodworth. Dragon model box art. Click to big up

Still, Laffey has been remembered in maritime art and in at least two scale models from Dragon as well as through a veteran’s association that honors both ships of the same name as well as the Irish-American bluejacket who earned his MOH by blood and deed.
Specs:

(Note, this is a late WWII Benson class with 4, 5-inch guns, Lafffey was completed with 5) click to big up

(Note, this is a late WWII Benson class with 4, 5-inch guns, click to big up

Displacement: 1620 tons (2515 tons full load)
Length: 341 ft. (103.9 m) waterline, 348 ft. 2 in (106.12 m) overall
Beam: 36 ft. 1 in (11.00 m)
Draft: 11 ft. 9 in (3.58 m) (normal),17 ft. 9 in (5.41 m) (full load)
Propulsion: Four Babcock & Wilcox boilers, General Electric SR geared turbines; two shafts;
50000 shp (37 MW)
Speed: 37.5 knots (69.5 km/h)
33 knots (61.1 km/h) full load
Range: 6,000 nautical miles (11,000 km) at 15 kt, (11,000 km at 28 km/h)
Complement: 208 (276 war)
Armament:

4× 5 in (127 mm) DP guns, Mk 30 single mounts
6 × 0.50 in. (12.7 mm) guns, single mounts
10 × 21 in (53 cm) torpedo tubes,
2 × depth charge tracks
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The International Naval Research Organization is a non-profit corporation dedicated to the encouragement of the study of naval vessels and their histories, principally in the era of iron and steel warships (about 1860 to date). Its purpose is to provide information and a means of contact for those interested in warships.

Nearing their 50th Anniversary, Warship International, the written tome of the INRO has published hundreds of articles, most of which are unique in their sweep and subject.

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