Kearsarge (CVA 33) - Naval Cruise Book

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teristics were required of aircraft carriers were learned-'fthe hard way M-at Coral Sea and Midway. Using this information, naval experts form- ulated ideas for a new and more powerful class of carrier. One of this class would carry the name of a proud ship whose grimy crane even then was laboring at the rusting hulks in Pearl Harbor. Back in Washington naval architects assembled the information gleaned from wartime experience and set to work designing the Essex class carrier. I came into being as a result of those plans. I am the product of years of work by men and women from all walks of life, people who utilized the fabulous resources of my country. From the forests of Oregon and Georgia to the iron ranges of the Great Lakes, from the chemical plants of the Gulf Coast to the coal fields of the Appalachians, I am a mirror of my country. But, more important I reflect the ability and energy of people through- out the land. Stenographers and typists, welders and riveters scrap dealers and steel workrs, damage control experts and electronics techm cians these and countless others played Indispensable roles in the massive lob of making me an entity Through their efforts I was made re than a ship I became an embodiment of the skill determination, and resourcefulness of America the 5th of May I945 s down the ways at the New York Naval Shipyard But I was far from being completed I was helpless and weak no engines no guns, no aircraft the skeleton the framework f what would come to be a powerful instrument of American sea power Tiny tugboats nudged me through the water to the clutter of the fitting out pier It was there that I would rest for half a year as workmen and technicians swarmed over me to in stall mules and miles of electrical circuits pipelines and tubing Ifelt

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as did her predecessor, but she carried her name proudly. As a member of the Great White Fleet during its around the world cruise, she helped to display the rising might of the young nation in keeping with Theodore Roosevelt's policy of Talk softly... but carry a big stick. During the First World War, the KEARSARGE was employed in anti- submarine work. At the end of that contiict, her iob as a man-of-war completed, she was converted to a crane ship. As the world's largest sea-going crane, she further proved her usefulness in numerous, though unglamorous, iobs, one of which was assisting in the raising of the doomed submarine SQUALUS. Shortly after the commencement of World War ll, she sailed from the East Coast to lend her efforts in the monumental task of salvaging the wreckage of the American Navy's battle fleet from the mud of Pearl Harbor. When Japanese carrier based aircraft opened hostilities in World War Il with the surprise attack on Pearl Harbor, they destroyed or heavily damaged every ship of the U.S. Navy's battle line. Naval avia- tion was the only remaining force capable of dealing with the threat of the Imperial Japanese Navy. The aircraft carrier, by default, became the offensive arm of the Pacific Fleet, the spearhead that would lead the advance across the ocean. But the early defeats, and even the successes, in the early days of the war pointed out the need for more and better ships from which to base the Navy's planes. Experience in combat was showing the Navy the strength and weakness factors of the current type carriers. Lessons about what charac-

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myself gain strength as mY Compart- ments were made watertight and electronic eClUlPmenl was installed' Giant cranes swung entire gun G5- Semblies high in the air and lowered them to their new resting places on my deck and sponsons. And while QunnerY eXPeVi5 Ullgned my battery and more equipment was stored below, Q' KR U 12 the cranes bent to the exacting task of lowering immense boilers and turbines to my deepest depths. Finally l was taken to sea on my builder's trials. Navy experts and inspectors observed and recorded my perform- GUCG, C0flClUding that l was fit for sea fit to serve. I On a chill, overcast day in March of T946, Captain Francis J. McKenna read his orders at the commissioning ceremonies. The watch was set Gnd the commission pennant was hoisted to the yardarm-I had ioined the Fleef. Born of the necessities of war, l served my early years during a period of de-emphasis of the Navy. Hundreds of battle-tested, veteran ships were retired to the Reserve Fleet as naval appropriations were drastically Cuf- The people at home, tired after four and a half years of wo, and hopefully looked forw years of peace and p,-Ospemy I relaxed i Clfd to . continued to steam the Anulmc . remaining vigilant, training for unit eventuality that might shower Owl dream of peace. The uneasy ,05w period drifted into the Cold Wunbufq, economic pressures continued and it T950 l was sent to Bremen Washington to be retired from seryi ' But my rest was not destined to , ' a lengthy one, for hardly hadlb i ' decommissioned than North ... 1 soldiers surged into South Korea, The Cold War had erupted into a long' drawn out battle in which the United States was morally obligated to take part. l was needed again and under. went an extensive, two-year program of modernization to keep me in step with the requirements of an attack carrier in the atomic age. In early T952 my face-lifting was completed. The five inch battery fore and aft of my island structure removed, my forty millimeter battery replaced by harder-hitting three inch guns, I was placed back in service. That fall found me off the coast of Korea as a part of Task Force 77. Operating out of supporting bases in the Western Pacific, lremained inthe combat zone for seven months. With the rest of the task force, l steamed up and down iust off the coast as my aircraft flew mission after mission in daylight and darkness, in fair weather and foul, supporting the United Nations forces ashore. In all, mY planes flew nearly 7,000 sorties-GH average of about 30 per ClUY l pin-pointing 4,500 tons of bombs, 2,800 rockets, countless rounds of 20 millimeter ammunition, and tons of napalm on Communist targets. Even after the truce was signed cl Panmuniom in the fall of l953, mY iob was not done. The Chinese Gnd North Korean Communists maintained the pressure on South Korea, Indo- China, and Taiwan, and l served mY time cruising in the troubled w0i9 5 of the Western Pacific.