USS Liscome Bay (CVE-56)
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| Career |  |
|---|---|
| Name: | USS Liscome Bay |
| Builder: | Kaiser Shipyards |
| Laid down: | 9 December 1942 |
| Launched: | 19 April 1943 |
| Commissioned: | 7 August 1943 |
| Fate: | Sunk by I-175 on 24 November 1943 |
| General characteristics | |
| Class and type: | Casablanca-class escort carrier |
| Displacement: | 7,800 tons (standard), 10,902 tons (full load) |
| Length: | 512 ft 4 in (156.16 m) overall |
| Beam: | 65 ft 3 in (19.89 m), Extreme width: 108 ft 1 in (32.94 m) |
| Draft: | 22 ft 6 in (6.86 m) |
| Propulsion: |
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| Speed: | 20 knots (37 km/h) |
| Range: | 10,240 nmi (18,960 km) @ 15 kn (28 km/h) |
| Complement: |
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| Armament: | 1 × 5 in (127 mm)/38 cal dual purpose gun, 16 × Bofors 40 mm guns (8x2), 20 × Oerlikon 20 mm cannons (20x1) |
| Aircraft carried: | 28 |
| Service record | |
| Part of: | United States Pacific Fleet (1943) |
| Commanders: | Captain I.D. Wiltsie |
| Operations: | Gilbert and Marshall Islands campaign |
USS Liscome Bay (CVE-56), a Casablanca-class escort carrier during World War II, was the only ship of the United States Navy to be named for Liscome Bay in Dall Island in the Alexander Archipelago off Alaska's southeast coast. She was lost to a submarine attack during Operation Galvanic, with a catastrophic loss of life, on 24 November 1943.
Her keel was laid down on 9 December 1942 by Kaiser Shipbuilding Company of Vancouver, Washington, under a United States Maritime Commission contract.
She was originally to have been given to the Royal Navy under the terms of Lend-Lease as HMS Ameer, but was reappropriated by the U.S. Navy whilst still being built.
She was launched on 19 April 1943 sponsored by Mrs. Ben Moreell, wife of the Chief of the Navy's Bureau of Yards & Docks. She was named Liscome Bay on 28 June 1943 and assigned the hull classification symbol CVE-56 on 15 July 1943. She was acquired by the Navy and commissioned on 7 August 1943, Captain Irving D. Wiltsie in command.
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[edit] Service history
[edit] Operation Galvanic
After training operations along the West Coast, Liscome Bay departed San Diego, California, on 21 October 1943 and arrived at Pearl Harbor one week later. Having completed additional drills and operational exercises, the escort carrier set forth upon what was to be her first and last battle mission. As a unit of Carrier Division 24 (CarDiv 24), she departed Pearl Harbor on 10 November attached to TF 52, Northern Attack Force, under Rear Admiral Richmond K. Turner, bound for the invasion of the Gilbert Islands.
The invasion bombardment announcing the United States's first major thrust into the central Pacific began on 20 November at 05:00, and 76 hours later, Tarawa Atoll and Makin A were captured. Liscome Bay's aircraft played their part in the 2278 action sorties provided by carrier-based planes which neutralized enemy airbases, supported landings and ground operations in bombing-strafing missions, and intercepted enemy raids. With the islands secured, the U.S. forces began a retirement.
[edit] Sinking
On 23 November, I-175 arrived off Makin. The temporary task group, built around Rear Admiral Henry M. Mullinnix three escorts - Liscome Bay, Coral Sea and Corregidor - was steaming 20 miles southwest of Butaritari Island at 15 knots. At 04:30 on 24 November, reveille was made in Liscome Bay. The ship went to routine general quarters at 05:05 as flight crews prepared their planes for dawn launchings.
There was no warning of a submarine in the area until about 05:10 when a lookout shouted: "Here comes a torpedo!" The torpedo struck abaft the after engine room and hit the aircraft bomb stockpile, causing a major explosion engulfing the entire vessel and sending shrapnel out 5,000 yards. "It didn't look like a ship at all", wrote Lieutenant John C. W. Dix, communications officer on Hoel, "We thought it was an ammunition dump....She just went whoom — an orange ball of flame."[1]
At 05:33, Liscome Bay listed to starboard and sank, carrying 53 officers and 591 enlisted men — including Admiral Mullinix, Captain Wiltsie, and famous Pearl Harbor survivor Petty Officer, Ship's Cook Third Class Doris Miller, down with her. Only 272 of her crew of 916 were rescued by Morris, Hughes and Hull.
Counting the sailors who went down with the carrier, American casualties of the assault on Makin exceeded the strength of the entire Japanese garrison of that island. Future legal scholar Robert Keeton, then a Navy lieutenant, survived the attack.
[edit] Awards
Liscome Bay received one battle star for her World War II service.
The ship is briefly mentioned in the clandestine diary that James Fahey kept as a sailor during the war. His brother John was an injured survivor and his ordeal and recovery are described.
[edit] See also
[edit] References
This article incorporates text from the public domain Dictionary of American Naval Fighting Ships.
- ^ J.D. Hornfischer. The Last Stand of the Tin Can Sailors.
- James J. Fahey, Pacific War Diary: 1942 - 1945, The Secret Diary of an American Sailor, New York: Houghton Mifflin, 1991. ISBN 0-395-64022-9
- James L. Noles, Jr., Twenty-Three Minutes to Eternity: The Final Voyage of the Escort Carrier USS Liscome Bay, Tuscaloosa: University of Alabama Press, 2004.
[edit] External links
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