Swinging With Swabbies In the Gulf of Maine
.The ship is named for Peter Francisco, a Revolutionary War hero also known as the “Virginia Giant.” He was 6’6” tall and 260 pounds, and he worked as a blacksmith before the war. Some people say he was the greatest soldier in American history. George Washington said he was directly responsible for victories in two battles, and that the whole war might have been lost without him. During the war, Lafayette asked Washington to order a special sword made for Francisco. It was five feet long.
He was injured several times in the war, but he kept on fighting. He took part in the Brandywine Creek battle, the Battle of Germantown, a battle a Monmouth that left him with a musket-ball hole in his thigh, and others. After the battle of Camden, South Carolina, Francisco saw that the Americans had abandoned an 1,100-pound cannon that was stuck in the mud. According to the stories told about him, he pulled the cannon out of the muck and hauled it out of reach of the enemy.
His successes led to the creation of a monument to him in the National Military Park and the painting of his name on the bow of a big grey boat.
Ship is a guided-missile destroyer that once had the capability to kick some other ships’ butts around the oceans. Just a few months ago, though, the Navy decided to take her out of active duty and convert her to a training ship for brand-new sailors. Most of her guns have been removed, and her fancy SPY-ID radar has been replaced with something that couldn’t get a ping off the side of a continent. But she still floats, she can go forward easily and backward with some effort, and her aluminum hull still looks spiffy in its distinctive grey paint. So the Pentagon — no doubt in close consultation with the President, the Joint Chiefs of Staff, the National Security Advisor, and the Secretary of Defense — decided to send her up here to see if they could make the Canadians shut up.
As a seasoned foreign correspondent who has been “in country,” as we say, for more than a whole week now, I sensed a story. This is why I came to Grand Seal Island. The threat of war, the hazards of combat duty, the thrill of strategy and gamble. By reporting on the agony and euphoria of battle, interweaving tales of international tension with wild stories from The Village, I was bound to get the attention of the exotic-assignments editor at Rolling Stone I had to get on board that destroyer, so I cooked up a plan and kicked it into action. Basically, it involved asking Cory if I could borrow a dinghy so I could row over to the destroyer, knock menacingly on the hull, and demand to see the Captain. Cory stared into my eyes for a half-hour or so, did one of her smile-free laughs again, and offered the dinghy with a suspicious degree of enthusiasm. I found the little wooden boat alongside one of the docks, climbed in, and shoved off for my first encounter with America’s Fighting Force.
Destroyers Lost North Atlantic - News
ON BOARD THE USS Francisco, SOMEWHERE IN THE NORTH ATLANTIC — Well, OK. The ship's actually bobbing in the mouth of the GSI harbor, and I just rowed a little dinghy out to see what was going on. I don't think I'm giving away any military secrets by
In 1950, the Canadian destroyers "Cayuga," "Sioux" and "Athabaskan" arrived in Tokyo to join UN forces in the Korean War. In 1953, 20 people died when a bus struck a stalled truck and plunged into a canal at Morrisburg, Ont. In 1955, 17-year-old
British cruisers between the wars | Aviation and Military History ...
The main implication of World War I , as far as cruiser design was concerned, was that the naval reconnaissance role was better undertaken by aircraft than by the cruiser, which was thereafter operated mainly in alternative roles such as escort of major convoys, commerce protection and raiding, and gunfire support of amphibious operations. This had become evident to the British in the later stages of World War I, when they had started to build cruisers somewhat larger than the standard light cruisers that had proved so effective in the earlier part of the war. Many of these latter were still comparatively new ships and were retained in service during the 1920s and 1930s, increasingly for second-line tasks such as the protection of trade routes. The oldest classes to survive into World War II were the ‘Caledon’, ‘Carlisle’ and ‘Ceres’ classes, which totalled three, five and five ships respectively. The ‘Caledon’ class ships were altered little in real terms from the standard in which they fought in World War I, but the three of the ‘Ceres’ class and all of the ‘Carlisle’ class ships were modified considerably in overall capability by their conversion to an anti-aircraft cruiser standard. Coventry were prototype conversions with a primary armament of 10 4-in (102-mm) anti-aircraft guns in single high-angle mountings and 16 2-pdr anti-aircraft guns in two octuple mountings, but the definitive standard adopted for the other six ships was eight 4-in (102-mm) anti-aircraft guns in four twin high-angle turrets and four 2-pdr anti-aircraft guns in a quadruple mounting.
Four of the five ‘Improved Birmingham’ class cruisers survived for limited service in World War II, and in basic terms these larger and generally more effective ships had a displacement of some 9,700 tons, an armament of seven or five 7.5-in (191-mm) guns in single mountings and four or five 4-in (102-mm) anti-aircraft guns in single high-angle mountings and, reflecting the increased threat posed by aircraft in World War II, eight 2-pdr anti-aircraft guns in two quadruple mountings and 10 20-mm anti-aircraft cannon, protection in the form of a 3-in (76-mm) belt and 1.5-in (38-mm) deck, and a speed of 30.5 kt on the 65,000 hp (48465 kW) delivered to four shafts by steam turbines. Another survivor from World War I and its immediate aftermath was the ‘D’ class of eight light cruisers originally built in the ‘Danae’ and ‘Delhi’ classes, and the two cruisers of the ‘E’ class completed in the early 1920s with a displacement of some 7,550 tons, an armament of seven 6-in (152-mm) guns and three 4-in (102-mm) anti-aircraft guns, protection in the form of a 2.5-in (64-mm) belt and 1-in (25-mm) deck, and a speed of 33 kt on the 80,000 hp (59650 kW) delivered to four shafts by steam turbines.
Destroyers Lost North Atlantic - Bookshelf
LIFE
So enormously will these bases strengthen America's Atlantic defenses, ... Britain started with 185 destroyers, lost 32 by torpedoes, shellfire and bombs ...Chronology of the war at sea, 1939-1945, the naval history of World War II
1 5 November-9 January North Atlantic/English Channel In operations by snorkel U -boats ... U 1020 torpedoes the destroyer Zephyr on 31 December but is lost, ...Blood on the Sea, American Destroyers Lost in World War II
Appendix C US Destroyer Losses in World War II (Alphabetical Listing) [A] Aircraft; ... North Atlantic 8/22/42 Jacob Jones (DD-130) [T] Cape May, ...United States destroyer operations in World War II.
Fighting the Battle of the Atlantic, the Atlantic Destroyer Force (DesLant) patrolled ... In battle areas that ranged from North Atlantic to South Pacific, ...The Last Century of Sea Power: From Port Arthur to Chanak, 1894-1922
NORTH ATLANTIC, APPROACHES, AND ENGLISH CHANNEL 1: German submarine U. 81 torpedoed and ... 17: British destroyer Setter lost as a result of collision with ...Casual Guide Directory
9781885119179: Blood on the Sea: American Destroyers Lost in ...
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1945
Local Western Approaches with Halifax/UK convoy SC.8; five crew lost (Battle of the Atlantic) ... in tow of escort destroyer Zetland'; 9 crew lost (French North African Campaign) ...
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Battle of the Atlantic (1939–1945) - Wikipedia, the free ...
The British lost the Audacity, a destroyer and just two merchant ships. ... operations in the North Atlantic, saying, "We had lost the Battle of the Atlantic".[37] ...
Battle of Atlantic - Atlantic convoys
In mid-Atlantic, escorting destroyer "VETERAN" was lost to "U-404" ... UK/North America Convoy ONS144 - Slow convoy ONS144 was heavily attacked in the mid-Atlantic and lost five ...