USS Raleigh (CL-7)
| USS Raleigh | |
|---|---|
_off_the_Puget_Sound_Naval_Shipyard_on_25_May_1944_(19-N-65901).jpg)
|
|
| period of service |
.svg){kind=small}
|
| Ordered: | August 29, 1916 |
| Builder: |
Fore River Shipyard ( Bethlehem Shipbuilding ) |
| Keel laying: | August 16, 1920 |
| Launch: | October 25, 1922 |
| Commissioning: | February 6, 1924 |
| Decommissioning: | November 2, 1945 |
| Fate: | Scrapped in 1946 |
| Technical specifications | |
| Ship type : | Light cruiser |
| Displacement: | 7050 ts |
| Length: | 167.8 meters |
| Width: | 16.9 meters |
| Draft : | 6.1 meters |
| Drive : |
Steam turbines 90,000 WPS on 4 screws |
| Speed: | 34 knots |
| Crew: | 458 |
| Armament: | 12 × 6 inches (152 mm) guns (2 * 2 + 8 * 1) 4 × 3 inches (76.2 mm) Flak 6 × 533 mm torpedo tubes (2 * 3) After conversion: 10 × 6 inches (152 mm) Guns (2 * 2 + 6 * 1) 8 × 3 inches (76.2 mm) Flak 6 × 533 mm torpedo tubes (2 * 3) |
| Aircraft: | 2 |
The USS Raleigh (CL-7) was an Omaha-class light cruiser of the United States Navy . It was the third US Navy ship named after the city of Raleigh , North Carolina , and one of the oldest US cruisers to serve in World War II .
1924-1941
Built at the Fore River Shipyard of Bethlehem Shipbuilding Co. , the ship entered service at the Boston Naval Shipyard in 1924 and was used in the North Atlantic and the Caribbean until 1933 , interrupted by several visits to Europe and short trips to the Pacific . From August 15, 1933, she was part of the Pacific Fleet and operated mainly on the American west coast for the next three years, until she called for a major overhaul at the Norfolk Naval Shipyard in June 1936 . There the flak was strengthened in a three-month conversion and two of the 6 inch single guns were removed aft. Due to a bad planning in the design of the Omaha class , these guns in the lower casemates had proven to be unusable because they got too wet from the splashing water even in shallow seas. After the overhaul was completed, the Raleigh ran to Gibraltar in September 1936 and formed a special squadron for the evacuation and protection of American citizens in the Spanish Civil War together with the destroyers USS Kane and USS Hatfield and the US Coast Guard cutter USCGC Cayuga . Until it was replaced by the USS Omaha in April 1938, the squadron evacuated several hundred Americans and citizens of other countries from the civil war zone.
Second World War
After her return from Europe, the Raleigh came back to the Pacific Fleet and became the flagship of the 1st Destroyer Flotilla . In October 1940, she and the rest of the Pacific Fleet were demonstratively moved from their home base in San Diego to Pearl Harbor , Hawaii , in order to put pressure on Japan in the face of rising tensions in Southeast Asia .
At the time of the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor on the morning of December 7, 1941, the cruiser was moored at berth F-12 on the northwest side of Ford Island together with its sister ship USS Detroit and the former battleship USS Utah , which had been converted into a training ship for anti-aircraft defense . At 8 a.m., 16 torpedo bombers of the type Nakajima B5N Kate of the first attack wave flew to the berths on the northwest side of the island. In accordance with their instructions to attack only battleships and aircraft carriers , most of the machines turned and looked for new targets, but some carried out their torpedo attack on these three ships and scored one hit on the Raleigh and two on the Utah , which capsized within 10 minutes . The torpedo hit on the Raleigh hit the ship on the port side in boiler room 2, causing severe water ingress that also flooded boiler room 1. Despite immediate counter-flooding, the ship was listed heavily and threatened to capsize. To make it easier, the crew members who were not standing by the guns first threw everything overboard that was not nailed down, such as the anchors , lifeboats and rafts. The two aircraft on board were lowered into the water and drove to Ford Island, the torpedoes were thrown overboard after the warheads had been removed. Then they began to remove more strongly anchored objects: both torpedo tube sets, both aircraft catapults and the ship's crane went overboard. A barge loaded with two pontoons moored on the port side and was moored with steel cables to prevent further sinking. During the second attack wave, the cruiser was attacked by horizontal bombers, where he received one bomb hit. The bomb, which was designed to penetrate heavy battleship armor and accordingly equipped with a delay detonator, hit the lightly armored cruiser at an oblique angle and penetrated the ship completely before detonating next to it on the harbor floor. However, the resulting damage was comparatively minor and after the attack was over, it was possible to generate enough electricity in the non-flooded engine rooms to start the pumps and stabilize the ship. There were several wounded but no dead on the Raleigh during the attack .
_being_kept_afloat_by_a_barge_lashed_alongside,_at_Pearl_Harbor,_7_December_1941_(80-G-19938).jpg)
The next day, the destroyer tender USS Whitney came alongside to help with the makeshift repairs until the ship could finally be towed into a dock on December 22nd. In February 1942 the repaired Raleigh went to San Francisco , where it underwent a major overhaul that lasted until July. This was followed by escort missions between San Francisco, Hawaii, Samoa and Fiji , until the Raleigh was moved to the theater of war with the Aleutians in November 1942 .
During the battle for the Aleutians , the cruiser served as escort or carried out patrol missions to cut off supplies from the Japanese units on the islands of Attu and Kiska . She also took part in the retaking of Kiska in August 1943. Even after the fighting in the Aleutians ended, she remained stationed there and was involved in the shelling of Japanese facilities on the island of Paramushiru in the northern Kuril Islands on February 4, 1944 . In June, the Raleigh was part of the task force that bombarded Matua Island in the central Kuril Islands in a similar operation , but had serious machine damage on the approach, which forced the cruiser to return early. After a repair in the Puget Sound Naval Shipyard , the cruiser was relocated to the east coast of the USA and used there exclusively for training purposes. The Raleigh received two Battle Stars as an award for its missions in World War II .
On November 2, 1945, the ship was decommissioned and scrapped in 1946.
