Text 5008, 51 rader
Skriven 2007-07-29 07:37:02 av Bob Ackley (1:2905/3)
   Kommentar till text 4976 av Roy Witt (1:397/22)
Ärende: FidoNews 24:29 [02/06]: General Articles
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Replying to a message of Roy Witt to Bob Ackley:

 RW> By 0704, under fire from the shore battery at El Hank and Battleship
 RW> Jean Bart, the Massachusetts fired the first American 16-inch gun
 RW> salvos of World War II in anger.

I don't think that's true.  Massachusetts' sister South Dakota (her other
sisters
were Alabama and Indiana) and the Washington were involved in fleet action(s)
in
the South Pacific near Guadalcanal in mid 1942.  If memory serves they occurred
shortly after the battle of Savo Island (where the Allies lost 4 heavy cruisers
against
zero Japanese losses).  The action I'm thinking of cost the Japanese fleet a
battleship (Kirishima) and some smaller vessels against a couple of US
destroyers.

Beginning with the South Dakotas, all US BBs were fitted with 16" main
batteries.
The South Dakotas (BB 55, 56, 57 and 58) used 16" 48 caliber rifles and the
Iowas
(BB 61, 62, 63, 64, 65 and 66 - 65 and 66, Illinois and Kentucky, were not
completed)
used 16" 50 caliber rifles (for large naval guns the caliber number is the
length of the
barrel expressed in barrel diameters).  Not sure about the North Carolina class
(NC and Washington, BB 59 and 60) I think they were 48 caliber.  The Montana
class (BB 67
et seq) never got off the drawing boards - they were basically Iowas stretched
out
a bit with a fourth turret aft.

Prior to the late 1930s construction at least one BB (Mississippi) had 16" main
batteries.  Mostly the earlier constructions back to pre-WWI Texas used 14" or
15"
main batteries.  Somewhere around here I have a breakdown of US battleships
beginning
with BB 1, giving dimensions, displacement and gun arrangements (and what
happened to
it); it occurs to me that the Navy probably also has the information on a web
site
someplace.

Only one BB is still (technically) in commission - Arizona.  One could, I
suppose,
also count Constitution as in her day she certainly was a capital ship; but
they weren't
called 'battleships' and given the BB designation until the very late 1800s.

--- FleetStreet 1.19+
 * Origin: Bob's Boneyard, Emerson, Iowa (1:2905/3)