Tuesday, September 25, 2012

USS Boston (CA-69, CAG-1)


Figure 1:  USS Boston (CA-69) in Boston Harbor, Boston, Massachusetts, 30 June 1943. Official US Navy Photograph, from the collections of the Naval Historical Center. Click on photograph for larger image.



Figure 2:  USS Boston (CA-69) on a full power run, 22 October 1943. Official US Navy Photograph, now in the collections of the National Archives. Click on photograph for larger image.   



Figure 3:  USS Boston (CA-69) steaming at high speed, probably during a full power trial in October 1943. Note that the ship is carrying Curtiss SO3C "Seamew" floatplanes. US Naval Historical Center Photograph. Click on photograph for larger image.




Figure 4:  Carrier raids on western New Guinea, April 1944. A USS Boston (CA-69) OS2U "Kingfisher" floatplane returns to the cruiser after rescuing a crewman of a downed TBF bomber during raids on Japanese targets in the Hollandia area, 21 April 1944. ARM2c W.R. Kesey is on the wing. AOM3c B.A. Kanitcer is in the rear cockpit. The OS2U's pilot is not identified. Official US Navy Photograph, now in the collections of the National Archives. Click on photograph for larger image.  
 
 
Figure 5:  USS Boston (CA-69) in Sagami Wan, outside of Tokyo Bay, Japan, circa late August 1945, at the time Third Fleet ships initially entered Japanese waters. Official US Navy Photograph, now in the collections of the National Archives. Click on photograph for larger image.  
 

Figure 6:  USS Boston (CAG-1) underway at sea, March 1956.This picture was taken after the ship was converted into the US Navy’s first guided missile cruiser. Official US Navy Photograph, from the collections of the Naval Historical Center. Click on photograph for larger image.



Figure 7:  USS Boston (CAG-1) fires a "Terrier" guided missile from her after launcher during a training cruise in August 1956. Official US Navy Photograph, from the collections of the Naval Historical Center. Click on photograph for larger image.
 
 
Figure 8:  USS Boston (CAG-1) steaming off Beirut, Lebanon, while serving with the Sixth Fleet, 18 July 1958. Official US Navy Photograph, from the collections of the Naval Historical Center. Click on photograph for larger image.
 

Figure 9:  View of the USS Boston’s (CAG-1) after portion, as she prepares for underway refueling, 15 July 1959. The photograph shows both of her launchers for "Terrier" guided missiles, with a pair of Mark 25 Mod 7 guidance radars just ahead of them. An antenna for an SPS-12 radar is atop the pedestal at the right side of the image, with Boston's after starboard 5-inch twin gun mount below. Note the refueling boom rigged alongside the forward missile launcher, and the destroyer USS Blandy in the left center background. This print features the large "NAVY" block frequently used in official public release photographs during the later 1950s. Official US Navy Photograph, from the collections of the Naval Historical Center. Click on photograph for larger image.




Figure 10:  USS Boston (CAG-1) underway off the Boston Navy Yard, Charlestown, Massachusetts, after overhaul, 26 July 1960. Note the new electronics antennas received during this overhaul, among them a Tactical Air Navigation (TACAN) "pot" atop the mainmast, antenna for SPS-29 air search radar (replacing a SPS-12) atop the pedestal aft of the mainmast, and two SPQ-5 guided-missile guidance radars (replacing the ship's original pair of Mark 25 Mod 7 types) just forward of the "Terrier" missile launchers. Official US Navy Photograph, from the collections of the Naval Historical Center. Click on photograph for larger image.   




Figure 11:  USS Boston (CAG-1) moored at Genoa, Italy, 27 January 1962. Note the large antenna for a SPS-37A air search radar (replacing the SPS-29 first fitted in 1960), located atop the pedestal just aft of her mainmast. This antenna was later moved to a new location, atop Boston's mainmast. Official US Navy Photograph, from the collections of the Naval Historical Center. Click on photograph for larger image.




Figure 12:  USS Boston (CAG-1) at anchor in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, 10 September 1963. Official US Navy Photograph. Click on photograph for larger image.




Figure 13: USS Boston’s (CAG-1) after port 5-inch gun mount firing during gunnery practice, 21 November 1964. Photographed by PHCS G.R. Phelps. Official US Navy Photograph. Click on photograph for larger image.




Figure 14:  USS Boston (CAG-1) underway, circa 1965. This photograph was received from Commander Cruiser-Destroyer Force, Atlantic Fleet, in June 1965. Note that the large antenna for a SPS-37A (or SPS-43A) air search radar is now located atop Boston's mainmast, replaced on the pedestal aft of that mast by a SPS-30 height finding radar. Her TACAN (Tactical Air Navigation) "pot" has been moved from the mainmast to the foremast. Official US Navy Photograph, from the collections of the Naval Historical Center. Click on photograph for larger image.  




Figure 15:  USS Boston (CAG-1) underway in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, 10 January 1967. Official US Navy Photograph. Click on photograph for larger image.




Figure 16:  USS Boston (CAG-1) underway in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, 10 January 1967. Official US Navy Photograph. Click on photograph for larger image.




Figure 17: The right and left guns of USS Boston’s (CA-69) forward 8-inch triple gun turret fire on North Vietnamese targets, during an Operation "Sea Dragon" bombardment in September 1968. Photographed by PHC Al Smith. Official US Navy Photograph. Click on photograph for larger image.




Figure 18:  USS Boston’s (CA-69) forward 8-inch triple turrets fire a six-gun salvo at enemy positions below the Demilitarized Zone in the Republic of Vietnam during her 1969 deployment to the western Pacific. This photograph was received by All Hands magazine on 12 November 1969. Official US Navy Photograph, from the collections of the Naval Historical Center. Click on photograph for larger image.  




Figure 19: USS Boston (CA-69) fires a salvo of 8-inch shells at enemy positions while operating off the coast of the Republic of Vietnam during her 1969 deployment to the western Pacific. Photographed from a helicopter flying nearby. This photograph was received by All Hands magazine on 12 November 1969. Official US Navy Photograph, from the collections of the Naval Historical Center. Click on photograph for larger image.




Figure 20:  "The heavy cruiser Boston steaming home after spending six months deployed to Southeast Asia," 1969. Quoted information is from the original caption, received with this photograph on 12 November 1969. Official US Navy Photograph, from the collections of the Naval Historical Center.  Click on photograph for larger image.

 
Named after the capital of Massachusetts, the 13,600-ton USS Boston (CA-69) was a Baltimore class heavy cruiser that was built by the Bethlehem Steel Company at Fore River, Massachusetts, and was commissioned on 30 June 1943. The ship was approximately 673 feet long and 70 feet wide, had a top speed of 33 knots, and had a crew of 1,142 officers and men. Boston was initially armed with nine 8-inch guns, 12 5-inch guns, 48 40-mm guns, and 24 20-mm guns, but this armament changed dramatically during the ship’s career. As built, Boston also carried four floatplanes.
After completing her shakedown cruise, Boston transited the Panama Canal and joined the US Pacific Fleet. The ship arrived at Pearl Harbor, Hawaii, late in 1943 and in January and February 1944 participated in the campaign to seize the Marshall Islands. Although primarily assigned to escort aircraft carriers, as she generally was throughout the rest of the war, Boston also used her 8-inch guns in the Eniwetok Island pre-invasion bombardment. Over the next several months, Boston took part in raids throughout the central Pacific and supported amphibious landings in northwestern New Guinea.  
Boston continued escorting aircraft carriers during the last half of 1944 and into 1945. As the Pacific war moved westward, Boston was part of the American assault on the Marianas and Palau Islands, as well as the battle to re-take the Philippines. The heavy cruiser also used her guns to bombard enemy targets on the Ryukyus Islands and Formosa, and on the Japanese home islands. Boston participated in the two major naval battles which took place in 1944, the Battle of the Philippine Sea in June and the Battle of Leyte Gulf in October. Also in October, as a member of Task Force 38, Boston was part of the major naval raid on Formosa and she assisted in towing the crippled light cruiser USS Houston (CL-81) after that ship was torpedoed during the battle. 
After completing an overhaul in California during the spring of 1945, Boston returned to the fighting in the Pacific just in time to take part in the final attacks on the Japanese home islands. In addition to her usual duty of escorting aircraft carriers, on 9 August 1945 Boston shelled Kaimaishi on the Japanese main island of Honshu. After Japan surrendered, Boston remained in the western Pacific, supporting Allied occupation efforts until late February 1946. The ship was made inactive after her return to the United States, formally decommissioning at Bremerton, Washington, in late October 1946. Early in January 1952, following more than five years in the Pacific Reserve Fleet, Boston was re-classified as a guided-missile heavy cruiser, receiving the new designation CAG-1. In February, Boston began a long tow from America’s west coast to Camden, New Jersey, on America’s east coast, where she underwent more than three years of modernization work.
Once her modernization was completed, Boston became the first guided-missile cruiser in the US Navy. The major changes to the ship included removing her after triple 8-inch gun turret and its support structure, extensive modifications to her superstructure, and installation of two twin launchers for “Terrier” anti-aircraft guided missiles and their associated radars and electronic equipment. Boston was re-commissioned at the beginning of November 1955 and during the rest of that year and most of 1956 the ship operated in the western Atlantic and the Caribbean, testing her new weapons and training for their use.
Boston was assigned to the Sixth Fleet in the Mediterranean Sea in November 1956, returning to the United States in March 1957. After completing a midshipmen’s cruise to South America, taking part in NATO exercises in the north Atlantic, and receiving an overhaul, Boston embarked on her second Sixth Fleet tour of duty, which lasted from June to September 1958. While operating with the Sixth Fleet, Boston participated in the tense Lebanon crisis which took place in July of that same year. During the next eight years, Boston frequently operated in the Mediterranean, often in the role of flagship, and also participated in exercises off northern Europe, in the Caribbean, and off the east coast of the United States.
In April 1967, Boston returned to the Pacific for the first time in fifteen years, transiting the Panama Canal to begin a tour of combat service with the US Seventh Fleet. Primarily stationed off the coast of Vietnam during this time, the heavy cruiser fired thousands of rounds of 8- and 5-inch shells against communist targets in North and South Vietnam. Although she was technically based on America’s east coast, Boston made two more Vietnam War deployments, one from April to October 1968, and the other from May to November 1969.
In May 1968, soon after beginning her second deployment to Vietnam, Boston was re-classified from guided-missile heavy cruiser to heavy cruiser, reverting back to her original hull number of CA-69. Although she retained her “Terrier” missiles, the rapid advance of technology made these pioneering weapons obsolete a little more than twelve years after they entered service. Boston’s main armament was, once again, her 8-inch guns, of which six remained in her forward turrets. USS Boston was de-activated soon after completing her final tour of duty off the coast of Vietnam. Decommissioned at Boston, Massachusetts, in May 1970, the ship was stricken from the Naval Vessel Register in January 1975 and was sold for scrapping in late March of that same year.