The

An O R A L H I S T O R Y

As Told By JOHN BOSIER

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U.S.S. N A S H V L L E

A World War II Oral History Experience

As Told By

John W. Bosier

Chief Machinist Mate, Fire-Room Repair U.S.S. Nashville

Recorded November 27, 2007

At Richland Public Library Richland, Michigan

By Kenneth Baker

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Transcription by:

Kenneth Baker Richland, Michigan

Copies and permission to quote available from:

State Archives of Michigan

State of Michigan Department of History, Arts and Libraries 717 West Allegan P.O. Box 30740 Lansing, Michigan 48909-8240 www.michigan.gov

Recording may be heard at seekingmichigan.org

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Table of Contents

Transcription pages 5 – 14

Ship History Pages 15 - 17

Bibliography Page 17

Oregonian Article Page 18

Note:

The first bold numerals ( 00:57 ) are the elapsed time of the recording.

The two bold letters following the bold numerals are the initials of the speaker.

KB Kenneth Baker

JB John Bosier

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KB For the record what is your name? JB John Bosier, John W. Bosier. KB We are here to present an oral history of his time on the U.S.S. Nashville during World War II. I am especially interested in the time that they were engaged in the War, especially in Los Negros Island. John can you tell me when you joined the Navy? 00:57JB January 1941. And I went to boot camp up to Great Lakes. After boot camp I went aboard the USS Anteries that was a transport and target repair ship for transportation to Pearl Harbor. Got out to Pearl Harbor and I was assigned to the U.S.S. Nashville but the Nashville was at sea at the time so I went aboard the Brookyn for four days then the Nashville came in and I went aboard the U.S.S. Nashville on May of 1941. About the 5th of May we left Pearl Harbor to escort three of those old battle ships to the east coast. Then in June of 1941 we escorted a convoy to Iceland when we took the first U.S. Marines up to Iceland and the Ruben James had been sunk up there by German submarines, in the North Atlantic and also they hit another destroyer the Kearney but that made it back into Iceland and while there we took on the firebrick and refactory off to use on our ship. 02:40KB Those were United States ships then prior to us entering the war? 02:42JB Yes. Right and Roosevelt give that order to shoot on sight any foreign ships. Then when we came back from Iceland we went around to the west coast and made up the task force that went to bombard when Doolittle went to bombard Tokyo. Well they, the Japanese patrol boat, spotted us early so they had to launch the planes earlier than they thought. We, the Nashville, sank two of the Japanese patrol boats and we picked up five survivors out there off those two boats. 03:43KB Japanese Survivors? 03:44JB Yeah. 03:44KB So this is now? 03:45JB 1942. 03:45KB When we entered the war. 03:49JB April of 42. 03:52KB Ok. What happened when war was declared? What happened to the Nashville? Start there then go around. 03:56JB Ok. We were in when the war was. 04:01KB Ok. You weren’t anywhere near. 04:09JB No we was over on the east coast. 04:10KB Oh; lucky. 04:10JB Yes and took that second batch of Marines to Iceland. And then we come around to the west coast through the the second time we had been through the Panama Canal.

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04:21KB Tell me about the canal. So you were going from the West side err the East side to the West side of the Peninsula there through the Panama. I didn’t realize it was that big you could take a ship that size back then. 04:42JB Oh yeah. So we went from the Pacific back to the East Coast the first time and then when we went back after the war started we came around to the West Coast and went into San Francisco and they were making up this task force to go out and bombard Tokyo. 05:04KB Right away then. 05:10JB We thought we were just escorting those carriers. They didn’t tell us where we were going until we were way out to sea. And, they said we would be fueling ships before we made our (unintelligible), on in, and if anybody didn’t have ten thousand dollars life insurance that you could carry that you could increase it because mail would leave the ship when we were fueling at sea. So! 05:42KB How did that make you feel? 05:44JB I upped mine to the maximum. Cause when I went in I only took out four-thousand dollars. 05:53KB OH OK. 05:54JB When we sank those two patrol boats they were wooden boats and our shells – we shot nine thousand rounds of six inch ammunition cause they were going right through em and there wasn’t very big pieces of wreckage left. And we picked up them five survivors and kept em on board. Then when we got back to Pearl Harbor they sent a Marine Higgins boat over with Marines to take the prisoners off and take them to – I don’t know where they ended up. But then we went back out and we were in on the capture and defense of . 06:55KB Ok. When was that? (18 April 1942 added for clarity.) 07:00JB I can’t remember what dates it was. 07:02KB That first voyage, or you know, when you were first deployed you never went to the Japanese Islands, did you. That was. 07:14JB No. They was about six hundred miles off Tokyo. They wanted to get in closer but they wasn’t sure whether those boats got a message off or not. 07:30KB I see. 07:31JB That’s why they shot nine thousand rounds to sink em in a hurry. 07:38KB I guess I am amazed. I didn’t realize that we went after the Japanese right away with-in a matter of weeks and got with-in six hundred miles of the island. 07:50JB It was in April of 1942 and it was mostly a, to get the morale of the people. 08:01KB Go ahead I am sorry to interrupt.

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08:01JB So then when we came back from there after we let off the prisoners then we went back out and started island hopping supporting island bombardment. 08:16KB In the South Pacific? 08:18JB Yes. Then we went up that one slot. We had a miss-fire in our one turret. See, we had a forty man Marine detachment on the ship. At that time the Marines all manned one turret from the powder room the shell room on up. Well they had a hang fire and it went off. 09:00KB What’s a hang fire? 09:02JB It didn’t fire and they opened the breech and then the darned thing fired and we lost our whole Marine detachment, was killed in that explosion. So they decided they wouldn’t put them all in the same place again. So they put the Marine detachment on the automatic weapons, one point one and forty millimeter guns along both sides of the ship. 09:37KB OK 09:39JB But when the hit us the plane came in and he was coming in and his wings were up and down and one wing hit one of the gun mounts and that jarred the bomb off the upper wing and it flew over on the port side of the ship and the plane and the other bomb lit on the starboard side. So. 10:07KB Is that a picture there of the. 10:09JB Yeah. 10:10KB OK. So one bomb, did I hear you right that one bomb on one of the wings went right over the top of the ship and that didn’t impact but the lower wing did eh? 10:17JB Both bombs... 10:24KB Both did. OK. What was the damage that did? 10:27JB We lost 138 men or something. 10:41KB Where were you when this happened? 10:42JB I was in the fire room and when that, we felt a hit and immediately water started pouring in from up above from out blowers and I reached out and tasted it and it was salt. I thought man this thing is going down and I thought nah it couldn’t happen that fast. What happened shrapnel had ruptured the fire main line above us. The concussions knocked our fires out. Because our fire rooms are under pressure to keep the fire in the boiler. We had to go through an airlock to get in and out of the fire room. Well the concussion knocked the fires out. The ship was dead in the water for about two minutes. Well then there was all kinds of stuff coming out of the blowers so I had to go topside with another fella and check and clear our blower intake. 11:54KB OK

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11:55JB And air came down. Well got that cleared and I went back to the fire room. I had to get everybody else out. They had to get out of the fire room while I tested the blowers because there was twenty millimeter shells and flesh coming out. Well I got the blowers tested and we got lit off. 12:21KB Wow, and that was part of your job getting that going again. 12:26JB Yah. I was a fire room repairman. So that was my job. And ah, Then we kept up with the fleet. 12:42KB You were able to maintain enough speed to keep up with them after all then. 12:47JB Yup, then they transferred the; You see what happened we had the Admiralment Staff aboard so they had to transfer them to another ship. But we kept up with the fleet the rest of the night. 13:00KB Could you defend yourself. Was there enough left to defend yourself with that? 13:04JB Oh Yeah cause there was another bomber coming in. Here is a paper. 13:15KB OK an article from the Oregonian, Thursday June 21st. 13:22JB Here is a picture of Mac Arthur leaving the ship. 13:27KB OK Now is this during that attack that he was on that ship? 13:32JB No. 13:34KB Yah. This was during the Philippines. 13:36JB Yah, when he landed at the Philippines. 13:38KB But this here is when you were hit that you were talking about this Oregonian, Thursday June twenty-first. And the guns were still in firing condition it said. 13:51JB Yup, some of em. Cause there was another Jap bomber coming in on us and they drove it away. 13:59KB They drove it off. I see here in the article. So there must have been other men who came up to man those guns for the ones that were killed topside when that bomb came down. 14:15JB Yeah. See our ready ammunition was opened on all our five inch guns so that was exploding. 14:30KB From the fire? 14:32JB From the fire from the bomb; and those guys got that fire put out in no time. 14:50KB What happened after that? How did they repair you then? Tell me about that process. That was way before you went into the New Guinea area then. 15:00JB Yeah. That was after we bombarded New Guinea. 15:08KB Oh the Kamikaze was after New Guinea. 15:10JB Yeah. It was in December of, ah, I can’t remember. 15:20KB Wait, you are right, the thirteenth of is according to this hand-out.

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15:24JB Yeah. You see we bombarded; here is a list of actions. 15:34KB This is a list of your actions. 15:36JB And we got hit with a near miss. A bomb hit near us. Break in recording. 15:46KB Tell us about your near miss then go into New Guinea area when you were supporting that bombardment. 15:51JB We were by Biak and the plane come in and dropped a five hundred bomb but it missed the ship it lit right beside us and it knocked a hole in the side of the ship and we took on eight hundred and sixty tons of water. We put a list on the ship to try and keep that; and then they, we put a temporary patch on with concrete, built a form around it and poured concrete. 16:37KB They poured concrete into the form. 16:38JB And then we went into a floating dry-dock in the . Nobody; Just a couple of guys got shrapnel when that happened so nobody got hurt. 16:56KB Nobody got hurt inside the ship? 17:03JB Just a couple of guys got shrapnel. So we didn’t; and after we got hit we thought we were going back to the States. They run us into that floating dry-dock. That dog gone floating dry-dock had gantry cranes on both sides, they had machine shops, and foundries and everything. 17:25KB Did they pump the water out low enough to get you; is that right. 17:30JB Yeah. They fill the ballast with water to sink it down and they had the blocks for the Nashville, they knew what blocks they needed. Then they pumped the water out and it picked the ship up. 17:48KB There you are. 17:48JB They repaired us right there so we went back out. We thought sure we were going to get back to the States. 18:05KB Tell me about New Guinea, I’m interested in that because the person I am named after. He was killed in 1944 and it looks like that campaign started according to these records, on March the first of 1944 with the Air Force B24s and B25s bombarding. When did the Nashville become involved in that bombardment? 18:27JB Well, I can’t remember, does it list there or not. 18:30KB Well they may call it the Admiralty Islands, that’s March ‘44; that is part of the Admiralty Group. In March of ‘44. They talk of bombard in the Admiralty Islands. So that may have been part of that campaign then. 18:52JB Yup, in New Guinea, April of 1944. 18:55KB OK. 18:56JB Says New Guinea General Mac Arthur embarked on three missions there. 19:02KB In April, Ok I see that.

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19:04JB He was on our ship about three or four times. He liked. 19:12KB Mac Arthur? 19:14JB Yeah. He liked the Nashville for some reason. 19:15KB Was he there then during the bombardment of Los Negros Island.? 19:28JB Yah and actually when the war ended he sent a message to our captain that he wanted the Nashville to take him in to Tokyo Bay. But Truman didn’t want that. 19:41KB Where was Truman from? 19:43JB Missouri. 19:44KB Which ship took him into Tokyo Bay? 19:47JB The Missouri. 19:50KB Did you ever get topside when they had the bombardment of Los Negros? 19:55JB No 19:56KB You were always down in the fire-room. 19:57JB Yeah that was my battle station. 20:00KB OK. 20:01JB When we were going to bombard we had to raise the air pressure in the fire-room because the concussions would take, momentarily take air away. If we didn’t raise pressure in the fire-room you would get a flare back. 20:22KB From the boilers then. 20:23JB And we didn’t have much room between the bulkhead and the front of the boiler. 20:28KB Ok. I’ll be darned. 20:32JB See when we had to go through that airlock you had to pop your eardrums all the time. 20:38KB So when the big guns were going then you would feel that concussion all the way down in there is that what I understand? 20:47JB Yeah, right you could feel it. 20:52KB How long would they bombard at a time what kinda time? 20:55JB Quite awhile. 20:57KB Hours? 20:58JB No I don’t think it would last hours. Maybe a couple of hours. If they were gonna fire the guns they would holler over the loudspeaker they were going to fire the guns then we would have to speed up our induced draft fan to get the pressure in the fire-room. 21:20KB I didn’t realize that.

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21:21JB Well, you see later on the new ships had double encased boilers, so air was in a double encasement. But ours we had just our room. The only air you got was the air from the blowers that you needed for the fire. If you had excess air it would make white smoke. If you didn’t have enough air you would make black smoke. We had smoke periscopes in the fire-room that looked up across the stack and you could tell whether you were making. Before the war we carried an efficiency haze, a light brown haze cause that was the most efficient but then during the war we had to carry excess air so we would have clear stack so that we didn’t leave any. 22:22KB What fuel did you burn? 22:23JB Number six bunker, it was that black heavy oil. Another thing on that ; while we were fueling the last time; see, they wanted everybody fueled up one hundred percent. They had never fueled the Nashville to a hundred percent. And we was taking on fuel and you had guys checking these manometers on the tanks to tell what the level was. Well in our number two fire-room the tank got pressurized. Each tank had an overflow; see, when we were going to fuel ships we would have the overflow tank empty. Then in case a wing tank got full it would overflow into that. Well this tank burst and was spraying this oil over the side of the boiler and I was in that fire-room cause I was a phone talker, (unintelligible), so we had to put on the bilge pumps and get the air circulating. And the ole water tender said boy if that hits the bottom of that boiler she’s going and I thought what the heck are we doing here. But we got the pump going. 23:53KB So it went right down into the bilge then. 23:57JB Yeah and we had to pump it over the side. So what they found out after the thing, we got back to a Navy yard; in the construction of the ship they would test all those tanks, fuel tanks, with hydrostatic pressure and then so they had blank flanges over the overflow line. Well they forgot one. And that’s what happened. 24:35KB That didn’t preclude you from going to Tokyo though you still had enough fuel capacity. 24:41JB No we kept up with the fleet. And at that time they used carbon-tet to clean it up and we could only spend about twenty minutes. We would go down and work and then had to get some fresh air then go back down to clean that stuff up so we could keep going. 25:07KB I bet they do it a little different now days. 25:09JB Yeah. 25:13KB Did you carry marines or soldiers on the Los-Nigros campaign? Did you off load anybody?

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25:23JB No. Our Marines were; we had a forty man Marine detachment. But they never landed. 25:32KB Did you support the people going in; did you have actual LSTs’ and things around you that were going in at this time? 25:40JB Yeah. We bombarded prior to them going in to soften up if we could. 25:48KB How far out were you when you bombarded? 25:49JB Well not too far out. 25:52KB Miles or Yards? 25:54JB Oh; I don’t think we would be a mile out. 25:58KB OK. Were you vulnerable from the island for cannon fire? 26:06JB Well yeah but they didn’t have any shore batteries. We didn’t have any fire. 26:11KB None that they exposed anyway. 26:15JB No. 26:18KB So you went in after the B24s and B25s bombed the island. Your bombardment then was just before the assault of the island. 26:26JB Yeah. 26:28KB Ok and you were part of the task group then and you seen the LSTs and the people going in. 26:36JB Yeah I was 26:37KB You didn’t see them but they were around the ship. I understand that a little better now. 26:42JB See the; we would escort the transports and they had and they was bombarding and they was supposed to be protecting us. We didn’t have any battleships out there for quite awhile. 27:03KB What type of ship was the Nashville then? 27:05JB A light . 27:08KB A , Ok. 27:09JB It had six inch main battery and five inch anti- aircraft guns. And then we had forty millimeter anti-aircraft guns. 27:22KB What was it designed for then? You say a cruiser; I don’t know what a cruiser really is. 27:28JB They was designed to screen battle ships and aircraft carriers, we would be out screening them. 27:41KB OK. So it would be a little faster than the group if it needed be. 27:50JB We could make thirty two knots. 27:51KB Thirty two knots, ok, that’s pretty fast.

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27:54JB Yup. We had eight boilers. Six of them were saturated steam; the saturated steam went to the two superheated boilers to superheat it. We carried four hundred twenty five pounds of pressure and six hundred degree superheat. 28:18KB That was before it was sprayed into the turbine to spin the props. 28:21JB Ah-hugh. 28:22KB I can understand that. 28:24JB And we had four turbines that had four screws. We didn’t have any automatic controls or anything. Everything was by hand. In the fire-room we were firemen. You stood there and watched the steam pressure for twenty minutes, you didn’t take your eyes off from it cause you had to raise or lower the oil pressure to maintain the steam pressure. 29:00KB OK. This is the number six the fuel you are talking about? 29:04JB Yah, and cut in burners or cut them out and we had twelve burners on each boiler see. So and if the guy running the blower throttle; he had to get the air pressure up fast enough so the fireman didn’t cut in too many burners cause the boiler would start going whoosh whoosh, panting see. 29:32KB Oh yeah, starved for air. I’ve seen that with a home furnace once except it was this big. 29:40JB Yup. 29:43KB Was there aerial engagements during this Los-Negros Island campaign? 29:51JB No we didn’t have many aircraft, air protection you know. Sometimes we had two or three of those Marine Corsair Fighters and we thought we had it made. 30:02KB Did you have a observation ship or anything on your ship. 30:07JB Yup we had six observation planes and we catapulted them off. 30:15KB Were they recoverable, could you get them back. 30:16JB Oh yeah we recovered them. They’d drag a cargo net out in back of the ship and the plane would land in the water and come up and then he would cut it when he was over the cargo net they would wave to him and he would cut the engine and there was a hook on the bottom of the pontoon that would catch on the cargo net then we could reel him in and swing our crane out and pick him up. 30:45KB That’s interesting, I didn’t realize that. And you had six of those on there. 30:47JB Yeah 30:49KB Were they Marine pilots then.

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30:52JB NO they was navy pilots. And when we were up in the North Atlantic one plane came down and it was too rough. We usually tried to make a wake to smooth out the – THE END

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USS Nashville (CL-43), 1935-1951

USS Nashville (CL–43) was laid down 24 January 1935 by New York Shipbuilding Corp., Camden, N.J.; launched 2 October 1937; sponsored by Misses Ann and Mildred Stahlman; and commissioned 6 June 1938, Capt. William W. Wilson in command.

Nashville departed 19 July 1938 for shakedown in the . In early August, she sailed for Northern on a good will visit, arriving at Cherbourg, France, 24 August 1938. Getting underway 21 September from Portland, England, with 25 million dollars in British gold bullion aboard, Nashville arrived at Brooklyn Navy Yard 30 September, offloaded the gold, and returned to Philadelphia 5 October.

In the spring of 1939, Nashville carried American representatives to the Pan American Defense Conference in Rio de Janiero, returning them to Annapolis 20 June 1939. On the 23rd she sailed from Norfolk for the Pacific via the Panama Canal, arriving San Pedro, California, 16 July for two years of operations. In February 1941, she and three other carried marines to . On 20 May she departed Pearl Harbor for the east coast, arriving 19 June to escort a convoy carrying marines to Iceland.

From August to December 1941 Nashville was based at Bermuda for neutrality patrols in the Central Atlantic. With the bombing of Pearl Harbor, Nashville sailed to Casco Bay, Maine, where she picked up a troop and cargo convoy to escort to Iceland. She continued escort duty to Bermuda and Iceland until February 1942.

On 4 March she rendezvoused with Hornet (CV–8) off the Virginia capes and escorted the carrier to the west coast via the Panama Canal, arriving 20 March at . Hornet and Nashville sailed, under Admiral William Halsey, from San Diego 2 April, the carrier laden with 16 Army B–25 bombers under the command of Lt. Col. James Doolittle. On 13 April, they rendezvoused with TF 16 north of Midway and set course for Japan. When 1000 miles from Japan on 17 April, the destroyers were detached; Nashville, other escorting cruisers, and carriers Hornet and Enterprise (CV–6) made a high speed run to the launching point 500 miles from Japan. The next day, the force was sighted by a Japanese picket boat, who reported the task force before being sunk by scout planes from Enterprise. A second scout vessel was sunk by Nashville, but the advantage of surprise was lost. The B–25’s were launched 150 miles short of the intended point in heavy seas. Immediately after the launch, the strike force reversed course and eluded Japanese forces, except. for patrol vessels which were sunk by the carriers’ aircraft. Nashville’s guns destroyed a second enemy scout vessel. The “Shangri-La” task force returned to Pearl Harbor 25 April 1942.

The cruiser left Hawaii 14 May to become flagship of TF 8 defending Alaska and the Aleutians, and arrived at Dutch Harbor, Alaska 26 May. She sailed for Kodiak two days later to join other units of the task force. On 3 and 4 June, Japanese carrier planes struck Dutch Harbor; Nashville and her task force were unable to make contact with the enemy due to heavy fog. Admiral Yamamoto withdrew his diversionary force from the Aleutians after the defeat at Midway. As the Japanese departed, they left occupying forces behind on Attu and in the Aleutians.

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From June to November 1942, Nashville patrolled the North Pacific, and participated in the attack on Kiska 7 August in which heavy damage was inflicted on Japanese shore installations.

Nashville arrived at Pearl Harbor 22 November 1942 and proceeded south to the Islands on 24 December. At , New Hebrides, she became flagship of TF 67. After escorting troopships to Guadacanal, Nashville, Helena, and St. Louis inflicted heavy damage on the Japanese air base at Munda on the night of 4 January 1943. Subsequent attacks were made on Kolombangara Island and New Georgia in the next several months. While shelling Vila Airfield on Kolombangara on the night of 12 May, she had an explosion of powder charges in one of her forward turrets, killing 18 and injuring 17.

Leaving Espiritu Santo 22 May, Nashville arrived at Mare Island Naval Shipyard for repairs and modernization. Departing San Francisco 6 August she arrived at Pearl Harbor on the 12th to join carrier task forces for strikes on Marcus and Wake during the next two months.

Nashville returned to Espiritu Santo 25 October and for the next seven months shelled targets in New Guinea and the Admiralty Islands. As the Allies pursued the Japanese along the New Guinea coast, Nashville provided fire support for the landings at Bougainville and Cape Gloucester, . After bombarding Wadke Island, 21–22 April 1944, Nashville provided fire support and carried General Douglas MacArthur to the amphibious operations at Hollandia, Tanahmerah Bay, and Aitape, on 22–23 April. On 27 May the light cruiser was a member of the assault force invading Biak, Schouten Islands, where on 4 June she sustained moderate damage from a near miss while repelling a Japanese air attack.

After repairs and patrol duty out of Espiritu Santo, Nashville twice more carried General MacArthur and his staff to invasions, at Morotai in mid-September, and on his return to the Philippines, for which she sailed from Manus 16 October. She provided fire support for the Leyte landings 20 October, and remained on station at the mouth of Leyte Gulf until 25 October, guarding the beachhead and transports. Returning to Manus for brief repairs, Nashville left the Admiralties 28 November as flagship for Commander, Visayan Attack Force, en route to the invasion of Mindoro. On 13 December she was struck by a kamikaze off Negros Island. The aircraft crashed into her port 5-inch mount, both bombs exploding about 10 feet off the deck. Gasoline fires and exploding ammunition made her midships area an inferno, but although 133 were killed and 190 wounded, her remaining 5-inch guns continued to provide antiaircraft cover.

The Attack Group Commander shifted his flag, and the damaged cruiser sailed for San Pedro Bay, Pearl Harbor, and Puget Sound Naval Shipyard, arriving 12 January 1945, for permanent repairs. Underway 12 March, Nashville departed San Diego 15 April after training exercises.

Arriving at Subic Bay 16 May, Nashville became flagship of TF 74. The closing months of the war found her providing fire support for the landings at Brunei Bay, Borneo, and protecting carriers in the Makassar Straits. On 29 July, Nashville made a brief sortie from Subic to intercept a Japanese convoy reported off Indochina, but the sortie was cancelled, ending the cruiser’s final wartime operation.

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Nashville, CTF 73 embarked, entered harbor 19 September 1945. CTF 73 hauled down his flag 17 November, and Nashville sailed for the west coast with 450 returning troops. Picking up 90 more in Hawaii, she reached San Pedro, California, 3 December, then immediately sailed to Eniwetok and Kwajalein for more returning troops. Nearing the west coast 3 January 1946, Nashville came to the aid of St. Mary’s (APA–126), laboring in heavy seas with engine breakdown and 1800 men aboard. The cruiser took St. Mary’s in tow, delivering her safely to tugs at the San Francisco Lightship 6 January.

Nashville departed San Francisco 21 January and arrived at Philadelphia Naval Shipyard for preinactivation overhaul. Decommissioned 24 June 1946, she remained in reserve until 1950. After overhaul at Philadelphia, she was sold to Chile 9 January 1951. In 1970 she still serves in the as Capitan Prot.

Nashville received 10 battle stars for World War II service.

Courtesy of the Naval Historical Center http://www.navy.mil/midway/ussnashville.html

TITLE: THE COURSE TO MIDWAY

Courtesy of the Naval Historical Center

For Further Reading:

Doolittle Raid on Japan: www.navy.mil/midway/doolittleraid.html

U.S.S. Nashville Website: www.ussnashville.org

Bustin, Steven George, HUMBLE HEROES: How The USS Nashville CL43 Fought WWII, April 9, 2007, Book Surge Publishing, 226 pages.

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Spencer, Murlin, Associated Press War Correspondent; Test of Men Nobly Met When Big Cruiser Is Hit, The Oregonian, Thursday, June 21, 1945

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