USS Gyatt

Gyatt In 1957, with her novel missile system aft
History
United States
Name	USS Gyatt
Namesake	Edward Earl Gyatt
Builder	Federal Shipbuilding and Drydock Company, Kearny, New Jersey
Laid down	7 September 1944
Launched	15 April 1945
Commissioned	2 July 1945
Decommissioned	22 October 1969
Reclassified	DDG-712, 1 December 1956 DDG-1, 23 May 1957 DD-712, 1 October 1962
Stricken	22 October 1969
Nickname(s)	Semper Primus ("Always First")
Fate	Sunk as a target, 11 June 1970
General characteristics
Class and type	Gearing-class destroyer
Displacement	2,425 long tons (2,464 t)
Length	390 ft 6 in (119.02 m)
Beam	41 ft 4 in (12.60 m)
Draft	14 ft 6 in (4.42 m)
Speed	35 knots (65 km/h; 40 mph)
Complement	336
Armament	As DD-712 : 3 × twin 5"/38 (127 mm) dual purpose guns 3 × quad, 2 × twin 40 mm Bofors AA guns 10 × twin 20 mm Oerlikon AA guns 1 × quintuple 21-inch (533 mm) torpedo tubes 6 × depth charge projectors 2 × depth charge tracks As DDG-1 : 2 × twin 5"/38 (127 mm) dual purpose guns 2 × twin 3"/50 (76 mm) AA guns 1 × twin arm Terrier AA missile launcher 2 × triple 12.75 in (324 mm) anti-submarine torpedo tubes

USS Gyatt (DD-712/DDG-1/DDG-712) was a Gearing-class destroyer of the United States Navy operated between 1945 and 1968. The ship was named for Edward Earl Gyatt, a United States Marine Corps private and Marine Raider killed during the Battle of Guadalcanal. She was laid down in 1944, commissioned in 1945, and missed combat during the Second World War. In 1955, she was converted into the world's first guided missile destroyer (DDG) to evaluate the RIM-2 Terrier surface-to-air missile and the practicality of similar weapons.

Her service contributed to the development of dedicated air-defense missile escorts and of later anti-air missiles by identifying flaws in both designs. Her goal was completed in 1962, and she was converted into a floating testbed for radars and other electronic equipment. By 1969, structural issues caused by missile launches forced her to be decommissioned and later sunk as a target in 1970.

Namesake

Edward Earl Gyatt was born on 4 September 1921 in Syracuse, New York and later enlisted in the United States Marine Corps on 28 January 1942. Private Gyatt was serving with the 1st Marine Raider Battalion during the Battle of Tulagi, part of the initial landings of the Guadalcanal campaign. He went ashore on Tulagi on 7 August 1942 and reported the approach of a Japanese counterattack that night. He remained at his post and inflicted heavy casualties on the Japanese force before he was killed by a hand grenade. For his actions, Gyatt was posthumously awarded the Silver Star. The first ship named after the private was USS Gyatt (DE-550), a John C. Butler-class destroyer escort that was canceled before construction began.

Design and construction

Main article: Gearing-class destroyer § design

Gyatt in her World War II-era configuration, much like her sisterships

Development

During World War II, the Fletcher-class destroyers were the main destroyers operated by the US Navy. Yet by 1943, the force had already identified methods to improve the design based on combat experience and further study. To maintain mass-production, a vast majority of the old design was retained aside from several details. The most obvious change was the consolidation of the main battery from six single 5"-gun turrets to three twin dual mounted turrets, thereby adding one gun barrel with half the turrets, thus freeing up emense space on and below deck. This design entered service as the Allen M. Sumner-class.

Towards the last stages of the Pacific War, destroyers were faced with increasingly distant voyages and faster ships in need of escorting. To rectify this, the Sumner-class design was extended by 14 feet (4.3 m) to add greater range and cruising speed. The resulting design became the Gearing-class, the most advanced US destroyer class of the war.

Design

The Sumner and Gearing-classes were the most heavily armed US destroyers of the war. Her main guns were the aformentioned three twin 5"/38 dual purpose guns, allowing her to engage air, land, or sea largets at an average of 15 rounds a minute per barrel. While it was planned that she would carry two quintuple 21-inch torpedo tube mounts, one was removed to make room for more anti-air guns. Due to the constant threat of enemy aircraft and Kamikazes, her nominal anti-air battery was enlarged to include 16 Bofors 40mm guns in quad and twin mounts and an additional twenty 20 mm Oerlikon guns in single ad-hoc mountings. To engage submarines, she was also fitted with 2 depth charge tracks and 6 depth charge projectors.

Characteristics

She had a overall length of 390.5 feet (119.0 m), a beam of 41.6 feet (12.7 m), and a draft of 14 feet (4.3 m). Four Babcock & Wilcox steam boilers produced 60,000 shp and a top speed of 34.6 knots through two propellers. Thanks to her class's extended hull, she could carry an additional 160 long tons of fuel than the Sumner-class ships, which increaed her crusing range by 30% to about 4,500 miles (7,200 km). She was laid down at the Federal Shipbuilding yard in Kearny, New Jersey, on 7 September 1944. She was launched on 15 April 1945, and commissioned on 2 July of the same year by the namesake's mother.

Service history

Early history

After a shakedown cruise in the Caribbean, the destroyer reported to Norfolk, Virginia, for duties along the East Coast. She then trained in the Gulf of Mexico and Caribbean while showing the flag in various South American ports. By 1946, she was reassigned to the 6th Fleet in the Mediterranean and regularly deployed to the region and the North Atlantic for the next several years.

DDG

Since World War II, the primary role of destroyers and screening ships in a carrier fleet had been to provide air defense. Following this doctrine, the US Navy began developing new escort ships in the early 1950s, equipping them with advanced surface-to-air missile systems that promised greater effectiveness than older methods. However, many of these new weapons, such as the RIM-2 Terrier, were still unproven for use on small destroyers. Gyatt was chosen to be fitted with a Terrier battery as a proof-of-concept for the weapon as they were slated for use on the upcoming Farragut-class destroyers. A weakness of early American guided missiles was a slow reaction time and difficulty engaging multiple targets, leaving ships susceptible to simultaneous attacks. It was hoped that having numerous small destroyers would mitigate the flaws, allowing a large number of Terriers to protect a carrier.

A twin RIM-2 launcher, similar to the one mounted on Gyatt

Terrier System

For her new role, she entered the Boston Naval Shipyard on 26 September 1955 and was decommissioned on 31 October for conversion into the world's first guided missile destroyer. Her entire aft - including a twin 5"/38 gun and parts of the superstructure and upper deck - were removed. In their place was the Terrier launcher and a 14-missile magazine.

To fire, the launcher would align itself along the centerline and with the magazine deckhouse. Inside was two cylindrical magazines that rotated the next missile into place, which allowed a loading arm to move each missile onto a rail and push it through a blast door and onto the launcher, achieving a reload speed of 2 missiles a minute. While the magazine took up the entire width of the ship, there was only space for 7 missiles per each arm of the launcher, greatly limiting Gyatt's practicality in any engagement. Missiles of the era were powerful and sensitive, and there was major concern regarding an accidental detonation inside the exposed magazine. To mitigate the threat, it was fitted with blowout ducts and pipes while the inside was air-conditioned. With each launch also producing temperatures up to 3,000 °F (1,650 °C), the superstructure and deck was also reinforced with Special Treatment Steel to absorb the loads.

To manage the weapon, she was fitted a variation of the Mark 37 Gun Fire Control System. To identify incoming aircraft, she was the first ship in the Navy to be mounted with the AN/SPS-49 search radar. Once a target was identified, her MK 25 gun director would track the target with a radar beam, allowing a launched Terrier to hone into the aircraft. She was armed to fire the RIM-2A and RIM-2B Terriers, initial and immature models of the weapon that had a range of about 10 miles (16 km), a flight ceiling of 40,000 feet (12,000 m), and a top speed of mach 2.

To keep the destroyer stable during missile launches, she was equipped with the Navy's first stabilizer fins. The system consisted of two 45 square foot (4m²) retractable fins that extended out from midship below the waterline that mitigated the pitching and rolling produced each launch. To compensate for the weight of the new systems, her quintuple missile tubes were replaced by triple tube mounts and her remaining Bofors were swapped with twin 3"/50 caliber guns. Once refurbishment was complete, she was recommissioned in December 1956 and assigned the hull number DDG-712 as a guided missile destroyer.

Weapon experimentation

Gyatt launching a RIM-2 Terrier in 1957

For the next three years, she was evaluated on various sailings along the Atlantic coast. In recognition of her novel position, her hull number was changed to DDG-1, signifying her as the first guided missile destroyer. She then sailed to join the 6th Fleet on 28 January 1960 and became the first DDG to deploy overseas. By the time of her arrival back in Charleston, her new home port on 31 August, Gyatt had trained with fleets throughout the Mediterranean.

Upon her return, she joined the United States' space program. For several days in 1960 and 1961, she was stationed to recover nose-cones that fell to Earth from Project Mercury launches. As the Berlin Crisis inflamed Cold War tensions, she then joined the 6th fleet in the Mediterranean to serve as an American counterbalance. After her return home, she operated out of Charleston, South Carolina.

Legacy

Her main contributions during the decade was her use as a missile testbed. The ship's various trainings demonstrated the Terrier's application onboard escorts, seeing the system adopted to the Navy's rapidly growing fleet of air-defense destroyer leaders. However, the battery proved to be too large for Gyatt's small hull, as immense strain was placed on her electrical grid, little room was left for other systems or modifications, and the design itself was overtly complicated. The experience dissuaded further efforts to convert destroyers into air-defense missile ships, and the Navy instead opted to convert the rest of her class into modernized anti-submarine escorts as part of the Fleet Rehabilitation and Modernization (FRAM) program. Her weapon tests also demonstrated the need for a smaller surface-to-air missile system, informing the development of the more compact RIM-24 Tartar, which was fitted on the next generation of guided missile destroyers. Issues regarding the Terrier were largely rectified with the larger Farragut-class destroyers as they were the first ships in the Navy built from the keel-up to provide missile air defense. With lessons in mind from Gyatt, the new ships displaced twice as much and carried two launchers and nearly three times as many missiles than her in better protected magazines.

Gyatt in 1966 with an aft mast and fitted with a wide assortment of experimental radars and attenas

Radar test ship

With her original goal fulfilled, she was retrofitted for service with the Operational Test and Evaluation Force in 1962. On 29 June, she entered the Charleston Naval Shipyard to have her Terriers removed and a mast fitted on top of the old missile magazine. The purpose of the new mast was to carry electronics and other experimental equipment so they could be tested at sea. Now designated as a radar test ship, her hull number was reverted to DD-712. On 1 January 1963, she reported to Norfolk and operated with the Naval Electronics Facility and tested new technology, primarily radars and sensors, along the US East Coast and Caribbean.

Sinking

By the late 1960s, her hull began to crack from the stresses caused by the missile launches. As it was cheaper to prematurely dispose of her than fix the hull, she was transferred to the reserve fleet and homeported to Washington, D.C. in 1968. She was then stricken on 22 October 1969 and sunk as a target off Virginia on 11 June 1970.

See also

• Ticonderoga-class cruiser, modern American air-defense ships
• Arleigh Burke-class destroyer Flight III, series of modern American guided missile destroyers built for air defense
• USS Timmerman and USS Witek, other experimental Gearing-class destroyers to not undergo FRAM conversions

External links

• Gyatt Association - Veterans Association of USS Gyatt
• NavSource - Photo gallery of the ship