USS Alabama BB-60

High-angle view of the stern of USS Alabama, off Norfolk Naval Shipyard, Virginia, 20 August 1943. 

USS Alabama (BB-60) is a retired battleship. She was the fourth and final member of the South Dakota class of fast battleships built for the United States Navy in the 1940s. The first American battleships designed after the Washington Treaty system began to break down in the mid-1930s, they took advantage of an escalator clause that allowed increasing the main battery to 16-inch (406 mm) guns, but Congressional refusal to authorize larger battleships kept their displacement close to the Washington limit of 35,000 long tons (36,000 t). A requirement to be armored against the same caliber of guns as they carried, combined with the displacement restriction, resulted in cramped ships. Overcrowding was exacerbated by wartime modifications that considerably strengthened their anti-aircraft batteries and significantly increased their crews.

After entering service, Alabama was briefly deployed to strengthen the British Home Fleet, tasked with protecting convoys to the Soviet Union. In 1943, she was transferred to the Pacific for operations against Japan; the first of these was the Gilbert and Marshall Islands campaign that began in November that year. While operating in the Pacific, she served primarily as an escort for the fast carrier task force to protect the aircraft carriers from surface and air attacks. She also frequently bombarded Japanese positions in support of amphibious assaults. She took part in the Mariana and Palau Islands campaign in June–September and the Philippines campaign in October–December. After a refit in early 1945, she returned to the fleet for operations during the Battle of Okinawa and the series of attacks on the Japanese mainland in July and August, including several bombardments of coastal industrial targets.

Alabama assisted in Operation Magic Carpet after the war, carrying some 700 men home from the former war zone. She was decommissioned in 1947 and assigned to the Pacific Reserve Fleet, where she remained until 1962 when she was stricken from the Naval Vessel Register. A campaign to save the ship from the breakers' yard succeeded in raising the necessary funds, and Alabama was preserved as a museum ship in Mobile Bay, Alabama. 

 

Alabama (BB-60), December 1, 1942. 

Gilberts Operation, November 1943: U.S. Navy ships of Task Force 50 en route to the Gilberts and Marshalls to support the invasions of Makin and Tarawa, 12 November 1943. Ships are (l-r): USS Alabama (BB-60); USS Indiana (BB-58), in the distance, wearing dazzle camouflage; and USS Monterey (CVL-26).

Chief Specialist Robert William (Bob) Feller by a 40mm quadruple anti-aircraft gun mount, probably on board USS Alabama (BB-60) in late 1942 or early 1943. The original caption (released 5 March 1943) reads: GUN CAPTAIN FELLER. Bob Feller, one of the finest baseball pitchers of the era, is all set to do a different kind of pitching these days. As a Chief Specialist, he is the captain of a 40mm gun crew aboard one of Uncle Sam's new battleships. The former American Leaguer joined the U.S. Navy as a physical education instructor and later applied for Gunnery School. Subsequently he was assigned to sea duty and here he is grin and all beside his guns on a cold winter day. 

Alabama underway in the Pacific with Task Force 58.2, circa 1943-44. Taken by a USS Essex (CV-9) photographer. 

The U.S. Navy destroyer USS Knapp (DD-653) with Task Force 58.3, escorting the battleship USS Alabama (BB-60), 28 April 1944. 

An Imperial Japanese Navy Nakajima B6N ("Jill") releases its torpedo off the starboard bow of the U.S. Navy aircraft carrier USS Essex (CV-9) off Formosa on 14 October 1944. In the background are the battleship USS Alabama (BB-60), right, and a destroyer, center. 

USS Alabama en route to Gilbert islands, 12 November 1943; note USS Indiana in distance and another ship in background; photo taken from USS Monterey. 

View of the U.S. Puget Sound Navy Yard, Bremerton, Washington, in 1945. Identifiable ships include (left to right): the battleship USS California (BB-44) in drydock No. 5. She arrived at the yard on 15 February after a kamikaze hit; the battleship USS Alabama (BB-60). She entered drydock on 18 January 1945, and she remained there until 25 February. Shipyard work continued until 17 March 1945; the light aircraft carrier USS Monterey (CVL-26). She arrived in January 1945 for an overhaul; an Essex-class carrier in the drydock, probably USS Ticonderoga (CV-14), which was under repair at the yard from 15 February to 20 April 1945 following a kamikaze hit; the escort carrier USS Commencement Bay (CVE-105) is visible on the right. She arrived at Bremerton on 1 February 1945 for duty as a training ship in Puget Sound until 2 October 1945. 

U.S. Navy ships at Seattle, Washington, on 9 January 1947. Three aircraft carriers are at Pier 91, USS Bunker Hill (CV-17), USS Bon Homme Richard (CV-31) and USS Essex (CV-9). USS Ticonderoga (CV-14) is at Pier 92. The battleships USS Indiana (BB-58) and USS Alabama (BB-60) are moored opposite of the Ticonderoga.