LSD-21 USS Fort Mandan
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USS Fort Mandan bore the designation Landing ship, dock, the 21st such ship
in the Navy, thus was known as LSD-21, a member of the Ashland Class for the
first ships of the type. They had the mission of lifting landing craft, or other
small craft, to an amphibious landing site, or simply as cargo. The LSD was like
a bathtub with a low, gated, end that would submerge partially to allow small
craft to float in. When the water was pumped out of the tanks of the LSD it
would rise, and the small craft would sit high and dry on keel blocks or on
their flat bottoms on the well deck. The LSD could also carry cargo by simply
loading it on the well deck using their own cranes, or those on the pier.
Typically this would include tanks, trucks, and other heavy vehicles. LSDs are a
very useful class of ship, and newer and modern versions have been built up to
this day.
The main characteristics of the ship are as follows:
overall length - 458 feet; exteme beam - 72 feet; and maximum draft - 18 feet.
The well deck measures 366 by 40 feet. Maximum displacement - 9375tons. Her
complement for wartime was 17 officers and 309 enlisted men, but in normal
operations for her type would embark other personnel, principally those to man
the lifted boats and those being lifted in those boats to the shore. These could
number up to 160 men with their officers. Her armament originally included one
five-inch, dual purpose, gun, and two twin and two quad mounts of 4Omm
anti-aircraft guns.
Naming of this type of ship is interesting. They are named for land-marks,
especially early colonial houses, such as Gunston Hall, home of George Mason,
and Monticello, home of Thomas Jefferson. Rushmore and the later Fort Snelling,
a name very familiar to every North Dakotan who entered the service during World
War II, were also of this type, and there were also Fort Marion, and famed Fort
McHenry. Early official histories of Fort Mandan state that it was named for the
Hidatsa Indian tribe, but that was later corrected to the proper meaning of
honoring the wintering over sits of the Lewis and Clark Expedition in 1804-05.
Her crews liked to call her "The Fort".
Fort Mandan was built in Boston Naval shipyard, launched June 2nd, 1945, and
commissioned on October 31st that year. thus she saw no service in World War II.
When laid down, she had been intended for the British Royal Navy, but instead it
went to the U. S. Navy, and assigned to the Atlantic Fleet. One of her earliest
tasks was transporting supplies from one base to another on the eastern
seaboard. A highlight was the training cruise to Northern Europe for midshipmen
of the Naval Academy in 1947. She departed from Newport, RI, on June 7th,
visited Rosyth, Scotland on June 21st, and Oslo, Norway from June 30th La July
5th. She anchored in Portsmouth, England on July 8th for a 10-day visit, and on
July 28th returned to Newport. Caught up in the cutbacks following World War II,
she was decommissioned in Orange, TX, on January 16, 1948, but still listed as
in reserve.
The aggression in Korea brought her back out again, recommissioned on October
25th, 1950, and assigned again to the Atlantic Fleet Amphibious Force, where she
engaged in routine exercises along the Coast and in the Caribbean. Her homeport
for most of this period was Little Creek Amphibious Base, VA, near Norfolk. She
was selected to sail in the first NATO Naval Exercise, Operation Mainbrace. This
took her from Norfolk to Rosyth to Copenhagen to Algiers. Then with the
Mediterranean Sixth Fleet, she operated for the next two months in those waters,
and visited nearly all its major ports. She arrived back in the United States on
February 4th, 1953, docking at Moorhead City, NC, and soon beginning eight
months of local operations.
On September 3rd, 1953 she departed New York with other ships to carry supplies
and construction material to Thule, Greenland, for building of the Ballistic
Missile Early Warning Site. For two months she operated in the waters around
Newfoundland, Labrador, and Baffin Island, visiting their major ports. She
returned to Norfolk on October 13th, stopping on the way at Goose Bay, Labrador,
and Argentia, Newfoundland. Four days later she was underway again for Argentia
with more supplies, but back to Norfolk on November 24th. For the next year she
was on training exercises on the Coast, while making another trip to Greenland
in September and October 1954.
Another supply mission to Greenland (SUNEC 1955), beginning July1955, had Fort
Mandan even further north, crossing the Arctic Circle, and visiting frontier
posts along the east coast of Baffin Island, Cape Dyer, Durban Island, Cape
Hiooper Kivitoo, and Ekalugad Fjord. In September she passed through the Hudson
Strait for Coral Harbor on Southhampton Island at the mouth of the Bay. She
visited Eskimo Point and Chesterfield Inlet on the westcoast of Hudson Bay.
After return to Norfolk on October 4th, 1955, the crew was treated to a trip to
Bermuda, taking naval reservists on a cruise.
More routine exercises were conducted in 1956, but once again she headed north
in August, spending time in Fox Basin north of Hudson Bay, and visiting again
the east coast of Baffin Island. On return in October, the crew picked up a
distress call from a motor vessel, the Canadian Lady Cecil, broken down,
drifting helplessly, and in danger of grounding on the rugged Labrador coast.
Despite severe wind and weather, and a small language difficulty of having to
communicate in French, Fort Mandan succeeded in getting her under tow, and took
her 140 miles down the coast of Newfoundland where a Canadian ice-breaker took
over. For this feat of seamanship and rescue, the ship and crew were highly
commended by the Chief of Naval Operations and the Fleet Commander, as well as
others in the chain of command. Fleet exercises followed, but these were
curtailed in November by the emergency situation in Europe then, beginning with
the invasion of Suez.
Both routine and major fleet exercises were conducted in 1957, and from
September to November the ship lifted Army personnel from Thule and Sondre
Stromfjord in Greenland for the winter closing out of operations at those two
locations. More Fleet exercises, then a lift of CBs (Navy Construction Battalion
members) from Bermuda to Rhode Island, encountering a hurricane on the way
north. More training of the type appropriate for this ship occurred in 1958.
In 1959, Fort Mandan served in the Mediterranean with the sixth Fleet. A
highlight occurred on July 3rd while visiting the French port of Sete. While
there an Italian gasoline tanker blew up in a canal running through the town. It
was Fort Mandan bluejackets who first boarded the tanker, entered the burning
compartments, and extin-guished the fire. On return to the united States she was
instrument-al in recovering "Sam", America's first monkey in space. In
November and December 1962 she served as a recovery ship for NASA's Project
Mercury and its astronauts. This followed a six-month overhaul to extend the
ship's life, this being called a FRAM for Fleet Rehabili-tation and Maintenance.
There are gaps in the record during the 1960s. The ship continued operations of
its type, with the Amphibious Forces, under advancing readiness concepts, such
as formation of "Ready Groups" to which ships were assigned in turn,
with embarked Marines and sometimes other personnel and, in the case of Fort
Mandan, landing craft. Being in the "Ready Group" usually meant
remaining in foreign waters for extended periods. Much of the time was spent in
the Caribbean on exercises with other ships, but including visits to virtually
all ports in the area. Anyone serving on board during that time would find much
to relate, but significant highlights are!
a. Relieving USS Fort Snelling off Haiti and standing by during the crises of
1963 in that country.
b. Picking up the scientific submersible Aluminaut from St. Croix in the Virgin
Islands and delivering her to Port Everglades, FL.
c. Receiving a visit by the Venezuelan Commandant of Marines at La Guaira. There
also the ship delivered Project Hand Clasp material to the Venezuelan Children's
Bureau.
d. Participating in naval operations connected with the Dominican Republic
crisis of 1963 and 1964.
e. In 1969, undergoing a further major modernization, with upgrade of radio
communications facilities and improvement of berthing and facilities for the
crew.
Nevertheless, in spite of her readiness and the substantial upgrades just
completed, she was decommissioned from the Atlantic Fleet in February 1971,
having most honorably served during the Korean War, although not in the Far
East, and the most critical periods of the Cold War. Among all ships off the
Navy, she was distinguished for her difficult and successful service in Arctic
regions, a fact that should make her memory warm to North Dakotans. It is a
guess that, other than icebreakers, she spent more time in the Arctic than any
ship of the Navy.
The same year she was sold to the Greek Government, to serve in its Navy under
the name Nafkratoussa, and with that new name the bell became surplus.
Technically, the "sale" was actually a lease for ten years, that
period having expired it is not; clear what her status is.
The foregoing was extracted and rewritten from official records in the U. S.
Naval Historical Center, Washington DC, by the author, and is entirely
unofficial.
