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Saturday 18 October 2014

American light-air defence cruiser USS Fresno (CL-121) 1946-1977

Visiting Amsterdam, Netherlands
Van der Valk/Anefo, 1948. Beeldbank Nationale Archief no. CC Attribution-ShareAlike.

As part of the Juneau-class was she laid down at the shipyard of the Federal Shipbuilding and Dry Dock Company, Kearney, New Jersey, USA on 12 February 1945, launched while sponsored by Mrs. Ruth R. Martin on 5 March 1946, commissioned on 27 November, reclassified CLAA-121 on 18 March 1949, stricken April 1965 and sold to Lipsett Incorporation, New York, USA to be broken up on 17 June 1966. With a displacement of 6.000 tons were her dimensions 165 x 16 x 6 metres or 541’6” x 53’3” x 20’7”. Speed 33 knots. A crew numbering 623 men. Her main armament consisted of 6x2-12,7cm/5.7” guns.

The visit to the port of Amsterdam, Netherlands found place when she was stationed at Plymouth, England between 3 March and 19 June 1948 and found place at the end of March.

The Dutch newspaper De locomotief dated 8 April 1948 reported an intended visit of an American squadron consisting of the aircraft carrier Valley Forge, the cruiser Fresno and an escort of four destroyers to the Norwegian port Bergen between 29 April and 2 May. At the same time this American squadron was cruising on the North Sea was also a British squadron including the battleships HMS Howe and Anson active on the North Sea. The British Admiralty announced however that this was a coincidence and the were none combined exercises planned (Algemeen Dagblad dated 23 April).