July 10-12, Charleston, South Caroline (continued)
.JPG)
Thursday morning we headed back into Charleston to Patriots Point Naval and Maritime Museum – home of the USS Yorktown, USS Laffey and the USS Clamagore. We started by touring the destroyer USS Laffey. The USS Laffey is named for Seaman Bartlett Laffey, a Civil War Medal of Honor recipient, and for the first Laffey which was sunk at the Naval Battle of Guadalcanal in 1942. The second Laffey was built by Bath Iron Works in Main as an Allan M. Sumner-class destroyer and was commissioned on February 8, 1944. While operating off Okinawa on April 26, 2945, the Laffey was attacked by a massive air strike of 22 Japanese bombers and suicide kamikazes. Five kamikazes and three bombs struck her and two bombs scored near misses. Thirty-two of her crew were killed and 71 of her 336 man crew were wounded. During the attack, the crew shot down 11 attackers and kept the Laffey afloat. She was decommissioned in 1975 and arrived at Patriots ...