USS Lawrence (DDG-4)

For other ships of the same name, see USS Lawrence.

USS Lawrence (DDG-4)
Career (US)
Name:	Lawrence (DDG-4)
Namesake:	James Lawrence
Ordered:	March 28, 1957
Builder:	New York Shipbuilding Corporation
Laid down:	27 October 1958
Launched:	27 February 1960
Acquired:	December 20, 1961
Commissioned:	6 January 1962
Decommissioned:	30 March 1990
Struck:	16 May 1990
Fate:	sold for scrap
General characteristics
Class and type:	Charles F. Adams-class destroyer
Displacement:	3,277 tons standard, 4,526 full load
Length:	437 ft (133 m)
Beam:	47 ft (14 m)
Draft:	15 ft (4.6 m)
Propulsion:	2 × Westinghouse steam turbines providing 70,000 shp (52 MW); 2 shafts 4 x Foster-Wheeler 1,275 psi (8,790 kPa) boilers
Speed:	33 knots (61 km/h)
Range:	4,500 nautical miles (8,300 km) at 20 knots (37 km/h)
Complement:	354 (24 officers, 330 enlisted)
Sensors and processing systems:	AN/SPS-39 3D air search radar AN/SPS-10 surface search radar AN/SPG-51 missile fire control radar AN/SPG-53 gunfire control radar AN/SQS-23 Sonar and the hull mounted SQQ-23 Pair Sonar for DDG-2 through 19 AN/SPS-40 Air Search Radar
Armament:	1 Mark 11 launcher (DDG2-14) or Mark 13 single arm launcher (DDG-15-24) for Tartar SAM system or later the Standard SM-1 and Harpoon antiship missile 2x Mark 42 5in(127mm)/54 1x ASROC Launcher 6x 12.8in(324mm) ASW Torpedo Tubes (2xMark 32 Surface Vessel Torpedo Tubes)
Aircraft carried:	None
Motto:	"Don't give up the ship"

USS Lawrence (DDG-4), the fifth ship named for Captain James Lawrence USN (1781–1813), was a Charles F. Adams class guided missile armed destroyer in the United States Navy.

Lawrence was laid down by the New York Shipbuilding Corporation at Camden in New Jersey on 27 October 1958, launched on 27 February 1960 by Mrs. Fernie C. Hubbard, great-great-granddaughter of Captain James Lawrence and commissioned on 6 January 1962, Comdr. Thomas W. Walsh in command. Lawrence served on blockade duty during the Cuban Missile Crisis in October 1962.

After a shakedown cruise on the Great Lakes, Lawrence proceeded to Naval Station Norfolk for duty in the Atlantic Fleet. Following the rapid development of the Cuban Missile Crisis in October 1962, the warship deployed with Task Group 136.1, a surface quarantine group of cruisers USS Canberra (CAG-2), USS Newport News (CA-148), three guided-missile destroyers including Lawrence and twelve escorts. The group took up a blocking position north of Cuba on 24 October, two days into the crisis. On Friday the 26, Lawrence and MacDonough (DLG-8) began shadowing Grozny, a tanker proceeding towards Cuba. The next day, the Soviet Union agreed to defuse the crisis and military forces on both sides began standing down.

After returning to Norfolk on 6 December 1962, Lawrence began the first of many Mediterranean cruises on 6 February 1963, steaming across the Atlantic to join the Sixth Fleet for operations in European waters, where she remained until 1 July. Following a second Mediterranean deployment between April and August 1964, the warship received an extensive overhaul in Norfolk over the ensuing winter. Before the end of the decade she conducted four more cruises; a Sixth Fleet deployment in 1965 (24 August to 17 December), a NATO exercise in the North Atlantic in 1966 (3 August to 5 September), another Mediterranean tour in 1966-67 (27 September to 1 February) and a third Sixth Fleet cruise in 1968 (10 January to 4 May). During her fourth Mediterranean deployment, Lawrence helped rescue crewmen from the sinking merchant vessel New Meadow, in distress off the coast of Crete.

Following two additional Mediterranean deployments, one in 1969-70 and another in 1971, the much-traveled destroyer made one Vietnam War tour in the Western Pacific in 1972-73, providing naval gunfire support, dodging enemy return fire and serving as plane guard during aircraft carrier operations. During her Vietnam tour, her reduction gears were sabotaged, forcing a return for repairs. Following those repairs in the summer of 1973, she took several NROTC midshipmen aboard and sailed to to the Caribbean for gunnery re-qualification. At the time, she was affectionately known as the "Leaky Larry" by her crew. Two more Sixth Fleet cruises followed in 1977-78 and 1979, and during the latter she briefly visited the Black Sea. Lawrence also passed through the Mediterranean en route to the Indian Ocean and Persian Gulf, deployments that took place in 1974-75, 1980 and 1983-84.

Lawrence also saw frequent service closer to home, in the western Atlantic and Caribbean, and occasionally visited other waters. In 1986 she steamed around South America as part of Operation Unitas XVII, exercising with Latin American navies and visiting ports in Venezuela, Colombia, Ecuador, Peru, Chile, Uruguay and Brazil.

Lawrence was decommissioned on 30 March 1990, stricken from the Naval Vessel Register on 16 May 1990, and sold for scrap on 15 April 1994. The scrap contract was terminated on 1 October 1996 and resold on 10 February 1999.

References

• This article includes text from the public domain Dictionary of American Naval Fighting Ships. The entry can be found here.
• This article includes information collected from the Naval Vessel Register, which, as a U.S. government publication, is in the public domain. The entry can be found here.

External links

• MaritimeQuest USS Lawrence DDG-4 pages