USS Boxer (CV/CVA/CVS-21, LPH-4) was one of 24 s of the United States Navy, and the fifth ship to be named for . She was launched on 14 December 1944 and christened by the daughter of a US Senator from Louisiana.
Commissioned too late to see any combat in World War II, Boxer spent much of her career in the Pacific Ocean, seeing 10 tours in the western Pacific. Her initial duties involved mostly training and exercises, including launching the first carrier-based jet aircraft, but demobilization prevented much activity in the late 1940s. At the outbreak of the Korean War, she was used as an aircraft transport before arriving off Korean waters as the third U.S. carrier to join the force. She supported the Inchon landings and subsequent invasion of North Korea, and was among the ships that provided support during the Chinese counteroffensive against an under-prepared and spread out United Nations (UN) force. She saw three subsequent combat tours in Korea, conducting close air support and strategic bombing in support of UN ground troops fighting along the 38th parallel, as the battles lines had largely solidified by this time. She was awarded eight battle stars for her service in Korea.
After the Korean War, Boxer saw a variety of duties, including as an anti-submarine warfare carrier and an amphibious assault platform. She participated in a number of training exercises including Operation Hardtack and Operation Steel Pike, as well as several contingencies including Operation Powerpack and the Cuban Missile Crisis. In her later years, she served as a pickup ship for spacecraft during the Apollo program, and as an aircraft transport to troops during the Vietnam War.
Although she was extensively modified internally as part of her conversion to a Landing Platform Helicopter (LPH), external modifications were minor, so throughout her career Boxer retained the classic appearance of a World War II Essex-class carrier. She was decommissioned on 1 December 1969 after 25 years of service and sold for scrap.
Construction
Boxer was one of 24 Essex-class ships to be completed, among the largest and most numerous capital ships produced for World War II. She was ordered in 1943.
The ship was one of the "long-hull" designs of the class, which had begun production after March 1943. This "long hull" variant involved lengthening the bow above the waterline into a "clipper" form. The increased rake and flare provided deck space for two quadruple 40 mm mounts; these units also had the flight deck slightly shortened forward to provide better arcs of fire. Of the Essex-class ships laid down after 1942, only followed the original "short bow" design. The later ships have been variously referred to as the "long-bow units", the "long-hull group", or the "Ticonderoga class". However, the U.S. Navy never maintained any institutional distinction between the long-hull and short-hull members of the Essex class, and postwar refits and upgrades were applied to both groups equally.
Like other "long-hull" Essex-class carriers, Boxer had a displacement of . She had an overall length of , a beam of and a draft of . The ship was powered by eight 600 psi Babcock & Wilcox boilers, and Westinghouse geared steam turbines that developed that turned four propellers. Like other Essex-class carriers, she had a maximum speed of . The ship had a total crew complement of 3,448. Like other Essex-class ships, she could be armed with 12 5-inch (127 mm)/38 caliber guns arrayed in four pairs and four single emplacements, as well as eight quadruple Bofors 40 mm guns and 46 Oerlikon 20 mm cannons. However, unlike her sisters, Boxer was armed instead with 72 40 mm guns and 35 20 mm cannons.
Her keel was laid on 13 September 1943 by the Newport News Shipbuilding Company at its facility in Newport News, Virginia. She was the fifth ship of the US Navy to be named Boxer, after , which had been captured by the U.S. during the War of 1812. The last ship to bear the name had been a training ship in 1905. The new carrier was launched on 14 December 1944 and she was christened by Ruth D. Overton, the daughter of U.S. Senator John H. Overton. The ship's cost is estimated at $68,000,000 to $78,000,000.
Service history
Boxer was commissioned on 16 April 1945 under the command of Captain D. F. Smith. She subsequently began sea trials and a shakedown cruise. Before these were complete, the Empire of Japan surrendered on V-J Day, marking the end of World War II before Boxer could participate. She joined the Pacific Fleet at San Diego in August 1945 and the next month she steamed for Guam, becoming the flagship of Task Force 77, a position she held until 23 August 1946. During this tour, she visited Japan, Okinawa, the Philippines, and China.
She returned to San Francisco on 10 September 1946, embarked Carrier Air Group 19 flying the Grumman F8F Bearcat fighter. With this complement, Boxer began a series of peacetime patrols and training missions off the coast of California during a relatively uneventful period during 1947. In spite of manning difficulties brought on by the demobilization of the US military after World War II, Boxer remained active in Pacific readiness drills around the West Coast and Hawaii. In 1948, she conducted a number of short cruises with US Navy Reserve personnel. On 10 March 1948, a North American FJ-1 Fury launched from Boxer, the first such launch of an all-jet aircraft from an American carrier,The first aircraft with a jet engine to operate from an aircraft carrier was the unusual composite propeller-jet Ryan FR Fireball, but it normally flew primarily under prop power during takeoff and landing. The first-ever all-jet carrier operations were conducted on 4 December 1945 using a de Havilland Sea Vampire piloted by Royal Navy Captain Eric "Winkle" Brown from . The first all-jet aircraft to take off and land from an American carrier was a McDonnell XFD-1 Phantom on 21 July 1946 from , but the tests were not conducted under operational conditions. which allowed subsequent tests of jet aircraft carrier doctrine. For the remainder of 1948 and 1949, she participated in numerous battle drills and acted as a training carrier for jet aircraft pilots.
She was dispatched to the Far East on another tour on 11 January 1950. She joined the 7th Fleet in the region, making a goodwill visit to South Korea and entertaining South Korean president Syngman Rhee and his wife Franziska Donner. and at the end of the tour returned to San Diego on 25 June 1950, the same day as the outbreak of the Korean War. At the time, she was overdue for a maintenance overhaul, but she did not have time to complete it before being dispatched again.
Korean War With the outbreak of the Korean War, the U.S. forces in the Far East had an urgent need for supplies and aircraft. The only aircraft carriers near Korea were and . Boxer was ordered into service to ferry aircraft from California to the fighting on the Korean Peninsula. She made a record-breaking crossing of the Pacific Ocean, leaving Alameda, California, on 14 July 1950 and arriving at Yokosuka, Japan, on 23 July, a trip of 8 days and 7 hours. She carried 145 North American P-51 Mustangs and six Stinson L-5 Sentinels of the United States Air Force destined for the Far East Air Force as well as 19 Navy aircraft, 1,012 Air Force support personnel, and of supplies for the United Nations troops fighting the North Korean invasion of South Korea, including crucially needed spare parts and ordnance. Much of this equipment had been taken from Air National Guard units in the United States because of a general shortage of materiel. She began her return trip from Yokosuka on 27 July and arrived back in California on 4 August, for a trip of 7 days, 10 hours and 36 minutes, again breaking the record for a trans-Pacific cruise. She carried no jet aircraft, though, because they were deemed too fuel inefficient for the initial defense mission in Korea. By the time Boxer arrived in Korea, the UN forces had established superiority in the air and sea.
After rapid repairs in California, Boxer embarked Carrier Air Group 2, flying the Vought F4U Corsair propeller driven fighter-bomber, and departed again for Korea on 24 August, this time in a combat role. She had 110 aircraft aboard, intended to complement the hundreds of aircraft already operating in Korea. En route to the peninsula, the carrier narrowly avoided Typhoon Kezia which slowed her trip. She was the fourth aircraft carrier to arrive in Korea to participate in the war, after Triumph and Valley Forge had arrived in June and followed in early August. She arrived too late to participate in the Battle of Pusan Perimeter, but instead she was ordered to join a flotilla of 230 US ships which would participate in Operation Chromite, the UN counterattack at Inchon. On 15 September, she supported the landings by sending her aircraft in a close air support role, blocking North Korean reinforcements and communication to prevent them from countering the attack. However, early in the operation, her propulsion system was damaged when a reduction gear in the ship's engine broke, a casualty of her overdue maintenance. The ship's engineers worked around the problem to keep the carrier in operation, but she was limited to 26 knots.On 19 September 1950, a Corsair and pilot of VF-63 was lost overboard from the USS Boxer.
She continued this role as the UN troops recaptured Seoul days later. Boxer continued this support as UN troops advanced north and into North Korea, but departed for the United States on 11 November for refit and overhaul. US military commanders believed the war in Korea was over, and had ordered a number of other carriers out of the area and were subsequently under-prepared at the beginning of the Chosin Reservoir Campaign when the Chinese People's Liberation Army entered the war against the UN. Battlefield commanders requested Boxer return to Korea as soon as possible, but she did not immediately return as commanders feared it might reduce the Navy's ability to respond if another conflict or emergency broke out elsewhere.
Boxers propulsion problems required extensive repair, so she returned to San Diego to conduct them. Upon arrival, she offloaded Air Group 2, which then embarked for Korea again aboard Valley Forge. After a repair and refit in California, Boxer was prepared for a second tour in Korea. She embarked Carrier Air Group 101. The group was composed of Navy Reserve squadrons from Dallas, Texas, Glenview, Illinois, Memphis, Tennessee and Olathe, Kansas, and most of its pilots were reservists who had been called to active duty. She rejoined Task Force 77, and began operations in Korea on 29 March 1951, and her squadrons were the first Naval Reserve pilots to launch strikes in Korea. Most of these missions were airstrikes against Chinese ground forces along the 38th parallel, and this duty lasted until 24 October 1951. During this time, the carrier operated around "Point Oboe", an area off the coast of Wonsan. They would withdraw another east when they needed replenishment or refueling. A large destroyer screen protected the carriers, though MiG-15 attacks against them did not occur.
After another period of rest and refits, Boxer departed California 8 February 1952 for her third tour in Korea, with Carrier Air Group 2 embarked, consisting of F9F in VF-24, F4U in VF 63 and VF-64, and AD in VF-65.The Sea War in Korea, Cagle and Manson, US Naval Institute, 1957, page 500 Rejoining Task Force 77, her missions during this tour consisted primarily of strategic bombing against targets in North Korea, as the front lines in the war had largely solidified along the 38th Parallel. On 23 and 24 June, her planes conducted strikes against the Sui-ho hydro-electric complex in conjunction with , and Philippine Sea.