U.S.S. FORT SNELLING

USS FORT SNELLING (LSD-30)

Fort Snelling (LSD-30) was launched 16 July 1954 by Ingalls Shipbuilding Corp. Pascagoula Miss.; sponsored by Mrs. Robert F. Briscoe wife of Vice Admiral Briscoe; and commissioned 24 January 1955 Commander H. Marvin-Smith in command.

Homeported at Norfolk Va. Fort Snelling carried out an intensive exercise schedule along the east coast and in the Caribbean almost always with Marines embarked for amphibious training. She made her first deployment to the Mediterranean in 1956 returning the next year again to serve with the 6th Fleet. During her 1958 deployment she was at sea bound for the island of Rhodes when on 14 July she was notified to land her Marines at Beirut Lebanon the next day. Thus Fort Snelling took part in the immediate response of the U.S. Navy to the Middle Eastern crisis of summer 1958. Several times more before leaving the Mediterranean she returned to the coast of Lebanon to support the Marines ashore. Through 1959 and 1963 Fort Snelling continued her training operations with marines in the Caribbean and on the Carolina coast.

Fort Snelling was decommissioned 28 September 1984 and transferred to the Maritime Administration 7 September 1989. Her name was struck from the Naval Vessel Register 24 February 1992 and she was sold 25 August 1995.

[Note: The above USS FORT SNELLING (LSD-30) history may or may not contain text provided by crew members of the USS FORT SNELLING (LSD-30) or by other non-crew members and text from the Dictionary of American Naval Fighting Ships]