USS Vixen (PG-53)

	USS Vixen (PG-53)
History
United States
Name	Vixen
Namesake	Vixen
Builder	Krupp Germaniawerft, Kiel, Germany
Launched	1929
Completed	August 1929
Acquired	by purchase, 13 November 1940
Commissioned	25 February 1941
Decommissioned	24 May 1946
Stricken	3 July 1946
Fate	Sold into commercial service, 21 January 1947; Broken up, 2005;
General characteristics
Type	Gunboat
Displacement	3,774 long tons (3,835 t)
Length	333 ft 2 in (101.55 m)
Beam	46 ft 7 in (14.20 m)
Draft	16 ft (4.9 m)
Propulsion	2 × 3,600 bhp (2,685 kW) Krupp diesel engines, 2 shafts
Speed	15 knots (28 km/h; 17 mph)
Complement	279 officers and enlisted
Armament	4 × 3 in (76 mm) guns; 7 × .50 cal (12.7 mm) guns. machine guns; 2 × .30 cal (7.62 mm) machine guns; 2 × Depth charge tracks;

USS Vixen (PG-53) was a

Atlantic Fleet

.

Construction

Built as the Orion by

Brooklyn, New York, by the Sullivan Drydock and Repair Corporation

, the erstwhile pleasure craft was renamed Vixen and designated PG-53. Commissioned at her conversion yard on 25 February she got underway for the Caribbean on 5 March 1941.

Service history

1941–1942

During her

ComSubLant), Rear Admiral Richard S. Edwards

.

The gunboat served Admiral Edwards throughout 1941. During this time, she participated in ceremonies off the

Argentia, Newfoundland; and Casco Bay, Maine, before returning to New London on 6 December - the day before Japan's attack on Pearl Harbor

.

Vixen remained at New London until 20 December, when Commander, Submarines, Atlantic, hauled down his flag. That day, the gunboat got underway for

Washington D.C. to commence his tour of duty as Commander in Chief, United States Fleet. Vixen got underway on the day after Christmas and arrived at the nation's capital on the 28th. Two days later, on 30 December, Admiral King broke his four-starred flag at Vixen's main. The gunboat served as his flagship, berthed at the Washington Navy Yard, until 17 June 1942 when she was relieved by Dauntless (PG-61)

.

1942–1944

While Vixen was undergoing the refit which followed, Admiral Royal E. Ingersoll, Commander in Chief, Atlantic Fleet, was laying plans for the yacht's future deployment. "I hope to get the Vixen in mid-July," he wrote an acquaintance on 10 June; "I will then be able to move to spots where there is more activity than here, and where I can see people, without their having to come to the 'mountain'."

Vixen embarked Admiral Ingersoll at Newport on 21 July and got underway for Boston in company with Charles F. Hughes (DD-428). Over the subsequent months, the ship ranged up and down the eastern seaboard from Maine to the Caribbean isles. Calling at Portland, Maine; New London; Philadelphia; New York City; Norfolk; Portsmouth, New Hampshire; Bermuda; the Dominican Republic; Trinidad; Curaçao - the ship's itinerary showed clearly that Ingersoll had mobility and was utilizing it to the fullest. From this base of operations, Ingersoll kept his finger on the pulse of German U-boat activity and the problems confronting the officers and ships under his command. Under his leadership, the Atlantic Fleet slowly, but surely, turned the tide against the Nazi submarines. His close contact with his commanders enabled Ingersoll to know local conditions and thus to deploy his forces where they could be most useful.

1944–1945

On 15 November 1944, Admiral Jonas H. Ingram relieved Ingersoll as Commander in Chief, Atlantic Fleet, and broke his flag in Vixen. Ingram, who had so successfully conducted United States-Brazilian relations during the period when he commanded American naval forces in the South Atlantic, would fly his flag in the gunboat through the end of hostilities.

Decommissioning and sale

Vixen was decommissioned on 24 May 1946 and struck from the Navy List on 3 July 1946. Transferred to the War Shipping Administration, Vixen was sold on 21 January 1947.

In commercial service, 1947–2004

Vixen reverted to her original name, Orion, and operated as a cruise ship in the Panama region.

In 1965 she was saved from the

Cairo, Egypt, and renamed Regina Maris, operating a seven-night cruise in the Red Sea, and later in 2001, the Mediterranean, under charter to Phoenix Reisen

of Germany.

She was laid up in

Alexandria, Egypt, from late 2001 until 2004 when she was sold and taken to Greece to be used as a floating hotel during the Athens 2004 Summer Olympics. She was sold for scrap once the Games were over, and taken to Turkey

where she was broken up in 2005.

References

This article incorporates text from the public domain Dictionary of American Naval Fighting Ships. The entry can be found here.
Lenton, H.J. World War 2 Fact Files: American Gunboats and Minesweepers. London:Macdonald and Jane's, 1974.
ISBN 0-356-08064-1
.

External links

Photo gallery of USS Vixen at NavSource Naval History