Never thought I’d actually get to see a battleship up-close and personal, but here we are at the USS Alabama in Mobile Bay. This WWII warhorse protected aircraft carriers and shot down 22 enemy planes without getting hurt herself. Battleships are now obsolete because submarines do such a better job of destroying enemy shipping, but they were critical in WWII. This battleship is over 2 football fields long and is 1/3 of a football field wide.
USS Alabama
As we walked up the ramp to the ship, we saw the monument honoring Marines, so I wanted to honor Barney!
Below decks
First area on this tour was the kitchen. Such a huge mixer!
3 rows of 6 ovens for baking—a lot of bread!
Enlisted Mess. I can’t imagine the amount of food cooked and served for the 2500 men onboard.
Machine Shop
They had to be able to fix anything and everything while onboard.
A couple of mangles were onboard for pressing uniforms. This was in the enlisted area of the ship.
I grew up mangling flat items after they were washed and dried on laundry days so I’m familiar with this machine.
beginning of the enlisted bunks
Three barbers and a couple of assistants worked in the barber ship with 5 barber chairs. The 3 barbers slept in the barber shop—see the bunks on the right?
laundry
Photography room: now we know where all the photos were processed.
This is the Geedunk bar with treats for the men. Barney said on his ships the treats were mainly candy.
See the Old Spice and Cracker Jacks?
Some of the doorways had high rises like this. Wonder how many men tripped over them as they were running to battle stations. The name “kneeknockers” came honestly.
Thought of everything. The spud container was on the top deck.
Garbage disposal, trash was tossed into the top and went through the machines that chewed up everything. The ground-up material finally went into the ocean; bet the fish loved it.
more bunks
Warrant officers are highly experienced enlisted men who are promoted to this rank. They are highly respected in the services.
Now for the Marines’ area; every “major” ship carried Marines and still do today.
We saw these lockers everywhere, but here they show us how each man could keep his clothing organized.
A place for everything, and everything in its place.
Even a place for pictures, ties, and belts. Barney did notice that the belt in the picture wasn’t for a Marine.
bunks for officers
Rifle racks: only Marines had access to arms onboard.
Marines had their own stores.
enlisted berthing
This room would have been full of these bunks for 85 men.
replacements shown next
Every inch of space is used.
Did you notice the curved “wall” in the previous picture? It’s one of the tubes protecting the turret mechanism for the big cannons on the ship.
This is the turret while being built.
more lockers curve around a turret
post office
radio room down below
engine room
more of the engine room
Here’s some info on the boilers onboard the ship.
Barney said that fresh water was so critical to the boilers that if the ship was running low, men had to go without showers.
Now I found this interesting.
Projectiles were stored here.
Then were unloaded individually through this hatch.
See the storage on the bottom left and the pass-through in the bottom middle? Then the projectiles were sent upwards.
This is the device to sent projectile up to next floor where it’s combined with gun powder (from floor below the projectiles in the middle of the illustration), and then sent up to be fired.
fire control area
knobs and controls for fire control
Important info: large guns were kept stable by using gyroscopes.
Shells for the 16″ guns; the taller shells were my height.
shells being sent upstairs
sick bay
General problems could be handled here.
sick bay beds
beds for critical cases
surgery
one of the two dentist chairs
primary radio room
protection against mines
degaussing equipment
Diver’s suit so men could go underneath the ship in case they had a problem.
how the divers were lowered
keeping water pure
finally, more bunks and lockers
topside
This is the real champagne bottle used to christen the ship; now we know why the glass didn’t make a mess when it broke!
belting table
These are the belt holders for the ammunition for the machine guns. The belts were filled on the table below, wrapped around each other, and the holders were taken outside to be put on the machine guns.
Here’s a belt holder ready for action.
long guns!
Now you can see how large they really are.
The view from the front (bow); ship is 108 feet wide.
We were able to go into one of the large turrets to see how the gunners operated (such tight spaces). The only way to see out was through the periscope.
Remember the fire control rooms? These guns were aimed by the solutions calculated in those fire control rooms below decks.
anti-aircraft guns
While the captain had quarters below deck, he spent most of his time on the bridge.
The captain’s room when all was calm.
During battles, this is where the captain “lived.”
This door is to the battle bridge. Look at how thick it is. The opening to climb through was really small.
The area inside was really cramped.
And the sailors’ only view was through these small slits.
We got to talk to a staff worker about how this projectile worked.
a 2000-pound projectile
This small area is where the gunners combined the projectile and the powder and loaded the guns. The noise must have been deafening; plus the doors were closed, and no ventilation was available.
