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Photo # NH 98442:  USS Oakland in San Francisco Bay, California, 2 August 1943

Online Library of Selected Images:
-- U.S. NAVY SHIPS --

USS Oakland (CL-95, later CLAA-95), 1943-1959

USS Oakland, first of a class of four 6,000-ton light cruisers built at San Francisco, California, was commissioned in mid-July 1943. After shakedown and training off the West Coast, she arrived in the Pacific war zone in time to escort the fast carriers during the November 1943 invasion of the Gilbert Islands and subsequent raids into the Marshalls. Oakland remained in the carrier screening role as U.S. forces seized bases in the Marshall Islands during January and February 1944, raided enemy-held islands throughout the Central Pacific, attacked Saipan and fought the Japanese Mobile Fleet in the Battle of the Philippine Sea in June, and conquered Guam in July. From August through October 1944 she took part in carrier strikes against the Bonin Islands, the Palaus, Okinawa and Formosa, and in the Battle of Leyte Gulf. Oakland served with the fast carriers for the rest of the year, as they supported the campaign to liberate the Philippines and hit Japanese facilities on the Asian mainland and the Western Pacific.

Following a West Coast overhaul that occupied the first part of 1945, Oakland returned to the combat area in late March. For the next four and a half months she helped protect the Pacific Fleet's aircraft carriers from enemy counterattacks during the bitter fight for Okinawa and strikes against the Japanese Home Islands. The light cruiser was one of the ships in attendance in Tokyo Bay when the enemy formally surrendered on 2 September 1945. During October-December of that year Oakland made three "Magic Carpet" voyages to bring home veterans of the great Pacific War. Though scheduled for inactivation in 1946, she remained active for three more years, serving as a gunnery training ship and making a cruise to the Western Pacific in 1947. Reclassified CLAA-95 in March 1949, USS Oakland was decommissioned in the following July. Following nearly a decade in the Pacific Reserve Fleet, she was stricken from the Naval Vessel Register in March 1959 and sold for scrapping in December of that year.

This page features nearly all the views we have related to USS Oakland (CL-95, later CLAA-95).


If you want higher resolution reproductions than the digital images presented here, see: "How to Obtain Photographic Reproductions."

Click on the small photograph to prompt a larger view of the same image.

Photo #: NH 98428

USS Oakland (CL-95)


Off San Francisco, California, 2 August 1943.

Official U.S. Navy Photograph, from the collections of the Naval Historical Center.

Online Image: 74KB; 740 x 575 pixels

 
Photo #: NH 98429

USS Oakland (CL-95)


Off San Francisco, California, 2 August 1943.

Official U.S. Navy Photograph, from the collections of the Naval Historical Center.

Online Image: 71KB; 740 x 570 pixels

 
Photo #: NH 98442

USS Oakland (CL-95)


In San Francisco Bay, California, with the San Francisco waterfront in the background, 2 August 1943.

Official U.S. Navy Photograph, from the collections of the Naval Historical Center.

Online Image: 89KB; 740 x 605 pixels

 
Photo #: NH 98443

USS Oakland (CL-95)


Off the Mare Island Navy Yard, California, 29 October 1943.

Official U.S. Navy Photograph, from the collections of the Naval Historical Center.

Online Image: 100KB; 740 x 610 pixels

 
Photo #: NH 98444

USS Oakland (CL-95)


Off the Mare Island Navy Yard, California, with a harbor tug alongside, 29 October 1943.

Official U.S. Navy Photograph, from the collections of the Naval Historical Center.

Online Image: 74KB; 740 x 610 pixels

 
Photo #: 80-G-326050

USS Oakland (CL-95)


Underway in Leyte Gulf, Philippines, in July 1945.
Photographed from USS Essex (CV-9).

Official U.S. Navy Photograph, now in the collections of the National Archives.

Online Image: 94KB; 740 x 545 pixels

Reproductions of this image may also be available through the National Archives photographic reproduction system.

 
Photo #: NH 98445

USS Oakland (CL-95)


Plan view, forward, taken from a pierside crane at the Mare Island Navy Yard, California, on 27 October 1943.
Circles mark recent alterations to the ship.
USS St. Louis (CL-49) is in the background, with YHB-21 (ex-SS Tamalpais) partially visible beyond.
Note Sailors sleeping on Oakland's bow 20mm gun position.

Official U.S. Navy Photograph, from the collections of the Naval Historical Center.

Online Image: 148KB; 610 x 765 pixels

 
Photo #: NH 98446

USS Oakland (CL-95)


Plan view, amidships looking aft, taken from a pierside crane at the Mare Island Navy Yard, California, on 27 October 1943.
Circles mark recent alterations to the ship.
Note the twin 40mm gun mount in the lower center of the view, with its associated director and single 20mm guns nearby.
USS St. Louis (CL-49) is in the background.

Official U.S. Navy Photograph, from the collections of the Naval Historical Center.

Online Image: 145KB; 605 x 765 pixels

 
Photo #: NH 98447

USS Oakland (CL-95)


Plan view, amidships looking forward, taken from a pierside crane at the Mare Island Navy Yard, California, on 27 October 1943.
Circles mark recent alterations to the ship.
USS St. Louis (CL-49) is in the left background.

Official U.S. Navy Photograph, from the collections of the Naval Historical Center.

Online Image: 162KB; 600 x 765 pixels

 
Photo #: NH 98448

USS Oakland (CL-95)


Plan view, aft, taken from a pierside crane at the Mare Island Navy Yard, California, on 27 October 1943.
Circles mark recent alterations to the ship.
Note depth charge racks on this cruiser's stern.
USS St. Louis (CL-49) is in the left background.

Official U.S. Navy Photograph, from the collections of the Naval Historical Center.

Online Image: 165KB; 600 x 765 pixels

 
Photo #: 80-G-216804

Marshall Islands Raids, December 1943


USS Oakland (CL-95), at right, and a destroyer firing on Japanese planes attacking Task Force 50 near the Marshall Islands, 4 December 1943. Two of the planes are visible, one in the photo's center and the other near the top.
Photographed from USS Minneapolis (CA-36).

Official U.S. Navy Photograph, now in the collections of the National Archives.

Online Image: 87KB; 740 x 600 pixels

Reproductions of this image may also be available through the National Archives photographic reproduction system.

 
Photo #: 80-G-315762

USS Enterprise (CV-6)
, at left

Under attack by a Japanese suicide plane, during operations off Okinawa on 11 April 1945. She was hit and damaged on this day, but returned to action in early May following repairs made at Ulithi.
At right is USS Oakland (CL-95), which is opening fire on the diving plane.
Note tracer shells streaking across the upper part of the image.

Official U.S. Navy Photograph, now in the collections of the National Archives.

Online Image: 82KB; 740 x 550 pixels

Reproductions of this image may also be available through the National Archives photographic reproduction system.

 


In addition to the images presented above, the National Archives appears to hold other views of USS Oakland (CL-95). The following list features some of these images:

The images listed below are NOT in the Naval Historical Center's collections.
DO NOT try to obtain them using the procedures described in our page "How to Obtain Photographic Reproductions".


  • Photo #: 80-G-65414
    USS Oakland (CL-95) in San Francisco Bay, California, 2 August 1943. Photographed from an aircraft based as Naval Air Station Alameda, California. Altitude 600 feet.
    Port bow high aerial view, showing the ship underway at low speed.

  • Photo #: 80-G-65417
    Same subject, but port quarter low aerial view. Taken from an altitude of 100 feet.


  • Photo #: USN 1045220
    USS Oakland (CL-95) underway at sea, circa 1945.
    Port bow low aerial view, taken from about the height of Oakland's foremast yardarm.

  • Photo #: USN 1045596
    USS Oakland (CL-95) at anchor, probably at San Diego, California, circa 1947-1949. The ship is painted in peacetime "haze grey", with small hull numbers on her bow.
    Port bow surface view.


    Reproductions of these images should be available through the National Archives photographic reproduction system for pictures not held by the Naval Historical Center.

    The images listed in this box are NOT in the Naval Historical Center's collections. DO NOT try to obtain them using the procedures described in our page "How to Obtain Photographic Reproductions".


  • If you want higher resolution reproductions than the digital images presented here, see: "How to Obtain Photographic Reproductions."


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    Page made 6 April 2003