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U.S. Ships named after Minnesota places
The following ships were named after Minnesota places or have Minnesota connections. The information and photos are courtesy of the U.S. Naval Historical Center or U.S. Coast Guard HIstorians Office.
Also see information on monuments, museums, parks and roads.
USCGC Winona, WHEC 65
The Winona was named for Winona Lake, IN, not Winona, MN. It is listed here because the anchor for the ship is included in the Winona Veterans Memorial Park.
The USCGC Winona, a 1,978-ton Owasco class high endurance cutter was built by the Western Pipe and Steel company. She was commissioned as a patrol gunboat (WPG-65) on April 19, 1945.
From 15 August 1946 to 11 September 1947, the Winona was stationed at San Pedro, California, and used for law enforcement, ocean station, and search and rescue operations. She was subsequently home-ported at Port Angeles, Washington, until 31 May 1974. While in service she was assigned to ocean station patrols, Bering Sea patrols, fisheries patrols and other law enforcement operations as well as search and rescue duties when needed. She typically served on Ocean Station November, mid-way between San Francisco and Hawaii, and Ocean Station Victor, midway between Hawaii and Japan.
She served in Vietnamese waters during 1968. On March 1, 1968 she engaged a North Vietnamese trawler, becoming "the first High Endurance Coast Guard Cutter to singly engage and destroy an enemy vessel since World War II." Returning home to Port Angeles On November 4,1968, she had accumulated a number of impressive statistics while serving in Vietnam. She steamed 50,727 miles, spent 203 days at sea, treated 437 Vietnamese, sunk one enemy trawler, destroyed 50 sampans and damaged 44 more, destroyed 137 structures and damaged 254, destroyed 39 bunkers and damaged 27, destroyed two bridges and damaged another, destroyed 3 gun positions and killed 128 enemy personnel, expending a total of 3,291 five-inch shells.
She was decommissioned on May 31,1974 and was sold for scrap. Winona's awards included: World War II Victory Medal, Korean Service Medal, United Nations Service Medal, National Defense Service Medal, Vietnam Campaign Medal (one battle star), and the Republic of Vietnam Meritorious Unit Citation (Gallantry Cross).\
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USS Duluth, CL-87
USS Duluth, a 10,000-ton Cleveland class light cruiser, was built at Newport News, Virginia. Commissioned in September 1944 she spent the rest of 1944 and the first three months of 1945 on shakedown and training duties along the U.S. East Coast. Duluth steamed to the Pacific in April 1945 and arrived in the war zone in late May to begin World War II combat operations. Her bow was damaged in a typhoon on 5 June, but she was repaired during the next month and served in a screening role during the final three weeks of carrier air strikes on the Japanese Home Islands. Following the enemy's mid-August decision to surrender, the cruiser continued to escort aircraft carriers as they covered the initial occupation of Japan.
In October 1945 Duluth recrossed the Pacific to the U.S. West Coast, but deployed back to the Far East during the first nine months of 1946. She again cruised in Western Pacific waters between February 1947 and May 1948, visiting Australia, Truk, Guam and the Philippines, as well as operating off the coast of China. In the summer of 1948 the ship served on training missions in the Eastern Pacific and, early in 1949 was active off Alaska. Decommissioned in June 1949, Duluth spent the next ten years in the Reserve Fleet. She was stricken from the Navy list in January 1960 and sold for scrapping in September of that year.
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USS Duluth, LPD-6
USS Duluth, a 16,861-ton Austin-class amphibious transport dock ship was built at the New York Naval Shipyard. She was launched on August 14, 1965 and was commissioned on December 18, 1965.
The ship was stationed in Vietnamese waters from May 1968 until 1975. Noteworthy during that time is on On April 29, 1975, there were fourteen landings by South Vietnamese, Marine and Air America helicopters delivering over 900 refugees to Duluth alone, including the Italian ambassador.
In 1983 she supported the mission to Beirut, Lebanon and 1994 to Somalia.
The ship was decommissioned on September 28, 2005 and is presently in the mothball fleet in Hawaii.
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USS Fort Snelling, LSD-30
USS Fort Snelling, a 8,899-ton Thomaston-class dock landing ship was built at the Ingalls Shipbuilding Corp and launched on July 16, 1954. The ship was commissioned on January 24, 1955.
Fort Snelling participated in the Palomares Incident recovery operations in 1966. It carried the deep diving submarine Aluminaut for the operation. During the Dominican Republican crisis in 1966, she participated in the extraction of U.S. Marines. In 1978, the ship collided with the Waccamaw. Repairs were done in Naples, Italy. During the invasion of Grenada, the Fort Snelling was part of Amphibious Squadron Four.
The Fort Snelling was decommissioned on September 28, 1984 and sold for scrap on August 25, 1995
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USS Gopher
The following is from the Veterans' Memorial Hall, Duluth, MN.
The above organization reports in the history of the Duluth Naval Reserve about the Minnesota Naval Militia that was created in Duluth in the 1905. Approval was given to acquire a ship. The ship was the USS Fern. She was then renamed the USS Gopher on December 27, 1905.
The USS Fern was a gunboat built in 1871 by Delamaer and Steack. She was commissioned on April 22, 1891 and decommissioned on October 22, 1898. The USS Gopher sank in the Gulf of St. Lawrence on September 21, 1923 while being towed during a northwest gale.
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USS Gopher State, ACS-4
USS Gopher State, a 31,500-ton auxiliary crane ship built at Bath Iron Works Corporation and launched on July 8, 1972. She was commissioned on January 22, 1973. It is the lead ship of the Gopher State class of crane ships. The ship is assigned to the Ready Reserve Force (RRF). It is used as a pre-positioning auxiliary for the U.S. Army and Marine Corps.
No further information is available about the USS Gopher State.
USS Minneapolis, CA-17
USS Minneapolis, a 7375-ton protected cruiser built at Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, was commissioned in December 1894. Her first year's service was off the U.S. east coast and in the West Indies. Assigned to the European Squadron in late November 1895, she operated in the Mediterranean until May 1896 and then spent a month in Russia's Baltic waters representing the U.S. Navy during the coronation of Czar Nicholas II. Thereafter, Minneapolis visited other ports from  northern Europe to Turkey. The cruiser was placed in reserve immediately after her return to the United states in July 1897 but returned to active service shortly before the beginning of the Spanish-American War. During April and May 1898 Minneapolis cruised in the West Indies, searching for the squadron dispatched from Spain as part of that nation's attempts to defend Cuba. Upon the conclusion of the war in August 1898, she was again placed in reserve at the Philadelphia Navy Yard.
Minneapolis, whose powerful engines made her an expensive ship to run, was mainly in reserve from 1898 to 1917. However, she was commissioned as receiving ship at Philadelphia in 1902-1903 and began three years' of seagoing work in September 1903. Following operations in the West Indies and Gulf of Mexico, from July to December 1905 Minneapolis cruised in the eastern Atlantic and Mediterranean. Among her assignments was participation in an expedition to gather scientific information during a solar eclipse. In April and May 1906 she was at Annapolis, Maryland, to welcome the squadron bringing the body of John Paul Jones back to the United States. Employed on training duty for much of the rest of the year, Minneapolis decommissioned in November 1906 and was laid up at Philadelphia for more than a decade.
Recommissioned for World War I service early in July 1917, Minneapolis operated between the Panama Canal Zone and Nova Scotia until February 1918, when she began escorting convoys in the North Atlantic. In February 1919, nearly three months after the Armistice ended First World War combat, she arrived in San Diego, California, for a tour as a flagship on the Pacific Station. Redesignated CA-17 in July 1920, USS Minneapolis was decommissioned at Mare Island Navy Yard, California, in March 1921 and sold for scrapping in August of that year.
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USS Minneapolis, CA-36
USS Minneapolis, a 9950-ton New Orleans class heavy cruiser built at the Philadelphia Navy Yard, Pennsylvania, was commissioned in May 1934. A few months later, she steamed to Europe for a shakedown cruise and in April 1935 was sent through the Panama Canal to take up her regular duties with the U.S. Fleet. Minneapolis conducted peacetime operations, generally in the Pacific, through the rest of the 1930s. In response to growing tensions with Japan, her base was changed to Pearl Harbor, Hawaii, in 1940.
Minneapolis was at sea nearby when the Japanese attacked Pearl Harbor on 7 December 1941. For the next several months, she usually served with aircraft carriers, taking part in raids during February and March 1942, the air battles at Coral Sea in early May and at Midway in June, the invasion of Guadalcanal and Tulagi in early August and the Battle of the Eastern Solomons later in that month. On August's last day, she assisted USS Saratoga after that carrier was torpedoed by a Japanese submarine.
On 30 November 1942, Minneapolis was flagship of a cruiser-destroyer force that intercepted a group of Japanese destroyers off Guadalcanal. In the ensuing Battle of Tassafaronga, she was one of four U.S. cruisers knocked out of action by enemy torpedoes. With her bow blown off, and a large hole amidships crippling nearly all of her power plant, Minneapolis needed emergency repairs locally, and more extensive work at the Pearl Harbor and Mare Island Navy Yards, before she could return to active service at the end of August 1943.
Thereafter, Minneapolis was fully engaged in Pacific combat operations, participating in raids and invasions throughout the war zone. Among her major undertakings were landings in the Gilberts in November 1943 and the Marshalls in January-February 1944, the Saipan invasion and the Battle of the Philippine sea in June, the capture of Guam in July and August, landings in the Palaus in September 1944 and at Leyte in October. During the latter operation, she took part in the war's last major gunfire battle, the Battle of Surigao Strait on 24-25 October 1944.
In the first four months of 1945, Minneapolis supported amphibious assaults in the Philippines and Okinawa. Later in the year, after the fighting had ended, she covered occupation operations in Korea and China, then helped bring U.S. service personnel home. The cruiser was inactive at Philadelphia from early 1946 until formally decommissioned in February 1947. Following a dozen years in "mothballs", USS Minneapolis was sold for scrapping in August 1959.
The ships bell is mounted on a display near the Minneapolis Convention Center along with the ships bell from the USS Minnesota (BB-22). View pictures of the memorial.
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USS Minneapolis-Saint Paul, SSN-708
USS Minneapolis-Saint Paul, a 373-ton Los Angles class submarine, was built by the General Dynamics corporation. She was launched on March 19, 1983 and commissioned on March 10, 1984. This was the first naval ship to be named for a metropolitan area.
She participated in Operation Desert Shield and the Gulf War. She was awarded five Meritorious Unit Commendations in 1985, 1986, 1987, 1988, and most recently 1991 for the ships operations in support of Desert Shield/Desert Storm. The ship has excelled in many other areas during her years of commissioned service, earning the Battle Efficiency “E” five times for 1986, 1988, 1989, 1996 and 2003. In January 1992, USS Minneapolis-Saint Paul was awarded the Southwest Asia Service Medal with two Bronze Stars for her deployment to the Mediterranean Sea and was the first submarine to carry Tomahawk Missiles specifically designated for use in strike warfare in support of Operation Desert Shield/Desert Storm.
The submarine was inactivated on June 22, 2007 and decommissioned on August 28, 2008.
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USS Minnesota, 1855
The USS Minnesota, a sailing steam frigate, was launched December 1, 1855 and commissioned on May 21, 1857. She served during the Civil War and remaining in service until her decommissioning in 1898. The USS Minnesota was named for the Minnesota River and her sister ships were also named after rivers: the Wabash (first in class), Colorado, Merrimack (salvaged and renamed Virginia by the Confederate Navy), and the Roanoke (later converted to a monitor-type). The ship was scrapped in 1901.
She served as the flagship of the Union’s Atlantic Blockading Squadron during the Civil War. The Minnesota is best remembered for her participation in the 1862 Battle of Hampton Roads, the famed clash between the ironclads Monitor and Virginia. During the first day of the Battle of Hampton Roads on March 8, 1862, Minnesota ran aground, and the following battle badly damaged her and inflicted many casualties. On the second day of the battle, USS Monitor engaged CSS Virginia, allowing tugs to free Minnesota on the morning of 10 March. Minnesota was repaired and returned to duty, and three years later she participated in the Second Battle of Fort Fisher. During the battle, nine sailors and Marines from the Minnesota earned the Medal of Honor as part of the landing party which assaulted the fort.
In the Minnesota Historical Society collection exists the Minnesota's wheel and bell. In addition there is a photograph taken around 1898 that shows the USS Minnesota in her last assignment as an barracks ship with the Massachusetts Naval Militia. The ship was just a hulk at that time with all of the masts and rigging removed.
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USS Minnesota, BB-22
USS Minnesota, a 16,000-ton Connecticut class battleship, was built at Newport News, Virginia. She was commissioned in March 1907 and participated in the Jamestown Exposition during much of that year. From December 1907 to February 1909, Minnesota steamed around the World with the "Great White Fleet", in one of the era's most impressive demonstrations of battle fleet mobility. Upon her return to the United States, she was modernized, receiving initially a "cage"foremast and other superstructure alternations, as well as a coating of gray paint. About a year later, she was fitted with a second "cage" mast.
During 1909-16, Minnesota performed the typical duties of contemporary battleships, taking part in fleet operations along the Atlantic coast and in the Caribbean area and supporting military interventions in Cuba and Mexico. She also crossed the Atlantic once to visit northern European waters. Minnesota served as a gunnery and engineering training ship during World War I. Damaged by a German mine on 29 September 1918, she was under repair until March 1919, then briefly served as a troop transport bringing service personnel home from France. In 1920, the battleship was designated BB-22. She made Midshipmen's training cruises in 1920 and 1921 and was decommissioned and stricken from the Navy registry in December of the latter year. After she was dismantled at the Philadelphia Navy Yard, USS Minnesota's remains were sold for scrap in January 1924.
The ships bell is mounted on a display near the Minneapolis Convention Center along with the ships bell from the USS Minneapolis (CA-36). View pictures of the memorial.
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USS Minnesota, SSN-783
The Navy has announced that one of the next
Virginia-class attack submarines will be named the USS Minnesota. Another will be named the USS North Dakota. The USS Minnesota (SSN-783) is scheduled to commissioned in 2014 and will be the 10th of a projected 30 Virginia-class submarines.
The North Dakota and Minnesota will have the capability to attack targets ashore with highly accurate Tomahawk cruise missiles and conduct covert long-term surveillance of land areas, littoral waters or other sea-based forces. Other missions include anti-submarine and anti-ship warfare; special forces delivery and support; and mine delivery and minefield mapping.
The Virginia-class is 7,800-tons and 377 feet in length, has a beam of 34 feet, and can operate at more than 25 knots submerged. It is designed with a reactor plant that will not require refueling during the planned life of the ship reducing life cycle costs while increasing underway time.
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USS Minnesotan, 4545
Minnesotan, a 6649 gross ton (14,375-tons displacement) freighter, was built in 1912 at Sparrows Point, Maryland, for commercial employment. In September 1917 she began operating under charter on behalf of the U.S. Army, carrying animals and other World War I cargo to France. The U.S. Navy took her over in August 1918 and placed her in commission as USS Minnesotan (her Navy ID #, 4545, was probably assigned some years later). Between early September and early November 1918 the ship made a round-trip voyage between the U.S. East Coast and Gibraltar. At the end of November, nearly three weeks after the Armistice brought the war's active phase to an end, Minnesotan began a second trip, this time to France. After returning to the U.S. in January 1919, she was converted to a troop transport, beginning work in that role at the end of March. During the next four months Minnesotan completed four voyages to and from France, bringing home more than 6000 service personnel. She was decommissioned in August 1919 and returned to her owner, the American Hawaiian Steamship Company, of New York City. Following three more decades of U.S. flag merchant service, the now very elderly steamer was sold abroad in July 1949.
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USS Saint Croix, APA-231
USS Saint Croix, one of 117 Haskell-class attack transports, was built to a modified Victory ship design at Vancouver, Washington, and was commissioned in December 1944. After shakedown, she left the West Coast in January 1945 for the Southwest Pacific where, in February and March, she carried troops and equipment between Guadalcanal and Florida Island. Saint Croix arrived in New Caledonia at the end of March, and in May transported Army troops from there to Leyte to conduct mop-up operations in the Philippines. In June, July, and August she made three trips bringing additional Soldiers to the Philippines from New Guinea.
In September 1945, after the Japanese surrender, Saint Croix embarked occupation troops in the Philippines and delivered them to Yokohama, Japan. The following month she picked up Marines at Guam and took them to Tsingtao, China. Moving to Indochina, Saint Croix lifted Chinese troops to Formosa in November. She then returned to Manila to embark returning veterans under Operation "Magic Carpet", taking them to San Francisco in December. In February 1946 Saint Croix sailed from the West Coast and served as an advance station ship during Operation "Crossroads," which culminated in two atomic bomb tests at Bikini during July. Returning to the West Coast in August, she made one more voyage to Pearl Harbor in January 1947. In April 1947 she was decommissioned, stricken from the Navy List, and delivered to the Maritime Commission for retention in its reserve fleet. Saint Croix was sold for scrapping in November 1979.
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USS Saint Paul, 1643
USS Saint Paul, a 14,910-ton auxiliary cruiser, was built in 1895 at Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, as a commercial passenger liner. Chartered by the Navy in April 1898, she served in the West Indies as a cruiser during the Spanish-American War. Later in the conflict, she was employed as a transport, and was returned to her owner in September 1898.
After nearly two more decades as a passenger steamer, the Navy reacquired Saint Paul during World War I, under the designation ID # 1643. However, on 28 April 1918, while under conversion at New York, she capsized in the North River. Though salvaged some months later, she was not repaired during the war and was again returned to her owner in March 1919. Saint Paul was scrapped in 1923.
USS Saint Paul, CA-73
USS Saint Paul, an 13,600-ton Baltimore class heavy cruiser, was built at Quincy, Massachusetts, and commissioned in February 1945. She went to the Pacific following shakedown and participated in final operations against the Japanese home islands in July and August 1945, including firing her eight-inch main battery guns at targets ashore at Hamamatsu and Kama is hi. Saint Paul was present in Tokyo Bay when Japan formally surrendered on 2 September 1945. She supported occupation activities in Japan until November, when she went to Chinese waters, where she continued to serve until late in 1946. The cruiser had three more Far Eastern tours during 1947-49.
With the outbreak of the Korean War in late June 1950, Saint Paul again was ordered to the Western Pacific, operating off Formosa and in the combat zone from July 1950 until the Spring of 1951. She made two more Korean War deployments, in November 1951 - June 1952 and from March 1953 until the fighting ended, firing the Navy's final shore bombardment round on 27 July 1953. Over the next decade, Saint Paul served in the Far East on several occasions, including a 39-month cruise that began in 1959. Specially modified for flagship service, she was frequently employed in that role by both the Seventh and the First Fleets.
Beginning in 1965, Saint Paul made five further Western Pacific deployments for Vietnam War operations. Her eight-inch and five-inch guns were kept busy supporting U.S. and allied troops in South Vietnam and bombarding coastal targets in the North. USS Saint Paul decommissioned in April 1971, following 26 years of continuous active service including combat in three wars. She was sold for scrapping in January 1980.
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USS Ward, DD-139, later APD-16
The USS Ward is not named for a place in it is listed on this page since many of the crew on December 7, 1941 were naval reservists from St. Paul. The USS Ward Gun #3 fired the "first shot" of World War II and is on display at the Minnesota State Capitol.
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