USS Wadleigh (DD-689)
USS Wadleigh (DD-689) Underway, c. 1951.
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| History | |
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 United States
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| Name: | USS Wadleigh (DD-689) |
| Namesake: | George H. Wadleigh |
| Laid down: | 5 April 1943 |
| Launched: | 7 August 1943 |
| Commissioned: | 19 October 1943 |
| Decommissioned: | 28 June 1962 |
| Struck: | 1 September 1975 |
| Fate: | Transferred to Chile, 26 July 1962 |
| History | |
 Chile
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| Name: | Blanco Encalada |
| Acquired: | 26 July 1962 |
| Decommissioned: | 1982 |
| Struck: | 1982 |
| Fate: | Sunk as target 28 September 1991 |
| General characteristics | |
| Class and type: | Fletcher-class destroyer |
| Displacement: | 2,050 tons |
| Length: | 376.4 ft (114.7 m) |
| Beam: | 39.6 ft (12.1 m) |
| Draft: | 13.8 ft (4.2 m) |
| Propulsion: |
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| Speed: | 38 knots (70 km/h) |
| Range: |
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| Complement: | 329 |
| Armament: |
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USS Wadleigh (DD-689) was a Fletcher-class destroyer of the United States Navy, named for Rear Admiral George H. Wadleigh (1842–1927).
Wadleigh was laid down on 5 April 1943 at Bath, Maine, by the Bath Iron Works; launched on 7 August 1943; sponsored by Miss Clara F. Wadleigh, daughter of RAdm. Wadleigh; and commissioned at the Boston Navy Yard on 19 October 1943, Lieutenant Commander Walter C. Winn in command.
Following shakedown training in the West Indies, Wadleigh rendezvoused in the mid-Atlantic with Iowa, Halsey Powell, and Marshall. The three destroyers escorted the battleship as she carried president Franklin D. Roosevelt back to the United States from talks with other Allied leaders at the Cairo Conference.
Soon after her return from this special escort duty, Wadleigh got underway from Hampton Roads, Virginia, on 3 January 1944 and steamed via Panama to Pearl Harbor.
Her baptism of fire came on 20 March 1944 during the Marshall Islands campaign. Assigned shore-bombardment duties, Wadleigh—in company with McCalla and Sage —supported LCIs and LSTs during the landings on Ailinglapalap and expended 478 rounds of 5 inch shells which destroyed an enemy-held village. Three days later, the new destroyer again took part in shooting up Japanese defenses, shelling a weather station and a radio station on Ebon Island, helping to clear the way for the 1,500 marines who soon took the island.
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