USS George C. Marshall (SSBN 654)

- decommissioned -

USS GEORGE C. MARSHALL was one of the BENJAMIN FRANKLIN - class nuclear powered fleet ballistic missile submarines. Generally similar to the LAFAYETTE - class, the twelve BENJAMIN FRANKLIN - class submarines had a quieter machinery design, and were thus considered a separate class. USS GEORGE C. MARSHALL was the first ship in the Navy to bear the name.

Decommissioned and stricken from the Navy list on September 24, 1992, the GEORGE C. MARSHALL was adjacently disposed of through the Nuclear Powered Ship and Submarine Recycling Program at the Puget Sound Naval Shipyard, Bremerton, Wash. Recycling was completed on February 28, 1994.

General Characteristics:

Awarded: July 29, 1963

Keel laid: March 2, 1964

Launched: May 21, 1965

Commissioned: April 29, 1966

Decommissioned: September 24, 1992

Builder: Newport News Shipbuilding & Dry Dock Co., Newport News, Va.

Propulsion system: one S5W nuclear reactor

Propellers: one

Length: 425 feet (129.6 meters)

Beam: 33 feet (10 meters)

Draft: 31.5 feet (9.6 meters)

Displacement:

Surfaced: approx. 7,250 tons
Submerged: approx. 8,250 tons

Speed:

Surfaced: 16 - 20 knots
Submerged: 22 - 25 knots

Armament: 16 vertical tubes for Polaris or Poseidon missiles, four 21" torpedo tubes for Mk-48 torpedoes, Mk-14/16 torpedoes, Mk-37 torpedoes and Mk-45 nuclear torpedoes

Crew: 13 Officers and 130 Enlisted (two crews)

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Crew List:

This section contains the names of sailors who served aboard USS GEORGE C. MARSHALL. It is no official listing but contains the names of sailors who submitted their information.

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About the Ship's Name:

George Catlett Marshall, born at Uniontown, Pa., 31 December 1880, was commissioned Second Lieutenant 2 February 1901 upon graduation from the Virginia Military Institute. After serving in the Philippines from 1902 to 1903 and at various posts in the Western United States, he went to the Army Staff College at Fort Leavenworth, Kansas, in 1908. Graduating at the head of his class, he instructed in the school until 1910.

Assignments with the Massachusetts National Guard and the 4th Infantry in Arkansas and Texas preceded his return to the Philippines in 1913. There his brilliance on maneuvers won him prophetic praise from General James Franklin Bell, who called him: "one of those rare men who live and dream in their profession - a soldier who is not satisfied with daily duty superbly done....the greatest military genius of America since Stonewall Jackson."

When the United States entered World War I, Marshall accompanied the 1st Division to France in July 1917. In the summer of 1918, he was transferred to the A.E.F. Headquarters where he helped to formulate plans for the St. Mihiel offensive and to transfer some 500,000 troops to the Argonne front in 2 weeks without the enemy's knowledge. In October Marshall became Chief of Operations of the 1st Army during the final action on the Meuse-Argonne sector, which helped greatly to force Germany to capitulate.

Outstanding service in a number of important assignments during the years between the wars won Marshall appointment as Chief of Staff of the Army in September 1939 when Nazi aggression plunged the world into World War II. He directed the mobilization of an army of some 10 million men which operated with the Navy and Allied forces in crushing the Axis powers. He was appointed General of the Army 16 December 1944.

After World War II, Marshall served as Secretary of State from 21 January 1945 to 21 January 1949 and was Secretary of Defense from 12 September 1950 to 12 September 1951. He died in Washington 16 October 1959.

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