USS Quincy (CA-71)

The third U.S. Navy ship named for the city in Massachusetts, and also to perpetuate the name after the Japanese sank the second Quincy , a heavy cruiser (CA-39), during the Battle of Savo Island on 9 August 1942.

The third Quincy was authorized as a heavy cruiser (CA-71) on 17 June 1940; and laid down by Bethlehem Steel Co., Quincy, Mass., as St. Paul on 9 October 1941.

“The loss of the [second] United States cruiser Quincy ,” Mayor Thomas S. Burgin of Quincy wrote to Secretary of the Navy Frank Knox on 13 October 1942, “is keenly felt by the citizens of this city for which the ship was named. Maintaining the traditions of the United States Navy, our ship went down fighting during the fierce attack on the Solomon Island. She had made a distinctive record for herself since being built here at the Fore River Shipyard. Acting in behalf of our 80,000 citizens, I earnestly suggest that you authorize one of the new heavy cruisers being built at the Fore River plant in Quincy to be named Quincy as a tribute to the officers and men of the Navy who were lost on the Quincy and also in honor of this great shipbuilding city of Quincy and the only city in the United States in which two presidents were born [John Adams and John Quincy Adams]. The spirit of Quincy will never die and we hope that the new cruiser Quincy may avenge the loss of its predecessor and be a definite factor in defeating the Axis Powers.”

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From the Dictionary of American Naval Fighting Ships, compiled by the Naval History and Heritage Command (Quincy III (CA-71)). A work of the United States Government, in the public domain.