ERICSSON DD 56

Ship Name and Designation History

This section lists the names and designations that the ship had during its lifetime. The list is in chronological order.

USS ERICSSON Destroyer No. 56
Commissioned August 14 1915
Placed in reduced commission from August 7 1919 until 1922
USS ERICSSON DD-56
Designated (DD) July 17 1920 - Decommissioned June 16 1922
USCGD ERICSSON CG-5
Loaned to the Coast Guard June 7 1924
USS ERICSSON DD-56
Returned to US Navy custody April 27 1934
Stricken July 5 1934 - Sold and broken up for scrap in 1934

Naval Covers

This section lists active links to the pages displaying covers associated with the ship. There should be a separate set of pages for each name of the ship (for example, Bushnell AG-32 / Sumner AGS-5 are different names for the same ship so there should be one set of pages for Bushnell and one set for Sumner). Covers should be presented in chronological order (or as best as can be determined).

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Covers Page 1 (DATE RANGE)

Postmarks

This section lists examples of the postmarks used by the ship. There should be a separate set of postmarks for each name and/or commissioning period. Within each set, the postmarks should be listed in order of their classification type. If more than one postmark has the same classification, then they should be further sorted by date of earliest known usage.

A postmark should not be included unless accompanied by a close-up image and/or an image of a cover showing that postmark. Date ranges MUST be based ONLY ON COVERS IN THE MUSEUM and are expected to change as more covers are added.

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Postmark Type --- Killer Bar Text	Postmark Date	Thumbnail Link To Cover Or Postmark Image	Thumbnail Link To Cover Image

1st Commissioning (USN) August 14 1915 to June 16 1922

Locy Type 3y

USCS Postmark
Catalog Illus. E-38

1917-02-26

DD-56. Return address from USS McDougal DD-54. Cover courtesy of the Jim Myerson Collection.

2nd Commissioning (USCG) June 7 1924 to April 27 1934

USPO Duplex

New London CT

1928-05-04

N/A

Official Business

Other Information

NAMESAKE - John Ericsson, one of the 19th Century's most creative engineers and inventors, was born on 31 July 1803 in Sweden. As a youth, he joined the Swedish Army, which recognized his talents and put him to work on topographical duties. Ericsson left the Army in 1826 and moved to England, where he pursued a variety of engineering projects, among them the use of screw propellers on ships, the development of extraordinary large guns and the creation of engines driven by hot air instead of steam. Ericsson's work attracted the attention Robert F. Stockton, an influential and progressive U.S. Navy officer, who encouraged him to relocate to the United States. During the early 1840s, the two designed a screw-propelled warship, which was commissioned in 1843 as USS Princeton, armed with heavy guns of their devising. The tragic explosion of one of these guns, and efforts to improperly assign the blame to Ericsson, led the strong-willed engineer to redirect his creativity into civilian fields, which he pursued successfully during the 1840s and 1850s. The outbreak of the American Civil War brought John Ericsson back into formal contact with the Navy, when he designed and produced USS Monitor, a revolutionary armored ship carrying her guns in a rotating turret. Monitor's successful battle with the Confederate ironclad Virginia on 9 March 1862 made Ericsson a great hero in the North. For the remainder of the conflict, he was actively involved in designing and building a large series of "Monitor"-type turret ships for the Navy. Ericsson continued his work on maritime and naval technology after the Civil War, producing ships for foreign navies and experimenting with submarines, self-propelled torpedoes and heavy ordnance. He remained active until his death in New York City on 8 March 1889. In August 1890, following a memorial service at New York, his body was placed on board the cruiser Baltimore, which carried him across the Atlantic to his native Sweden for burial. {DANFS}

Five ships have been named in his honor - USS ERICSSON TB-2, USS ERICSSON DD-56, USS Ericsson DD-440.
USAT JOHN ERICSSON (1942-1947) and USNS JOHN ERICSSON T-AO-194.

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