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USS Semmes (DDG 18)

USS SEMMES - the second ship in the Navy to bear the name - was the 17th ship in the CHARLES F. ADAMS - class of guided missile destroyers. She was stricken from the navy list on September 13, 1991, and transferred to Greece the same day. There, SEMMES was recommissioned as KIMON and remained in service until 2004.

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Crew List:

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

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Accidents aboard USS SEMMES:

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About the Ship's Name:

A naval hero for all the South, Raphael Semmes (1809-1877) sailed two famous Confederate raiders. He outfitted CSS SUMTER in 1861 and captured 18 Union merchant ships in six months before the raider was blockaded at Gibraltar. Next he took command of CSS ALABAMA, an English-built raider, and terrorized U.S. merchant vessels on the high seas from August 1862 until the raider was sunk by USS KEARSARGE in a sea battle off Cherbourg in June 1864. During that two-year period, Semmes captured more enemy merchant ships than had any other cruiser captain in maritime history. He is considered one of the greatest ship's commanders that America has produced.

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USS SEMMES History:

USS SEMMES entered commissioned service on December 10, 1962, and quickly settled into Atlantic and Caribbean exercises from Charleston, South Carolina, before striking north for NATO's "Masterstroke/Teamwork" in the Norwegian Sea, where she crossed the Arctic Circle on September 22, 1964. Two months later, on November 28, 1964, she began her first Sixth Fleet deployment in the Mediterranean amid Cold War stability operations and returned in early 1965 to support U.S. sea control and crisis response during the Dominican Republic intervention of spring 1965.

After a second Mediterranean tour from February to July 1966, she shifted home port to Norfolk on August 1, 1966, entered major overhaul at Norfolk Naval Shipyard, then resumed refresher training in the Caribbean in April 1967 and deployed again to the Mediterranean in August 1967, remaining with NATO and Sixth Fleet task groups into January 1968, before coming home on January 31.

She sailed east again on June 10, 1968, visiting Germany and Denmark and then rejoining the Sixth Fleet. On November 15, at Rota, Spain, she turned over to another destroyer and reached Charleston late in the month to close out the year in port. Through January and April 1969, she alternated between anti-submarine warfare work and "Springboard" evolutions in the Puerto Rico operating areas and Second Fleet exercises, then crossed the Atlantic in late September 1969 for another Mediterranean tour that was interrupted on February 10, 1970, when, moored at Naples, she was struck by the Greek freighter SS MAUTRIC. Alongside repair ship YELLOWSTONE (AD 27) and in company with SAMUEL B. ROBERTS (DD 823) and CHARLES F. ADAMS (DDG 2), emergency repairs were completed within days, allowing SEMMES to resume operations and proceed to Barcelona for mid-March turnover with CONYNGHAM (DDG 17), depart the Mediterranean on March 18, and return to Charleston on March 28.

In 1971, she repeated the pattern of East Coast and Caribbean training punctuated by a summer-to-autumn Sixth Fleet deployment (July 16-October 11), adding post-deployment visits to the Netherlands and Denmark for bilateral and NATO work. She entered Charleston Naval Shipyard in January 1972, for conversion to Navy distillate fuel oil, returned to sea in spring 1972, and in September steamed back above the Arctic Circle during NATO "Strong Express", followed by port calls in Norway and Denmark and a return to Charleston in October, then further Caribbean training in November and pre-deployment preparations in December.

On January 4, 1973, she sailed for Portsmouth, England (arriving January 15) to embark a seven-month assignment with NATO's Standing Naval Force Atlantic. During that tour she ranged both sides of the Atlantic and took part in "Sunny Seas" (January-February), Canadian MARCOT 2/73 (April-May), and "Midnight Sun" (June) before shifting back under Second Fleet control on July 1 and mooring at Charleston on July 9. After a summer stand-down she closed the year with "Fun in the Sun" and LANTREADEX 2-74 and entered preparations for overhaul on December 19.

In the later 1970s her Atlantic focus broadened: in 1977 the ship executed a documented Baltic and Black Sea cruise that combined diplomacy and sea-control presence typical of the detente era, including calls in Spain, Greece, Germany, Sweden, France, and Belgium, and transits that demonstrated allied access in constrained northern and southern European waters. The ship remained active with NATO groups and U.S. carrier and amphibious task units into the early 1980s, and in 1983 - amid a year marked by crises in the Caribbean and Levant - she contributed to the Grenada operation (Operation Urgent Fury) by providing simulated naval gunfire support alongside BOONE (FFG 28) during the landings in October, a measure used to shape enemy behavior and deconflict fires near friendly troops and populated areas. One month later, on November 1, 1983, she is recorded alongside the amphibious assault ship GUADALCANAL (LPH 7) during Exercise AHUAS TARA II off Honduras, part of joint U.S.-Honduran training intended to bolster regional defense capacity during the Central American conflicts.

In the mid-1980s, SEMMES shifted eastward again. From July 6 to November 4, 1986, she served with the Middle East Force in the Red Sea-Arabian Sea-Persian Gulf arcs at the height of the Iran-Iraq War's "Tanker War", performing presence, escort screening, and regional engagement while U.S. naval forces worked to deter attacks on merchant shipping and manage risk in straits and narrow seas. The ship's late-1980s Mediterranean work included close operations with carrier and logistics groups - on June 16, 1988, she is photographed taking fuel alongside MILWAUKEE (AOR 2) while screening FORRESTAL (CV 59) during a Sixth Fleet period marked by frequent NATO exercises and extended at-sea stretches that reflected the tempo of the final Cold War years. Having spent nearly three decades as an Atlantic Fleet and NATO destroyer - repeatedly cycling through independent port visits, multi-ship air defense and ASW exercises, and periodic shipyard availabilities that kept her combat systems and engineering current enough for the era - SEMMES was decommissioned and stricken on April 14, 1991. Transferred to Greece on September 13, 1991, she served the Hellenic Navy as KIMON (D 218) through June 17, 2004, was then placed in reserve at Souda Bay, Crete, and was ultimately scrapped in 2006, closing the career of a CHARLES F. ADAMS-class.

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Homeports of USS SEMMES:

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USS SEMMES Image Gallery:

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