USS Toledo (CA-133) was a Baltimore-class heavy cruiser of the United States Navy active during the Korean War.
Toledo was laid down on 13 September 1943 at Camden, New Jersey, by the New York Shipbuilding Corporation, launched on 6 May 1945, sponsored by Mrs Edward J. Moan, and commissioned at the Philadelphia Naval Shipyard on 27 October 1946, Captain August J. Detzer, Jr., in command.
Service history
1947
On 6 January 1947, the heavy cruiser got underway for a two-month training cruise in the waters of the West Indies. After completing shakedown training out of Guantanamo Bay, she visited St. Thomas in the U.S. Virgin Islands; Kingston, Jamaica; and Port-au-Prince, Haiti, before returning north to Philadelphia and a three-week post-shakedown availability. On 14 April, she departed Philadelphia and shaped a course across the Atlantic. Toledo steamed through the Mediterranean, transited the Suez Canal, crossed the Indian Ocean, and arrived at Yokosuka, Japan, on 15 June. Toledo remained in the Far East visiting Japanese and Korean ports in support of occupation forces until October. On the 21st, she stood out of Yokosuka for her first transpacific voyage and steamed via Pearl Harbor to Long Beach, California, where she arrived on 5 November.
1948
On 3 April 1948, she departed Long Beach in company with the heavy cruiser and shaped a course for Japan. She arrived in Yokosuka on the 24th and began her second tour of occupation duty patrolling for contraband smugglers. Later that spring, the cruiser made a goodwill cruise to the Indian Ocean during which she stopped at Karachi, Pakistan; Singapore, Malaya; Trincomalee, Ceylon; and Bombay, India. After her return to the northwestern Pacific in early summer, Toledo operated out of Tsingtao, China, during the evacuation of Chiang Kai-shek's Nationalist Chinese forces to Taiwan. On 16 September, the warship departed the China coast and headed for Bremerton, Washington, entering the Puget Sound Naval Shipyard on 5 October for her first major overhaul.
1949–1950
The cruiser's refurbishing was completed on 18 February 1949; and she headed back to Long Beach for six months of training along the coasts of California, Mexico, and the Isthmus of Panama. Among other exercises, she participated in Operation Miki, a simulated air-sea assault on Pearl Harbor. On 14 October, Toledo stood out of Long Beach to resume duty in the Far East. For eight months, she cruised the waters between Japan, China, the Philippines, and the Marianas.
Toledo returned to Long Beach on 12 June 1950, less than two weeks before North Korean forces invaded the Republic of Korea (ROK), beginning the Korean War. Ten days later, Toledo pointed her bow west once more and embarked upon her fourth cruise to the Orient and her first tour of combat duty.
Korean War
1950
Toledo made a brief stop at Pearl Harbor en route and continued on to Sasebo, where Rear Admiral J. M. Higgins, Commander, Cruiser Division 5, broke his flag in her on 18 July 1950. Eight days later, the cruiser took up station off the eastern coast of Korea a few miles north of Pohang, near Yongdok. She teamed up with Destroyer Division 91 to form one of the two alternating East Coast Support Elements of Task Group 95.5. From 27 July to 30 July, Toledo, , and bombarded North Korean communication arteries which started at Yongdok and ran north between the mountains and the sea to the 38th parallel north. On 4 August, the task element joined Air Force fighters in a combined air-sea strike on an enemy-held village near Yongdok. The following day, her 8-inch guns, directed by airborne controllers, rendered call-fire for the front-line troops. Toledo then moved some 70 miles north to the area around Samchok where she cruised along a 25-mile stretch of coastline and shelled a number of targets. During that interdiction run, she demolished a bridge, chewed up highway intersections, and generally wreaked havoc on communist supply lines. On the 6th, Helena relieved Toledo, enabling her to return to Sasebo for upkeep.
The warship resumed station off the Korean coast on 15 August and operated with , Mansfield, Collett, and along a 40-mile length of coast from Songjin south to Riwon. After a number of bombardment missions, she returned to Sasebo again on the 26th and remained there until 31 August when she headed for a week of duty off Pohang Dong.