page_title: USS Savannah (CL-42)
section_title: Invasion of North Africa
hierarchical_section_title: USS Savannah (CL-42) / World War II / Invasion of North Africa
caption_attribution_description: Two "Liberty" ships are afire in Algiers harbour, Algeria, following a German air attack, 16 July 1943. The U.S. Navy light cruiser USS Savannah (CL-42) is in the foreground.
context_page_description: USS Savannah (CL-42) was a light cruiser of the Brooklyn-class that served in World War II in the Atlantic and Mediterranean theatres of operation.
  Savannah conducted Neutrality Patrols and wartime patrols in the Atlantic and Caribbean, and supported the invasion of French North Africa in Operation Torch. She sought German-supporting blockade runners off the east coast of South America, and supported the Allied landings on Sicily and at Salerno. Off Salerno on 11 September 1943, a German radio-controlled Fritz X glide-bomb caused extensive casualties aboard and serious damage to Savannah, requiring emergency repairs in Malta and permanent repairs at the Philadelphia Naval Shipyard. After repairs and upgrades, she served in the task force that carried President Roosevelt to the Yalta Conference in early 1945.
context_section_description: Savannah became a unit of Admiral H. Kent Hewitt's Western Naval Task Force which would land some 35,000 Army troops and 250 tanks at three different points on the Atlantic coast of French Morocco. As part of the Northern Attack Group, commanded by Rear Admiral Monroe Kelly, Savannah departed from Norfolk on 24 October 1942, and then rendezvoused with the Western Naval Task Force four days later at a point about 450 mi (720 km) south southeast of Cape Race. The Task Force, including the outer screen, covered an area approximately 20-30 mi (30–50 km), making it the greatest warship fleet to be sent out by the United States up to that time. Shortly before midnight on the night of 7 – 8 November 1942, three separate task groups closed in on three different points on the Moroccan coast to begin Operation Torch.
  Savannah's Northern Attack Group was to land Brigadier General Lucian K. Truscott's 9,099 officers and men, including 65 light tanks, on five widely separated beaches on either side of Mehedia. Their objectives were the Port Lyautey city and its all-weather airfield, the Wadi Sebou, and the Salé airfield.
  On the morning of 8 November 1942, Savannah commenced firing against Vichy guns near the Kasbah, which had been firing on the Army troop's landing boats. She also temporarily silenced a battery which had opened up on the destroyer Roe, enabling her to avoid a disaster. By the next morning, Savannah's 6 in (150 mm) guns had scored a direct hit on one of the two 5.4 in (140 mm) artillery guns in the fortress of Kasbah and had silenced the other.
  During that same day, Savannah's  scout planes started a new phase of warfare by successfully bombing some tank columns with their depth charges, whose fuses had been set to detonate on impact. The scout planes, maintaining about eight hours of flight time daily, struck at other shore targets, and they also kept up antisubmarine patrols. Savannah's warplanes located an enemy battery that had been firing on the destroyer Dallas, and eliminated the battery with two well-placed depth charges.
  This action aided Dallas in winning the Presidential Unit Citation for safely landing a U.S. Army Raider Battalion on the obstacle-strewn Wadi Sebou, just off the airport near Port Lyautey.
  Savannah's scout planes again bombed and strafed enemy tanks on the Rabat Road on the morning of 10 November 1942. Throughout this day, her gunfire aided the Army's advance. Hostilities fittingly ended on Armistice Day, 11 November. Four days later, Savannah headed for home, and she reached Norfolk on 30 November. After brief repairs following her combat missions, at New York City, Savannah steamed on 25 December to join the U.S. Navy's South Atlantic Patrol, arriving at Recife, Brazil, on 7 January 1943. Robert W. Carey was named commander on 17 February.
caption: USS Savannah in Algiers, 16 July 1943, near burning Liberty ships.
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