USS Beatty (DD-640)

USS Beatty (DD-640)

For other ships of the same name, see USS Beatty.

Career
Builder:	Charleston Navy Yard
Laid down:	1 May 1941
Launched:	20 December 1941
Commissioned:	7 May 1942
Fate:	Sunk by German aircraft, off Algeria, 6 November 1943
General characteristics
Class & type:	Gleaves-class destroyer
Displacement:	2,060 tons
Length:	348 ft 3 in (106.15 m)
Beam:	36 ft 1 in (11.00 m)
Draft:	11 ft 10 in (3.61 m)
Propulsion:	50,000 shp (37 MW) 4 boilers 2 propellers
Speed:	37.4 knots (69 km/h)
Range:	6,500 nautical miles at 12 knots (12,000 km at 22 km/h)
Complement:	16 officers, 260 enlisted
Armament:	4 × 5-in (127 mm)/ 38 caliber DP guns, 4 × Bofors 40 mm guns (2×2), 5 × Oerlikon 20 mm cannons (5×1), 5 × 21-inch (533 mm) torpedo tubes (1×5; 5 Mark 15 torpedos), 6 × depth charge projectors, 2 × depth charge tracks

USS Beatty (DD-640), a Gleaves-class destroyer, was the first ship of the United States Navy to be named for Rear Admiral Frank E. Beatty.

Beatty was laid down as Mullany on 1 May 1941 at the Charleston Navy Yard.

The name "Beatty" was originally assigned to a destroyer scheduled to be built in San Francisco, but the names of DD-528 and DD-640 were switched on 28 May 1941 to accommodate Mrs. Charles H. Drayton, the daughter of the late Rear Admiral, who had asked that the ship honoring her father be built at the Charleston Navy Yard. Sponsored by Mrs. Drayton, Beatty was launched on 20 December 1941, and commissioned on 7 May 1942, Lieutenant Commander Frederick C. Stelter, Jr., in command.