Ships the USS Helena CL-50, sailed with, during WWII.
Ships named below, are mentioned in a number of the CL-50 War Diary files.


HMNZS Achilles first found in USS Helena CL-50 War Diary for 4 August 1942,


Name: HMS Achilles

Namesake: Achilles
Builder: Cammell Laird, Birkenhead, England
Laid down: 11 June 1931
Launched: 1 September 1932
Commissioned: 10 October 1933
Out of service: Loaned to Royal New Zealand Navy1 October 1936
Identification: Pennant number: 70
Honours and awards: River Plate 1939
Fate: Sold to Indian Navy 5 July 1948

Name: HMNZS Achilles
Commissioned: 1 October 1941
Decommissioned: 17 September 1946
Identification: Pennant number: 70
Honours and awards: Guadalcanal 1942-43, Okinawa 1945

HMNZS Achilles was a Leander-class light cruiser which served with the Royal New Zealand Navy in
the Second World War, the second of five in the class. Originally constructed by the Royal Navy, she was
loaned to New Zealand in 1936 before formally joining the new Royal New Zealand Navy in 1941. She
became famous for her part in the Battle of the River Plate, alongside Ajax and Exeter and notable for
being the first Royal Navy cruiser to have fire control radar, with the installation of the New Zealand-made
SS1 fire-control radar in June 1940.

After Japan entered the war, she escorted troop convoys, then joined the ANZAC Squadron in the south-west Pacific.

Achilles met Canberra, flagship of Rear-Admiral John G. Crace, and Perth in December 1941 to form
an escort for the Pensacola Convoy.

While operating off New Georgia Island with US Navy forces, a bomb damaged her X turret on 5 January 1943.
Between April 1943 and May 1944 Achilleswas docked in Portsmouth, England for repairs. Her damaged X
turret was replaced by four QF 2 pom poms in a quadruple-mount. Sent back to the New Zealand Fleet, Achilles
next joined the British Pacific Fleet in May 1945 for final operations in the Pacific War.

After Second World War service in the Atlantic and Pacific, she was returned to the Royal Navy. She
was sold to the Indian Navy in 1948 and recommissioned as INS Delhi. She was scrapped in 1978.



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