BAD, Maine — With an Irish flag flying and bagpipes playing, three sisters of an Irish-born Navy Cross recipient christened a warship bearing his name on Saturday, with the promise that the ship would visit Ireland.
The future USS Patrick Gallagher is a guided missile destroyer under construction at Bath Iron Works and is named for the Irish citizen and U.S. Marine who fell on a grenade to save his comrades in Vietnam. Gallagher survived the grenade attack and was lauded for his heroism. However, he did not survive his service in Vietnam.
Pauline Gallagher, one of his sisters, told a crowd at the shipyard that the destroyer bearing her brother’s name eases her mother’s fear that memories of her son would be forgotten.
“Patrick is not forgotten. He lives forever young in our hearts and minds, and this ship will outlive us all,” she said, before reciting the ship’s motto, which comes from the family: “Life is for living. Be brave and be bold.”
Along with sisters Rosemarie Gallagher and Teresa Gallagher Keegan, they smashed bottles of sparkling wine onto the hull of the ship. A Navy band played “Anchors Aweigh” as streamers appeared in the air above them.
The Irish influence was unmistakable at the event. An Irish flag joined the Stars and Stripes. A Navy band played the Irish national anthem and bagpipes played “My Gallant Hero.” Many of Gallagher’s family and friends traveled from Ireland. The keynote speaker was Seán Fleming, the Irish minister of state at the Department of Foreign Affairs.
Lance Cpl. Patrick “Bob” Gallagher was an Irish citizen, originally from County Mayo, who moved to America to start a new life and enlisted in the Marines while living on Long Island, New York. He survived being dropped on a grenade to save his comrades in July 1966—the grenade only exploded when he threw it into a nearby river—only to be killed while on patrol in March 1967, just days before he was due to return home.
Teresa Gallagher Keegan described her brother as a humble man who tried to hide his service in Vietnam until he was awarded the Navy Cross, making it impossible. She said Gallagher’s hometown was preparing to celebrate his return. “Ironically, the plane that brought my brother’s casket home was the plane that would have brought him home to a hero’s welcome,” she said.
Gallagher was one of more than 30 Irish citizens who lost their lives in Vietnam, said US Senator Susan Collins, one of the speakers, who described the event as “a day of solemn remembrance and a day of celebration.”
In addition to the sisters, a brother was also present at the ceremony in which Pauline Gallagher received a promise from Rear Admiral Thomas Anderson that the ship would sail to Ireland after it was commissioned.
The 510-foot (155-meter) guided-missile destroyer was in dry dock while work continues to prepare the ship for delivery to the Navy. The 9,200-ton Arleigh Burke-class destroyer is built to simultaneously wage war against submarines, surface warships, aircraft, and missiles. The latest versions are being equipped for ballistic missile defense.