March 2020

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USS Holland AS-32

Welcome Aboard

The Holland has seen many of ports in her time of service. At reunions shipmates remember the good times and try to forget some of the bad times that we all had at one point in our Holland life. Even though we all come from different time era’s there is one common bond that unite us together and that is the ship its self. The making of news friends is very exciting for me and I’m sure for everyone else. I always tell shipmates that I make contact with from time to time that we are a Family, it does not matter if your “Young or Old”, and from the different time era’s. We all have but the memory of the ship engraved in our hearts and our mind forever. Until the Lord calls us home or we have become senile. Again this website is dedicated to You. If you are a former Holland crew member please sign our guest book/ Deck log. From time to time we sent out e-mail to all about important issues, news, reunions. Also It is used as a message board for those who are searching for those old long but not forgotten shipmate’s.
As soon as you fill out the Deck log , We will respond back to you with an e-mail asking for some other information that is not asked on the Deck log.(mailing address, etc) So we ask that you kindly return it fill out. It is of importance to us all. Thank you for coming aboard and we hope you will enjoy your Tour on the website. Fair Horizons Ahead !
Smooth Sailing & Fair Winds

Third Launch

The third Holland was launched by Ingalls Shipbuilding Corp., Pascagoula, Mississippi, 19 January 1963; sponsored by Mrs. John C. Stenuis, wife of U.S. Senator from the State of Mississippi; delivered to the Charleston Naval Shipyard, Charleston, South Carolina; and commissioned 7 September 1963, Captain Charles W. Styer, Jr., in command. Holland departed Charleston on 14 October for shakedown training at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, returning to Charleston on 19 November. She commenced post-shakedown availability on 25 November. While Holland was neither a submersible nor a combatant ship, she was a vital link in support of United States’s first line of deterrance —the Navy’s Polaris Weapons System. She was capable of making any submarine repair other than major overhaul, including servicing and maintaining the nuclear power plants of Polaris-firing submarines. The opening of 1964 found Holland at Charleston, South Carolina, making preparations for deployment to the Polaris replenishment anchorage at Rota, Spain. She arrived Rota 1 April and relieved Proteus (AS-19) as the FBM submarine tender shortly thereafter. Holland continued her vital service to the Polaris submarines until relieved 4 November 1966. Holland arrived Charleston 22 November. There she tended submarines of the Atlantic Fleet into 1967. The Holland was decommissioned on April 13, 1996, in Apra Harbor, Guam, a few years after the Cold War officially ended. There was a State side decommissioning ceremony in Bremerton, WA on 30 September 1996. During her thirty-three years of active duty, the USS Holland AS-32 serviced Fleet Ballistic Missile Submarines (SSBN) and Fast Attack Submarine (SSN) in both Atlantic and Pacific and ended her career as the only US navy Tender, submarine or surface, in WestPac (Western Pacific). She is currently laid up in the National Defense Reserve Fleet at Suisun bay, Benicia, California waiting for final disposition .