An Elegant Young Lady

The U.S.S. Bainbridge was steaming up the Yangtze River in 1912 when Commodore Mark Hersey got a desperate message to hurry below. He found a crewman with his fist in a hole in the side of the ship--holding back the Yangtze's waters. While scraping paint, the sailor had punched a hole clear through the tinny sides of America's first destroyer. Recalls Hersey: ''We stuffed a potato in the hole, covered it with concrete and prayed."

At Quincy. Mass., last week the Navy celebrated the 60th anniversary of the construction of the original Bainbridge by commissioning a namesake that is totally unlike any other U.S. destroyer ever to hit the waves. The new Bainbridge is the latest member of the Navy's small fleet of atom-powered vessels. The first Bainbridge could make it just once across the Atlantic on a full load of coal; two-thirds of her sailors did nothing but stoke the boilers. On a single fueling of its reactor, the new Bainbridge will be able to cruise 180,000 miles at top speed--considerably over 30 knots.

With no smokestacks, the Bainbridge looks more like a sleek runabout than a warship. Oil-fueled destroyers are soon coated above and below deck with grease and grime, but the Bainbridge is as clean as an operating room. White linen curtains flutter at the portholes in the wardroom. The cabin for visiting admirals is decorated with artificial yellow roses. Contemporary paintings, presents from the Bethlehem Steel Co.. which built the ship, hang in the ship's cabins and wardrooms.

The crew is as modern as the ship. Captain Raymond E. Peet, 41, an Annapolis graduate ('43) with a master of science degree from M.I.T., was one of the officers hand-picked and trained by Admiral Hyman Rickover to operate the nuclear Navy. During World War II, Peet was a gunnery officer in Admiral Arleigh Burke's famed "Little Beaver" squadron of destroyers in the Pacific. Later he was Burke's aide for two years, when the man who handled a destroyer like a hot-rod became Chief of Naval Operations. To get ready for the Bainbridge, Peet had a year of special training--as did all the other 400 officers and sailors.

Prime mission of the 8,000-ton Bainbridge will be antisubmarine warfare; the ship bristles with special torpedoes and rockets to hunt out the underwater enemy. But the destroyer is also armed with antiaircraft Terrier missiles, may be used as an escort. "This ship is really a task force in herself." says Captain Peet. "She's an elegant young lady."

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