USS Essex LHD-2 Amphibious Assault Ship Patch

Her crews call her the Iron Gator, and from 2000 to 2012 USS Essex (LHD-2) was forward deployed to Sasebo, Japan. She is the second ship of the Wasp class of amphibious assault ships, built by Ingalls Shipbuilding in Pascagoula, Mississippi. Laid down on 20 March 1989 and launched on 23 February 1991, she was commissioned on 17 October 1992 while moored at NAS North Island. She is the fifth Navy ship named for Essex County, Massachusetts, a name carried through World War II by the carrier USS Essex (CV-9). Her home port today is San Diego, and her motto is two words long: Take Notice.

Essex made her first deployment in 1994 with the 13th Marine Expeditionary Unit, and in 1995 she covered the withdrawal of the United Nations force from Somalia during Operation United Shield. In 2004 she carried the 31st MEU to Kuwait, and the MEU and 1st Battalion, 3rd Marines went on into Iraq for the fighting in Fallujah. That December she sailed for Banda Aceh, Indonesia, for Operation Unified Assistance after the Indian Ocean tsunami. From Sasebo she stood by off Burma after Cyclone Nargis in 2008, brought relief to the Philippines after Super Typhoon Megi in 2010, and supported Japan after the 2011 Tohoku earthquake and tsunami. On 27 September 2018, with the 13th MEU and the F-35B Lightning II jets of VMFA-211 aboard, Essex launched the first F-35B airstrike in history, against a Taliban target in Afghanistan.

The patch is a tall shield, 3.5 inches wide and 5 inches tall, framed by a gold anchor chain and trimmed with a cut edge. USS ESSEX LHD 2 is stitched in gold across a royal blue band at the top. Below, on white, a red streamer reading TAKE NOTICE trails a line of white stars as it curls around a brown eagle. The eagle wears a small shield with the numeral 2 and grips a sword in its talons, standing on a blue and green globe crossed by two gold anchors. It is a sew-on patch, so it needs to be stitched in place rather than ironed.

An amphibious assault ship is a Navy ship that lives for the Marines it carries, and Essex has been home to a long line of MEUs. Her sailors run the flight deck, the well deck and the landing craft that put Marines ashore, and her Marines remember her as the ship that took them there. Twelve years in Sasebo made her a familiar sight across the Western Pacific, answering storms and earthquakes as often as she trained for combat. The first F-35B strike from her deck put her name in the history of naval aviation.

It fits a shadow box next to a MEU patch and a cruise book, or the sleeve of a jacket worn to an Essex reunion. It is also a good gift for a sailor or Marine who made a WestPac on the Iron Gator. Take Notice, as the streamer says.