READ ABOUT THIS WRECK IN SHIPWRECKS OF THE SUNSHINE STATE!

The USS Amesbury (DE-66/APD-66), known locally as "Alexander's Wreck," was a Charles Lawrence Class High-speed Transport originally laid down as a Buckley Class Destroyer Escort. She was launched from the Bethlehem-Hingham Shipyard at Hingham, Massachusetts on March 8,1943. She was converted to a Charles Lawrence Class High-speed Transport at the Philadelphia Navy Yard and redesignated (APD-46) on February 23, 1945. The Amesbury was 306 feet in length and almost 37 feet in breadth. She carried four LCVP landing craft and was well armed with one five-inch dual purpose gun mount, three twin 40mm gun mounts, eight single 20mm gun mounts and two depth charge tracks.

After a trivial amount of service off Korea she was decommissioned on July 3, 1946. Struck from the Naval Register on June 1, 1960, she was utilized as a target before being sold to salvor Chet Alexander on October 24, 1962. Alexander planned to sink the vessel in deep water in the Gulf of Mexico, but the Amesbury sunk on her own accord while being towed. She now rests in 25 feet of water approximately five miles from Key West.