DDG 134 now has a keel. General Dynamics Bath Iron Works held the keel laying ceremony for the future USS John E. Kilmer in Bath, Maine, on Sept. 10, 2026, a formal construction milestone for the Flight III Arleigh Burke-class destroyer. The ship carries the name of a Navy hospital corpsman who was awarded the Medal of Honor posthumously for shielding a wounded Marine in Korea.
The ship’s sponsor, Linda Gilday, wife of retired Adm. Michael Gilday, the former Chief of Naval Operations, inscribed her initials on the keel plate. A Bath Iron Works welder with 19 years at the yard, Douglas Sinclair, assisted her, according to the yard.
The yard announced the ceremony in a Sept. 11, 2026, Bath Iron Works release. Gilday told the shipbuilders, “This is really important work,” and BIW President Charles F. Krugh said, “This ship is built by American shipbuilders for American sailors to protect America and our families.”
Hospitalman John E. Kilmer
Kilmer was born Aug. 15, 1930, in Highland Park, Illinois, according to his Congressional Medal of Honor Society record, and served as a hospital corpsman attached to a Marine rifle company of the 1st Marine Division. His company was holding a hill position well forward of the main line of resistance when it came under assault. The citation says he repeatedly braved mortar, artillery and sniper fire to reach the wounded, kept going after he was hit himself, and, as another barrage fell, “unhesitatingly shielded the wounded man with his body.” He did not survive. The citation closes: “He gallantly gave his life for another.”
The fight was the Battle of Bunker Hill. Bath Iron Works’ release dates his actions to Aug. 12, 1952; the Medal of Honor Society lists his date of action and death as Aug. 13, 1952.
The Navy chose his name for DDG 134 in October 2019. Seapower magazine’s report of the Oct. 16, 2019, announcement by then-Navy Secretary Richard V. Spencer noted that Kilmer enlisted in 1947, served with the Fleet Marine Force and was awarded the Medal of Honor posthumously on June 18, 1953. Spencer’s office described the ship as 509 feet long with a 59-foot beam and capable of more than 30 knots.
A Flight III hull in a crowded yard
Flight III is the upgraded version of the Arleigh Burke class, built around the SPY-6 radar from the Air and Missile Defense Radar program and upgraded Aegis ballistic missile defense combat systems. A GAO report issued Aug. 4, 2016, recorded the Navy’s plan at the time to buy 22 Flight III ships over a decade at a cost of more than $50 billion, and warned that the lead ship was being bought before detail design was mature. GAO also cautioned against multiyear contract authority “without the benefit of a significant amount of detail design knowledge or any Flight III construction history.” GAO later noted the Navy delayed the lead-ship award, with Huntington Ingalls Industries receiving a contract modification in June 2017.
Kilmer joins a busy line at Bath. According to the yard’s Sept. 11 release, BIW now has seven Flight III destroyers under construction: Louis H. Wilson Jr. (DDG 126), William Charette (DDG 130), Quentin Walsh (DDG 132), John E. Kilmer (DDG 134), Richard G. Lugar (DDG 136), J. William Middendorf (DDG 138) and Thomas G. Kelley (DDG 140).
Bath Iron Works did not give a christening or delivery date for DDG 134 in its release. For now, the record for the ship named for a corpsman from Highland Park is a keel plate in Maine carrying its sponsor’s initials.
Top image: General Dynamics Bath Iron Works on the Kennebec River in Bath, Maine. Image Credit: Quintin Soloviev — CC BY 4.0 / Wikimedia Commons
This article was produced with the assistance of AI and reviewed by Combat Rated editors prior to publication.