USS Savannah (CL-42) was a light cruiser of the Brooklyn class. She was laid down on 31 May 1934 by the New York Shipbuilding Association in Camden, New Jersey; launched on 8 May 1937; sponsored by Miss Jayne Maye Bowden, the niece of Senator Richard B. Russell, Jr., of Georgia; and commissioned in the Philadelphia Navy Yard on 10 March 1938, with Captain Robert C. Griffin in command.