USS LST523 was a LST511 Class Tank Landing Ship built for the US Navy at the Jeffersonville Boat and; Machine Co. in Indiana, laid down in October 1943 and commissioned into US Navy service in February 1944. Like many of her sisterships, she transited the length of the Mississippi River to New Orleans, was fully manned and stood out for European Waters in convoy, arriving in time to take her part in Operation Overlord, known today as the DDay landings.
Assigned to the Western Task Force, Followup Force B at Falmouth, the LST523 and her crew made two round trips to the Normandy Beachhead, each time delivering supplies and removing wounded. On her third trip with the men and material of the 300th Engineer Combat Battalion embarked in addition to her crew of 195 and a 40man medical staff, the LST523 struck a mine while manoeuvring from the Utah Beach anchorage to the beachhead.
The force of the blast split the LST in two pieces and sank her at this location on June 19th, 1944, with 94 men of the 300th and 41 of her crew carried down with her.