USS Farragut (NCC-1647)
The USS Farragut (NCC-1647) was a  Federation starship operated by Starfleet in the 23rd century.

Service history  
In the 2250s, the Farragut was commanded by Captain Garrovick. The ship was Lieutenant James T. Kirk's first deep space assignment after his graduation from Starfleet Academy, where he was assigned to a phaser station. 

While exploring Tycho IV in 2257, the Farragut encountered a dikironium cloud creature that proceeded to kill nearly half the crew, some two hundred personnel including Captain Garrovick. Nearly ten hours of record tapes chronicled the encounter. According to the tapes, Kirk insisted upon blaming himself for the incident because of his delay in firing phasers at the creature. The executive officer disagreed, stating for the record: "Lieutenant Kirk is a fine young officer who performed with uncommon bravery." 

Eleven years later, it was determined that Kirk could not have prevented the death of his captain and crewmates, when the  encountered the same creature and discovered that phasers were ineffective against it. ()

Nurse Christine Chapel had served aboard the Farragut prior to her assignment to the Enterprise in 2259. For Starfleet Remembrance Day that year, she wore a Farragut pin to memorialize the crewmates she had lost from this ship. ()

By 2259, James Kirk was still serving aboard the Farragut. ()

In an alternate timeline where Captain Christopher Pike remained in command of the Enterprise and avoided the accident that exposed him to delta radiation, Kirk became the captain of the Farragut. In 2266, he responded to the distress call sent by Outpost 4 as it came under Romulan attack. At Kirk's suggestion, the Farragut and the Enterprise shadowed the Romulan Bird-of-Prey responsible, preparing to engage it in a pincer move once it entered the tail of the comet Icarus IV and became temporarily visible through its cloaking device.

However, the Romulan Commander had anticipated their plan and positioned his vessel behind the Farragut. Kirk ordered his ship to turn and engage the Bird-of-Prey, but the Farragut was hit by a plasma torpedo at close range and sustained catastrophic damage to its saucer section. With life support failing, the surviving crew were evacuated to the Enterprise. ()

Command crew  

 Commanding officer 
Garrovick (2257)
James T. Kirk (2266, alternate timeline)

Appendices

Appearances

Background information 
Although no official registry or class was established during the TOS-era when this ship was mentioned, both the Star Trek Concordance and the , using the information created by Greg Jein in his The Case of Jonathan Doe Starship article, identified this ship as a  heavy cruiser with the registry number NCC-1647. Doug Drexler confirmed this on his blog, Drexfiles.

Many other publications, beginning with The Making of Star Trek, p. 165 and Franz Joseph's Star Fleet Technical Manual, listed the Farragut as a Constitution-class heavy cruiser with the registry NCC-1702. (The Technical Manual also listed the vessel as being destroyed, as does The Making of Star Trek, although there was no canon evidence supporting that assertion.)

The Farragut was "named for American naval officer , who commanded Union ships during the American Civil War, famous for his rallying cry, "Damn the torpedoes, full speed ahead!"" ()

In the Star Trek Encyclopedia (4th ed., vol. 1, p. 262), there was a starboard profile of the Farragut.

The registry of this ship and its class were revealed in the  episode . Though the ship retained the registry NCC-1647, it belonged to a new class of ship.

Like other Federation starships of Star Trek: Strange New Worlds, there were two dedication plaques on the ship's bridge. The ship's class would be mentioned on these plaques. They are not readable in the episode.

In a tweet,  art director Tim Peel wrote that he believed the class of this ship to be Bellerophon. This was based on information he had received from other members of the production crew. He had not yet to confirm this.

Apocrypha 
Two DC comic books in the second volume provided non-canon appearances of the Farragut in "Behind Enemy Lines!" and "All Those Years Ago...". Further appearances in DC issues included "" showing a model of the  Farragut with the NCC-1647 registry, while the comic "Debt of Honor" showed the ship with the registry NCC-1702 (matching the Star Fleet Technical Manual). The ship appeared in the Gold Key TOS issue "Murder Boards the Enterprise".

In the  The Ashes of Eden by William Shatner, Kirk participated in an early holodeck recreation of his first encounter with the creature, that confirms that he could have done nothing; if the Farragut had fired on the creature, the entire ship would have been destroyed. The ship also made appearances in a number of other novels including Web of the Romulans, The Rings of Tautee, Crisis on Centaurus, The Covenant of the Crown, and Treaty's Law.

In the novel The Captains' Honor, the Farragut had been decommissioned from Starfleet and was operated by the Romans of the planet Magna Roma as the USS Centurion. However, "Debt of Honor" shows the Farragut separating her saucer section and the engineering hull being destroyed by self-destruct after it was overrun by the inter-dimensional creatures in the aftermath of the encounter with the Cloud Creature.

In the computer games  and Star Trek: Judgment Rites, Kirk mentions that his first dealings with the  were as a lieutenant on the Farragut.

External links 
 
 

de:USS Farragut (23. Jahrhundert)
fr:USS Farragut
es:USS Farragut (NCC-1647)
Farragut, 23rd century