Notes
Note N24
Index
USS Titania (AK-55/AKA-13) was an Arcturus-class attack cargo ship named after Titania, one of the moons of the planet Uranus. She served as a commissioned ship for 13 years, beginning in 1942.
Korean War
When fighting broke out in Korea on 25 June 1950, Titania was at Yokohama. Early in July, she carried troops, cargo and the 8055th M.A.S.H. unit from Naha to Pusan, docking there 7 July;[1] then returned to Japan to embark marines and troops of the 1st Cavalry Division for the assault on Pohang. Underway on 16 July, the darkened ship crossed the Japanese Inland Sea and passed between Kyūshū and Honshū through the Shimonoseki Strait, arriving off the assault area at 04:15 on 18 July. Debarkation was uneventful; and, by 22:25, her landing craft had returned to the ship, their mission completed. Titania remained anchored at Geitjetsu Wan until 23 July when she got under way for Yokosuka.
Following the Pohang operation, the transport returned to the United States, arriving at San Diego on 7 August. There, she began taking on ammunition and marine cargo; but in the early hours of 15 August, before the loading had been completed, a fire broke out in her number 1 boiler. Within three hours, the fire was brought under control, but the damage incurred required two weeks of repairs. It was 3 September before Titania got under way for Japan. As she crossed the Pacific, she skirted Typhoon Missatha, encountering 53-knot (98 km/h; 61 mph) winds before she arrived at Kobe on 21 September.
On 25 September, only 10 days after the initial landings at Inchon, Titania arrived off that port to unload marines, equipment, and ammunition, and to embark members of the 1st Naval Beach Group. Although Titania did not come under fire, frequent alerts and the sights and sounds of night shore bombardment made this a tense operation. Her mission completed, Titania departed Inchon on 1 October. She made additional voyages to Inchon and Wonsan carrying combat cargo before getting under way from Yokohama on 17 November 1950 for San Francisco.
After the Korean War and decommissioning
Until the signing of the armistice on 27 July 1953, the Titania continued to carry men and cargo between American ports and the Orient. Much of her time was spent rearming and provisioning ships at sea in the waters off Korea. Rough seas, rain, and snow hampered the ship's operations during the winter months, taxing the resilience and resourcefulness of her crew on many occasions. Following the cessation of hostilities in the summer of 1953, Titania remained in the Far East operating out of Japanese ports and in Korean waters until February 1954 when she returned to San Francisco.
On 15 July 1954, the Titania departed San Francisco steaming, via the Hawaiian Islands and Japan, for the Philippines. She operated out of Subic Bay until October when she visited Hong Kong and Sasebo before getting under way from Japan on 6 November. After spending the early months of 1955 in California ports, Titania was decommissioned on 19 July 1955. Her name was struck from the Navy List on 1 July 1961 and she was sold for scrap to China Trade & Development Corp. on 10 July 1974.[2]
Notes
Note N25
Index
USS U. S. Grant (AP-29) was a transport ship that saw service with the United States Navy in World War II. Originally a German ocean liner named Konig Wilhelm II, she was seized by the United States during the First World War and renamed USS Madawaska (ID-3011) in 1917 before being renamed USS U. S. Grant (AP-29) in 1922.
Between the wars
For almost two decades, U. S. Grant soldiered on in the Army Transport Service, maintaining a regular schedule of voyages carrying troops, passengers, and supplies along a route which included calls at San Francisco, California; Honolulu, Territory of Hawaii; Guam; Manila, Philippine Islands; Chinwangtao and Shanghai, China; the Panama Canal Zone, and New York. For many of these years of service in the Pacific, U. S. Grant served as the sole source of refrigerated stores from the United States. Her periodic arrivals at Apra Harbor invariably produced a temporary improvement in the diet of Americans living in Guam.
Run aground at Guam
On one voyage to Guam, the transport was nearly lost. On the late afternoon of 19 May 1939, U. S. Grant ran aground on the dangerous inner reef in the as-yet unfinished harbor. Fortunately, the accident did not occur during typhoon season. The combined efforts of minesweeper USS Penguin (AM-33) and oil depot ship Robert L. Barnes (AG-27) failed to budge the ship off the coral, leading the Acting Governor of Guam, Comdr. George W. Johnson, to hit upon a plan of action in collaboration (by radio) with Capt. Richmond K. Turner, in heavy cruiser Astoria (CA-34), which was then en route to the island.
For 21 hours, members of the U.S. Naval Insular Force and local stevedores unloaded 300 tons of cargo from the grounded U. S. Grant, while much of her fuel was transferred to Robert L. Barnes and Admiral Halstead. Astoria - en route for the United States after carrying Japanese Ambassador Hiroshi Saito's ashes back to his homeland - arrived at 0630 on 21 May. She took up her assigned position, as did Penguin, Robert L. Barnes and Admiral Halstead; at 0809 U. S. Grant lurched free of the coral reef, to the accompaniment of cheers from the transport's crew. The island's newspaper, The Guam Recorder, subsequently reported in its June 1939 edition: "The short time in which the difficult operation was carried out was due to the efficient cooperation of all...involved, the Army, Navy, and Merchant Marine."
All cargo was soon reloaded, and U. S. Grant resumed her voyage. She continued under the aegis of the Army Transportation Service through 1940. Then as war clouds gathered in the Pacific and Atlantic, U. S. Grant was subsequently reacquired by the Navy. Armed with seven 3-inch guns (she had been unarmed while serving as an Army transport), the vessel was refitted at the Mare Island Navy Yard, Vallejo, California, and was commissioned on 16 June 1941, Capt. Herbert R. Hein in command. Continuing her service as a transport, the ship received the classification of AP-29.