USS General M. L. Hersey (AP-148) was a for the U.S. Navy

United States Navy

The United States Navy is the naval warfare service branch of the United States Armed Forces and one of the seven uniformed services of the United States. The U.S. Navy is the largest in the world; its battle fleet tonnage is greater than that of the next 13 largest navies combined. The U.S...

 in World War II

World War II

World War II, or the Second World War , was a global conflict lasting from 1939 to 1945, involving most of the world's nations—including all of the great powers—eventually forming two opposing military alliances: the Allies and the Axis...

. She was named in honor of U.S. Army

United States Army

The United States Army is the main branch of the United States Armed Forces responsible for land-based military operations. It is the largest and oldest established branch of the U.S. military, and is one of seven U.S. uniformed services...

 general Mark Leslie Hersey

Mark L. Hersey

Mark Leslie Hersey was a Major General in the United States Army who commanded the 4th Infantry Division during World War I. The USS General M. L. Hersey is named after him....

. She was transferred to the U.S. Army as USAT General M. L. Hersey in 1946. On 1 March 1950 she was transferred to the Military Sea Transportation Service (MSTS) as USNS General M. L. Hersey (T-AP-148). She was later sold for commercial use, and operated under the names SS Pittsburgh and SS St. Louis.

Operational history

General M. L. Hersey (AP-148) was launched under a Maritime Commission

United States Maritime Commission

The United States Maritime Commission was an independent executive agency of the U.S. federal government that was created by the Merchant Marine Act of 1936, passed by Congress on June 29, 1936, and replaced the U.S. Shipping Board which had existed since World War I...

 contract (MC #665) 1 April 1944 by Kaiser Co., Inc.

Kaiser Shipyards

The Kaiser Shipyards were seven major shipbuilding yards located mostly on the U.S. west coast during World War II. They were owned by the Kaiser Shipbuilding Company, a creation of American industrialist Henry J...

, Yard 3, Richmond, California

Richmond, California

Richmond is a city in western Contra Costa County, California, United States. The city was incorporated on August 7, 1905. It is located in the East Bay, part of the San Francisco Bay Area. It is a residential inner suburb of San Francisco, as well as the site of heavy industry, which has been...

; sponsored by Mrs. Alice Hersey Wick, General Hersey's daughter; acquired by the Navy 31 May 1944; and commissioned 29 July 1944; Captain James W. Smith in command.

After shakedown off San Pedro

San Pedro, Los Angeles, California

San Pedro is a port district of the city of Los Angeles, California, United States. It was annexed in 1909 and is a major seaport of the area...

, General M. L. Hersey sailed from San Francisco

San Francisco, California

San Francisco , officially the City and County of San Francisco, is the financial, cultural, and transportation center of the San Francisco Bay Area, a region of 7.15 million people which includes San Jose and Oakland...

 5 September 1944 with troops and cargo for garrison

Garrison

Garrison is the collective term for a body of troops stationed in a particular location, originally to guard it, but now often simply using it as a home base....

s in the Southwest Pacific. She reached Milne Bay

Milne Bay

Milne Bay is a large bay in Milne Bay Province, southeastern Papua New Guinea. The bay is named after Sir Alexander Milne.The area was a site of the Battle of Milne Bay in 1942....

, New Guinea

New Guinea

New Guinea is the world's second largest island, after Greenland, covering a land area of 786,000 km2. Located in the southwest Pacific Ocean, it lies geographically to the east of the Malay Archipelago, with which it is sometimes included as part of a greater Indo-Australian Archipelago...

, 21 September and subsequently carried troops and supplies to the Admiralty Islands

Admiralty Islands

The Admiralty Islands are a group of eighteen islands in the Bismarck Archipelago, to the north of New Guinea in the south Pacific Ocean. These are also sometimes called the Manus Islands, after the largest island. These rainforest-covered islands form part of Manus Province, the smallest and...

, the Russell Islands

Russell Islands

The Russell Islands are two small islands, as well as several islets, of volcanic origin, in the Central Province of the Solomon Islands. They are located approximately 48 km northwest from Guadalcanal. The islands are partially covered in coconut plantations, and have a copra and oil factory at...

, and the Solomon Islands

Solomon Islands

Solomon Islands is a sovereign state in Oceania, east of Papua New Guinea, consisting of nearly one thousand islands. It covers a land mass of . The capital, Honiara, is located on the island of Guadalcanal...

, before departing Guadalcanal

Guadalcanal

Guadalcanal is a tropical island in the South-Western Pacific. The largest island in the Solomons, it was discovered by the Spanish expedition of Alvaro de Mendaña in 1568...

 for the United States 6 October. Arriving San Francisco 19 October, she brought home more than 3,000 veterans of the bitter Pacific fighting. Between 7 November 1944 and 14 August 1945 the transport made four round-trip voyages from San Francisco and, Seattle

Seattle, Washington

Seattle is the county seat of King County, Washington. With 608,660 residents as of the 2010 Census, Seattle is the largest city in the Northwestern United States. The Seattle metropolitan area of about 3.4 million inhabitants is the 15th largest metropolitan area in the country...

 to the Western Pacific, carrying troops to New Guinea, the Philippines

Philippines

The Philippines , officially known as the Republic of the Philippines , is a country in Southeast Asia in the western Pacific Ocean. To its north across the Luzon Strait lies Taiwan. West across the South China Sea sits Vietnam...

, the Palau

Palau

Palau , officially the Republic of Palau , is an island nation in the Pacific Ocean, east of the Philippines and south of Tokyo. In 1978, after three decades as being part of the United Nations trusteeship, Palau chose independence instead of becoming part of the Federated States of Micronesia, a...

s, and the Marianas

Mariana Islands

The Mariana Islands are an arc-shaped archipelago made up by the summits of 15 volcanic mountains in the north-western Pacific Ocean between the 12th and 21st parallels north and along the 145th meridian east...

 during the final amphibious offensive against Japan

Empire of Japan

The Empire of Japan is the name of the state of Japan that existed from the Meiji Restoration on 3 January 1868 to the enactment of the post-World War II Constitution of...

, At Leyte in November General M. L. Hersey endured frequent air attacks.

Following the surrender

Surrender of Japan

The surrender of Japan in 1945 brought hostilities of World War II to a close. By the end of July 1945, the Imperial Japanese Navy was incapable of conducting operations and an Allied invasion of Japan was imminent...

, the veteran ship departed Seattle 31 August; and, steaming via the Philippines, she arrived Yokohama

Yokohama

is the capital city of Kanagawa Prefecture and the second largest city in Japan by population after Tokyo and most populous municipality of Japan. It lies on Tokyo Bay, south of Tokyo, in the Kantō region of the main island of Honshu...

 24 September with occupation troops. There she embarked 3,052 troops and departed 5 days later as a unit of Operation Magic Carpet, a giant sea-lift designed to return hundreds of thousands of American fighting men to the United States as quickly as possible. Between 3 December and 3 March 1946 she steamed twice to the Far East where she embarked returning veterans at Yokohama and Manila

Manila

Manila is the capital of the Philippines. It is one of the sixteen cities forming Metro Manila.Manila is located on the eastern shores of Manila Bay and is bordered by Navotas and Caloocan to the north, Quezon City to the northeast, San Juan and Mandaluyong to the east, Makati on the southeast,...

 and transported them to San Pedro and San Francisco. Departing San Francisco 23 March, she then steamed via Manila and Singapore

Singapore

Singapore , officially the Republic of Singapore, is a Southeast Asian city-state off the southern tip of the Malay Peninsula, north of the equator. An island country made up of 63 islands, it is separated from Malaysia by the Straits of Johor to its north and from Indonesia's Riau Islands by the...

 to Calcutta

Kolkata

Kolkata , formerly known as Calcutta, is the capital of the Indian state of West Bengal. Located on the east bank of the Hooghly River, it was the commercial capital of East India...

, India

India

India , officially the Republic of India , is a country in South Asia. It is the seventh-largest country by geographical area, the second-most populous country with over 1.2 billion people, and the most populous democracy in the world...

, and Colombo

Colombo

Colombo is the largest city of Sri Lanka. It is located on the west coast of the island and adjacent to Sri Jayawardenapura Kotte, the capital of Sri Lanka. Colombo is often referred to as the capital of the country, since Sri Jayawardenapura Kotte is a satellite city of Colombo...

, Ceylon

Sri Lanka

Sri Lanka, officially the Democratic Socialist Republic of Sri Lanka is a country off the southern coast of the Indian subcontinent. Known until 1972 as Ceylon , Sri Lanka is an island surrounded by the Indian Ocean, the Gulf of Mannar and the Palk Strait, and lies in the vicinity of India and the...

, where she embarked "Magic Carpet" troops. She departed Colombo 28 April, sailed via the Suez Canal

Suez Canal

The Suez Canal , also known by the nickname "The Highway to India", is an artificial sea-level waterway in Egypt, connecting the Mediterranean Sea and the Red Sea. Opened in November 1869 after 10 years of construction work, it allows water transportation between Europe and Asia without navigation...

, and arrived New York

New York City

New York is the most populous city in the United States and the center of the New York Metropolitan Area, one of the most populous metropolitan areas in the world. New York exerts a significant impact upon global commerce, finance, media, art, fashion, research, technology, education, and...

 21 May. She decommissioned at New York 1 June and was turned over to WSA

War Shipping Administration

The War Shipping Administration was a World War II emergency war agency of the US Government, tasked to purchase and operate the civilian shipping tonnage the US needed for fighting the war....

 6 June for eventual use as a transport by the Army Transportation Service.

Rebuilt by the Army to 12,545 tons, she was on duty for the International Refugee Organization

International Refugee Organization

The International Refugee Organization was founded on April 20, 1946 to deal with the massive refugee problem created by World War II. A Preparatory Commission began operations fourteen months previously. It was a United Nations specialized agency and took over many of the functions of the earlier...

 (IRO) and initially based out of New Orleans

New Orleans, Louisiana

New Orleans is a major United States port and the largest city and metropolitan area in the state of Louisiana. The New Orleans metropolitan area has a population of 1,235,650 as of 2009, the 46th largest in the USA. The New Orleans – Metairie – Bogalusa combined statistical area has a population...

 (but later based out of New York).

On 14 January 1947, during a return voyage from Bremerhaven

Bremerhaven

Bremerhaven is a city at the seaport of the free city-state of Bremen, a state of the Federal Republic of Germany. It forms an enclave in the state of Lower Saxony and is located at the mouth of the River Weser on its eastern bank, opposite the town of Nordenham...

, USAT General M. L. Hersey responded to distress calls issued by SS Tecumseh Park which was thought to be in danger of foundering 840 miles (1,351.8 km) off Halifax

City of Halifax

Halifax is a city in Canada, which was the capital of the province of Nova Scotia and shire town of Halifax County. It was the largest city in Atlantic Canada until it was amalgamated into Halifax Regional Municipality in 1996...

. General M. L. Hersey had stood by for two days before Tecumseh Park got underway on her own.

On 16 November 1949 USAT General M. L. Hersey left Naples

Naples

Naples is a city in Southern Italy, situated on the country's west coast by the Gulf of Naples. Lying between two notable volcanic regions, Mount Vesuvius and the Phlegraean Fields, it is the capital of the region of Campania and of the province of Naples...

 with 1,283 displaced person

Displaced person

A displaced person is a person who has been forced to leave his or her native place, a phenomenon known as forced migration.- Origin of term :...

s from Europe and arrived in Melbourne

Melbourne

Melbourne is the capital and most populous city in the state of Victoria, and the second most populous city in Australia. The Melbourne City Centre is the hub of the greater metropolitan area and the Census statistical division—of which "Melbourne" is the common name. As of June 2009, the greater...

 on 6 December 1949. This voyage was one of almost 150 "Fifth Fleet" voyages by some 40 ships bringing refugees of World War II to Australia. General M. L. Hersey made two more such trips herself, arriving in Melbourne, again, with 1,336 refugees on 27 April 1950, and in Fremantle

Fremantle, Western Australia

Fremantle is a city in Western Australia, located at the mouth of the Swan River. Fremantle Harbour serves as the port of Perth, the state capital. Fremantle was the first area settled by the Swan River colonists in 1829...

 with 1,370 passengers on 2 November 1950.

In the midst of her “Fifth Fleet” voyages to Australia, the transport was reacquired by the Navy 1 March 1950. General M. L. Hersey was placed in service and assigned to MSTS under a civilian crew. Continuing to operate out of New York, she resumed carrying European refugees to the United States in support of the IRO.

On 07:32 on 4 November 1951, while ferrying elements of the 43rd Infantry Division to Bremerhaven, USNS General M. L. Hersey struck Argentine

Argentina

Argentina , officially the Argentine Republic , is the second largest country in South America by land area, after Brazil. It is constituted as a federation of 23 provinces and an autonomous city, Buenos Aires...

 cruise ship MS Maipo amidships in thick fog over a calm North Sea

North Sea

In the southwest, beyond the Straits of Dover, the North Sea becomes the English Channel connecting to the Atlantic Ocean. In the east, it connects to the Baltic Sea via the Skagerrak and Kattegat, narrow straits that separate Denmark from Norway and Sweden respectively...

. Maipo sank some three hours after the collision off Wangerooge

Wangerooge

Wangerooge is one of the 32 Frisian Islands in the North Sea located close to the coasts of the Netherlands, Germany and Denmark. It is also a municipality in the district of Friesland in Lower Saxony in Germany.Wangerooge is one of the East Frisian Islands...

. All 238 people aboard Maipo were able to be rescued, and no one aboard General M. L. Hersey was injured.

During 1952 and 1953 she made four round-trips from San Francisco to the Far East in support of the Korean War

Korean War

The Korean War was a conventional war between South Korea, supported by the United Nations, and North Korea, supported by the People's Republic of China , with military material aid from the Soviet Union...

. She was placed out of service 11 June 1954 and placed in the Pacific Reserve Fleet at San Diego

San Diego, California

San Diego is the eighth-largest city in the United States and second-largest city in California. The city is located on the coast of the Pacific Ocean in Southern California, immediately adjacent to the Mexican border. The birthplace of California, San Diego is known for its mild year-round...

. Later transferred to the Maritime Administration, on 3 September 1959 she entered the National Defense Reserve Fleet

National Defense Reserve Fleet

The National Defense Reserve Fleet consists of "mothballed" ships, mostly merchant vessels, that can be activated within 20 to 120 days to provide shipping for the United States of America during national emergencies, either military or non-military, such as commercial shipping crises.The NDRF is...

, Suisun Bay, California

Suisun Bay

Suisun Bay is a shallow tidal estuary at in northern California, USA. It lies at the confluence of the Sacramento and San Joaquin Rivers, forming the entrance to the Sacramento-San Joaquin River Delta, an inverted river delta...

.

The transport was sold to Sea-Land Service, Inc.

Sea-Land Service, Inc.

Sea-Land Service, Inc. was a pioneering shipping and containerization company founded by American entrepreneur Malcom McLean in 1960, out of the operations of the Pan-Atlantic Steamship Company, which McLean acquired in 1955...

 on 16 August 1968 and renamed SS Pittsburgh. She was renamed SS St. Louis in September 1969, and converted to a container ship

Container ship

Container ships are cargo ships that carry all of their load in truck-size intermodal containers, in a technique called containerization. They form a common means of commercial intermodal freight transport.-History:...

 10 January 1970. There is conflicting information about the fate of St. Louis. According to one source, she sank in 1971, yet, another source reports she was scrapped in 1988.

General M. L. Hersey received one battle star for World War II service and two battle stars for Korean War service.

External links