USS ''Ulysses'' (ARB-9) was planned as a
United States Navy
The United States Navy (USN) is the maritime service branch of the United States Armed Forces and one of the eight uniformed services of the United States. It is the largest and most powerful navy in the world, with the estimated tonnage ...
, but was redesignated as one of twelve
''Aristaeus''-class battle damage repair ships built for the
United States Navy
The United States Navy (USN) is the maritime service branch of the United States Armed Forces and one of the eight uniformed services of the United States. It is the largest and most powerful navy in the world, with the estimated tonnage ...
during World War II. Named for
Ulysses (a character in
Greek mythology
A major branch of classical mythology, Greek mythology is the body of myths originally told by the ancient Greeks, and a genre of Ancient Greek folklore. These stories concern the origin and nature of the world, the lives and activities ...
and the protagonist of
Homer
Homer (; grc, Ὅμηρος , ''Hómēros'') (born ) was a Greek poet who is credited as the author of the ''Iliad'' and the ''Odyssey'', two epic poems that are foundational works of ancient Greek literature. Homer is considered one of the ...
's epic poem, the ''
Odyssey
The ''Odyssey'' (; grc, Ὀδύσσεια, Odýsseia, ) is one of two major ancient Greek epic poems attributed to Homer. It is one of the oldest extant works of literature still widely read by modern audiences. As with the ''Iliad'', th ...
'', which tells of his arduous voyage back to
Ithaca
Ithaca most commonly refers to:
*Homer's Ithaca, an island featured in Homer's ''Odyssey''
*Ithaca (island), an island in Greece, possibly Homer's Ithaca
*Ithaca, New York, a city, and home of Cornell University and Ithaca College
Ithaca, Ithaka ...
, his home, after the
Trojan War
In Greek mythology, the Trojan War was waged against the city of Troy by the Achaeans (Greeks) after Paris of Troy took Helen from her husband Menelaus, king of Sparta. The war is one of the most important events in Greek mythology and ...
), she was the second US Naval vessel to bear the name.
Construction
Originally slated for construction as ''LST-967'', but redesignated ARB-9 on 14 April 1944, and named ''Ulysses'' on 28 April 1944, the ship was laid down on 2 November 1944, at
Hingham, Massachusetts
Hingham ( ) is a town in metropolitan Greater Boston on the South Shore (Massachusetts), South Shore of the U.S. state of Massachusetts in northern Plymouth County, Massachusetts, Plymouth County. At the 2020 United States Census, 2020 census, t ...
, by the
Bethlehem-Hingham Shipyard
The Bethlehem Hingham Shipyard of Hingham, Massachusetts, was a shipyard in the United States from 1941 until 1945. Located on Weymouth Back River, it was owned by the Bethlehem Shipbuilding Company and operated by the nearby Fore River Shipyard. ...
; launched on 2 December 1944; and commissioned on 27 December 1944, for transit to her conversion yard. After proceeding to
Baltimore
Baltimore ( , locally: or ) is the List of municipalities in Maryland, most populous city in the U.S. state of Maryland, fourth most populous city in the Mid-Atlantic (United States), Mid-Atlantic, and List of United States cities by popula ...
, she was decommissioned on 9 January 1945; converted to a battle damage repair ship by the
Maryland Drydock Company; and recommissioned on 20 April 1945.
Service history
In May 1945, the new battle damage repair ship conducted
shakedown exercises in
Chesapeake Bay
The Chesapeake Bay ( ) is the largest estuary in the United States. The Bay is located in the Mid-Atlantic region and is primarily separated from the Atlantic Ocean by the Delmarva Peninsula (including the parts: the Eastern Shore of Maryland / ...
; then, on 22 May, she departed
Norfolk
Norfolk () is a ceremonial and non-metropolitan county in East Anglia in England. It borders Lincolnshire to the north-west, Cambridgeshire to the west and south-west, and Suffolk to the south. Its northern and eastern boundaries are the No ...
, in company with . She steamed via the
Panama Canal
The Panama Canal ( es, Canal de Panamá, link=no) is an artificial waterway in Panama that connects the Atlantic Ocean with the Pacific Ocean and divides North and South America. The canal cuts across the Isthmus of Panama and is a condui ...
and
San Pedro, and arrived at
San Francisco
San Francisco (; Spanish for " Saint Francis"), officially the City and County of San Francisco, is the commercial, financial, and cultural center of Northern California. The city proper is the fourth most populous in California and 17th ...
, on the morning of 1 June. There, she loaded stores and
pontoons before getting underway from
San Francisco Bay on 28 June.
After ''Ulysses'' had been at sea for only six hours, the bolts, plates, and turnbuckles holding the pontoons in place began to show signs of bending under the stress of the ocean voyage, and the ship was ordered back to San Francisco, for additional work on the pontoon mounts. At noon on 6 July, she again got underway and set her course, via
Pearl Harbor
Pearl Harbor is an American lagoon harbor on the island of Oahu, Hawaii, west of Honolulu. It was often visited by the Naval fleet of the United States, before it was acquired from the Hawaiian Kingdom by the U.S. with the signing of the R ...
and
Eniwetok
Enewetak Atoll (; also spelled Eniwetok Atoll or sometimes Eniewetok; mh, Ānewetak, , or , ; known to the Japanese as Brown Atoll or Brown Island; ja, ブラウン環礁) is a large coral atoll of 40 islands in the Pacific Ocean and with i ...
, for the
Marianas. She arrived at
Saipan, on 6 August, (just over a week before
Japan capitulated) and reported to Commander, Service Division 103.
Ironically, on the very day – 6 August 1945 – ''Ulysses'' arrived at Saipan, only away on
Tinian Island, a plane named the
Enola Gay took off and flew to
Hiroshima, Japan, and dropped the world's first atomic bomb on that city. The sailors aboard ''Ulysses'' knew nothing of this at the time, nor for several days afterwards.
During the remainder of 1945, she carried out repair assignments while based in turn at Saipan and at
Okinawa
is a prefecture of Japan. Okinawa Prefecture is the southernmost and westernmost prefecture of Japan, has a population of 1,457,162 (as of 2 February 2020) and a geographic area of 2,281 km2 (880 sq mi).
Naha is the capital and largest city ...
. At
Buckner Bay
is a bay on the southern coast of Okinawa Island on the Pacific Ocean in Japan. The bay covers and ranges between to deep. The bay is surrounded by the municipalities of Uruma, Kitanakagusuku, Nakagusuku, Nishihara, Yonabaru, Nanjō, a ...
, on 9 and 10 October 1945, she weathered a devastating
typhoon
A typhoon is a mature tropical cyclone that develops between 180° and 100°E in the Northern Hemisphere. This region is referred to as the Northwestern Pacific Basin, and is the most active tropical cyclone basin on Earth, accounting for a ...
(
Typhoon Louise (1945)) during which she collided three times with . The repair ship lost three anchors in attempting to hold her position in the anchorage during the height of the storm and emerged from the ordeal with a hole in one side.
In January 1946, ''Ulysses'' shifted operations to
Shanghai
Shanghai (; , , Standard Mandarin pronunciation: ) is one of the four direct-administered municipalities of the People's Republic of China (PRC). The city is located on the southern estuary of the Yangtze River, with the Huangpu River flowin ...
; then, in March, she set her course for the United States. After transiting the
Panama Canal
The Panama Canal ( es, Canal de Panamá, link=no) is an artificial waterway in Panama that connects the Atlantic Ocean with the Pacific Ocean and divides North and South America. The canal cuts across the Isthmus of Panama and is a condui ...
and unloading ammunition at
Charleston, South Carolina, in mid-May, she proceeded to
Jacksonville
Jacksonville is a city located on the Atlantic coast of northeast Florida, the most populous city proper in the state and is the List of United States cities by area, largest city by area in the contiguous United States as of 2020. It is the co ...
, for preservation work. On 3 September, she reported to the 16th Fleet and, on 28 February 1947, she was decommissioned and joined the
Atlantic Reserve Fleet
The United States Navy maintains a number of its ships as part of a reserve fleet, often called the "Mothball Fleet". While the details of the maintenance activity have changed several times, the basics are constant: keep the ships afloat and s ...
at
Green Cove Springs, Florida
Green Cove Springs is a city in and the county seat of Clay County, Florida, United States. The population was 5,378 at the 2000 census. As of 2010, the population recorded by the U.S. Census Bureau was 6,908.
The city is named after the portio ...
. She remained there until 1 January 1961, when her name was struck from the
Naval Vessel Register
The ''Naval Vessel Register'' (NVR) is the official inventory of ships and service craft in custody of or titled by the United States Navy. It contains information on ships and service craft that make up the official inventory of the Navy from t ...
.
West German service
''Ulysses'' was transferred to the
West Germany Navy and renamed ''Odin'' (A512).
Commissioned in the German Navy 2 July 1960, at
Kiel
Kiel () is the capital and most populous city in the northern German state of Schleswig-Holstein, with a population of 246,243 (2021).
Kiel lies approximately north of Hamburg. Due to its geographic location in the southeast of the Jutland ...
she was stationed at
Naval Base Olpenitz for many years.
Notes
Citations
Bibliography
Online resources
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External links
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{{DEFAULTSORT:Ulysses (ARB-9)
Aristaeus-class repair ships
Aristaeus-class repair ships converted from LST-542-class ships
Ships built in Hingham, Massachusetts
1944 ships
World War II auxiliary ships of the United States
Aristaeus-class repair ships of the German Navy
Cold War auxiliary ships of Germany