USS Attu (CVE-102)
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USS ''Attu'' (CVE-102) was a of the United States Navy. She was named after the Battle of Attu in the Aleutian Islands and was built for service during World War II. Launched in May 1944, and commissioned in June, she served as a transport carrier, ferrying aircraft, and as a replenishment carrier, supporting the
Invasion of Iwo Jima The Battle of Iwo Jima (19 February – 26 March 1945) was a major battle in which the United States Marine Corps (USMC) and United States Navy (USN) landed on and eventually captured the island of Iwo Jima from the Imperial Japanese Army (IJA ...
and the
Battle of Okinawa The , codenamed Operation Iceberg, was a major battle of the Pacific War fought on the island of Okinawa by United States Army (USA) and United States Marine Corps (USMC) forces against the Imperial Japanese Army (IJA). The initial invasion of ...
. Postwar, she participated in
Operation Magic Carpet Operation Magic Carpet was the post-World War II operation by the War Shipping Administration to repatriate over eight million American military personnel from the European, Pacific, and Asian theaters. Hundreds of Liberty ships, Victory ships ...
. She was decommissioned in June 1946, and sold for scrapping in January 1947. After a failed acquisition attempt by the Jewish Agency, she was ultimately scrapped in 1949.


Design and description

''Attu'' was a ''Casablanca''-class escort carrier, the most numerous type of
aircraft carrier An aircraft carrier is a warship that serves as a seagoing airbase, equipped with a full-length flight deck and facilities for carrying, arming, deploying, and recovering aircraft. Typically, it is the capital ship of a fleet, as it allows a ...
s ever built, and designed specifically to be mass-produced using prefabricated sections, in order to replace heavy early war losses. Standardized with her
sister ship A sister ship is a ship of the same class or of virtually identical design to another ship. Such vessels share a nearly identical hull and superstructure layout, similar size, and roughly comparable features and equipment. They often share a ...
s, she was
long overall __NOTOC__ Length overall (LOA, o/a, o.a. or oa) is the maximum length of a vessel's hull measured parallel to the waterline. This length is important while docking the ship. It is the most commonly used way of expressing the size of a ship, and ...
, had a
beam Beam may refer to: Streams of particles or energy *Light beam, or beam of light, a directional projection of light energy **Laser beam *Particle beam, a stream of charged or neutral particles **Charged particle beam, a spatially localized grou ...
of , and a draft of . She displaced standard, with a full load. She had a long hangar deck and a long flight deck. She was powered with two
Skinner Unaflow The uniflow type of steam engine uses steam that flows in one direction only in each half of the cylinder. Thermal efficiency is increased by having a temperature gradient along the cylinder. Steam always enters at the hot ends of the cylinder an ...
reciprocating steam engines, which drove two shafts, providing , thus enabling her to make . The ship had a cruising range of at a speed of . Her compact size necessitated the installment of an aircraft catapult at her bow, and there were two aircraft elevators to facilitate movement of aircraft between the flight and hangar deck: one each fore and aft. One /38
caliber In guns, particularly firearms, caliber (or calibre; sometimes abbreviated as "cal") is the specified nominal internal diameter of the gun barrel Gauge (firearms) , bore – regardless of how or where the bore is measured and whether the f ...
dual-purpose gun A dual-purpose gun is a naval artillery mounting designed to engage both surface and air targets. Description Second World War-era capital ships had four classes of artillery: the heavy main battery, intended to engage opposing battleships and ...
was mounted on the stern. Anti-aircraft defense was provided by eight Bofors anti-aircraft guns in single mounts, as well as twelve Oerlikon cannons, which were mounted around the perimeter of the deck. By the end of the war, ''Casablanca''-class carriers had been modified to carry thirty 20-mm cannons, and the amount of 40-mm guns had been doubled to sixteen, by putting them into twin mounts. These modifications were in response to increasing casualties due to kamikaze attacks. ''Casablanca''-class escort carriers were designed to carry 27 aircraft, but the hangar deck could accommodate more.


Construction

Her construction was awarded to Kaiser Shipbuilding Company, Vancouver, Washington under a Maritime Commission contract, on 18 June 1942. She was ordered under the name ''Elbour Bay'' (a misspelling of "Elbow Bay"), as part of a tradition which named escort carriers after bays or sounds in Alaska. She was renamed ''Attu'', after the Battle of Attu, on 6 November 1943, as part of a new naval policy which named subsequent Casablanca-class carriers after naval or land engagements. The escort carrier was laid down on 16 March 1944, MC hull 1139, the forty-seventh of a series of fifty ''Casablanca''-class escort carriers. She was launched on 27 May 1944; sponsored by Mrs. George W. Steele; transferred to the United States Navy and commissioned on 30 June 1944, with
Captain Captain is a title, an appellative for the commanding officer of a military unit; the supreme leader of a navy ship, merchant ship, aeroplane, spacecraft, or other vessel; or the commander of a port, fire or police department, election precinct, e ...
Henry Fahnestock MacComsey in command.


Service history


World War II

Upon being commissioned, ''Attu'' underwent a shakedown cruise down the West Coast to San Diego. On 7 August, she departed San Diego, transporting aircraft and passengers to Pearl Harbor. She then took on another load of aircraft and personnel, and proceeded west, making stops at
Guadalcanal Guadalcanal (; indigenous name: ''Isatabu'') is the principal island in Guadalcanal Province of Solomon Islands, located in the south-western Pacific, northeast of Australia. It is the largest island in the Solomon Islands by area, and the seco ...
and Espiritu Santo. Upon finishing her transport run, she got underway on her return trip on 31 August. She arrived at San Diego on 13 September, where overhaul was conducted. On 28 September, she sailed north to Alameda, California, where she loaded fuel, supplies, and replenishment aircraft. She departed the West Coast on 1 October, bound for Finschhafen, New Guinea, arriving there on 18 October. She then stopped at Seeadler Harbor in Manus Island, before returning via Pearl Harbor back to Alameda. She departed yet again on 23 November, bound for Pearl Harbor. Upon arriving, she began ferrying supplies and troops between Pearl Harbor and Guam. She finished her duties and returned to San Diego on 4 January 1945. After a short period of rest, she sailed again on 20 January, arriving at Pearl Harbor on 27 January. There, she conducted gunnery exercises in the waters off of Oahu. She concluded her exercises and steamed for
Enewetak Atoll 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 it ...
on 1 February. Pausing briefly, she proceeded onwards to Ulithi. On 16 February, she departed Ulithi, and was assigned to Task Group 50.8.4 (Logistics Support Group), along with the escort carriers , , and . This task group was responsible for ferrying and transferring replenishment aircraft to the frontline
Fifth Fleet The Fifth Fleet is a numbered fleet of the United States Navy. It has been responsible for naval forces in the Persian Gulf, Red Sea, Arabian Sea, and parts of the Indian Ocean since 1995 after a 48-year hiatus. It shares a commander and headq ...
and its carriers, which were supporting the
Invasion of Iwo Jima The Battle of Iwo Jima (19 February – 26 March 1945) was a major battle in which the United States Marine Corps (USMC) and United States Navy (USN) landed on and eventually captured the island of Iwo Jima from the Imperial Japanese Army (IJA ...
. After transferring all of her aircraft, ''Attu'' returned to Guam for replacement of her aircraft and supplies. She then sailed westwards again, and served as a replenishment carrier again, this time in support of the
landings Landing is the last part of a flight, where a flying animal, aircraft, or spacecraft returns to the ground. When the flying object returns to water, the process is called alighting, although it is commonly called "landing", "touchdown" or ...
on Okinawa. This time, her task group was responsible for resupplying both the escort carriers and the fleet carriers operating over the island. On 4 June, were being refueled by tankers, east of Okinawa. Throughout the day, winds began to pick up, and refueling operations had ceased by the time tropical storm force winds were reported in the late afternoon. In fact, ''Attu''s task group was directly in the path of
Typhoon Connie The 1945 Pacific typhoon season was the first official season to be included in the West Pacific typhoon database. It has no official bounds; it ran year-round in 1945, but most tropical cyclones tend to form in the northwestern Pacific Ocean betwe ...
, which was proceeding northwards. As
Admiral Admiral is one of the highest ranks in some navies. In the Commonwealth nations and the United States, a "full" admiral is equivalent to a "full" general in the army or the air force, and is above vice admiral and below admiral of the fleet, ...
William Halsey Jr., the commander of the Third Fleet, got word of the typhoon, his orders ended up driving a large part of his fleet directly into the path of the incoming storm. Amazingly, Halsey had previously blundered his way into Typhoon Cobra, with much damage and loss of life, in December 1944. As part of the Logistics Support Group, ''Attu'' witnessed the worst of the damage, weathering the eyewall of the storm. As night fell, it became evident that the task group could not avoid encountering the typhoon. The storm's eyewall struck on the early morning of 5 June, and by 3:30, hurricane-force winds had already been reported. At around 4:00, some flags tore off ''Attu'', and wrapped around her radarscope, rendering her blind to the location of the other ships around her. Consequently, she only narrowly avoided, with careful manipulation of the engines, a collision with the tankers. Her crew noted that the bow once came as close as to a catastrophic collision with a tanker's stern. The typhoon's winds blew several aircraft on board her flight deck off her side, and rendered inoperational or otherwise damaged many more. As she passed through the eye of the storm, the crew managed to unfurl the flags blocking her radar, enabling her to pass through the second half of the storm without much further damage. On 10 June, Captain Paul Hubert Ramsey took over command of the vessel. In early July, she retired back to San Diego for much belayed repairs of her typhoon damage. On 24 July, with repairs quickly concluded, she steamed westwards. She was sailing through a fueling area in the West Pacific when news of the Japanese surrender broke.


Post-war

Following the end of the war, she sailed back to California, arriving on 11 November. On 25 November, she joined the "Magic Carpet" fleet, which repatriated U.S. servicemen from throughout the Pacific. She cruised around the Pacific, making stops and returning U.S. servicemen back to the mainland. She completed her "Magic Carpet" duties, and was discharged in early 1946. By May 1946, ''Attu'' was slated for disposal by the Navy. She sailed for
Norfolk, Virginia Norfolk ( ) is an independent city in the Commonwealth of Virginia in the United States. Incorporated in 1705, it had a population of 238,005 at the 2020 census, making it the third-most populous city in Virginia after neighboring Virginia Be ...
, passing through the Panama Canal and making a stop at Jacksonville, Florida. She was decommissioned on 8 June, and she was struck from the Navy list on 3 July. After ''Attu'' was decommissioned, she was acquired by representatives of the Jewish Agency in New York. The representatives, led by
Yehuda Arazi Yehuda Arazi ( he, יהודה ארזי; 1907–1959), code name ''Alon'', was an Israeli who was active in the Haganah in Palestine during the British Mandate era. Biography Arazi was born in Łódź to a Jewish family in 1907. He immigrated wit ...
, planned to use the ship to transport up to 10,000 Jews to Palestine, where they wanted to establish a Jewish state. In addition, they planned to utilize the carrier to ferry a large quantity of armaments for the
Haganah Haganah ( he, הַהֲגָנָה, lit. ''The Defence'') was the main Zionist paramilitary organization of the Jewish population ("Yishuv") in Mandatory Palestine between 1920 and its disestablishment in 1948, when it became the core of the ...
, the paramilitary precursor of what would become the Israeli Defense Forces in 1948. An initial payment of about $10,000 () was arranged, and a refit was scheduled to prepare the ship. However, the United States Department of State discovered the plan and cancelled the deal; this allowed ''Attu'' to be
scrapped Scrap consists of recyclable materials, usually metals, left over from product manufacturing and consumption, such as parts of vehicles, building supplies, and surplus materials. Unlike waste, scrap has monetary value, especially recovered me ...
in 1949. ''Attu'' received two battle stars for her World War II service.


References


Sources


Online sources

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Bibliography

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External links

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Cruise Book of USS ''Attu'' (CVE-102)
{{DEFAULTSORT:Attu Casablanca-class escort carriers World War II escort aircraft carriers of the United States Ships built in Vancouver, Washington 1944 ships S4-S2-BB3 ships