USS Culgoa

History
United States
Name	USS Culgoa
Builder	J. L. Thompson and Sons, Ltd., Sunderland, England
Launched	1889
Acquired	by purchase, 4 June 1898
Commissioned	3 December 1898
Decommissioned	31 December 1921
Reclassified	AF-3, 17 July 1920
Fate	Sold, 25 July 1922
General characteristics
Type	Supply ship
Tonnage	3,325 GRT; 2,135 NRT;
Displacement	6,000 long tons (6,096 t)
Length	346 ft 3 in (105.54 m)
Beam	43 ft (13 m)
Draft	21 ft 8 in (6.60 m)
Propulsion	2 × Compound steam engines; 2 × shafts;
Speed	13 knots (24 km/h; 15 mph)
Complement	122 officers and enlisted
Armament	1 or 2 × 6-pounder guns

USS Culgoa (AF-3) was a refrigerated supply ship in the United States Navy.

Culgoa was built in 1889 by

Sunderland, England and purchased at Cavite, Philippines on 4 June 1898. During the naval blockade of Manila

, the vessel supplied the American squadron with ice and meat. Since she was not a commissioned naval vessel, Culgoa could purchase supplies while avoiding the neutrality laws that banned sales to the Navy.

Service history

Philippine–American War, 1898–1901

On 3 December 1898, one week before the Treaty of Paris that ended the Spanish–American War was signed, Culgoa was commissioned.

Assigned to the

Cavite Navy Yard supplying ships and troops at Manila with ice and meat until August 1899. Overhauled at Hong Kong between 20 October and 18 November 1899, Culgoa returned to supply duties, making three voyages to Sydney and Brisbane, Queensland

, Australia, for fresh stores in 1900 and 1901.

On 22 July 1901 she cleared Cavite and sailed by way of

Boston, Massachusetts

.

North Atlantic Squadron, 1902–1907

Recommissioned 1 October 1902 Culgoa joined the North Atlantic Squadron and provided storeship services to ships and shore stations in the Caribbean and Gulf of Mexico until again placed out of commission 11 August 1905. Considered for disposition, she was stricken from the Naval Vessel Register on 7 May 1906, but reinstated on 30 June 1906 and recommissioned 12 September 1907 for service with the Atlantic Fleet.

Great White Fleet, 1907–1909

Sailing from New York on 21 September 1907 Culgoa was loaned to the

Panama Railway Company for an emergency shipment of beef, returning to New York 16 October 1907. On 11 December Culgoa left to join the Atlantic Battleship Fleet at Santa Lucia as mobile stores ship, one of four auxiliaries accompanying the sixteen battleships on the cruise of the "Great White Fleet". During the cruise, while on a planned supply run, she carried naval artist Henry Reuterdahl

, who painted a number of scenes of the expedition.

At

Formosa Strait

between 28 October and 5 November 1908, she assisted in the establishment of wireless communications with the Second Squadron.

On 3 January 1909, while at

Messina, Italy, which had been ravaged by an earthquake.^[1]

Atlantic, Caribbean, 1909–1919

Returning to

Gravesend, Kent

, England, before returning to New York on 20 January 1911.

She put out from New York 11 February 1911 for duty in the Caribbean, where she supplied stores for ships and shore detachments protecting American citizens and interests throughout this troubled area until February 1918.

Serving with the Naval Overseas Transportation Service during the remainder of World War I, Culgoa made seven transatlantic convoy voyages to bases in France and Britain between 19 February 1918 and 10 May 1919. On 10 July 1918 she assisted the SS Oosterdijk which sank after a collision with SS San Jacinto. Culgoa took aboard the passenger survivors and towed San Jacinto into Halifax, Nova Scotia.

Pacific, 1920–1922

Culgoa issued stores and provisions to Battle Squadron 2 at

Seattle, Washington

, and San Francisco.

Returning to New York 3 September 1920 for overhaul, she resumed her supply operations on the east coast and in the Caribbean between February and October 1921. Culgoa was decommissioned at New York City on 31 December 1921 and sold 25 July 1922.

As of 2005, no other US ship has been named Culgoa.

Sources

This article incorporates text from the public domain Dictionary of American Naval Fighting Ships. The entry can be found here.

^ Mowbray, Jay Henry (1909). Italy's Great Horror or Earthquake and Tidal Wave. pp. 109–111.

Other sources that document USS Culgoa's service during World War I include Jay C. Martin, Convoys, Consumables, and Camaraderie: The World War I Journal of Earle M. Powers, United States Navy (Ithaca: University Museum Press, 2015).

ISBN 1519576609

. Powers' journal includes photographs, daily entries, and illustrations that document his time aboard the USS Culgoa, 1917–1918.