USS U. S. Grant

USAT U. S. Grant underway in Manila Bay, 11 May 1938
History
United States
Builder	Vulcan Aktiengesellschaft, Germany
Launched	20 July 1907
Christened	König Wilhelm II
Acquired	(Seized from Germany) 6 April 1917
Commissioned	Navy: 27 Aug 1917 - 2 Sep 1919 Army: 3 Jun 1922 - 1940 Navy: 16 Jun 1941 - 14 Nov 1945
Renamed	USS Madawaska (1917 - 1922) USS U. S. Grant (1922 - 1948)
Stricken	28 November 1948
Honors and awards	One battle star for World War II service
Fate	Sold for scrap, 24 February 1948
General characteristics
Displacement	15,010 tons
Length	508 ft 2 in
Beam	55 ft 3 in
Draft	27 ft 6 in
Depth of hold	31 ft 8 in
Propulsion	Reciprocating engines, single screw, 8,000 shaft horsepower[1]
Speed	15 knots
Troops	1,244
Complement	211
Armament	(World War II) 7 x 5"/38 caliber guns , 4 x 3"/50 cal. guns, 2 x machine guns

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 König 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.

World War I

König Wilhelm II was a steel-hulled screw

, the passenger liner was seized after the United States entered the war on 6 April 1917, as were all other German vessels in American ports.

Before agents of the U.S. federal government took possession of the ship, her German crew unsuccessfully attempted to render her unusable by cracking her main steam cylinders with hydraulic jacks. Following repairs to the damaged machinery, König Wilhelm II was assigned the identification number 3011 and commissioned on 27 August 1917, Lt. Charles McCauley in temporary command pending the arrival of Comdr. Edward H. Watson.

Renamed Madawaska on 1 September, the ship was assigned to the Cruiser and Transport Force of the Atlantic Fleet. During World War I, she conducted 10 transatlantic voyages in which she carried nearly 12,000 men to Europe. After the armistice of 11 November 1918, Madawaska made seven more voyages, bringing 17,000 men home from the European theater. She completed the last of these runs upon her arrival at New York on 23 August 1919. She was decommissioned by the Navy on 2 September and simultaneously transferred to the War Department.

Between the wars

Sailing for the Pacific soon thereafter, Madawaska embarked elements of the

for lay-up.

The following year, however, the War Department reacquired the vessel and authorized a major refit for her before she could resume active service. During this overhaul, which would last through the spring of 1922, the ship was fitted with modern marine watertube

, christened the ship.

For almost two decades, U. S. Grant soldiered on in the

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

, 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 one 5-inch and four 3-inch guns (she had been unarmed while serving as an Army transport), the vessel was refitted at the

, and was commissioned on 16 June 1941. Continuing her service as a transport, the ship received the classification of AP-29.

[2] ^[3]

World War II

Aleutian Islands

U. S. Grant operated between ports on the

, on 7 December 1941.

In April, U. S. Grant resumed trips to Alaskan ports carrying troops from

islands on the 7th.

During this time, U. S. Grant carried troops to

while proceeding from Seattle to Dutch Harbor in convoy on 20 July. Alert lookouts picked out the tracks of two torpedoes and evasive action enabled the ship to avoid the deadly "fish" which passed close aboard, from starboard to port.

The venerable transport disembarked Army troops at Massacre Bay on 14 June 1943, three days after the initial landings on Attu. The following month, as American and Canadian troops prepared to assault Kiska, Rear Admiral Francis W. Rockwell broke his flag in U. S. Grant as Commander, Task Force 51. During this operation, U. S. Grant served as a combination transport and communications vessel. The Americans eventually discovered that the Japanese had stolen away like nomads, leaving only a few dogs to "contest" the landings, and had completed their evacuation, undetected by the Allies, by 28 July. ^[4]

During the Kiska landings, the transport not only carried Army troops, but also a Mexican liaison group; a detachment of Canadian troops, and a group of civilian correspondents. After a period of repairs in late 1943, which lasted into 1944, U. S. Grant resumed coastwise voyages to Alaska.

Caribbean and Pacific service

From April to December, she shifted to the eastern Pacific to operate between Hawaii and the west coast. She often embarked medical patients to return them to the west coast from Hawaiian area hospitals. Arriving at San Francisco after one such voyage on 23 January 1945, U. S. Grant disembarked passengers and got underway the same afternoon without passengers or escort, bound for the Caribbean. Transiting the

, until the end of the war.

U. S. Grant returned to Pacific duty in September, departing San Francisco on the 18th for

. She arrived at Okinawa on 12 October, in the wake of a destructive typhoon, and took on board 1,273 passengers for transportation to the United States, getting underway from the island on 21 October. Arriving at San Francisco on 7 November, U. S. Grant disembarked her passengers soon thereafter.

Decommission

One week later, on 14 November, the transport was decommissioned and returned to the War Department. Her name was struck from the

, on 24 February 1948 for scrapping.

Awards

U. S. Grant received one

battle star

for her World War II service.

Footnotes

^[1]

References

• This article incorporates text from the public domain Dictionary of American Naval Fighting Ships. The entry can be found here.
• AP-29 U. S. Grant, Navsource Online.