.gif)
USS Rutland (APA-192)
Encyclopedia
USS Rutland (APA-192) was a Haskell-class
attack transport
built and used by the US Navy in World War II. She was a Victory ship
design, VC2-S-AP5. She was named after Rutland County, Vermont, USA.
, Vancouver, Washington; launched on 10 August 1944; sponsored by Mrs. Karl V. Kilgore; acquired on a loan-charter basis from the Maritime Commission and commissioned on 29 September 1944, Commander
Francis K. O'Brien in command.
Reporting to Commander-in-Chief, Pacific, on 9 October 1944, Rutland underwent shakedown along the Pacific coast
and departed Oakland, California
, for Pearl Harbor
on 30 November 1944. Arriving on 6 December, flagship
Rutland, and other ships of Transport Division 47 loaded the 5th Marine Division at Hilo, Hawaii, and conducted training exercises for the crew and troops in and around the islands
.
The division departed Pearl Harbor on 27 January 1945 for Eniwetok Atoll, Marshall Islands
, arriving on 5 February, and then proceeded on to Saipan
and Tinian Islands. On 16 February, Squadron 16, of which Division 47 was a part, sailed for the invasion of Iwo Jima
.
On the morning of D-Day
, 19 February 1945, Rutland participated in the assault on that strongly fortified island. Her landing craft
operated on Red Beaches 1 and 2, with her beach party in charge of Red Beach 2. For eight days, she unloaded troops and cargo and handled casualties. Although 11 of her boats were lost and several of her beach party personnel were wounded, not one man was killed.
Leaving Iwo Jima
on 27 February, Rutland arrived at Saipan on 2 March, went on to Guam
, where her Marine casualties were unloaded, and next got underway to pick up replacement boats at Tulagi
, Solomon Islands
, where she arrived on 12 March. She proceeded on to Espiritu Santo
and loaded part of the 27th Division, 10th Army
, to act as a floating reserve in the invasion of Okinawa
.
Transport Division 47 proceeded to Kerama Retto
and Rutland entered Kerama Kaikyo on the morning of 9 April only to get underway that evening while enemy planes attacked ships in the vicinity. At dawn on 10 April, she arrived in the inner transport area off Tsugen Jima, a small enemy occupied island on the eastern side of Okinawa
, where Rutlands boats landed troops from . Soon after noon, the ships shifted berth to Nakagusuku Wan, a large bay on Okinawa proper, and remained there until Tsugen Jima had been secured two days later. During the operations at Tsugen Jima, the ship's landing craft were subjected to considerable mortar
, canister
, and rifle
fire from the island, and though hardly a boat escaped unscathed, no serious damage resulted and no men were wounded.
From Tsugen Jima, the ships sailed to the Hagushi
beaches on the western shores of Okinawa, which had been secured on D-Day, 1 April, and proceeded with unloading operations. This phase continued until the 16th, while the transport area experienced numerous enemy air attacks. Rutland assisted in shooting down four enemy planes.
From Okinawa, Rutland went to Saipan for boats to replace those transferred to the boat pool at Okinawa, then underwent overhaul and reconditioning at Ulithi
and Subic Bay
. From 26 June until 22 August, she prepared for the invasion of the Japanese home islands
with exercises at Leyte
and Ilaiho. With the Japanese acceptance of surrender terms
, these training exercises were canceled.
Among the first transports to arrive off Honshū
, Rutland put into Tokyo Bay
on 2 September, disembarked troops of the 1st Cavalry Division at Yokohama
, and got underway again on the 4th to return to the Philippines
. Arriving at Leyte a week later, she embarked elements of the 41st Infantry Division, 10th Corps, U.S. Army
, and troop cargo at Zamboanga
, Mindanao
, Philippine Islands, on 16 September, and carried them to Hiro Wan, Honshū, Japan, which she reached on 6 October via Leyte and Okinawa. On 14 October, she embarked almost 1,900 Navy passengers at Okinawa for passage to the United States, arriving at Seattle on 1 November. She made one last run to Okinawa and back before being assigned to the Atlantic Reserve Fleet on 29 December 1945.
where she remained until struck from the Navy List
and transferred to the Maritime Commission for disposal on 1 October 1958. She entered the National Defense Reserve Fleet
at James River, Virginia on 31 March 1959. On 8 June 1982 she was sold to Union Minerals & Alloys Corporation, for $25,000, to be scrapped. At 1030 EDT, on 24 August 1982 she was withdrawn from the Reserve Fleet and sent to the breaker's yard
.
Haskell class attack transport
Haskell-class attack transports were amphibious assault ships of the United States Navy created in 1944. They were designed to transport 1,500 troops and their combat equipment, and land them on hostile shores with the ships' integral landing craft....
attack transport
Attack transport
Attack Transport is a United States Navy ship classification.-History:In the early 1940s, as the United States Navy expanded in response to the threat of involvement in World War II, a number of civilian passenger ships and some freighters were acquired, converted to transports and given hull...
built and used by the US Navy in World War II. She was a Victory ship
Victory ship
The Victory ship was a type of cargo ship produced in large numbers by North American shipyards during World War II to replace shipping losses caused by German submarines...
design, VC2-S-AP5. She was named after Rutland County, Vermont, USA.
World War II service
Rutland was laid down on 4 May 1944 by Kaiser Shipbuilding Corp.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...
, Vancouver, Washington; launched on 10 August 1944; sponsored by Mrs. Karl V. Kilgore; acquired on a loan-charter basis from the Maritime Commission and commissioned on 29 September 1944, Commander
Commander (United States)
In the United States, commander is a military rank that is also sometimes used as a military title, depending on the branch of service. It is also used as a rank or title in some organizations outside of the military, particularly in police and law enforcement.-Naval rank:In the United States...
Francis K. O'Brien in command.
Reporting to Commander-in-Chief, Pacific, on 9 October 1944, Rutland underwent shakedown along the Pacific coast
West Coast of the United States
West Coast or Pacific Coast are terms for the westernmost coastal states of the United States. The term most often refers to the states of California, Oregon, and Washington. Although not part of the contiguous United States, Alaska and Hawaii do border the Pacific Ocean but can't be included in...
and departed Oakland, California
Oakland, California
Oakland is a major West Coast port city on San Francisco Bay in the U.S. state of California. It is the eighth-largest city in the state with a 2010 population of 390,724...
, for Pearl Harbor
Pearl Harbor
Pearl Harbor, known to Hawaiians as Puuloa, is a lagoon harbor on the island of Oahu, Hawaii, west of Honolulu. Much of the harbor and surrounding lands is a United States Navy deep-water naval base. It is also the headquarters of the U.S. Pacific Fleet...
on 30 November 1944. Arriving on 6 December, flagship
Flagship
A flagship is a vessel used by the commanding officer of a group of naval ships, reflecting the custom of its commander, characteristically a flag officer, flying a distinguishing flag...
Rutland, and other ships of Transport Division 47 loaded the 5th Marine Division at Hilo, Hawaii, and conducted training exercises for the crew and troops in and around the islands
Hawaiian Islands
The Hawaiian Islands are an archipelago of eight major islands, several atolls, numerous smaller islets, and undersea seamounts in the North Pacific Ocean, extending some 1,500 miles from the island of Hawaii in the south to northernmost Kure Atoll...
.
The division departed Pearl Harbor on 27 January 1945 for Eniwetok Atoll, Marshall Islands
Marshall Islands
The Republic of the Marshall Islands , , is a Micronesian nation of atolls and islands in the middle of the Pacific Ocean, just west of the International Date Line and just north of the Equator. As of July 2011 the population was 67,182...
, arriving on 5 February, and then proceeded on to Saipan
Saipan
Saipan is the largest island of the United States Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands , a chain of 15 tropical islands belonging to the Marianas archipelago in the western Pacific Ocean with a total area of . The 2000 census population was 62,392...
and Tinian Islands. On 16 February, Squadron 16, of which Division 47 was a part, sailed for the invasion of Iwo Jima
Battle of Iwo Jima
The Battle of Iwo Jima , or Operation Detachment, was a major battle in which the United States fought for and captured the island of Iwo Jima from the Empire of Japan. The U.S...
.
D-Day
D-Day is a term often used in military parlance to denote the day on which a combat attack or operation is to be initiated. "D-Day" often represents a variable, designating the day upon which some significant event will occur or has occurred; see Military designation of days and hours for similar...
, 19 February 1945, Rutland participated in the assault on that strongly fortified island. Her landing craft
Landing craft
Landing craft are boats and seagoing vessels used to convey a landing force from the sea to the shore during an amphibious assault. Most renowned are those used to storm the beaches of Normandy, the Mediterranean, and many Pacific islands during WWII...
operated on Red Beaches 1 and 2, with her beach party in charge of Red Beach 2. For eight days, she unloaded troops and cargo and handled casualties. Although 11 of her boats were lost and several of her beach party personnel were wounded, not one man was killed.
Leaving Iwo Jima
Iwo Jima
Iwo Jima, officially , is an island of the Japanese Volcano Islands chain, which lie south of the Ogasawara Islands and together with them form the Ogasawara Archipelago. The island is located south of mainland Tokyo and administered as part of Ogasawara, one of eight villages of Tokyo...
on 27 February, Rutland arrived at Saipan on 2 March, went on to Guam
Guam
Guam is an organized, unincorporated territory of the United States located in the western Pacific Ocean. It is one of five U.S. territories with an established civilian government. Guam is listed as one of 16 Non-Self-Governing Territories by the Special Committee on Decolonization of the United...
, where her Marine casualties were unloaded, and next got underway to pick up replacement boats at Tulagi
Tulagi
Tulagi, less commonly Tulaghi, is a small island in the Solomon Islands, just off the south coast of Florida Island. The town of the same name on the island Tulagi, less commonly Tulaghi, is a small island (5.5 km by 1 km) in the Solomon Islands, just off the south coast of Florida...
, 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...
, where she arrived on 12 March. She proceeded on to Espiritu Santo
Espiritu Santo
Espiritu Santo is the largest island in the nation of Vanuatu, with an area of . It belongs to the archipelago of the New Hebrides in the Pacific region of Melanesia. It is in the Sanma Province of Vanuatu....
and loaded part of the 27th Division, 10th Army
U.S. Tenth Army
The Tenth United States Army was the last army level command established in the Pacific Theater of Operations during World War II. It was commanded by Lieutenant General Simon Bolivar Buckner, Jr. until he was killed by enemy artillery fire on Okinawa on 18 June 1945...
, to act as a floating reserve in the invasion of Okinawa
Battle of Okinawa
The Battle of Okinawa, codenamed Operation Iceberg, was fought on the Ryukyu Islands of Okinawa and was the largest amphibious assault in the Pacific War of World War II. The 82-day-long battle lasted from early April until mid-June 1945...
.
Transport Division 47 proceeded to Kerama Retto
Kerama Retto
The are a group of 22 islands located southwest of Okinawa Island in Japan. Four of the islands are inhabited:,., and. The islands are within Shimajiri District. The Kerama-shotō coral reef is a Ramsar Site....
and Rutland entered Kerama Kaikyo on the morning of 9 April only to get underway that evening while enemy planes attacked ships in the vicinity. At dawn on 10 April, she arrived in the inner transport area off Tsugen Jima, a small enemy occupied island on the eastern side of Okinawa
Okinawa Island
Okinawa Island is the largest of the Okinawa Islands and the Ryukyu Islands of Japan, and is home to Naha, the capital of Okinawa Prefecture. The island has an area of...
, where Rutlands boats landed troops from . Soon after noon, the ships shifted berth to Nakagusuku Wan, a large bay on Okinawa proper, and remained there until Tsugen Jima had been secured two days later. During the operations at Tsugen Jima, the ship's landing craft were subjected to considerable mortar
Mortar (weapon)
A mortar is an indirect fire weapon that fires explosive projectiles known as bombs at low velocities, short ranges, and high-arcing ballistic trajectories. It is typically muzzle-loading and has a barrel length less than 15 times its caliber....
, canister
Canister
The term canister comes from Latin or Greek . It means:* Originally, from Greek καννα , a basket of woven reeds...
, and rifle
Rifle
A rifle is a firearm designed to be fired from the shoulder, with a barrel that has a helical groove or pattern of grooves cut into the barrel walls. The raised areas of the rifling are called "lands," which make contact with the projectile , imparting spin around an axis corresponding to the...
fire from the island, and though hardly a boat escaped unscathed, no serious damage resulted and no men were wounded.
From Tsugen Jima, the ships sailed to the Hagushi
Hagushi
Hagushi bay was the primary unloading point for American supplies during the invasion of Okinawa during World War II. The bay, at the mouth of the Bishi River , was the dividing line between the First and Sixth US Marine divisions, which landed on the Hagushi beaches to the north, and the Seventh...
beaches on the western shores of Okinawa, which had been secured on D-Day, 1 April, and proceeded with unloading operations. This phase continued until the 16th, while the transport area experienced numerous enemy air attacks. Rutland assisted in shooting down four enemy planes.
From Okinawa, Rutland went to Saipan for boats to replace those transferred to the boat pool at Okinawa, then underwent overhaul and reconditioning at Ulithi
Ulithi
Ulithi is an atoll in the Caroline Islands of the western Pacific Ocean, about 191 km east of Yap. It consists of 40 islets totalling , surrounding a lagoon about long and up to wide—at one of the largest in the world. It is administered by the state of Yap in the Federated States of...
and Subic Bay
Subic Bay
Subic Bay is a bay forming part of Luzon Sea on the west coast of the island of Luzon in Zambales, Philippines, about 100 kilometers northwest of Manila Bay. Its shores were formerly the site of a major United States Navy facility named U.S...
. From 26 June until 22 August, she prepared for the invasion of the Japanese home islands
Operation Downfall
Operation Downfall was the Allied plan for the invasion of Japan near the end of World War II. The operation was cancelled when Japan surrendered after the atomic bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki and the Soviet Union's declaration of war against Japan. The operation had two parts: Operation...
with exercises at Leyte
Leyte Island
Leyte is an island in the Visayas group of the Philippines.The island measures about 180 km north-south and about 65 km at its widest point. In the north it nearly joins Samar, separated by the San Juanico Strait, which becomes as narrow as 2 km in some places...
and Ilaiho. With the Japanese acceptance of surrender terms
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...
, these training exercises were canceled.
Among the first transports to arrive off Honshū
Honshu
is the largest island of Japan. The nation's main island, it is south of Hokkaido across the Tsugaru Strait, north of Shikoku across the Inland Sea, and northeast of Kyushu across the Kanmon Strait...
, Rutland put into Tokyo Bay
Tokyo Bay
is a bay in the southern Kantō region of Japan. Its old name was .-Geography:Tokyo Bay is surrounded by the Bōsō Peninsula to the east and the Miura Peninsula to the west. In a narrow sense, Tokyo Bay is the area north of the straight line formed by the on the Miura Peninsula on one end and on...
on 2 September, disembarked troops of the 1st Cavalry Division at 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...
, and got underway again on the 4th to return to 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...
. Arriving at Leyte a week later, she embarked elements of the 41st Infantry Division, 10th Corps, 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...
, and troop cargo at Zamboanga
Zamboanga City
The City of Zamboanga : is a highly urbanized, independent and a chartered city located in Mindanao, Philippines....
, Mindanao
Mindanao
Mindanao is the second largest and easternmost island in the Philippines. It is also the name of one of the three island groups in the country, which consists of the island of Mindanao and smaller surrounding islands. The other two are Luzon and the Visayas. The island of Mindanao is called The...
, Philippine Islands, on 16 September, and carried them to Hiro Wan, Honshū, Japan, which she reached on 6 October via Leyte and Okinawa. On 14 October, she embarked almost 1,900 Navy passengers at Okinawa for passage to the United States, arriving at Seattle on 1 November. She made one last run to Okinawa and back before being assigned to the Atlantic Reserve Fleet on 29 December 1945.
Fate
Navy-owned as of 14 January 1946, Rutland was placed out of commission in reserve, on 26 February 1947 and berthed at Norfolk, VirginiaNorfolk, Virginia
Norfolk is an independent city in the Commonwealth of Virginia in the United States. With a population of 242,803 as of the 2010 Census, it is Virginia's second-largest city behind neighboring Virginia Beach....
where she remained until struck from the Navy List
Naval Vessel Register
The Naval Vessel Register 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 the time a vessel is authorized through its life cycle and...
and transferred to the Maritime Commission for disposal on 1 October 1958. 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...
at James River, Virginia on 31 March 1959. On 8 June 1982 she was sold to Union Minerals & Alloys Corporation, for $25,000, to be scrapped. At 1030 EDT, on 24 August 1982 she was withdrawn from the Reserve Fleet and sent to the breaker's yard
Ship breaking
Ship breaking or ship demolition is a type of ship disposal involving the breaking up of ships for scrap recycling. Most ships have a lifespan of a few decades before there is so much wear that refitting and repair becomes uneconomical. Ship breaking allows materials from the ship, especially...
.