USS West Elcasco (ID-3661)
Encyclopedia
USS West Elcasco (ID-3661) was a steel
Steel
Steel is an alloy that consists mostly of iron and has a carbon content between 0.2% and 2.1% by weight, depending on the grade. Carbon is the most common alloying material for iron, but various other alloying elements are used, such as manganese, chromium, vanadium, and tungsten...
-hulled
Hull (watercraft)
A hull is the watertight body of a ship or boat. Above the hull is the superstructure and/or deckhouse, where present. The line where the hull meets the water surface is called the waterline.The structure of the hull varies depending on the vessel type...
cargo ship
Cargo ship
A cargo ship or freighter is any sort of ship or vessel that carries cargo, goods, and materials from one port to another. Thousands of cargo carriers ply the world's seas and oceans each year; they handle the bulk of international trade...
which saw service as an auxiliary
Auxiliary ship
An auxiliary ship is a naval ship which is designed to operate in any number of roles supporting combatant ships and other naval operations. Auxiliaries are not primary combatants, although they may have some limited combat capacity, usually of a self defensive nature.Auxiliaries are extremely...
with the U.S Navy in World War I
World War I
World War I , which was predominantly called the World War or the Great War from its occurrence until 1939, and the First World War or World War I thereafter, was a major war centred in Europe that began on 28 July 1914 and lasted until 11 November 1918...
and as an Army transport in World War II
World War II
World War II, or the Second World War , was a global conflict lasting from 1939 to 1945, involving most of the world's nations—including all of the great powers—eventually forming two opposing military alliances: the Allies and the Axis...
.
West Elcasco was commissioned into the Navy only weeks before the end of World War I, and the war ended before she had time to complete a single Navy mission. She subsequently undertook two relief missions to Europe
Europe
Europe is, by convention, one of the world's seven continents. Comprising the westernmost peninsula of Eurasia, Europe is generally 'divided' from Asia to its east by the watershed divides of the Ural and Caucasus Mountains, the Ural River, the Caspian and Black Seas, and the waterways connecting...
in the immediate postwar period prior to decommission in 1919. Between the wars she operated as a merchant vessel.
The ship was reacquired for U.S. government service in World War II with the Army Transport Command, when she was renamed USAT Major General Henry Gibbins. Major General Henry Gibbins was torpedoed and sunk off Key West, Florida
Key West, Florida
Key West is a city in Monroe County, Florida, United States. The city encompasses the island of Key West, the part of Stock Island north of U.S. 1 , Sigsbee Park , Fleming Key , and Sunset Key...
by U-158
German submarine U-158 (1941)
German submarine U-158 was a Type IXC U-boat of the German Kriegsmarine built for service during World War II.Her keel was laid down on November 1, 1940 by AG Weser in Bremen...
on 23 June 1942.
Design and construction
West Elcasco was built in Seattle, WashingtonSeattle, Washington
Seattle is the county seat of King County, Washington. With 608,660 residents as of the 2010 Census, Seattle is the largest city in the Northwestern United States. The Seattle metropolitan area of about 3.4 million inhabitants is the 15th largest metropolitan area in the country...
in 1918 at the No. 2 Plant of the Skinner & Eddy Corporation—the second last in a series of 24 steel
Steel
Steel is an alloy that consists mostly of iron and has a carbon content between 0.2% and 2.1% by weight, depending on the grade. Carbon is the most common alloying material for iron, but various other alloying elements are used, such as manganese, chromium, vanadium, and tungsten...
-hulled
Hull (watercraft)
A hull is the watertight body of a ship or boat. Above the hull is the superstructure and/or deckhouse, where present. The line where the hull meets the water surface is called the waterline.The structure of the hull varies depending on the vessel type...
Design #1013 cargo ship
Cargo ship
A cargo ship or freighter is any sort of ship or vessel that carries cargo, goods, and materials from one port to another. Thousands of cargo carriers ply the world's seas and oceans each year; they handle the bulk of international trade...
s built by Skinner & Eddy for the United States Shipping Board
United States Shipping Board
The United States Shipping Board was established as an emergency agency by the Shipping Act , 7 September 1916. It was formally organized 30 January 1917. It was sometimes referred to as the War Shipping Board.http://www.gwpda.org/wwi-www/Hurley/bridgeTC.htm | The Bridge To France by Edward N....
's emergency wartime shipbuilding program.
Nominally a vessel of 8,800 deadweight tons, West Elcasco is listed in mercantile records as having a deadweight tonnage of 8,568 tons and a gross register tonnage
Gross Register Tonnage
Gross register tonnage a ship's total internal volume expressed in "register tons", one of which equals to a volume of . It is calculated from the total permanently enclosed capacity of the vessel. The ship's net register tonnage is obtained by reducing the volume of non-revenue-earning spaces i.e...
of 5,766. The ship had an overall length of 423 feet 9 inches, a beam of 54 feet and a draft of about 24 feet. West Elcasco was powered by a steam turbine
Steam turbine
A steam turbine is a mechanical device that extracts thermal energy from pressurized steam, and converts it into rotary motion. Its modern manifestation was invented by Sir Charles Parsons in 1884....
driving a single screw propeller, delivering a service speed of between 10.5 to 11.25 knots.
Naval service
West Elcasco was acquired by the Navy on 23 October 1918 on behalf of the Naval Overseas Transportation Service (NOTS), and commissioned the same day as USS West Elcasco (ID-3661), with Lt. Comdr. Lt. T. Ward, USNRF, in command.Laden with a cargo of flour, West Elcasco departed Seattle on 31 October, bound for the east coast
East Coast of the United States
The East Coast of the United States, also known as the Eastern Seaboard, refers to the easternmost coastal states in the United States, which touch the Atlantic Ocean and stretch up to Canada. The term includes the U.S...
. After stopping briefly at San Pedro, California, she transited the Panama Canal
Panama Canal
The Panama Canal is a ship canal in Panama that joins the Atlantic Ocean and the Pacific Ocean and is a key conduit for international maritime trade. Built from 1904 to 1914, the canal has seen annual traffic rise from about 1,000 ships early on to 14,702 vessels measuring a total of 309.6...
and arrived at New York
New York
New York is a state in the Northeastern region of the United States. It is the nation's third most populous state. New York is bordered by New Jersey and Pennsylvania to the south, and by Connecticut, Massachusetts and Vermont to the east...
on 2 December. With her cargo consigned to European food relief, she got underway for Europe on 8 December and arrived at Gibraltar
Gibraltar
Gibraltar is a British overseas territory located on the southern end of the Iberian Peninsula at the entrance of the Mediterranean. A peninsula with an area of , it has a northern border with Andalusia, Spain. The Rock of Gibraltar is the major landmark of the region...
on the last day of 1918. From the strait, she proceeded to the Adriatic Sea
Adriatic Sea
The Adriatic Sea is a body of water separating the Italian Peninsula from the Balkan peninsula, and the system of the Apennine Mountains from that of the Dinaric Alps and adjacent ranges...
and arrived at Trieste, Italy on 11 January 1919. After discharging part of her cargo there, West Elcasco shifted to Gallipoli
Gallipoli
The Gallipoli peninsula is located in Turkish Thrace , the European part of Turkey, with the Aegean Sea to the west and the Dardanelles straits to the east. Gallipoli derives its name from the Greek "Καλλίπολις" , meaning "Beautiful City"...
, on the Dardanelles
Dardanelles
The Dardanelles , formerly known as the Hellespont, is a narrow strait in northwestern Turkey connecting the Aegean Sea to the Sea of Marmara. It is one of the Turkish Straits, along with its counterpart the Bosphorus. It is located at approximately...
, where she delivered the remainder of her cargo. She then took on a cargo of depth charge
Depth charge
A depth charge is an anti-submarine warfare weapon intended to destroy or cripple a target submarine by the shock of exploding near it. Most use explosives and a fuze set to go off at a preselected depth in the ocean. Depth charges can be dropped by either surface ships, patrol aircraft, or from...
s and headed home on 15 February.
After her arrival at Philadelphia on 7 March, West Elcasco shifted to Boston
Boston
Boston is the capital of and largest city in Massachusetts, and is one of the oldest cities in the United States. The largest city in New England, Boston is regarded as the unofficial "Capital of New England" for its economic and cultural impact on the entire New England region. The city proper had...
and loaded a cargo of foodstuffs for France
France
The French Republic , The French Republic , The French Republic , (commonly known as France , is a unitary semi-presidential republic in Western Europe with several overseas territories and islands located on other continents and in the Indian, Pacific, and Atlantic oceans. Metropolitan France...
. She got underway on 8 April and delivered her cargo after arriving at Le Verdon-sur-Mer
Le Verdon-sur-Mer
Le Verdon-sur-Mer is a commune in the Gironde department in Aquitaine in southwestern France.-Population:-References:*...
. Returning from Europe, via New York, to Boston on 9 June, West Elcasco was decommissioned on 14 June 1919 and transferred to the U.S. Shipping Board the same day.
Mercantile service
Little information is available regarding West Elcascos movements in the interwar period, but the ship is known to have been active from 1919 through the mid-1920s in transatlantic service, when the ship transported passengers and cargo from various ports in SpainSpain
Spain , officially the Kingdom of Spain languages]] under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages. In each of these, Spain's official name is as follows:;;;;;;), is a country and member state of the European Union located in southwestern Europe on the Iberian Peninsula...
, France
France
The French Republic , The French Republic , The French Republic , (commonly known as France , is a unitary semi-presidential republic in Western Europe with several overseas territories and islands located on other continents and in the Indian, Pacific, and Atlantic oceans. Metropolitan France...
and Italy
Italy
Italy , officially the Italian Republic languages]] under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages. In each of these, Italy's official name is as follows:;;;;;;;;), is a unitary parliamentary republic in South-Central Europe. To the north it borders France, Switzerland, Austria and...
to the United States. West Elcasco was sold in 1930 to the Mississippi Shipping Co. and homeported at New York. With the reduction in international trade brought about by the Great Depression
Great Depression
The Great Depression was a severe worldwide economic depression in the decade preceding World War II. The timing of the Great Depression varied across nations, but in most countries it started in about 1929 and lasted until the late 1930s or early 1940s...
however, West Elcasco like many other U.S. ships of the era was eventually laid up by the Shipping Board for lack of work.
Army service
With the outbreak of World War IIWorld War II
World War II, or the Second World War , was a global conflict lasting from 1939 to 1945, involving most of the world's nations—including all of the great powers—eventually forming two opposing military alliances: the Allies and the Axis...
in 1939, shipping losses caused by U-boat
U-boat
U-boat is the anglicized version of the German word U-Boot , itself an abbreviation of Unterseeboot , and refers to military submarines operated by Germany, particularly in World War I and World War II...
s created an increased demand for tonnage. To help meet this demand, the U.S. Maritime Commission (successor to the Shipping Board), in addition to its orders for new tonnage, decided to recondition and place back into service a number of old Shipping Board vessels laid up between the wars. In July 1940, it was announced that West Elcasco would be reconditioned and placed back into service along with nine other ships, including four more Skinner & Eddy-built ships, Eldena, Polybius and West Elcascos sister ships and , all of which had spent the latter part of the 1930s laid up at New Orleans.
In 1941, the United States Army Quartermaster Corps acquired West Elcasco and renamed her USAT Major General Henry Gibbins. In February 1942, Major General Henry Gibbins, along with the SS Florida, transported 850 troops and their weapons to the oil refinery port of Aruba
Aruba
Aruba is a 33 km-long island of the Lesser Antilles in the southern Caribbean Sea, located 27 km north of the coast of Venezuela and 130 km east of Guajira Peninsula...
, Netherlands Antilles
Netherlands Antilles
The Netherlands Antilles , also referred to informally as the Dutch Antilles, was an autonomous Caribbean country within the Kingdom of the Netherlands, consisting of two groups of islands in the Lesser Antilles: Aruba, Bonaire and Curaçao , in Leeward Antilles just off the Venezuelan coast; and Sint...
, disembarking their cargoes on the 11th. Major General Henry Gibbins was fortunately still safely in port when German submarines attacked
Attack on Aruba
The Attack on Aruba was an attack on oil installations and tankers by Axis submarines during World War II. On 16 February 1942, a German U-boat attacked the small island of Aruba in the first shelling of American soil by Axis forces during the war. Other submarines patrolled the area for shipping...
shipping in the area on the 16th.
On 23 June 1942, Major General Henry Gibbins, sailing unescorted with a cargo of coffee, was attacked and sunk by U-158 about 375 miles west of Key West, Florida. The ship was hit on the port side by two torpedoes fired about twenty minutes apart, and sank shortly thereafter. The ship's crew of 47 along with her 21 army guards survived the attack, and were rescued within a day or two and taken to Pensacola, Florida
Pensacola, Florida
Pensacola is the westernmost city in the Florida Panhandle and the county seat of Escambia County, Florida, United States of America. As of the 2000 census, the city had a total population of 56,255 and as of 2009, the estimated population was 53,752...
.