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USS ALDEBARAN (AF-10)
SS Stag Hound was laid down on 28 November 1938 at Newport News, Virginia, by the Newport News Shipbuilding & Drydock Co. under a Maritime Commission contract; launched on 21 June 1939; sponsored by Mrs. Martha Macy Hill, and delivered to the Grace Lines on 4 December 1939. The Navy purchased her on 22 December 1940. Renamed Aldebaran, classified a stores ship, and designated AF-10, she was placed in commission, in ordinary on 26 December 1940. Commander Royal Abbott assumed command on 10 January 1941, and Aldebaran was placed in full commission at San Francisco on 14 January 1941. The stores ship embarked upon her first Navy mission on 26 January, departing from San Francisco on a round-trip voyage via Pearl Harbor to Pago Pago, Samoa. Following her maiden mission for the Navy, Aldebaran remained at San Francisco until 29 March when she put to sea with a cargo bound for Hawaii. The ship made a seven-day layover at Pearl Harbor between 5 and 12 April and returned to San Francisco on the 18th. Upon her arrival back on the west coast, she was converted to a fleet provisioning ship. On 14 November, Aldebaran departed San Francisco on her way to San Diego. Following a three-day stay at that port between 16 and 19 November, she got underway for Hawaii. The ship discharged cargo at Pearl Harbor during the last six days of November and, after an overnight stop at Maui, headed back to the west coast on I December. Aldebaran arrived at San Francisco on the 6th. On the following morning, the Japanese attacked Pearl Harbor and plunged the United States into World War 11. The ship embarked upon her first wartime voyage on 17 December. Over the next six months, Aldebaran completed four round-trip runs carrying provisions and passengers between San Francisco and Hawaii. She concluded the fourth of those Pearl Harbor shuttle assignments at San Francisco on 6 June 1942.
Her next assignment took the ship beyond Hawaii to the South Pacific. She stood out of San Francisco on 23 June, stopped at Pearl Harbor early in July and then spent the remainder of the summer of 1942 making calls at ports on the South Pacific circuit. Aldebaran visited Samoa, Tongatabu, New Caledonia, and Espiritu Santo before returning to San Francisco on 23 September. That first wartime series of port calls in the South Pacific established a pattern of operations for her that endured through the next 20 months. Aldebaran loaded cargo at San Francisco and then embarked upon long, circuitous voyages that took her back to New Caledonia, Samoa, and Espiritu Santo. New places also cropped up on her itinerary--Havannah Harbor at Efate and Purvis Bay, Tulagi, and Guadalcanal in the Solomon Islands. She then returned to San Francisco at the conclusion of all but the last of those long resupply missions. In May 1944, during the run back to the west coast from Espiritu Santo, Aldebaran was diverted to Hawaii to load cargo bound for the Central Pacific. She arrived in Pearl Harbor on 24 May, took on her cargo, and returned to sea on the 29th, entering Kwajalein Atoll in the Marshall Islands on 5 June. After unloading her cargo, she headed back to Pearl Harbor on 12 June, arriving on the 18th. Aldebaran spent the next nine months carrying provisions to ships at forward bases in the Marshalls and Carolines. Her most frequent ports of call were Eniwetok in the Marshalls and Ulithi in the Carolines; however, she made one visit each to Kwajalein in the Marshalls, Manus in the Admiralty Islands, and Guam in the Marianas. At the conclusion of each supply mission, she returned to either Pearl Harbor or San Francisco to load additional cargo On 10 April, she departed San Francisco for Pearl Harbor where she spent the period 16 to 21 April fitting out for a new mission, replenishing the fast carriers and their screens at sm. Aldebaran stood out of Pearl Harbor on the 21st and arrived in Ulithi on 2 May. There, she reported for duty with Task Unit (TU) 50.8.5, part of the underway replenishment group. She departed Ulithi in company with TU 50.8.5 on May and joined the rest of Task Group (TG) 50.8 at sea. The stores ship spent about five weeks at sea replenishing the warships engaged in the Okinawa campaign before putting in at Guam on 13 June to reload. For the remaining two months of hostilities, Aldebaran provided logistics support for the carrier task groups making air strikes on the Japanese home islands returning periodically to either Guam or Ulithi to restock her larder. |
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