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N7KTP > NAVNET 19.05.05 07:19l 71 Lines 4155 Bytes #999 (0) @ WW
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Subj: USS SOLOMONS (ACV-67)
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Sent: 050518/2126z @:N7FSP.#SEA.#WWA.WA.USA.NOAM West Seattle, WA. on 145.010
Carrier Solomon's aircraft engaged U-boats off Brazil in World War II
By Fred Miles Watson - Managing Editor - Northwest Navigator
The escort aircraft carrier USS Solomons (CVE 67), was converted from
a Maritime Commission hull and built by thee Kaiser Shipbuilding Company of
Vancouver, Wash. During her construction, she was assigned the first of her
three names, Emperor.
After being designated an auxiliary aircraft carrier, ACV-67, she was
renamed Nassuk Bay on June 28, 1943.
On July 15, she was redesignated an escort carrier, CVE-67. On Nov. 6,
she received her third and final name, Solomons, and was commissioned on
Nov. 21, 1943 with, Capt. M. E. Crist as her first commanding officer.
With a full load Solomons displaced 10,400-tons and was 512 feet in
length. She carried a draft of 22 feet, and could attain a top speed of
just above 19 knots. Outfitted with one, 5-inch gunmount, and 16, 40mm.
antiaircraft gunmounts, The carrier had _60 men on the ship's roster.
Following commissioning, Solomons spent the next four weeks in the
Astoria-Puget Sound area undergoing post-trial shakedown, tests, and
exercises. Departing Astoria on Dec. 20, she stopped at Alameda, Calif.,
three days laterand arrived at San Diego on Christmas Day.
Following operations out of San Diego, she sailed for Pearl Harbor,
Hawaii, on Dec. 30. On Jan. 6, 1944, Solomons loaded aircraft and supplies,
embarked passengers, and departed Pearl Harbor on Jan. 9 for the West
Coast. Arriving at San Diego on Jan. 6, 1944, Solomons conducted battle
practice off the coast of southern California until the end of the month.
She departed San Diego on the 30th, bound for Norfolk, Va. During her
approach to the Panama Canal, the carrier's planes participated in a
simulated aerial attack on the canal. The carrier arrived at Baitboa on
Feb. 9, embarked passengers, and departed for Norfolk two days later,
arriving on Feb. i6.
Loaded with planes, supplies, and aviation stores, Solomons got
underway on March 21 bound for Brazil and arrived at Recife on April 13 and
reported for duty with the 4th Fleet. On the next day, she got underway for
her first antisubmarine patrol. This cruise, which lasted until the 30th,
and the next, May 4 to the 20th, proved uneventful.
Departing Recife in June of 1944 on her third patrol, Solomons was
soon involved in her sole U-boat engagement of the war. On June 15, one of
Solomon's pilots reported contact with an enemy submarine some 50 miles
from the carrier The escorts, Straub (DE-181) and Herzog (DE-178) were
immediately directed to the position of the contact. The pilot, who had
made the initial contact on the submarine, was shot down by enemy
antiaircraft fire, but later that afternoon, another Solomons aircraft
regained visual contact.
Five other Solomon aircraft soon joined up with it, and the group
commenced a series of rocket and depth charge attacks which resulted in the
sinking of the submarine, although with the loss of another pilot. Straub
succeeded in rescuing 20 survivors including the commanding Officer.
Solomons continued antisubmarine air operations until June 23, when she
returned to Recife to refuel and disembark the captured German sailors.
After one more antisubmarine patrol and a visit to Rio de Janeiro,
Solomons returned to Norfolk, arriving on Aug. 24. She remained at that
port for a month before leaving for Staten Island, N.Y. She docked there on
Sept. 25.
She embarked 150 Army airmen together with their P-47 aircraft and
departed on Oct. 6, bound for Casablanca, French Morocco. By Nov. 7, she
was back in the United States this time at Narragansett Bay,R.1. Solomons
spent the rest of her active service engaged in qualifying Navy and Marine
pilots in carrier landings, initially off Quonset Point, R.I. In January
1945, she moved to Port Everglades, Fla., and continued her carrier landing
qualification assignment throughout 1945. .
On May 15, 1946, Solomons was decommissioned at Boston Naval Shipyard
and struck from the Navy List on June 5. She was sold for scrap to the
Patapsco Scrap Corp., Bethlehem, Pa.
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