Riverside II APA-102

Riverside II

(APA-102: dp. 8,392 (lt.),1. 492'; b. 69'0", dr. 26'6"; s. 18 k.;
epl. 539; trp. 1,740; a. 2 5", 4 40mm., 18 20mm., cl. Bayfield;
T. C3-S-A2)

The second Riverside was laid down on 11 November 1942 by the Ingalls Shipbuilding Co., Pascagoula, Miss., under Maritime Commission contract (M.C. hull 870); launched 13 April 1944, sponsored by Mrs. Sidney Swan; acquired by the Navv on loan charter, designated APA1 02, and commissioned on 29 June 1944. Then ordered to New York for conversion to an attack transport at the Atlantic Basin Ironworks Corp. yard, she was decommissioned on 8 July, converted, and recommissioned on 18 December 1944, Capt. Louis N. Miller in command.

After shakedown in Chesapeake Bay, Riverside proceeded to Davisville, 11.I.; loaded men and equipment of the 81st Construetion Batallion; and departed for the pacific. Transiting the Panama Canal on 30 January 1945, she continued on to Pearl Harbor, arriving on 15 February. She then carried patients and passengers to California. In mid-April she returned to Hawaii; conducted amphibious landing exercises through May, tested equipment and trained personnel in cargo handling in June; and in mid-June got lmderway on another

Hawaii-California run. At the end of the month she shifted from San Pedro to Portland, Oreg., for availability, and in early July steamed west with reinforcements for Okinawa.

Steaming via Guam and Ulithi, Riverside, flagship of Transport Squadron 21, arrived at the Hagushi anchorage on 12 August and discharged her cargo and passengers. Two days later the war ended. She then shifted around to Buckner Bay, whence she proceeded to the Philippines to embark Army occupation troops for Korea. From Korea she returned to Okinawa and toward the end of October joined the "Magic Carpet" fleet to bring American troops back to the United States. At the end of January 1946, she completed her second transPacific "Magic Carpet" run. She then made a round trip to Hawaii and, in mid-February, she departed San Francisco for the east coast and inactivation.

Riverside arrived at Norfolk on 5 March. Decommissioned on 27 April, she was redelivered to the Maritime Commission's War Shipping Adminstration on the 28th. Her name was struck from the Navy list on 8 May 1946.