USS Achilles (ARL-41)

USS Achilles (ARL-41) was one of 39 Achelous-class landing craft repair ships built for the United States Navy during World War II. Named after the Greek hero Achilles, she was the only U.S. Naval vessel to bear the name.

She was laid down as the unnamed LST-455 on 3 August 1942 at Vancouver, Washington by Kaiser Company; launched on 17 October 1942; and commissioned on 30 January 1943 with Lieutenant Clarence Cisin in command.

Service history

World War II

Amphibious assaults on Japanese-held islands in the South and Southwest Pacific Theater had involved virtually hundreds of landing craft of all types and sizes, ranging from small craft to infantry landing craft and tank landing craft (LCIs and LCTs, respectively). Since these specialized assault craft, of comparatively light construction, could not be repaired with the few facilities and men available to them alone, orders went out that several tank landing ships would be converted to special landing craft repair ships (later classified as ARL). However, modifying existing LSTs in stateside yards required time (a critical commodity in the fairly steady pace of the amphibious island-hopping campaigns) that the forces fighting at the front did not have. At this point, LST-455, then in Australian waters, came under the gaze of these amphibious planners. Experienced personnel, trained in ship repair work, were assigned to the ship and almost doubled the size of her complement. Ready for service by the latter part of May 1943, the former tank landing ship departed Australian waters, bound for New Guinea, and arrived at Milne Bay on 2 June 1943. She immediately commenced the work for which she had been converted, repairing LCIs under the guidance of the repair officer of Rigel.

On 4 September 1943, Vice Admiral Daniel E. Barbey's 7th Fleet Amphibious Forces put Australian troops ashore on the Huon Peninsula, near Lae, New Guinea. LST-455 moved up to support these operations from Morobe Bay and lay anchored there among the Allied ships, presenting a tempting target by virtue of the nest of LCIs alongside. Nine Japanese dive bombers, escorted by nine "Zero" fighters, attacked the shipping in Morobe Bay and singled out LST-455 for attention, scoring a direct hit aft. A large bomb hit the stern, passed through the galley, and exploded in the crew's quarters, aft, starting fires and trapping men in the after steering room. Determined sailors battled the blaze and cut through bulkheads to rescue the trapped men. The damage control measures were directed by the ship's commanding officer, Lieutenant E. A. Peterson, USNR (who had relieved Lieutenant Cisin in August) and won him a Navy Cross for personal heroism. Although she had been heavily hit, LST-455 shot down two of the attackers. By nightfall, her men had extinguished the blaze and commenced initial repairs. She had suffered the loss of 18 men killed; 11 were wounded; and six men were missing. Sonoma then towed LST-455 to Milne Bay where the repair ship was berthed alongside Rigel. However, the need for LST-455's services was so urgent that she was soon back to work repairing LCI's even though her own severe damage had not yet been fully corrected. On 21 August 1944, the ship was named Achilles and reclassified officially as a landing craft repair ship, ARL-41. Soon thereafter, she proceeded north to participate in the reconquest of the Philippine Islands. As the invasion proceeded, all Service Force ships were shifted to anchorages off Samar, in San Pedro Bay. There Achilles saw daily evidence of a new weapon unveiled by the Japanese in their relentless attempt to disrupt the American offensive: the kamikaze ("Divine Wind"), planes flown by Japanese pilots on one-way missions of destruction.

During the first four days of November, the weather provided a respite from the kamikaze, although it came in the form of a typhoon which buffeted the ship. When the clouds finally cleared, the kamikaze returned. Lookouts soon pinpointed three "Zekes" (Mitsubishi A6M5 "Zero" fighters) heading on a course that would take them across Achilles` bow. As the landing craft repair ship's forward guns commenced firing, one plane passed ahead; the second, however, turned tightly and commenced a dive straight at Achilles as she and the four LCIs moored to her lay immobile. The repair ship's gunners scored hits on the diving aircraft, but could not stop it. The aircraft crashed into the ship forward, its motor tearing through the main deck. The aircraft itself hit the forward deckhouse in the carpenter shop, where number one repair party had gathered at its battle station. After the deafening explosion that wiped out the repair party, orange-red flames (caused by gasoline from the burning aircraft) swept across the weather deck, while parts of the "Zeke" tumbled through the air, some landing 250 yards (230 m) astern. Fires immediately spread, their progress unchecked due to the disruption of the forward fire mains upon impact of the aircraft. The kamikaze crash had killed 19 men and wounded an additional 28; 14 men were unaccounted for.

In the latter half of February 1945 and early March, Achilles returned via Biak to Leyte, but quickly proceeded to Subic Bay and Mindoro, spending a week in each place, tending LSMs and carrying out her vital support work. During the latter part of April, Achilles moved down to Morotai, in the Netherlands East Indies, for further tender duty, readying landing craft for the impending invasion of Borneo. Participating in the initial landings at Brunei Bay, Borneo, Achilles again came under air attack, when a "Dinah" loosed two bombs that landed 50 yards (46 m) off her starboard beam. This attack, on 10 June 1945, caused no damage to the ship, although shrapnel wounded two men in Achilles` crew. The repair ship remained at Borneo until she returned to the Philippine Islands late in July to join the forces marshalling there for the projected invasion of the Japanese homeland. However, the capitulation of Japan in mid-August obviated "Operation Olympic" (the assault against the home islands of Japan) but did not end operations for Achilles. She repaired landing craft into the fall of 1945, relieved on station by Proserpine. Proceeding to Hawaii, Achilles, in company with Remus, reached Pearl Harbor on the last day of October. Decommissioned on 19 July 1946, Achilles was struck from the Navy List on 28 August 1946.

The ship received three battle stars for her World War II service: one as LST-455 and two as Achilles.

China

On 14 March 1947, the Navy decided to transfer Achilles to China under Lend-Lease; and, on 8 September 1947, the repair ship was delivered to representatives of the Chinese Navy at New Orleans. Commissioned as Hsing An on 5 November 1947, she sailed for China two days later. Little is known of the ship's active service under the Chinese flag, except that in fleeing the Red Chinese advance in 1949, she ran aground. Her crew then set fire to the hulk to deny the Chinese communists her use. The veteran of bombing at Morobe Bay and the kamikaze in San Pedro Bay, however, proved tougher; the communists salvaged her, refitted her, and renamed her Dagu Shan(大孤山; Dàgūshān; lit. Lonely Mountain) and was last seen as late as 1985 with the East Sea Fleet of the People's Liberation Army Navy. Her ultimate disposition, however, is cloaked in the mystery that usually surrounds ships that come into the hands of the Red Chinese Navy.

References

This article incorporates text from the public domain Dictionary of American Naval Fighting Ships.