USS Montague (AKA-98)

Typical Andromeda class AKA
Career
Name:	USS Montague
Namesake:	Montague County, Texas
Builder:	Federal Shipbuilding and Drydock Company, Kearny, New Jersey
Launched:	12 February 1945
Commissioned:	12 April 1945
Decommissioned:	22 November 1955
Struck:	Unknown
Honors and awards:	4 battle stars (Korea)
Fate:	Sold for scrapping, 12 March 1971
General characteristics
Class and type:	Andromeda-class attack cargo ship
Type:	Type C2-S-B1
Displacement:	6,761 long tons (6,869 t)
Length:	459 ft 2 in (139.95 m)
Beam:	63 ft (19 m)
Draft:	26 ft 4 in (8.03 m)
Speed:	16.5 knots (30.6 km/h; 19.0 mph)
Complement:	474
Armament:	• 1 × 5"/38 caliber gun mount • 4 × twin 40 mm gun mounts • 16 × 20 mm gun mounts

USS Montague (AKA-98) was an Andromeda-class attack cargo ship named after a county in Texas. She served as a commissioned ship for 10 years and 7 months.

Montague (AKA–98), was built under Maritime Commission contract by the Federal Shipbuilding and Drydock Co., Kearny, N.J.; launched on 12 February 1945; sponsored by Mrs. Irving S. Olds; and commissioned on 13 April 1945, Capt. B. H. Thomas in command.

Service history

After shakedown in the Chesapeake Bay, Montague proceeded to Hawaii, arriving Pearl Harbor on 10 June 1945. She departed Pearl Harbor on 2 July, unloading her cargo on 10 July at Eniwetok. The next five months she shuttled cargo, ranging from Guam to China. After discharging equipment in China, she departed Tsingtao on 29 November, for the United States. Montague operated off the east coast for the next two years, and participated in training exercises in the Caribbean. Getting underway from Norfolk, Virginia, on 3 January 1948, she sailed for duty with the 6th Fleet, helping to stabilize the postwar situation in the Mediterranean. She returned to Norfolk on 15 March, and participated in amphibious exercises off the east coast before getting underway on 13 September to join the 6th Fleet in the Mediterranean, returning Morehead City, North Carolina, on 24 January 1949. The following 15 months were spent training off the east coast, and in the Caribbean.

She departed Morehead City on 2 May 1950 for her third tour of duty with the 6th Fleet. Receiving orders to support United Nations action in Korea in August, she transited the Suez Canal, arriving Kobe, Japan on 9 September. Anchored off Inchon, she disembarked troops and cargo from 8 to 16 October. After a run to Kobe she embarked troops at Inchon, disembarking them at Wonsan on the east coast. Then she sailed to Chinnampo, the port city of the North Korean capital, to embark refugees. She continued to operate between Hŭngnam and Wonsan, and the port of Pusan until returning to Japan on 29 December. She cruised between Korea and Japan for three months, before sailing home, arriving San Diego, on 28 April 1951.

Between 1951 and 1954, Montague made three more voyages to the Far East, visiting ports in the Philippines, Japan, and Korea. On her last tour of duty, she departed Japan on 2 August 1954, and proceeded to Indochina to take part in "Operation Passage to Freedom" shuttling refugees from North to South Vietnam following the French defeat in the First Indochina War. She returned to the west coast, and anchored on 9 October at Long Beach.

Decommissioning and sale

Montague was decommissioned on 22 November 1955, was berthed at Mare Island, California, as a unit of the Pacific Reserve Fleet, and was transferred to the Maritime Administration on 29 January 1960. Berthed as a unit of the National Defense Reserve Fleet at Olympia, Washington, the ship was sold for scrapping on 12 March 1971 to West Waterway Lumber Company.

Awards

Montague received four battle stars for Korean service.

References

This article includes text from the public domain Dictionary of American Naval Fighting Ships. The entry can be found here.

External links

• Photo gallery of USS Montague (AKA-98) at NavSource Naval History
• 51 Years of AKAs