CHIWAWA AO 68

Ship Name and Designation History

This section lists the names and designations that the ship had during its lifetime. The list is in chronological order.

Chiwawa Class Fleet Oiler Keel Laid (Date unknown) as "SS SAMOSET" Launched June 25 1942 Acquired by U.S. Navy December 24 1942 USS CHIWAWA AO-68 Commissioned December 24 1942 - Decommissioned May 6 1946 Laid up in National Defense Reserve Fleet August 23 1946 Struck from Naval Register September 25 1946 WALTER A. STERLING (Commercial Service) Sold 1961 and rebuilt as Straight Decked Bulk Freighter Used for Great Lakes service WILLIAM CLAY FORD (Commercial Service) Sold 1985 to Ford Motor Company and renamed LEE A. TREGURTHA (Commercial Service) Sold 1989 to Lakes Shipping Co and renamed Still in service on The Great Lakes

Naval Covers

This section lists active links to the pages displaying covers associated with the ship. There should be a separate set of pages for each name of the ship (for example, Bushnell AG-32 / Sumner AGS-5 are different names for the same ship so there should be one set of pages for Bushnell and one set for Sumner). Covers should be presented in chronological order (or as best as can be determined).

Since a ship may have many covers, they may be split among many pages so it doesn't take forever for the pages to load. Each page link should be accompanied by a date range for covers on that page.

1. Covers Page 1     (1946)

 

Postmarks

This section lists examples of the postmarks used by the ship. There should be a separate set of postmarks for each name and/or commissioning period. Within each set, the postmarks should be listed in order of their classification type. If more than one postmark has the same classification, then they should be further sorted by date of earliest known usage.

A postmark should not be included unless accompanied by a close-up image and/or an image of a cover showing that postmark. Date ranges MUST be based ONLY ON COVERS IN THE MUSEUM and are expected to change as more covers are added.
 
>>> If you have a better example for any of the postmarks, please feel free to replace the existing example.

 

Postmark Type --- Killer Bar Text	Date From to Date To	Thumbnail Link To Postmark Image	Thumbnail Link To Cover Image

 

Locy Type 9efu USCS Postmark Catalog Illus. C-47a

1946-02-25

Note:

 

Locy Type P USCS Postmark Catalog Illus. C-47b

1946-02-27

Note:

 

Other Information

USS CHIWAWA AO-68 was at Tokyo Bay September 2 1945 for the Japanese surrender

USS CHIWAWA earned the American Campaign Medal, the Europe-Africa-Middle East Campaign Medal (w/ 1 Battle star), the Asiatic-Pacific Campaign Medal (w/ 1 Battle star), the World War II Victory Medal and the Navy Occupation Service Medal (with Asia clasp) during her Naval career.

NAMESAKE - A river in Washington.

 

---

 

If you have images or information to add to this page, then either contact the Curator or edit this page yourself and add it. See Editing Ship Pages for detailed information on editing this page.

 

---

Copyright 2024 Naval Cover Museum