Thetis Bay got underway
for San Diego where she conducted brief shakedown training. On 2
June 1944, she moved to San Pedro to load planes and passengers for
Pacific bases. The new escort carrier stood out to sea on 5 June
1944;
called at Pearl Harbor on the 11th; and continued on, via Makin and
Majuro, to Kwajalein. There, she embarked the Army's 50th Engineer
Battalion which she offloaded at Pearl Harbor on 5 July. Two days
later, the carrier got underway for Alameda with 41 aircraft that
needed repairs. She arrived on 13 July and, after offloading the
aircraft, proceeded to Terminal Island for a three-week yard period.
Between 11 August and 13 September, the escort carrier delivered
spare parts, replacement aircraft, and personnel to Hawaii and the
Marshalls. From September 1944 through mid-April 1945, Thetis Bay
made five round-trip voyages from California ports to bases in the
Pacific ranging from Pearl Harbor to Finschhaven, New Guinea.
On 12 June 1945, Thetis Bay arrived at Pearl Harbor from San Diego
with a load of aircraft. There, the aircraft were readied for combat
within 72 hours; and the ship got underway for Guam. She arrived at
Apra Harbor on 25 June and was assigned to Task Group 30.8 for duty
as a replenishment carrier. Thetis Bay made her first rendezvous
with Task Force 38 on 12 July when she transferred 40 planes to
various carriers. She returned to Guam on 22 July and remained there
until 24 July to load more aircraft before joining the fast carriers
again on the 31st. The ship reloaded at Guam once more and
resupplied the task force from 14 August to 8 September when she
returned to Apra Harbor en route to the United States.
Thetis Bay arrived at Alameda on 7 September 1945 and was assigned
to "Magic-Carpet" duty, returning veterans from overseas bases to
the United States. She served in this capacity until January 1946
when she began inactivation. The ship was placed out of commission,
in reserve, at Bremerton, Washington, on 7 August 1946.
In May 1955, Thetis Bay
was towed to the San Francisco Naval Shipyard where she began
conversion to the Navy's first assault helicopter aircraft carrier.
On 1 July 1955, her designation was changed from CVE-90 to CVHA-1.
With that change, she became a complement to the attack transport.
Her helicopters supplemented landing craft to give the Navy and
Marine Corps the flexibility of a vertical assault capability. She
was recommissioned on 20 July 1956, Captain Thomas W. South, II, in
command, and completed conversion six weeks later on 1 September.
The carrier arrived at her new home port, Long Beach, on 20
September. There, helicopter teams from Marine Corps Test Unit No.
1, Camp Pendleton, demonstrated landing and take-off techniques.
Thetis Bay participated in amphibious training exercises off the
California coast before deploying to the Far East on 10 July 1957.
She returned to Long Beach on 11 December 1957 and resumed local
operations. On 28 May 1959, her designation was changed to LPH-6,
amphibious assault ship.
In August 1959, Thetis Bay was serving with the 7th Fleet when
floods in Taiwan left thousands homeless. On the 12th, she was
ordered to proceed from Hong Kong to Taiwan and use HMR(L)-261's 21
large troop-carrying helicopters to aid the flood victims. By the
end of the assistance operation, at noon of the 20th, the ship had
delivered a total of 1,600,540 pounds of supplies to the Chinese. In
addition, HMR(L)-261's helicopters had lifted 850 passengers to and
from various sites in the flooded area.
In May 1960, Thetis Bay participated in a practice night assault
landing at Camp Pendleton during which her helicopters carried 1,300
troops and 33 tons of cargo to the objective area. This was the
first large-scale night landing of ground forces by carrier-based
helicopters.
Thetis Bay deployed to the western Pacific in the spring of 1961.
After the assault ship returned to Long Beach, she was transferred
to the Atlantic Fleet. She arrived at Norfolk, her new home port, in
early December 1961.
During the next three years, the ship operated along the Atlantic
coast and in the Caribbean. The highlight of her service with the
Atlantic Fleet came during the Cuban missile crisis in October 1962
when she proceeded to the quarantine area with her embarked marine
landing team and helicopter squadron ready for action. In September
1963 Thetis Bay proceeded to hurricane-stricken Haiti. She anchored
off Port-au-Prince and launched Marine helicopters carrying medical
aid and food supplies to thousands of victims of Hurricane Flora.
Thetis Bay stood out of Norfolk on 5 January 1964 en route to
Philadelphia for deactivation and arrived there the next day. She
was decommissioned and struck from the Navy List on 1 March 1964.
Her hulk was sold in December 1964 to Peck Iron & Metal Co., Inc.,
Portsmouth, Virginia, for scrap. |