CM-3 Aroostook
The second Aroostook was originally constructed as the passenger steamship Bunker Hill by the William Cramp and Sons shipyard in Philadelphia. She was launched on 26 March 1907. Bunker Hill was inspected by the Navy on 2 November 1917 for possible use as a passenger and freight-carrying steamship. Acquired by the Navy from the Eastern Steamship Lines, of Boston, on 12 November 1917, Bunker Hill was renamed Aroostook in General Order No. 343 of 15 November 1917, and given the identification number (Id. No.) 1256.
Aroostook was commissioned at the Boston Navy Yard on 7 December 1917. As the ship's crew was organized and assembled, the conversion of the ship to a "mine planter" proceeded apace. Upon removal of the former cruise ship's wooden superstructure, the crew - organized into industrial "gangs" of riveters, caulkers , shipfitters, and carpenters - was scattered to available spaces in yard shops, and subsisted on other ships, all work on the ship being performed in spite of a severe winter.
USS Oglala, a 3,746-ton minelayer, was originally built at Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, in 1907 as a coastal passenger steamer. During the First World War, while named Massachusetts, she was purchased by the Navy for conversion to a minelayer. The ship was commissioned in December 1917 and renamed Shawmut (ID # 1255) a month later. She steamed to Great Britain in June 1918 and spent the rest of World War I helping to plant the great anti-submarine mine barrage across the North Sea.
Aroostook sailed for Scotland on 12 June, in company with Shawmut, the mine planter Saranac (Id. No. 1702), and the tender Black Hawk (Id. No. 2140). Prior to these ships' sailing, concern had arisen over the fuel capacities of Aroostook and Shawmut, since their abbreviated trial runs off Provincetown had disclosed that they consumed fuel at a higher rate than had been anticipated. Faced with an indefinite delay, Capt. Wat T. Cluverius and Comdr. Roscoe Bulmer devised a plan to refuel the ships at sea from Black Hawk. They procured enough oil hose to do so, and the ships all sailed accordingly. Both fuelings at sea-the first considered a "novel undertaking" and done in spite of a gale-were successfully carried out, and the ships made arrival without further incident.
Aroostook put into the Norfolk Navy Yard on 1 April 1919 for alterations to fit her out for to serve as the base ship for the NC flying boats earmarked to attempt a transatlantic flight. She received tanks for 5,000 gallons of gasoline, cradles to handle two small Curtiss MF flying boats, and modifications to her berthing and messing spaces to enable her to accommodate the men needed to service seaplanes.
In December 1918, Shawmut returned to the US. Through the next two decades, she served as an aircraft tender and minelayer, receiving the hull number CM-4 in 1920. To avoid verbal confusion with USS Chaumont (AP-5), she was renamed Oglala on 01 January 1928. At about the same time, she was given new boilers and other modifications, changing her appearance from two smokestacks to one.
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