Fleetco, an built by the Newport News Shipbuilding and Dry Dock Co., Newport News, Virginia

Newport News, Virginia

Newport News is an independent city located in the Hampton Roads metropolitan area of Virginia. It is at the southeastern end of the Virginia Peninsula, on the north shore of the James River extending southeast from Skiffe's Creek along many miles of waterfront to the river's mouth at Newport News...

, for the United States Shipping Board

United States Shipping Board

The United States Shipping Board was established as an emergency agency by the Shipping Act , 7 September 1916. It was formally organized 30 January 1917. It was sometimes referred to as the War Shipping Board.http://www.gwpda.org/wwi-www/Hurley/bridgeTC.htm | The Bridge To France by Edward N....

 (E.F.C. 1639), was launched on 21 April 1920; transferred to the Navy by Executive Order on 17 October 1921; renamed USS Sepulga (AO-20) on 2 November 1921; delivered to the Navy at Mare Island, California, on 13 December 1921.

Service history

Commissioned on 13 January 1922, with Lt. Arthur G. Somers, USNRF, in temporary command, Sepulga was decommissioned on 15 April 1922, and laid up at Mare Island for the next 18 years. She was re-commissioned on 5 February 1940, Comdr. Arthur R. Ponto in command; and, in March, she commenced operations for the Naval Transportation Service. Based at San Pedro

San Pedro, Los Angeles, California

San Pedro is a port district of the city of Los Angeles, California, United States. It was annexed in 1909 and is a major seaport of the area...

, she carried fuel, general cargo, and passengers from the west coast to Guam

Guam

Guam is an organized, unincorporated territory of the United States located in the western Pacific Ocean. It is one of five U.S. territories with an established civilian government. Guam is listed as one of 16 Non-Self-Governing Territories by the Special Committee on Decolonization of the United...

, the Philippines

Philippines

The Philippines , officially known as the Republic of the Philippines , is a country in Southeast Asia in the western Pacific Ocean. To its north across the Luzon Strait lies Taiwan. West across the South China Sea sits Vietnam...

, Wake Island

Wake Island

Wake Island is a coral atoll having a coastline of in the North Pacific Ocean, located about two-thirds of the way from Honolulu west to Guam east. It is an unorganized, unincorporated territory of the United States, administered by the Office of Insular Affairs, U.S. Department of the Interior...

, Midway

Midway Atoll

Midway Atoll is a atoll in the North Pacific Ocean, near the northwestern end of the Hawaiian archipelago, about one-third of the way between Honolulu, Hawaii, and Tokyo, Japan. Unique among the Hawaiian islands, Midway observes UTC-11 , eleven hours behind Coordinated Universal Time and one hour...

, and Hawaii

Hawaii

Hawaii is the newest of the 50 U.S. states , and is the only U.S. state made up entirely of islands. It is the northernmost island group in Polynesia, occupying most of an archipelago in the central Pacific Ocean, southwest of the continental United States, southeast of Japan, and northeast of...

 during the remaining months of peace in the Pacific. On 7 December, she was en route from San Pedro to Pearl Harbor

Pearl Harbor

Pearl Harbor, known to Hawaiians as Puuloa, is a lagoon harbor on the island of Oahu, Hawaii, west of Honolulu. Much of the harbor and surrounding lands is a United States Navy deep-water naval base. It is also the headquarters of the U.S. Pacific Fleet...

. At mid-month, she arrived in Hawaii, where she delivered fuel to carriers , , and . On 3 January 1942, she sailed for California

California

California is a state located on the West Coast of the United States. It is by far the most populous U.S. state, and the third-largest by land area...

 to take on cargo and fuel for the Society Islands

Society Islands

The Society Islands are a group of islands in the South Pacific Ocean. They are politically part of French Polynesia. The archipelago is generally believed to have been named by Captain James Cook in honor of the Royal Society, the sponsor of the first British scientific survey of the islands;...

.

Upon arriving at Bora Bora

Bora Bora

The commune of Bora-Bora is made up of the island of Bora Bora proper with its surrounding islets emerging from the coral reef, 29.3 km² in total, and of the atoll of Tupai , located north of Bora Bora...

 on 18 February, she fueled merchant and Allied naval ships through March; then sailed for San Pedro. By mid-May, she resumed fueling duties at Bora Bora and continued them until 16 July when she again sailed for the west coast.

After reaching San Pedro on 5 August, she again departed her California base on the 24th and headed north to Dutch Harbor in the Aleutians where she dispensed petroleum products into the fall, interrupting those duties only for runs to the Seattle area to refill her tanks.

In January 1944, Sepulga returned to the Central Pacific. Temporarily assigned to ServRon 4, she arrived at Funafuti

Funafuti

Funafuti is an atoll that forms the capital of the island nation of Tuvalu. It has a population of 4,492 , making it the most populated atoll in the country. It is a narrow sweep of land between 20 and 400 metres wide, encircling a large lagoon 18 km long and 14 km wide, with a surface of...

 on the 15th; took on Navy and Marine passengers; and, on the 23d, got underway for Kwajalein

Kwajalein

Kwajalein Atoll , is part of the Republic of the Marshall Islands . The southernmost and largest island in the atoll is named Kwajalein Island. English-speaking residents of the U.S...

. Arriving on 4 March, she provided fuel and water to fleet units at that atoll. Later reassigned to ServRon 10, she remained at Kwajalein into June; then moved to Eniwetok to provide similar services, to serve as receiving ship for passengers in transit, and to act as headquarters for the fuel section of her squadron. In October 1944, she proceeded to Ulithi

Ulithi

Ulithi is an atoll in the Caroline Islands of the western Pacific Ocean, about 191 km east of Yap. It consists of 40 islets totalling , surrounding a lagoon about long and up to wide—at one of the largest in the world. It is administered by the state of Yap in the Federated States of...

 where she served as station ship and headquarters ship through the end of the war.

On 4 November 1945, the World War I

World War I

World War I , which was predominantly called the World War or the Great War from its occurrence until 1939, and the First World War or World War I thereafter, was a major war centred in Europe that began on 28 July 1914 and lasted until 11 November 1918...

-designed oiler got underway for the United States and inactivation. Arriving at San Francisco on 29 November, she was decommissioned on 1 March 1946; struck from the Navy List on 20 March; transferred to the Maritime Commission on 1 July; and sold, for scrapping, to the National Metal and Steel

National Metal and Steel

National Metal and Steel Corporation was engaged in ship dismantling operations at Terminal Island in Los Angeles, California. Operations ceased on 1 January 1986 when the company lost its harbor facility....

 Corp., on 10 December.

See also

• List of ship launches in 1920
• List of ship commissionings in 1922
• List of ship decommissionings in 1946

External links

• Mare Island Navy Yard - 1928. Elbridge Ayer Burbank
  Elbridge Ayer Burbank
  Elbridge Ayer Burbank was an American artist who sketched and painted more than 1200 portraits of Native Americans from 125 tribes. He studied art in Chicago and in his 30s traveled to Munich, Germany for additional studies with notable German artists...
  
  pencil sketch.
• Photo gallery at navsource.org