Hello all; What type of ship did troops load into a Higgins boats from ?

Tahnks Rigger

Mitch,
I take it you mean the LCVP type Higgins and not the PT Boat type?
If the former they were transported into theatre on Attack Cargo Ships (Various classes, some based on Liberty ship designs pennant numbers start with 'AKA') Or Attack Transports (APA pennants) and high Speed Transports (Converted from Destroyer Escorts. APD Pennants).
I've found the link below. for more links just Google search LCVP
www.ussrankin.org/id41.htm
Good Modelling
Tom


Skipper,
I don't know how to make the link 'live'. Could you help out?
Ta
Tom

www.ussrankin.org/id41.htm

Chuck

Thanks guys

I picked up one of those 350 scale Trumpeter Liberty ships. Is there any conversion I would need to make to designate her an AKA? Anybody see any LCVP's in this scale just in case?

I've got the Fahey's "Ships and Aircraft of the US Fleet" from the war years which will have that info for sure, but off the top of my head I'm pretty sure that the two types of ships are not identical. I'm not sure what mods you'd need to make but I'll do some checking.

Tom

LST's also carried a few. I toured the last one, LST 325, this summer and there was a launch rail on either side as well as a Higgins on display on the main deck.

Morning Al (AJLaFleche)

Is there a lot of pics of your trip on the LST?
It would make a good resourse oic folder in warships

Skipper

There was a pretty good program last night on The History Channel about the Higgins boats. Man, Moment, Machine. They'll probably show it again this weekend. One thing I didn't realize was the first design for the boats had a standard, pointed, bow. When that proved impractical Higgins basically sawed off the pointed part and put in the flat ramp bow. Funny how like so many other things in WWII Higgins was at first turned down by the Navy.

I'll send them off to you and you can do with them as you choose. I'll include the background of this ship, as I recall it.

Thank you very much Al!

I'lll let you know when it is "released"

Skipper

Well I did some research last night digging through the "Victory Edition" of "The Ships and Aircraft of the US Fleet, and I have good news and bad news.

The good news is that there is no doubt that Liberty ships were designated as AK's which is "Cargo Ship". Additionally they also wound up being used as many other different types of Auxiliaries, to include AKS (General Issue Store Ship), AKN (Net Cargo Ships) which transport and lay anti-submarine nets to protect fleet anchorages, and several different varieties of AR (Repair Ships).

Here's the detail. The "Liberty Ship" is a specific "Maritime Commission type". To be precise, these ships are EC2-S-C, which according to the tables indicate they are 14,250 tons, 441' 7" length, 56' 11" beam, 27' 7" draft, and a top speed of 11 knots. There are literally dozens of different designs for auxiliaries from the Maritime Commission with all sorts of dimension, weight, speed, function, and appearance differences.

Now for the bad news. No Liberty ships were designated as either AKA (Cargo Ship - Attack) or APA (Transport - Attack). The "Attack" ships operate inshore and "discharge troops (transport) and cargo off beachheads, loading their self-borne small Landing Craft, providing considerable fire-power to cover the operation".

I found one note which said 4 EC2s were designated as "AP's" (Transport) with the difference being that this class unloaded troops well outside of combat areas, but none of the ships listed in that section are EC2 designs, and beside, these are not APA's anyway.

But there is a silver lining!!! I DID find a picture of a Liberty as an AK and in addition to some Grumman Wildcats on the deck, there were also some Landing Craft as well. I'm not certain, but they appear to be LCMs based on size, rather than an LCVP.

So if you can find some Landing Craft in 1/350, you can put them on the deck as well as some Wildcats, and you'll be fine, it just shouldn't be called an AKA.

You're going to have to use something else if you want to make an "Attack" Auxiliary. I've got the old Revell "Montrose" kit in box scale, that I intend to make as the APA 228 instead of the Montrose which was the APA 212. And the name of the APA 228 (most of which were named for counties) you may ask???

The Rockbridge.

Tom

Hi Tom,

Just to say that this is why I love Armorama so much!
It was a pleasure to read your post!

It also gives another option for a 1/35 dio:
A section of a Liberty Ship packed with LCM's

Skipper

Thanks, Skipper. The "Ships and Aircraft" are indispensable references for anyone interested in the US Navy. James Fahey started these with the first edition being published in 1939. I remember reading through the ones my dad had when I was a teenager.

The "Fahey" versions were about 5 x 8 and around 100 pages or so and went through eight editions with the 8th Edition being published in 1965.

Seven of the eight are still available as reprints and sold in box sets through the Naval Institute Press. Each set is about $36 each and one contains four of the first five and the other one contains the last three. They are a GREAT buy at that price, and contain a ton of great info. (You can also find originals from used book stores on line.)

After Fahey died, they went through several style changes, and are now up to a huge 9 x 12 format with close to 600 pages, and the current one (18th Edition) listing at around $80 or so. The current ones not only contain all the ship and aircraft information, but cover the USMC, weapons, and organization topics.

You just need good books!!!

Tom

When it comes to Andrew Jackson Higgins and his Eureka boat, the best eidence showing the toughness of the orginal design is the picture of Higgins driving one of his boats up the Lake Ponchetrain (I know, I'm from Louisiana and can't it's biggest lake's name) seawall. This was done for the navy brass. If you can, get the Squadron US landing craft in action. It has some great pics of all the landing craft and even LCVP's and LCM's debarking from APA and AKA.

Kenny