Nanticoke (AOG-66)
1945-1946
A river rising in south central Delaware named for an Indian tribe on the eastern shore of Maryland; a fishing village in southeastern Maryland, 18 miles west southwest of Salisbury, Md.
(AOG-66: displacement 5,970; length 352'2"; beam 48'2"; draft 15'8"; speed 10 knots; complement 80; armament 1 3-inch, 2 40-millimeter, 3 20-millimeter; class Klickitat; type T1-M-BT1)
Nanticoke (AOG-66) was laid down on 16 January 1945 at Jacksonville, Fla., by the St. Johns Shipbuilding Corp., under a Maritime Commission contract (M.C. Hull 2626),; launched on 7 April 1945; sponsored by Mrs. Gustav W. Nelson; delivered and acquired by the Navy on 31 August 1945; and commissioned on 1 September 1945.
Assigned to the Naval Transportation Service, Nanticoke reported for duty on 18 October 1945 to the Service Force, U.S. Atlantic Fleet. Arriving at Norfolk, Va. on 28 November, she was decommissioned there on 4 January 1946 and returned to the Maritime Commission on 12 January. She was stricken from the Naval Register on 21 January 1946.
Briefly operated later in 1946 by the American Petroleum Transport Corp. as Sugarland, she was acquired later in the year by the Argentine Navy and commissioned as Punta Delgada (B-16). Decommissioned in 1984, Punta Delgada caught fire and capsized off La Plata on 4 March 1985.
Updated, Robert J. Cressman
20 July 2022
