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Pemiscot (AK-201)

1945 

A county located in the southeastern corner of the state of Missouri.

(AK-201: displacement 8,300 (full load); length 338'6½"; beam 50ꞌ; draft 21'1"; speed 12 knots; complement 85; armament 1 3-inch, 6 20-millimeter; class Alamosa; type C1-M-AV1)

Pemiscot (AK-201) was laid down on 7 July 1944 under a Maritime Commission contract (M.C. Hull 2155) at Superior, Wisc., by the Globe Shipbuilding Co.; launched on 18 November 1944; sponsored by Mrs. Alma Mitchell of New York City, N.Y.; and delivered to the Maritime Commission on 31 December 1944.

Following trials and a post-trial inspection, Pemiscot departed Duluth, Wisc., on 6 January 1945. The vessel then transited the Great Lakes and Mississippi Rivers, ultimately reaching New Orleans, La., on 7 April 1945. Arriving at the Pendleton Shipyard, New Orleans, the following day [8 April] for reassembly, Pemiscot was accepted by the Navy on 12 September 1945, ten days after the Japanese government signed the articles of surrender on board the battleship Missouri (BB-63) in Tokyo Bay.

Chief of Naval Operations restricted dispatch 281645 of 28 September 1945 ordered the Commandant Eighth Naval District (ComEight) to return the vessel to the Maritime Commission. ComEight reported that the ship had been redelivered to the War Shipping Administration (WSA) on 31 October 1945. Renamed Coastal Competitor, she was to be operated initially under a general agency agreement by the American Liberty Steamship Corp.; Pemiscot was stricken from the Navy Register on 5 December 1945.

Coastal Competitor operated under a number of house flags: United Fruit Co. (as a break bulk carrier), being delivered to that firm at New Orleans on 19 June 1946; the American West Africa Line, Inc. (general agency agreement), delivered at New Orleans on 27 September 1946; Lykes Brothers Steamship Line, Inc. (break bulk), delivered at Mobile, Ala., on 29 December 1946; and the South Atlantic Steamship Line (general agency agreement), delivered at New Orleans on 8 August 1948. Subsequently delivered to the Maritime Commission for lay-up at Beaumont, Texas, Coastal Competitor entered the Reserve Fleet at 9:15 a.m. on 3 May 1948.

The vessel remained inactive for almost a decade, until being sold on 13 July 1956 to Companhia Nacional de Navegacao Costeira, Patrimonio Nacional, a Brazilian firm, on the condition that she would be operated only in the coastwise trade of Brazil. Remaining in U.S. hands until the ship could be delivered to her purchaser, Coastal Competitor was physically delivered to an agent of the Brazilian government at Beaumont, Texas, at 10:50 a.m. on 26 December 1956, and was renamed Rio Tubarao.

Robert J. Cressman

20 May 2019

Published: Mon May 20 20:00:26 EDT 2019