(ARL-22: displacement 2,125; length 328-; beam 50-; draft 11-2-; speed 12 knots; complement 253; armament 1 3-, 8 40mm.; class Achelous)
One of the legendary twin sons of Mars and the Vestal Rhea Silvia. As infants, they were saved from the Tiber River; nursed by a shewolf; and, as young men, founded Rome.
Romulus was laid down as LST-962 on 17 October 1944 by the Bethlehem Steel Co., Hingham, Mass.; launched 15 November 1944; and commissioned 9 December 1944, Lt. George R. Hoell, USNR, in command.
On 10 December, LST-962 shifted to the Boston Navy Yard, and on the 11th departed for Jacksonville, Fla., where she entered the Gibbs Gas Engine Works yard for conversion to a landing craft repair ship (ARL). Decommissioned on 8 January 1945, she was recommissioned on 10 May as Romulus (ARL-22).
After shakedown, Romulus sailed for the Pacific. Transiting the Panama Canal in late June, she reached the Marianas in August and for a short time tended and repaired landing craft at Apra Harbor, Guam, and Tanapag Harbor, Saipan. In early September, she continued west. From 25 September 1945 to 3 September 1946, she provided tender and repair services at the Yokosuka Naval Base, Honshu, Japan. Then ordered to Okinawa, she served in a similar capacity at Buckner Bay into December.
Departing the Ryukyus early in the month, she visited Hong Kong, then continued on to the United States. Arriving at San Pedro, Calif., on 3 February 1947, she was decommissioned on 12 May and berthed with the Reserve Fleet at San Diego.
Recommissioned at San Diego on 2 April 1952, Romulus remained on the west coast until January 1953. On the 31st, she sailed for the Far East, arriving at Yokosuka on 6 March. Operations servicing amphibious ships then took the ARL to the ports of Nagoya, Sasebo, Buckner Bay, and Nagasaki. At the end of May, she shifted to Inchon, Korea, where she was assigned station ship and repair facility duty in support of U.N. forces in the area. Back in Japan from mid-June through July, she again served U.N. forces at Inchon from 2 to 26 August. She departed Yokosuka on 6 September and returned to San Diego on 5 October.
Romulus remained in the 1st Fleet until 3 January 1955 when she sailed once more for Yokosuka and Sasebo, Japan, and her last tender duty with the 7th Fleet.
Returning to San Diego on 27 April, Romulus briefly operated there, then prepared for inactivation. In January 1956, she steamed to Astoria, Oreg. Six months later, on 1 June 1956, she was decommissioned and berthed with the Columbia River Group, Pacific Reserve Fleet. Struck from the Navy list on 1 October 1960, she was transferred, under the terms of the Military Assistance Program, to the Republic of the Philippines in November 1961 and recommissioned as Aklan (AR-67). Renamed Kamagong in 1975, the repair ship remained in the Philippine navy until retired in 1989.
Romulus (ARL-22) earned one battle star during the Korean conflict.
21 October 2005
