WORKHORSE OF THE FLEET A History of the Liberty Ships
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Workhorse of the Fleet: A History of the Liberty
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company-information/workhorse-of-the-fleet-2019.pdf
Table of Contents Introduction 1 Historical Overview and “Raison d’etre” of the Liberty Ship 3 Chapter I: The British Technical Merchant Shipbuilding Mission 7 Chapter II: Origin of the Liberty Ship Design 19 Chapter III: Joseph L. Thompson & Sons 23 Chapter IV: The Emergency Shipbuilding Program 35 Chapter V: The Design Decision 47 Chapter VI: Modifications from the British Design 53 Chapter VII: Justifying the Design 57 Chapter VIII: Liberty Fleet Day 61 Chapter IX: The Name “Liberty Ship” 65 Chapter X: The Liberty at War 67 Chapter XI: The Liberty Ship – Basic Design 77 Chapter XII: Wartime Experience – Hull and Machinery 91 Chapter XIII: Conversions 101 Chapter XIV: Statistics 107 Epilogue 119 Addendum: The Story Behind a Name 121 Bibliography 125
Introduction Originally called “Ugly Ducklings,” the Liberty ships when built, were expected to last one trip and to have no economical life after the war. However, as the record shows, the Liberty ships labored long and hard during the war and dominated the ocean highways of the world for over ten years after the war. This history is mainly from the point-of-view of the US Maritime Commission with most of the information coming from informal notes kept by several members of the design division of the US Maritime Commission during and just after the war. The existence of the notes was mentioned in Lane’s “Ships for Victory.” These notes and other documents were transferred to the National Archives in Washington, DC after the war and initially proved very difficult to locate. However, with the assistance of an archives employee who had worked for the Maritime Commission during and just after the war I was able to find most of the available records. A great deal of assistance and information on the British part of the design came from the Curator of Naval Architecture and Shipbuilding at the National Maritime Museum in Greenwich and the Curator of the Tyne and Wear Museum, Newcastle-on-Tyne. In addition, a lot of information and photographs of Liberty ships in the Atlantic and Russian convoys was found in the archives of the Imperial War Museum in London. Much valuable information including log books, a complete set of “blue prints,” instruction manuals, etc., was salvaged during the scrapping of the SS George Gershwin. Copies of some of the manuals pages are included in this history for information. The George Gershwin met the scrapper’s torch in a back marsh area of southern Mississippi during the very hot summer of 1975. This was a long way from the winter gales of the North Atlantic where, as its logs indicate, it spent a lot of its time. For all her assistance and advice in preparing the manuscript I wish to thank Natalia Terek. Finally, I would like to thank John Conlon, for the time he took to review the manuscript and for all his helpful suggestions. Gus Bourneuf Jr.
Historical Overview and “Raison d’etre” of the Liberty Ship A study of history reveals that when the United States entered World Wars I and II the national security of the United States was seriously threatened because the country failed to have a shipbuilding and a shipping industry suitable for its security requirements. There are many who argue that World War II, and especially the participation of the United States in both world wars, was caused to a large extent by the fact that the United States, together with other powers that finally joined together as the Allies in World War I and as the United Nations in World War II, were inadequately prepared to wage war. Part of the lack of preparation was the lack of ships and the lack of adequate shipyards to build ships quickly. Whether this absence of preparation helped to cause two world wars can probably never be satisfactorily proved, but the possibility of its being true is worthy of serious consideration. Whatever were the causes of the wars, the fact remains that the United States entered both world wars and, especially in World War II, was totally unprepared with respect to ships and shipyards. The entry of the United States into World War II when it was inadequately prepared forced the United States to run the risk of losing the war. In spite of the fact that world events allowed the United States more time to prepare than many other countries, events in the early days after Pearl Harbor illustrated the serious risk which the United States had incurred. It is known that the results of the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor were much more favorable than even the Japanese suspected at that time. For almost a year the United States was forced to fight delaying actions with inadequate equipment. Furthermore, at the time the United States entered the war it had the opportunity to erase part of the effects of the failure. World War II had begun more than two years before the United States formally became engaged, and throughout most of this period the United States was engaged in producing war material for foreign countries and was fast becoming the page 4 HISTORICAL OVERVIEW AND “RAISON D’ETRE” OF THE LIBERTY SHIP arsenal of democracy. Throughout the same period there was some attempt to build up the armaments of the United States in what was known then as the National Defense Program. While the absolute output of munitions in this period was rather small, the experience gained and the industrial facilities prepared, enabled the country to get into large-scale war production much more quickly after Pearl Harbor than would have been true if the period of preparation had not been available. Not only was the United States granted a time period, while its future allies were carrying on the fight to prepare for engaging in World War II, but likewise those same allies had some of the weapons of war and some ships and shipyards to help with the United Nations’ fight. In the early part of the war the ships of its allies were more numerous than those furnished by the United States. Both before and after entry into World War II, the United States produced large quantities of munitions. On many occasions the full effect of these munitions could not be realized however, because of the inability of the United States and its allies to transport them to the proper places at the time when they would have been most useful. The unpreparedness of the United States with respect to ships caused serious modifications in the prosecution of World War II. The lack of ships not only modified military strategy but also changed the whole program of production of war goods. In addition to restricting the strategy of warfare, the lack of shipping contributed to changing the pattern of the war by claiming a large part of the labor and material available for production during the first year after Pearl Harbor. The demand for new ships was great. This was due in part to the inadequate number of ships available at the beginning of the war and in part to the fact that wartime demands far exceeded the number which could or should have been built in peacetime. Because of this great demand, not only were old shipyards using labor and material to build new ships but also the construction of new and the expansion of old shipyards were likewise requiring labor and material. page 5 HISTORICAL OVERVIEW AND “RAISON D’ETRE” OF THE LIBERTY SHIP Thus, neither the shipping capacity nor the shipbuilding capacity of the country was sufficient to meet the needs of war, and both had to be expanded greatly and rapidly. The demand for ships therefore exerted a three-way pressure on the war production program. It demanded men and material to build ships to make up for the inadequate fleet in existence at the beginning of the war; it demanded men and material to build the ships required by the excess demands of war over prewar demands; and it demanded men and material to build up the shipbuilding capacity. All this at a time when the men and material were sorely needed for the production of other implements of war. These demands were both urgent and large. At a time when the United States had set itself a goal of mobilizing a total fighting force of 10 million men, in comparison with a prewar force of well under 1 million ships and shipyards were demanding more that 1.5 million additional workers and the industries supporting shipbuilding were demanding at least another million. Likewise, the materials used to make a ship are the same kid of materials which are used to make many other munitions. Ships and shipyards were competing with other munitions industries for steel, copper, machine tools, engines and almost every other scarce item. This lack of preparedness was responsible for the building of the Liberty ships. There will always be competing demands for men and material during wartime, but when the lack of preparation in a single area, such as shipping, demands so many men and so much material that it drastically interferes with the prosecution of the war, the results are extremely serious. The lack of ships furthermore, was more serious than the lack of some of the smaller implements of war for two other reasons. First, it prevented satisfactory transportation of the men and materials of war which were available, even though the available quantities were small. Secondly, the construction of a ship takes so long that it is much more difficult to supply a missing ship than it is to supply a missing machine-gun bullet. And all this was happening during the first year of the war when time was precious and the country was, as has since become known, in possible danger of invasion. Finally, the inability to import sufficient quantities of strategic materials such as bauxite and other ores forced further substitutions and modifications in many phases of war production. While it may not be important in a military sense, the shortage of ships also made more difficult the sustaining of the domestic economy. All the effects of being inadequately prepared for war, especially the failure to have sufficient ships and shipyards in which to build them, can be summarized in the statement that the resulting war was more expensive than it otherwise would have been. Looking back over the 20 years between World Wars I and II, it seems evident that if a moderate but effective program of preparedness had been undertaken the total dollar costs would have been less than the costs incurred by the frantic scramble for production of ships and shipyards that actually took place in 1941 and 1942. Perhaps some ill-advised program of preparedness would not have assured lower costs, but surely a well-planned effective one would have prevented some of the occurrences that led to high cost. The expense in dollars and in time however, is negligible when compared with the expense in lives. Delays in ending the war cost lives; delays in becoming able to fight an offensive war cost lives; and having soldiers and sailors try to fight wars without sufficient equipment cost lives. If, as many claim, it is the policy of the United States when fighting a war to be extravagant with material in order to be economical with lives, the policy of lack of preparedness does not coincide with this principle. Even if it had been more expensive in dollars to be prepared for war, according to the wartime ideals of the United States this extra expense would have been worthwhile if it had contributed to saving the lives of American soldiers and sailors.