Emergency Fleet Corporation
The Emergency Fleet Corporation (EFC) was established by the United States Shipping Board, sometimes referred to as the War Shipping Board, on 16 April 1917 pursuant to the Shipping Act (39 Stat. 729) to acquire, maintain, and operate merchant sh ...
(EFC) Design 1074 cargo ship built for the
United States Shipping Board
The United States Shipping Board (USSB) was established as an emergency agency by the 1916 Shipping Act (39 Stat. 729), on September 7, 1916. The United States Shipping Board's task was to increase the number of US ships supporting the World War ...
(USSB) during the massive shipbuilding effort of
World War I
World War I (28 July 1914 11 November 1918), often abbreviated as WWI, was List of wars and anthropogenic disasters by death toll, one of the deadliest global conflicts in history. Belligerents included much of Europe, the Russian Empire, ...
.
The USSB operated the ship until sold in 1923 to the Southern Steamship Company for operation between
Philadelphia
Philadelphia, often called Philly, is the largest city in the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, the sixth-largest city in the U.S., the second-largest city in both the Northeast megalopolis and Mid-Atlantic regions after New York City. Sinc ...
and
Houston
Houston (; ) is the List of cities in Texas by population, most populous city in Texas, the Southern United States#Major cities, most populous city in the Southern United States, the List of United States cities by population, fourth-most pop ...
as ''City of Philadelphia''. In June 1942 the ship was delivered to the
War Shipping Administration
The War Shipping Administration (WSA) was a World War II emergency war agency of the US government, tasked to purchase and operate the civilian shipping tonnage the United States needed for fighting the war. Both shipbuilding under the Maritime C ...
(WSA) for wartime operation first allocated to the U.S. Army with the WSA operator being
Atlantic Gulf and West Indies Lines
Agwilines Inc was a passenger and cargo shipping company of New York City. Agwilines is short for Atlantic, Gulf & West Indies Steamship Inc.
AGWI Lines group operated four main lines in the 1910s, 1920s and 1930s:
*Ward Line
* Clyde line
* Ma ...
(AGWILINES), the parent company of Southern Steamship. On 27 May 1943 WSA obtained the vessel under
bareboat charter
A bareboat charter or demise charter is an arrangement for the chartering or hiring of a ship or boat, whereby no crew or provisions are included as part of the agreement; instead, the people who rent the vessel from the owner are responsible ...
with Army operating the ship under sub-bareboat charter. As USAT ''City of Philadelphia'' the ship arrived in Australia to remain the rest of the war in the U.S. Army Services of Supply permanent local fleet with the fleet designation X-104. WSA delivered the ship to the owners at
Shanghai
Shanghai (; , , Standard Mandarin pronunciation: ) is one of the four direct-administered municipalities of the People's Republic of China (PRC). The city is located on the southern estuary of the Yangtze River, with the Huangpu River flowin ...
in December 1945 where the ship was sold to the China Merchants Steam Navigation Company and renamed ''Hai Cheh''. Later sold to the Republic of China the ship was named ''Ho Ping Pa Hao'' 1950 to 1960 and ''Hoping No. 8'' 1960 until 1967 when the ship dropped out of registers.
Construction
''Lake Elsmere'', hull 513, was one of eight Design 1074 ships built by
Great Lakes Engineering Works
The Great Lakes Engineering Works (GLEW) was a leading shipbuilding company with a shipyard in Ecorse, Michigan, that operated between 1902 and 1960. Within three years of its formation, it was building fifty percent of the tonnage of all ships ...
at its
Ashtabula, Ohio
Ashtabula ( ) is a city in Ashtabula County, Ohio, United States, and the center of the Ashtabula micropolitan area. It is located at the mouth of the Ashtabula River on Lake Erie, northeast of Cleveland. As of the 2020 census, the city ha ...
yard, launched 3 November 1919 with completion later that month. A total of fifty-two Design 1074, "Great Lakes Engineering type," were built in among a larger group of ships built for the USSB on the
Great Lakes
The Great Lakes, also called the Great Lakes of North America, are a series of large interconnected freshwater lakes in the mid-east region of North America that connect to the Atlantic Ocean via the Saint Lawrence River. There are five la ...
known as the "Laker" type.
The ship was registered with U.S. Official Number 219256, signal LTRW, at Cleveland, Ohio as , , registry length, beam, depth, 1,500 indicated horsepower and a crew of 35. In 1950 rebuilds resulted in a tonnage change to , . The ship disappeared from registry in 1967.
U.S. Operation
The USSB operated ''Lake Elsmere'' from delivery in November 1919 until sold in an offer accepted 10 April 1923 of the Southern Steamship Company, a wholly owned subsidiary of Atlantic Gulf and West Indies Lines (AGWILINES), for $75,000. The ship was renamed ''City of Philadelphia'', registered at Philadelphia, operating in freight service between Philadelphia and Houston, Texas.
On 6 June 1942 the ship was delivered to the War Shipping Administration (WSA) at
South West Pacific Area
South West Pacific Area (SWPA) was the name given to the Allied supreme military command in the South West Pacific Theatre of World War II. It was one of four major Allied commands in the Pacific War. SWPA included the Philippines, Borneo, the ...
(SWPA). Operations in undeveloped ports and shallow waters of northern Australia and the islands to the north resulted in a request by the South West Pacific Area Services of Supply for at least twenty additional vesselsThe core of the SWPA fleet was composed of twenty-one refugee ships from the Dutch East Indies island trading
Koninklijke Paketvaart-Maatschappij
Koninklijke Paketvaart-Maatschappij (Dutch for Royal Packet Navigation Company), better known as KPM, was a Dutch shipping company (1888–1966) in the Netherlands East Indies, now Indonesia. It was the dominant inter-island shipping line in In ...
fleet. They were suited for the relatively shallow and undeveloped ports in northern Australia and the islands to the north. for the command's permanent local fleet having moderate draft and capacity of between and with large hatches and at least one boom rated for 25 ton lift. The vessels were to be capable of troop transport without significant loss of cargo capacity. Such vessels were typically in coastwise trade in the United States and the size limitation of passage from the Great Lakes to the coasts meant that many were built on the Great Lakes with them often being termed "Lakers" or "Lake type vessels". Such vessels were allocated to meet the SWPA requirement with ''City of Philadelphia'', arriving 12 November 1943 and given the SWPA fleet identification X-104, being one of 29 sent by 11 February 1844. The ship was classed among the vessels and among the ten altered to transport refrigerated cargo.
After the war WSA redelivered ''City of Philadelphia'' to the owners at Shanghai on 29 December 1945 who, with
United States Maritime Commission
The United States Maritime Commission (MARCOM) was an independent executive agency of the U.S. federal government that was created by the Merchant Marine Act of 1936, which was passed by Congress on June 29, 1936, and was abolished on May 24, 195 ...
approval sold the ship for $158,973.89 to China on 4 January 1946.
China service
Renamed ''Hai Cheh'' the ship operated for China Merchants Steam Navigation Company until transferred to the Republic of China in 1949. From 1950 the ship was operated by China People's Steam Navigation Co., Shanghai as ''Ho Ping Pa Hao'' 1950—1960 and ''Hoping No. 8'' 1960—1967 when the ship dropped out of registers in 1969.