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SS ''Kentuckian'' was a cargo ship built in 1910 for the American-Hawaiian Steamship Company. During World War I she was known as USAT ''Kentuckian'' in service for the United States Army and USS ''Kentuckian'' (ID-1544) in service for the United States Navy. After her Navy career, she reverted to her original name of SS ''Kentuckian''. She was built by the Maryland Steel Company as first of three ships ordered by the American-Hawaiian Steamship Company, and was employed in inter-coastal service via the Isthmus of Tehuantepec and the Panama Canal after it opened. In World War I, USAT ''Kentuckian'' carried cargo and animals to France under charter to the U.S. Army. When transferred to the U.S. Navy in December 1918, a month after the Armistice, USS ''Kentuckian'' was converted to a troop transport and returned almost 8,900 American troops from France. Returned to American-Hawaiian in 1919, ''Kentuckian'' resumed inter-coastal cargo service. Shortly before World War II, ''Kentuckian'' was requisitioned by the War Shipping Administration and sailed between Trinidad and African ports, between New York and Caribbean ports, and in transatlantic convoys through mid 1944. In mid-July 1944, the ship was scuttled as part of the breakwater for one of the Mulberry artificial harbors built to support the Normandy Invasion. == Design and construction == In the second quarter of 1909, American-Hawaiian, looking to expand its fleet, placed an order with the Maryland Steel Company of Sparrows Point, Maryland, for three new cargo ships—''Kentuckian'', ''Georgian'', and ''Honolulan''. The contract for the ships required that American-Hawaiian pay $1,000,000 in cash and a further $650,000 in twelve monthly notes at 5% interest. Provisions of the deal allowed that the monthly notes could be converted into longer-term mortgages at 6% interest, and secured by the ships themselves.〔American-Hawaiian was so pleased by the arrangements with Maryland Steel, and by the ships themselves, that they gave Maryland Steel the monopoly for all future construction, a further eleven ships by 1914. See: Cochran and Ginger, pp. 358, 365.〕 The final cost of ''Kentuckian'', including financing costs, was $58.33 per deadweight ton, which came out to just under $579,000.〔 ''Kentuckian'' (Maryland Steel yard no. 104)〔 was the first ship built under the contract. She was launched on 19 March 1910, by Miss Nancy Johnson, the daughter of U.S. Representative Ben Johnson (D-KY), who christened the ship with sparkling spring water from the Kentucky farms of Abraham Lincoln and Jefferson Davis.〔〔Senator and Mrs. William Edgar Borah (R-ID) and the wives of Representative Joseph F. Howell (D-UT) and former senator Thomas H. Paynter (D-KY) were among the invited guests at the noon launching ceremony. All had taken a special train from Washington, D.C. at 10:00 that morning.〕 The completed ship, delivered to American-Hawaiian on 1 June,〔 was ,〔 and was in length (between perpendiculars) and abeam.〔 She had a deadweight tonnage of ,〔 and her cargo holds had a storage capacity of .〔 ''Kentuckian'' had a single quadruple-expansion steam engine powered by oil-fired boilers that drove a single screw propeller at a speed of .〔〔 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「SS Kentuckian」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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