USS Arthur Middleton (APA-25)
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| History | |
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 United States of America
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| Operator: |
 United States Navy
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| Laid down: | 1 July 1940 |
| Launched: | 28 June 1941 |
| Commissioned: | 7 September 1942 |
| Decommissioned: | 21 October 1946 |
| Struck: | 1 October 1958 |
| Fate: | Sold for scrapping on 9 May 1973 |
| General characteristics | |
| Tonnage: | 9,000 GRT |
| Displacement: | 18000 tons |
| Length: | 489 ft (149 m) |
| Beam: | 69 ft 9 in (21.3 m) |
| Draft: | 27 ft 4 in (8.3 m) |
| Speed: | 18.4 knots (34 km/h) |
| Complement: | 530 officers and enlisted |
| Armament: |
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USS Arthur Middleton (AP-55/APA-25) was a transport launched as the commercial cargo/passenger ship African Comet serving in the United States Navy during World War II. The ship, along with later sister ships SS African Meteor and SS African Planet, was at the time the largest all welded passenger/cargo ship. The ships, of 9,000 GRT and varying only in interior decorations, were designed for New York to South and East African service with accommodations for 116 passengers.
African Comet, ordered as American Banker, was laid down under a Maritime Commission contract (MC hull 106) on 1 July 1940 at Pascagoula, Mississippi, by the Ingalls Shipbuilding Corporation, launched on 28 June 1941, sponsored by Miss Mary Maud Farrell, and delivered 31 December 1941. The ship was acquired by the War Shipping Administration from the American South African Line, Inc., on 31 December 1941 and purchased by the Navy on 6 January 1942.
The ship was renamed Arthur Middleton (AP-55) on 7 January 1942 for Arthur Middleton, a member of the Continental Congress. The ship underwent initial conversion at Tietjen & Lang Dry Dock Co. yard in Hoboken, N. J. for operation as a civilian-manned convoy-loaded transport. She was fully converted for service as a combat-loaded (attack) transport by the Union Iron Works, San Francisco, California after arrival in San Francisco from the South Pacific in June 1942. Commissioned on 7 September 1942, Commander Paul K. Perry, USCG, in command.
After Navy acquisition and preliminary conversion, but before full conversion and commissioning, the Middleton was pressed into service during a shipping crisis involving securing the South Pacific lines of communication and critical air ferry route with Australia. New Caledonia (codename "Poppy"), a key point in those lines, had been in some turmoil with Vichy governance and recent takeover by Free French and was threatened by the Japanese. Another key island, Bora Bora (codename "Bobcat"), was also to be heavily reinforced in early 1942 yet available shipping was extremely short. Major realignment, taken to the head of state level, was required. The Bobcat convoy was to depart Charleston, South Carolina and, as a result of the candidate ship President Fillmore being damaged in a grounding with repairs taking longer than the convoy schedule allowed, the Arthur Middleton was quickly substituted and sent to Charleston from New York, but without proper ballasting for newly installed armament.
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