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DEPARTMENT OF THE NAVY -- NAVAL HISTORICAL CENTER
805 KIDDER BREESE SE -- WASHINGTON NAVY YARD
WASHINGTON DC 20374-5060

Photo # USN 711573:  USS Washtenaw County cruises in Haiphong Harbor, North Vietnam, at the end of Operation End Sweep, 1973

Online Library of Selected Images:
-- U.S. NAVY SHIPS --

USS Washtenaw County (LST-1166, later MSS-2), 1953-1975.
Originally named LST-1166.

USS LST-1166, a 2590-ton LST-1156 class tank landing ship built at Sturgeon Bay, Wisconsin, was commissioned in late October 1953. She served in the western Atlantic and Caribbean areas for her first two years and, at the beginning of July 1955, was renamed Washtenaw County. The LST spent the first five months of 1956 in the Mediterranean Sea as a unit of the Sixth Fleet. In mid-January 1958 she passed through the Panama Canal to join the Pacific Fleet. In mid-year she started across the ocean on an emergency deployment to the Far East, but this was cancelled when she reached Hawaii. Washtenaw County's first regular Western Pacific cruise began in April 1959 and was completed in September.

Washtenaw County again went to the Far East in June 1960 and remained there for the rest of her career. Homeported at Yokosuka, Japan, she spent the next thirteen years participating in Seventh Fleet amphibious training and logistics activities in the waters of Japan, Korea, Taiwan, the Philippines and Southeast Asia. Beginning in mid-1964 she was frequently closely involved in Vietnam War operations. These included amphibious landings, personnel and cargo transportation, combat support operations in the Mekong River area and along the South Vietnamese coast, and at times even the use of her three-inch guns to bombard enemy targets ashore. The last of Washtenaw County's wartime assignments ended in mid-1972.

Later in that year she began conversion to a special minesweeper and in February 1973 was decommissioned. Placed in service at that time with the designation MSS-2, though retaining her name, in April and June she was employed in the waters near Haiphong, North Vietnam, ensuring that mines laid the previous year had been successfully neutralized. Washtenaw County was inactivated at Yokosuka, Japan, in August 1973. Stricken from the Naval Vessel Register late in that month, she was sold at the end of January 1975.

This page features all the views we have concerning USS LST-1166 and USS Washtenaw County.


If you want higher resolution reproductions than the digital images presented here, see: "How to Obtain Photographic Reproductions."

Click on the small photograph to prompt a larger view of the same image.

Photo #: K-78101

USS Washtenaw County
(LST-1166)

Moored in Subic Bay, Philippines, 4 October 1969.

Official U.S. Navy Photograph.

Online Image: 128KB; 740 x 615 pixels

Reproductions of this image may also be available through the National Archives photographic reproduction system as Photo # 428-K-78101.
Though reproductions of this photo from the Naval Historical Center's collections are available in black & white only, those from the National Archives should be available in color.

 
Photo #: K-78102

USS Washtenaw County
(LST-1166)

Moored in Subic Bay, Philippines, 4 October 1969.

Official U.S. Navy Photograph.

Online Image: 115KB; 740 x 615 pixels

Reproductions of this image may also be available through the National Archives photographic reproduction system as Photo # 428-K-78102.
Though reproductions of this photo from the Naval Historical Center's collections are available in black & white only, those from the National Archives should be available in color.

 
Photo #: USN 711573

Operation "End Sweep", 1973


USS Washtenaw County (MSS-2, formerly LST-1166) cruises in Haiphong Harbor, North Vietnam, in a final demonstration that the channel is safe for shipping at the completion of minesweeping operations.
The photograph is dated 20 June 1973.
Note the single-mast junk under sail at right.

Official U.S. Navy Photograph.

Online Image: 80KB; 740 x 535 pixels

Reproductions of this image may also be available through the National Archives photographic reproduction system as Photo # 428-N-711573.

 
Photo #: NH 103693

USS Washtenaw County
(MSS-2, formerly LST-1166)

Conducts a run in the main channel of Haiphong Harbor, North Vietnam, to demonstrate its safety for shipping after Operation "End Sweep" mine clearance activities, 20 June 1973.
Photographed by PHCS Virgil C. McColley, USN.

Official U.S. Navy Photograph, from the collections of the Naval Historical Center.

Online Image: 59KB; 740 x 545 pixels

 
Photo #: NH 103691

USS Washtenaw County
(LST-1166)

Offloading vehicles onto a pontoon causeway, off Chu Lai, South Vietnam, circa May-June 1965.
The original print, dated 24 June 1965, featured the following Master Caption: "Marine Corps F4 Phantoms and A4 Skyhawks began flying air strikes against North Vietnam June 1 from an 8000 foot long aluminum air strip at Chu Lai, South Vietnam. Construction on the new air base, located on Dangquat Bay, about 60 miles south east of Da Nang, began May 8 after some 6000 Marines and Seabees made an amphibious landing from U.S. Navy ships. The air field, scheduled to be fully completed the last of June, is being built from inter locking aluminum and steel mats.

Official U.S. Navy Photograph, from the collections of the Naval Historical Center.

Online Image: 81KB; 595 x 765 pixels

 
Photo #: NH 103692

Operation "Deckhouse V"


"U.S. and South Vietnamese combat troops move ashore during 'Operation Deckhouse V' recently conducted in the Mekong Delta." (Quoted from the original photo caption, released by the Department of Defense on 27 January 1967)
Two U.S. Marine Corps amphibious tractors are moving along the beach in the foreground, with a UH-1 helicopter approaching at right. USS Washtenaw County (LST-1166) is in the background.

Official U.S. Navy Photograph, from the collections of the Naval Historical Center.

Online Image: 63KB; 740 x 545 pixels

 
Photo #: USN 1142248

Operation "Deckhouse V"
, late 1966

UH-34D "Seahorse" helicopters from USS Iwo Jima (LPH-2) approach a Mekong Delta Beach during Operation "Deckhouse V". USS Washtenaw County (LST-1166) is in the background.
Photographed by JOC R.D. Moeser.
The original photo caption was dated November 1967, but was taken about a year earlier.

Official U.S. Navy Photograph.

Online Image: 90KB; 740 x 555 pixels

Reproductions of this image may also be available through the National Archives photographic reproduction system as Photo # 428-N-1142248.

 
Photo #: NH 103694

USS Washtenaw County
(LST-1166)

"Chaplain Ted Edwards leads the Easter Sunrise Service aboard the USS Washtenaw County on station, South China Sea, in April." (quoted from the original 1960s or early 1970s era photo caption)

Official U.S. Navy Photograph, from the collections of the Naval Historical Center.

Online Image: 52KB; 740 x 505 pixels

 
Photo #: NH 70141-KN (Color)

Insignia of USS Washtenaw County (LST-1166)

This emblem, received in 1970, features the following symbols:
Rough map of the western Pacific, representing the ship's operating area;
Japanese "tori" gateway, representing her homeport of Yokosuka, Japan;
Numeral seven, representing the Seventh Fleet, to which the ship is assigned; and
Alligator, symbol of the Amphibious Force.

U.S. Naval Historical Center Photograph.

Online Image: 80KB; 610 x 675 pixels.

 


If you want higher resolution reproductions than the digital images presented here, see: "How to Obtain Photographic Reproductions."


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Page made 26 September 2006