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U.S. Navy Auxiliary Ships, 1835-1945

Auxiliary Vessels Board Reports, 1941-1948
-- The Auxiliary Vessels Board and the District Craft Development Board are described on the Auxiliary Vessels Board page and the sources for their reports are listed on the Sources, 1920-1945 page.

Ships' Data, U.S. Naval Vessels, 1911-1945
Lists of Ships extracted from the "Navy Register," 1816-1939
-- The Act of 5 August 1882 appropriating funds for FY 1883 specified that, when a vessel was deemed unfit for further service, "it was the duty of the Secretary of the Navy ... to strike the name of such vessel ... from the Navy Register and report the same to Congress." This "Navy Register," whose full title soon became "Register of the Commissioned and Warrant Officers of the United States Navy and Marine Corps," originated with Senate resolutions of 2 August 1813 and 13 December 1815 requesting annual lists of officers. The 1816 Register added a brief list of the Navy's ships, called after 1862 the "List of Vessels (later Ships) of the U. S. Navy." This "List of Ships" was omitted permanently from the 1918 Navy Register, but in the same year a list of ships soon called the "Register of Vessels of the United States Navy" appeared in a monthly "Navy Directory, Officers of the United States Navy" issued by the Bureau of Navigation (which in 1942 became the Bureau of Naval Personnel). This ship register last appeared in 1939. During this time vessels were stricken by official Navy notices from the "Navy Register" or occasionally from the "Navy List."

The Naval Vessel Register and its immediate precursors , 1942-date
-- In 1920 the Bureau of Construction and Repair (since 1942 the Bureau of Ships) added to its "Ships' Data, U.S. Naval Vessels" (above) two sections called "Standard Nomenclature" (the ship type symbols adopted in 1920) and "List of Naval Vessels" (showing the name and type of each ship). Between January 1942 and September 1945 BuShips published multiple editions of these two lists as a separate publication at a lower level of classification (Restricted, now Unclassified) called "Standard Nomenclature and List of Naval Vessels (NAVSHIPS 250)." Also during World War II the Bureau of Ordnance issued two publications, an "Ordnance Vessel Register" listing all the Navy's ships and a frequently changed "Armament Summary" listing their armaments. During this time vessels were usually stricken from the "List of Ships in the Navy Register."
    On 25 March 1946 the Bureau of Ships issued its first "Naval Vessel Register" (NVR), which replaced the "Ordnance Vessel Register," much of whose format and content it took over, and NAVSHIPS 250. This NVR was merged in 1959 with the Ships Data Book, which was last published separately in 1956. Printed copies of the new "Ships Data Book / Naval Vessel Register," in which the NVR was Volume I and the Ships Data Book was Volume II, were issued through at least 1 April 1995, and since 1998 the NVR has continued to exist as a website online here. From December 1945 to January 1950 vessels were stricken from the "List of Naval Vessels" or "List of District Craft including Service Craft and Floating Equipment," and from March 1950 they were stricken from the "List of Naval Vessels" or "List of Service Craft," later described as the "NVR, List of Naval Ships" and the "NVR, List of Service Craft."
    Source notes: The Navy Department Library and the National Archives (Record Groups 38 and 165) hold multiple editions of NAVSHIPS 250 between 1 January 1942 and September 1945, the one posted here being from the Navy Department Library. The 23 December 1944 Armament Summary is available with unrestricted access to researchers at the National Archives in Record Group 74 (probably NAID 6664536, which covers the years 1941-1960), having been declassified at NARA under NND-927516 and copied by a researcher on 28 August 1997. The 25 July 1945 Bureau of Ordnance Vessel Register is available with unrestricted access to researchers at the National Archives in Record Group 165 (NAID 2142630). A slightly later (25 November 1945) edition is on Wikimedia Commons in two parts, Part 1 (211 MB) here and Part 2 (184 MB) here. The 1 January 1949 Naval Vessel Register is from www.generalstaff.org.

U. S. Navy Temporary Auxiliary Ships of World War I

Unpublished Appendix (Volume II) to Clephane, History of the Naval Overseas Transportation Service in World War I
-- At the end of World War I the Navy Department assembled the records of the Naval Overseas Transportation Service (NOTS), which operated most of the Navy's temporary auxiliary ships of World War I except for the troop transports, and detailed LCDR Lewis P. Clephane, USNRF, to prepare a history. He prepared two manuscripts: one with the history proper (published in 1969 on the 50th anniversary of the war) and one with individual histories of the 450 NOTS ships from commissioning to end of service. This second manuscript, referenced on the World War I front page, remained unpublished but was available to the authors of the Dictionary of American Naval Fighting Ships and the Online Library of Selected Images.

U. S. Navy Section Patrol (SP) and Identification (ID) Numbers, 1916-1941

Analogous World War II programs
-- Shipscribe has done no research on the World War II analogs to the World War I Section Patrol program but these two reports give glimpses into Navy and WSA activity in this area. The main World War II analog to the SP's appears to have been the Coast Guard Reserve, which enrolled several thousand small craft with CGR numbers during the war.

Shipbuilding Programs and Contracts of the U. S. Navy, 1938-1945
-- This report, NAVSHIPS (282), issued by the Finance Division of the Bureau of Ships, is referenced on the Introduction page for the section on Navy building programs, 1938-1945, as the primary source for program numbers and is also a comprehensive source for authorizations and appropriations for 1922-1945 as of the end of the war.

-- This report, NAVSHIPS 250-641, issued by Code 641 in the Bureau of Ships, is referenced on the Introduction page as the most comprehensive source for shipbuilding contracts of this period in their final form besides the postwar Ships' Data Books, which are not available on the web. A change updating it to 1 January 1956 has been entered.

-- This report, issued by Op-41, formerly Op-05, in the office of the Chief of Naval Operations, is referenced on the Introduction page for the section on Navy building programs, 1938-1945. It provides information from directives and other correspondence regarding the wartime building program for combatant ships. It does not cover the Auxiliary Program, the Landing Craft Program, or the District Craft Program, because they were under the cognizance of Op-414, formerly Op-23. It is now at the National Archives, RG-38, NAID 26864400.

Shipbuilding Contracts of the U.S. Maritime Commission, 1937-1945
-- This report, issued by the Construction Division of the U. S. Maritime Commission ca. 1948, is a major source for data on the shipbuilding contracts of the Maritime Commission, 1937-1945, and was also referenced on the Sources page for the 1835-1945 naval auxiliaries section as the primary source for construction dates for all ships built by the MC.

-- This Maritime Administration report extends the record of U.S. Government merchant shipbuilding through 1976.

Other References
-- This report lists all of the contracts issued by the Army Transportation Corps during World War II for "marine equipment" up to 180-foot coastal cargo ships and tankers and including various sizes of tugs. Information includes hull designations, builders, design numbers, and hull dimensions. Section I page 3 also lists the craft built for the Defense Plant Corporation.

-- This reference correlates Army hull numbers with their design numbers, allowing them to be found in the Small Boat report.


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