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

Photo #  NH 96756:  SS Cape San Juan, photographed circa Summer 1943.


Online Library of Selected Images:
-- CIVILIAN SHIPS --

Cape San Juan (American Freighter and Troop Transport, 1943-1943)

Cape San Juan, a 6711 gross ton C1-B type cargo ship, was built at Long Beach, California, for the U.S. Maritime Commission. Completed in June 1943 and converted to a troopship during the next two months, she was assigned to the American Hawaiian Steamship Company for operation. Cape San Juan made one round-trip voyage between San Francisco and the south Pacific during August-October 1943 and late in the latter month began a second trip, this time to Australia. While near the Fiji Islands on 12 November 1943 (local time -- 11 November in the U.S.) she was torpedoed by the Japanese submarine I-21. More than a hundred lives were lost among her crew and passengers as a result of this attack and the subsequent abandonment of the ship. Attempts were made to tow Cape San Juan to port, but she sank on the following day.

This page features the only views we have of the freighter/troop transport Cape San Juan.


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 #: NH 96756

SS Cape San Juan
(U.S. Troopship, 1943)

Halftone reproduction of a photograph taken circa Summer 1943, at the time of the ship's conversion to a troop transport.
Copied from "Troopships of World War II", by Roland W. Charles, page 174.

U.S. Naval Historical Center Photograph.

Online Image: 46KB; 740 x 370 pixels

 
Photo #: NH 89892

SS Cape San Juan
(U.S. Troopship, 1943)

Listing and down by the head on 12 November 1943, after she had been torpedoed by a Japanese submarine. She sank on the following day.

U.S. Naval Historical Center Photograph.

Online Image: 75KB; 740 x 610 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 1 June 2003