During wars, all glory usually goes to those who fight on the front lines and take part in hostilities. At the same time, rear services and units often remain in the shadows. Today, many have heard the names of armored vehicles from the Second World War, used small arms and artillery weapons, but few people know and remember the names of vehicles used by the belligerent parties. To such invisible and unknown to the general public workers of the Second World War can be safely attributed to the American transport ships of the "Liberty" type.
Liberty type transports are a huge series of ships built in the USA during the Second World War. The ships were used to transport a variety of military cargo and troops, as well as to compensate for the losses caused to the merchant fleet by German submarines. This series of transport ships during the war years provided both massive military transportation and the supply of food, goods and military cargo under Lend-Lease from the USA to Great Britain and the USSR. In total, from 1941 to 1945. American industry produced 2,710 Liberty-class ships, and these ships themselves became one of the symbols of the industrial power of the United States.
Mass production and records
The first Liberty-class transport departed from the American shipyard Bethlehem Fairfield in Baltimore on September 27, 1941. It was the steamer "Patrick Henry", which led a huge series of ships of this type. Plans for the construction of transport ships appeared in the United States in the pre-war years, as Washington was concerned about the state of its merchant fleet and shipbuilding in particular. There was a clear need to revive and increase foreign trade; for this, a large transport fleet was needed, capable of operating on sea communications. Created in 1936, the US Maritime Commission began developing projects for new sea transports, plans for their construction, as well as reorganizing the entire American shipbuilding industry. However, only the Second World War, which began in Europe in September 1939, gave a real impetus to the development of the American shipbuilding program.
The surviving transport SS John W. Brown
Great Britain, which was an active participant in the outbreak of the war, was located on the islands, which were both a defense against a large-scale invasion and a real problem. In order to live and fight, Great Britain every year had to receive about 40 million tons of various cargo delivered by sea. Realizing this, the top leadership of Germany organized attacks on the most vulnerable places of the British Empire - its sea communications. At the beginning of the war, British transports went to the bottom one after another, and German submariners sank transport ships with virtually impunity. By the end of 1940, the losses of the British merchant fleet had reached enormous values - 4.5 million tons, which was 20 percent of its total tonnage. The situation with the delivery of goods to the islands was becoming threatening.
Experiencing problems with transport ships, the UK decides to order them from the USA. Initially, it was about 60 transports of the "Ocean" type, which had a very conservative design and a carrying capacity of about 7 thousand tons. The ships were propelled by coal-fired steam engines. The power plant looked the most archaic, but it suited the British, since the British Isles had rich coal reserves, but there were no oil deposits at all. It was the project of this ship that was chosen in the United States to create a mass standard transport vessel, of course, the ship was modernized and adapted for American conditions of production and operation. For example, wherever possible, riveting was replaced by welding, oil water-tube boilers operating on fuel oil were installed instead of coal boilers, etc.
For the first time in the world practice of shipbuilding in the United States, they switched to fully all-welded hulls, abandoning the common riveted joints. This solution had a lot of advantages, including significantly reducing the labor intensity of assembly work (reducing labor costs by about 30 percent). In addition, eliminating the use of rivets saved 600 tonnes of steel per hull. Welding of the hulls of Liberty type transports was carried out both manually and using automatic electric welding, which made it possible to speed up the process of assembling ships, replacing highly skilled manual labor. The construction program assumed in-line assembly with the sectional method of assembling the hulls. The sections of the future ship were prepared in the assembly shops and at the pre-pellet sites, after which they were submitted for assembly in a completely finished form. The weight of each section reached from 30 to 200 tons. The main purpose of the improvements was also to reduce the cost of the ship itself as much as possible and adapt it to mass production. So, for simplicity, it was decided to abandon the wooden deck flooring even in the living quarters of the transport, everywhere the tree was replaced with linoleum and mastic. In the process of mass production, the cost of one ship was reduced from $ 1.2 million to $ 700 thousand.
Simultaneous construction of Liberty transports at an American shipyard
Initially, in January 1941, it was planned to build 200 ships according to the "modified British project", for which the American government chose 6 companies located on the West coast of the country. However, after the United States entered World War II, the need for transport increased significantly, and the list of shipyards engaged in their production was quickly increased to 18 (excluding numerous subcontractors). At the same time, not all of these companies had at that time experience in building ships for the merchant fleet. The first 14 ships took about 230 days to build, with the first SS Patrick Henry taking 244 days to build. However, by the end of 1942, American industry had taken an unprecedented rate of production, it took an average of 70 days to build a ship, in 1944 this figure reached 42 days. The absolute record was set in November 1942 at the Kaiser's shipyard, it belonged to the transport SS Robert E. Peary, from the moment the ship was laid down to launching it took only 4 days and 15.5 hours. On November 12, 1942, the ship was launched, and on November 22, 1942, she set off on her maiden voyage with cargo. Built in record time, the ship was able to survive the war and served in the navy until 1963. But this example is rather a propaganda trick, which was impossible to repeat serially. But even without this, the achieved pace of construction of Liberty-class transports is worthy of respect; in 1943, American shipyards issued an average of three such transport ships a day.
The rush to build and launch into the series, especially in wartime, could not pass without leaving a trace. 19 ships of this type of early construction literally broke into the sea while sailing. The reason was poor-quality welding, poorly chosen steels and not fully developed technologies. However, this number is less than a percentage of all Liberty-class transports built. During 1942, they tried to eliminate these shortcomings as much as possible, although problems with the strength of the hull, especially in difficult weather conditions at sea, persisted until the end of the use of the ships. Subsequently, the experience gained in the construction and operation of Liberty-class transports was taken into account in the production of the next series of military transports - Victory (534 ships) and T2 tankers (490 ships). At the same time, the bulk of Liberty-class transports survived the Second World War and were used in the fleets of many countries for decades. Therefore, the myth that these transports were one-way ships is devoid of any foundation.
Another difficult task faced the creators of the ships - to name such a huge series. About 2,500 transports that were used by the American Navy were named after people, and always in honor of the deceased (there were at least exceptions). The first ships of the Liberty class were named after those who signed the US Declaration of Independence, then the names of public figures, politicians, scientists and soldiers who died during the First World War, and later the Second World War, were used. After war bonds were issued in the United States, anyone (or a group of persons) who purchased bonds worth two million dollars could give the ship a name while maintaining the general rules. The 200 British ships transferred under Lend-Lease received names starting with “Sam”, but it quickly became clear that the vocabulary for “sam” in the English language is limited, so such atypical names for the British as SS Samara, SS Samovar were used. and even SS Samarkand.
Design features of transports of the "Liberty" type
The transport hull had a layout quite typical for the ships of the merchant fleet of the 1930s. There were five cargo holds in total, three holds in the bow of the superstructure, two more in the aft half of the hull. Ships of the "Liberty" type were twin-deck vessels, that is, the cargo holds were divided into upper and lower halves of the twin-deck deck. The upper deck was made as free as possible from all kinds of mechanisms, which made it easier to receive cargo. For unloading at the port of destination, the ship had three masts with cargo arrows, which could lift cargo weighing up to 50 tons. The central part of the ship was occupied by boiler rooms and engine rooms, under which were the premises for the transport crew, and above them - the wheelhouse. The ship was distinguished by a sloping stem and a "cruising" rounded stern. The service life of the ship's hull was estimated at five years; it was believed that then the ship would be easier to write off than to repair.
The ship's propulsion system included a triple expansion steam engine, which was borrowed from the Ocean-class transports, and two oil water-tube boilers that ran on fuel oil. In addition to simplifying bunkering and saving fuel, the use of oil boilers allowed the ship to get rid of the coal bunkers located in the superstructure, making it easier to navigate the ship. From the steam engine to a single propeller, there was a long shaft line, which passed under holds No. 4 and No. 5. The power plant of the ship provided it with a maximum speed of 11-11, 5 knots, this was the standard value for transport ships of that time.
The armament of the ships consisted of five 127-mm or less often 102-mm guns (4-inch), which were installed on the poop and intended for self-defense against German submarines, here on the poop there were two 20-mm anti-aircraft machine guns. A naval three-inch gun (76, 2 mm) was installed on an elevated forecastle. Further on the sides of the bow cargo arrows were placed two 20-mm anti-aircraft machine guns, 4 more anti-aircraft machine guns were installed at the corners of the superstructure.
According to the project, the crew of the Liberty-class transports consisted of 45 sailors and 36 artillerymen, while their composition could seriously change. Unlike the ships of the British Merchant Navy, on which the sailors also worked as servants with guns for an additional shilling a day, the sailors of the American Merchant Navy remained civilian personnel. Military sailors were responsible for the maintenance of anti-aircraft and artillery guns. The rescue equipment on board the transports was represented by two 31-seater rowboats, two 25-seater motor boats and four liferafts (they were in fairly noticeable inclined boxes located at masts No. 2 and No. 3).
Steam engine of transport "Liberty" before being sent to the shipyard
Service of ships during the Second World War
It is impossible to estimate exactly how much cargo was transported by the ships of the "Liberty" type during the Second World War. These ships carried food and resources to Great Britain, military equipment and cargo to the USSR on all three Lend-Lease routes, various army equipment for the landing in Normandy, soldiers and marines to the islands in the Pacific Ocean, and performed many other tasks. During the war years, in almost every corner of the world's oceans, one could see a characteristic silhouette, in which a high-board cargo steamer with a sloping nose and a low chimney located in the middle of the superstructure could be easily guessed. The capacity of Liberty type transports could reach: 2840 jeeps; 525 wheeled armored vehicles M8 or 525 ambulances; 260 medium or 440 light tanks; 300 thousand 105-mm or 651 thousand 76-mm shells. In practice, the cargoes transported by the ships were groupage.
For the period from 1942 to 1945. out of 2710 built ships of this type, 253 transports were killed, about 50 ships on their maiden voyage, in total, 9 percent of the built ships were lost during the hostilities. At the same time, the greatest losses fell on the first series of 153 ships, which were launched in the first half of 1942 in the midst of the unfolding battle for the Atlantic. 34 ships from this series were lost during the first year of service, another 13 were destroyed before the end of the war, losses among the first series of ships were 31 percent. At the same time, every 26th among the sailors of the US merchant fleet during the Second World War died.
During the years of the war, for the bravery and courage shown by the ship and its crew, the American government awarded ships the honorary title "Gallant ship". This title was awarded to 7 transports of the "Liberty" type. The most famous of these ships was the SS Stephen Hopkins, which on September 27, 1942, off the coast of Africa, engaged the German raider Stier, armed with six 150 mm guns. During a fierce battle, the transport was sunk, however, he himself managed to get 18 hits from a German raider from his only old 102-mm gun from the First World War, as a result of which the Stier received serious damage, caught fire and was abandoned by the German crew, who moved to the ship. supplies Tannenfels. In this battle, most of the crew of the American transport was killed - 37 people, including the captain, 19 survivors drifted in the boat for more than a month until they were washed ashore Brazil. Three Liberty-class transports were named after the captain, chief mate and gunnery cadet, who was the last to fire with a 102mm gun, and a destroyer escort was named after the only naval officer on board.
The death of the SS Paul Hamilton transport on April 20, 1944
The most tragic for ships of the "Liberty" class were two days: on December 2, 1943, during a massive German air raid on Bari, six transports were killed in the port from air bombs at once, on the second day: June 29, 1944, when the German submarine U-984, operating in the English Channel, sank 4 such vehicles at once. A certain number of transports during the war years were converted to transport troops, and a small part of the ships were originally built as specialized transports for the transport of military personnel. The worst disaster involving the Liberty transports was the sinking of the SS Paul Hamilton off the coast of Algeria on April 20, 1944. The ship fell victim to German Ju-88 torpedo bombers. On board the transport was a huge amount of ammunition and explosives, as well as soldiers and officers of the Air Force. As a result of the torpedo hit, the ship exploded and sank in 30 seconds, out of 580 people on board, only one body was found.
In total, during the period of serial production from 1941 to 1945, 2,710 Liberty-type transports were built in the United States. About 200 of them were transferred under the Lend-Lease of Great Britain, 41 more ships (38 transports and 3 tankers) were transferred to the USSR, and a total of 54 Liberty-class ships sailed under the Soviet flag, another 13 ships were received in different ways, including bought after the end of World War II. Active operation of these transport ships continued until the late 1960s, when they began to be withdrawn from flights due to increased operating costs. There are currently two restored Liberty-class vehicles in the United States: SS John W. Brown in Baltimore and SS Jeremiah O'Brien in San Francisco.
Ship type "Liberty" of the Soviet fleet
The performance characteristics of the Liberty type transport:
Displacement - 14,450 tons.
Overall dimensions: length - 134.57 m, width - 17.3 m, draft - 8.5 m.
Power plant - one steam engine, two boilers, power - 2500 hp
Travel speed - 11-11, 5 knots (20, 4-21, 3 km / h).
Cruising range - 20,000 nautical miles.
Crew - 38-62 people (merchant seamen), 21-40 people (military seamen).
Armament: 127-mm (or 102-mm) gun at the stern for protection from enemy submarines, 76-mm gun on the tank, up to 8x20-mm Oerlikon anti-aircraft machine guns.
