SS Amerika was a transatlantic ocean liner and a troop transport for the United States during both world wars. She was launched in 1905 as Amerika by Harland & Wolff in Belfast for the Hamburg America Line of Germany. As a passenger liner, she sailed primarily between Hamburg and New York. At the outset of the war, Amerika was docked at Boston; rather than risk seizure by the British Royal Navy, she remained in port for the next three years.
Hours before the American entry into World War I, Amerika was seized and placed under control of the United States Shipping Board (USSB). Later transferred to the U.S. Navy for use as a troop transport, she was initially commissioned as USS Amerika with Naval Registry Identification Number 3006 (ID-3006), but her name was soon Anglicized to America. As America she transported almost 40,000 troops to France. She sank at her mooring in Hoboken in 1918, but was soon raised and reconditioned. After the Armistice, America transported more than 51,000 troops back home from Europe. In 1919, she was handed over to the War Department for use by the United States Army as USAT America, under whose control she remained until 1920.
Returned to the USSB in 1920, America was initially assigned to the United States Mail Steamship Company, and later, after that company's demise, to United States Lines, for which she plied the North Atlantic on Bremen to New York routes. In March 1926, due to an oil leak from inside the ship, near the end of one of her periodic refits, America suffered a fire that raged for seven hours and burned nearly all of her passenger cabins. Despite almost $2,000,000 in damage, the ship was rebuilt and back in service by the following year. In April 1931, America ended her service for the United States Lines and was laid up for almost nine years.
In October 1940, America was reactivated for the U.S. Army and renamed USAT Edmund B. Alexander. After establishing the Newfoundland Base Command and a stint as a barracks ship at St. John's, Newfoundland in January–May 1941, Edmund B. Alexander was refitted for use as a troopship for World War II duty. She was first placed on a New Orleans to Panama route, but later transferred to trooping between New York and European ports. At the end of the war, Edmund B. Alexander was converted to carry military dependents, remaining in that service until 1949. She was placed in reserve until sold for scrapping in January 1957.
Amerika
Amerika was a steel-hulled, 22,225 gross register tons, twin-screw, steam passenger liner. She was launched on 20 April 1905 at Belfast, by the shipbuilding firm Harland & Wolff. Built for the Hamburg America Line, the steamer entered transatlantic service in the autumn of 1905, when she left Hamburg on 11 October, bound for New York City. The night before her inaugural voyage on 19 June 1905, Kaiser Wilhelm II boarded the ship and dined on a menu created by Auguste Escoffier, the French chef who was in charge of organizing the restaurant on board Amerika.
A slightly larger sister ship, was being built at the same time at Hamburg and would remain the largest ship in the world until the . Easily one of the most luxurious passenger vessels to sail the seas, Amerika entered upper New York Bay on 20 October, reaching the Hamburg America piers at Hoboken, New Jersey, in mid-afternoon. Some 2,000 people turned out to watch her as she was moored near her consorts at the Hamburg America Line which were bedecked in colorful bunting in nearby slips.
From 1905 to 1914, Amerika plied the North Atlantic trade routes touching at Cherbourg, France, while steaming between Hamburg and New York. Toward the end of that period, her itinerary was altered so that the ship also called at Boulogne, France, and Southampton, England.
On 14 April 1912, a telegram message to the Hydrographic Office in Washington, D.C. reporting that the ship "passed two large icebergs in 41 27N 50 8W on the 14th of April" signed "Knutp, 10;51p[m]". This message was, coincidentally, relayed by the Marconi operator on to the station at Cape Race because the transmitter of Amerika was not in range of Cape Race at the time.
Amerika was responsible for the accidental loss of British submarine by collision northeast of Dover in the early hours of 4 October 1912.
The eruption of fighting at the outset of World War I caught Amerika at Boston, where she was preparing to sail for home. Although due to leave port on 1 August 1914, Amerika stayed at Boston to avoid capture by the Royal Navy. She remained there through almost three years of United States neutrality.
On her voyage from New York to Europe in the second week of April 1911, Amerika carried the mortally ill composer Gustav Mahler back home. He died in Vienna on 18 May 1911.
Interiors Lavishly decorated throughout, Amerika had several unique shipboard features, including an electric passenger elevator (the first to be installed on a passenger liner), and an à la carte restaurant which, from early morning to midnight, offered a variety of dishes. It was managed by the hotelier César Ritz, while the chef Auguste Escoffier was responsible for creating the menu, organizing and staffing the kitchen and restaurant.
French architect Charles Mewès was responsible for designing the interiors of Amerika, while the English firm of Waring & Gillow was contracted to decorate the main public rooms. The Illustrated London News stated simply that "the rooms which they [Waring & Gillow] have decorated are artistic triumphs." The Sphere wrote of the interiors that "the whole of the vessel is planned on such a scale that the various rooms do not any longer partake of the nature of ship's cabins but are rather a series of sumptuously-furnished and comfortably-contrived apartments such as one would find in a costly house on shore." Amerika's interiors were a departure from the prevailing style on ocean liners up to that point, as they were modelled after a luxury hotel rather than on castles and palaces.
The grand staircase in First-Class was designed in the Adam style, as was the ladies' drawing room. The drawing room had white walls inset with blue Wedgwood plaques. It was topped by a glass dome, with furniture upholstered in rose-colored silk and draperies in rose and silver. Adjoining the drawing room was a writing room in the Empire style, with paneling of white and gold and heliotrope-colored silk panels. There was also an Elizabethan style smoking room, which occupied two floors connected by a staircase. The room was paneled in oak "of the roughly-fashioned style of the sixteenth century" and along the walls of the upper-level was a carved frieze illustrating scenes from the life of Saint Hubert. The chimneypiece of the smoking room was made of brick, with a stone hearth. The room was lit by lanterns hung from the oak beams which crossed the ceiling.
The First-Class dining saloon was at the bottom of the three-deck high grand staircase. The saloon, which was in the Louis XVI style, was as wide as the ship and about 100 ft. in length. It was overlooked by a balcony on four sides. It featured copies of paintings by François Boucher at either end, with furniture in "gold-colored West Indian satin, veined with green." The à la carte restaurant was modelled on the Ritz-Carlton Grill at the Carlton Hotel in London, which Mewès had designed. The Carlton Hotel Company Board agreed to let the shipping company use the name "Ritz-Carlton Restaurant." It was in the Louis XVI style, with paneling made of chestnut and mahogany, enriched with bronze ormolu accents in vegetative designs. The sideboards were made of matching woods and ormolu, while the chairs were copied from examples at Versailles from the Louis XVI period. At the center of the room was a skylight with gray and yellow-colored panels of glass. Children had their own nursery, which was decorated with painted scenes from nursery rhymes.
In terms of accommodation, the finest suites on board were the two called the "Imperial State Rooms", one decorated in the Adam style, the other in the Empire style. There were also 13 chambres de luxe decorated by Waring & Gillow in a range of historic styles, including Georgian, Queen Anne, Adam, and Sheraton.
USS America (1917 to 1919) On 6 April 1917, in anticipation that Congress would declare war on Germany, Edmund Billings, the Collector of Customs for the Port of Boston, ordered that Amerika and four other German ships (the Cincinnati, Wittekind, Köln, and Ockenfels) be seized. It remained inactive until it was taken by deputies under the orders of John A. Donald, the Commissioner of the United States Shipping Board (USSB), on 25 July 1917. Upon inspecting the liner, American agents found her filthy and discovered that her crew had sabotaged certain elements of the ship's engineering plant. Nevertheless, with her officers and men detained on Deer Island, Amerika was earmarked by the United States Navy for service in the Cruiser and Transport Force as a troop transport. Given the identification number 3006, she was placed in commission as USS Amerika (ID-3006) at 08:00 on 6 August 1917, at the Boston Navy Yard with Lieutenant Commander Frederick L. Oliver in temporary command. Ten days later, Captain George C. Day arrived on board and assumed command.
Over the ensuing weeks, she was converted into a troopship, and while this work was in progress, Secretary of the Navy Josephus Daniels promulgated General Order No. 320, changing the names of several ex-German ships on 1 September 1917. As a consequence Amerika was renamed America.
The major part of her conversion and repair work having been completed by late September, America ran a six-hour trial outside Boston Harbor on the morning of 29 September. The ship managed to make three more revolutions than she had ever made before. The completion of these trials proved to be a milestone in the reconditioning of the former German ships, for America was the last to be readied for service in the American Navy.
On 18 October 1917, America departed the Boston Navy Yard and, two days later, arrived at Hoboken, New Jersey, which would be the port of embarkation for all of her wartime voyages carrying doughboys to Europe. There, she loaded coal and cargo; received a brief visit from Rear Admiral Albert Gleaves, the commander of the Cruiser-Transport Force; and took on board her first contingent of troops. Completing the embarkation on the afternoon of 29 October, America sailed for France on the morning of 31 October, in company with the transports , , , the armored cruiser , and destroyers and .
For more than a week, the passage was uneventful. Then, on 7 November, Von Steuben struck Agamemnon while zig-zagging. As America war history states: "The excitement caused by the collision of these great ships was greatly increased when the Von Steuben sent out a signal that a submarine was sighted." The ships in the convoy dispersed as if on signal, only to draw together in formation once more when the "enemy" failed to materialize. All vessels resumed their stations—all, that is, except Von Steuben whose bow was open to the sea from the damage suffered in the collision. Even the crippled transport rejoined the convoy the following afternoon. Met on 12 November off the coast of France by an escort consisting of converted American yachts and French airplanes and destroyers, the convoy reached safe haven at Brest, America only wartime port of debarkation. She dropped her anchor at 11:15 and began discharging the soldiers.