Samarinda ScStr

Samarinda

(ScStr.: dp. 12,300; 1. 430'4" b. 55'4", dr. 25'10~"
dph. 34'4", s. 12k.; cpl. i2; a. 1 5", 1 6-pdr.)

Samarinda (No. 2511) was launched during 1912 by W. Hamilton & Co., Ltd., Port Glasgow, Scotland, as a steel collier for the Rotterdamsche Lloyd Line. Interned during World War I at New York, she was seized during March 1918 by Customs officials along with 88 other Dutch ships to speed relief to Holland and to further the war effort against the Central Powers. The ship was commissioned on 29 March 1918 at New York, Lt. Comdr. George White, USNRF, in command.

Assigned to the Naval Overseas Transportation Service (NOTS), Samarinda departed from New York on g April 1918 on the first of three round-trip voyages to Europe before the war's end. Operating from New York, she landed general Army supplies and coal at Brest, St. Nazaire, and le Verdon, France. After the Armistice of 11 November, Samarinda made one further round-trip voyage to Quiberon and Nantes France, before being transferred from NOTS to the United States Shipping Board account.

After discharging cargo at Copenhagen and Hamburg, Samarinda proceeded to The Netherlands, arriving at Rotterdam on 14 April 1919. Samarinda was decommissioned there on 14 May 1919 and was returned to her owner the same day. Her United States crew was returned to the United States on board Lake Tulare.