Ship Model, Transport American Merchant
Ship Model, Transport American Merchant
Usage conditions apply
- Description
- The United States entered World War I in April 1917. Within days, the federal government created the Emergency Fleet Corporation (EFC) to construct a fleet of merchant ships. The EFC hired the American International Shipbuilding Corporation to build and operate the largest shipyard in the world: Hog Island, near Philadelphia.
- Most of the Emergency Fleet Corporation’s 122 ships were Type A cargo freighters. However, a few were Type B troop transports. Originally named Sisladobsis, this single-screw transport was completed in December 1920 by the American International Shipbuilding Corporation as Aisne for the US Shipping Board at Hog Island, Philadelphia. In 1924, it was renamed the American Merchant and later sold to the United States Lines. In February 1940 it was sold again to a Belgian holding company partly owned by the United States Lines and renamed Ville de Namur.
- In mid-June 1940, the Ville was transporting a cargo of horses from Bordeaux, France to Liverpool, England. On the 19th, it was struck by two torpedoes from the German U-Boat U-52 and sank quickly. Fifty-four of its crew of 79 survived.
- Location
- Currently not on view
- Object Name
- ship
- ship model
- model, ship
- date made
- 1920
- Measurements
- overall: 15 5/8 in x 56 1/4 in x 7 5/8 in; 39.6875 cm x 142.875 cm x 19.3675 cm
- ID Number
- TR.306999
- accession number
- 64928
- catalog number
- TR*306999
- Credit Line
- Transferred from U.S. Senate Committee on Commerce (through Hon. Wesley L. Jones)
- subject
- Fishing
- The Emergence of Modern America
- See more items in
- Work and Industry: Maritime
- Military
- Transportation
- Data Source
- National Museum of American History
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