On 20 October "Oak Hill" stood off Leyte and launched LCMs and LVTs carrying 1st Cavalry Division units toward White beach. For the next two months she carried reinforcements from New Guinea to Leyte and then, on Christmas Day, arrived at Morotai to prepare for the Lingayen Gulf offensive. Departing the 28th, she proceeded to Sansapor, thence, on 1 January 1945, to the Philippines. On the 9th she dispatched LCTs and LCVPs to the Luzon beachhead, then withdrew to Leyte to begin ferrying reinforcements from there, and from Morotai, to the assault area.