USS Warren ( APA - 53 ) USS " Warren " ( APA - 53 ) was a " Sumter " - class attack transport that served with the US Navy during World War II . " Jean Lafitte " - named for the legendary pirate of Barataria , Louisiana , who assisted General Andrew Jackson in defending New Orleans against the British in 1815 - was a C2 - S - E1 - type merchant ship laid down under a Maritime Commission contract ( MC hull 415 ) on 19 April 1942 at Chickasaw , Alabama , by the Gulf Shipbuilding Corporation . She was launched on 7 September 1942 ; renamed " Warren " and classified a transport , AP - 98 ; redesignated as an attack transport , APA - 53 , on 1 February 1943 ; and placed in commission , in ordinary , on 19 February 1943 . Taken to the Key Highway plant of the Bethlehem Steel Corporation soon thereafter , the ship was decommissioned on 10 March 1943 ; and was recommissioned on 2 August 1943 , CDR William A . McHale , USNR , in command . World War II . " Warren " soon sailed south to the Norfolk Navy Yard , where the work converting her to an attack transport was completed and she was fitted out for service . She next conducted her shakedown and type training in the waters of Chesapeake Bay . In intensive exercises , the ship practiced the amphibious tactics and techniques that she would soon be putting into practice . On 1 November 1943 , " Warren " departed Hampton Roads and headed for Panama , reaching the Canal Zone on the 5th after a brief stop at Guantanamo Bay , Cuba , en route . Following her transit of the Panama Canal , " Warren " pushed on for San Diego and reached that California port on 17 November . The ship subsequently underwent repairs and a drydocking at Long Beach before she returned to San Diego for more amphibious training . From 26 November 1943 to 13 January 1944 , " Warren " landed troops of the 4th Marine Division in practice assaults at Aliso Canyon and San Clemente Island . Invasion of Kwajalein . On the latter day , Friday 13 January 1944 , " Warren " sailed for the Central Pacific with men of the 1st Battalion , 25th Marine Regiment , 4th Marine Division , embarked . Steaming via the Hawaiian Islands , the attack transport arrived off the northern islets of Kwajalein Atoll in the Marshalls at dawn on 31 January . The marines embarked in " Warren " were assigned the task of taking two small islands in the atoll , nicknamed " Ivan " and " Jacob . " Those isles lay to the south of Roi and Namur , two heavily fortified areas of the atoll . Her marines were to secure both a guarded passage into the lagoon and artillery bases from which to soften up the defenses on the main islands , Roi and Namur , in support of the landings slated to take place the following day . The initial men ashore encountered minor opposition , and the casualties sustained were very light . " Warren " eased into the lagoon on 1 February and continued the process of discharging munitions and cargo for her troops ashore . After a channel had been blasted through the coral , the attack transport ' s beach party supervised the arrival of supplies on " Ivan . " " Warren " herself remained in the lagoon with other ships from her division for the next five days . " Warren " departed Kwajalein on 4 February , leaving the island still smoking " and reeking with the stench of unburied dead . " As the ship ' s commanding officer later wrote , " we knew now the horror of war . " Sailing southward , the attack transport reached Funafuti in the Ellice Islands on 9 February , before she continued onward , arriving at Noumea , New Caledonia , on 19 February . She ultimately weighed anchor from New Caledonian waters on 7 March and got underway for Guadalcanal - the scene of once - bitter fighting . She arrived off Lunga Point on the morning of the 10th and spent the majority of her days over the next three months in the Guadalcanal - Tulagi area . The only exceptions were trips to Kwajalein to pick up marines from the 22nd Marine Regiment and to Cape Gloucester — where she landed the troops from elements of the Army ' s 40th Infantry Division and returned to the Russells with men of the 1st Marine Division embarked . Invasion of Guam . At the end of May , " Warren " completed the loading of the men of the 3rd Battalion , 3rd Regiment , 3rd Marine Division , and headed north in convoy — her objective Guam , where she was to debark the marines after their comrades had landed at Saipan in the Marianas . However , because of the fierceness of the Japanese resistance on Saipan , " Warren " ' s mission was aborted ; and she therefore spent over a week cruising off that island , standing by with her marines forming a reserve force . Ultimately , however , " Warren " ' s leatherneck s were not needed , and the ship returned to Eniwetok , to commence a three - week stay in the Marshall Islands . " Warren " finally received the nod to go into action once more , and she accordingly sailed for Guam , sending boatloads of marines from the 3rd Marine Division ashore on 20 July . Over the ensuing five days , " Warren " remained off the bitterly contested beaches , her beach party lying pinned down in their foxholes ashore . " So perilous was the position on the " Warren " beach - the left flank of the assault " , wrote " Warren " ' s commanding officer , " that supplies could not be landed there . " Time and time again , " Warren " ' s hospital corpsmen exposed themselves to enemy fire evacuating wounded marines and the ship ' s boat crews went to the reef ' s edge to pick up the precious cargo of human lives beneath the enemy ' s mortar fire . Invasion of Peleliu . After departing Guam on 25 July , " Warren " evacuated marine casualties to Espiritu Santo . She then shifted to the Russell Islands in the Solomons , where she embarked men of the 1st Battalion , 1st Regiment , 1st Marine Brigade - combat veterans of the Guadalcanal campaign . The attack transport then took those combat - hardened marines to the island of Peleliu in the Palaus . Despite the carrier - based air strikes and intense bombardment which preceded the initial landings of 15 September , the marines who went ashore that day still met fierce resistance from the Japanese defenders . The enemy , firmly entrenched in caves and tunnels that honeycombed the hills overlooking the beach and the strategic airfield , proved difficult to dislodge . Again , " Warren " ' s beach party worked to keep the supplies flowing from the ship to shore where they were needed , providing the necessary supplies and ammunition for the hard - pressed marines . Meanwhile , as the casualties began coming back to the ship , the attack transport ' s medical department worked diligently to save the wounded . Among the first ships to discharge her cargo , " Warren " remained offshore in the ensuing days , becoming a floating hospital , as doctors and corpsmen worked to sustain lives of men evacuated from " the flaming hell of Peleliu . " The routine remained almost the same during the days and nights that " Warren " lay off the beachhead . Each night there would be more burials at sea while the crew waited at battle stations for what became almost a regular visit by snooping Japanese planes . It was not until 22 September that " Warren " departed Pelelieu , bound for New Guinea . Invasion of Leyte . She arrived at Hollandia on 25 September and stayed there until 15 October , when she embarked the men and equipment of the Army ' s 52nd Field Artillery , 24th Division Artillery , 24th Infantry Division . As part of TG 78 . 6 , she subsequently sailed for the Philippine Islands , as General Douglas MacArthur made good his pledge to return - this time well - backed by ships , men , and planes - to the islands from which he had been so unceremoniously ejected in 1942 . On 22 October - two days after the initial landings on Leyte commenced - " Warren " discharged her cargo and disembarked her troops before pulling out of the area that evening . " Warren " returned to Leyte on 14 November , this time with six Red Cross nurses as passengers in addition to the Army 1st Battalion , 127th Regiment , 32nd Infantry Division . The attack transport ' s commanding officer later recounted : " We all recalled that old superstition of the sea - - ' women on board ship bring bad luck ' - - when a Jap torpedo plane came close to hitting us with its deadly charge the afternoon before we sailed into Leyte Gulf . " " Warren " relied on more than luck to enable her to escape damage — it was the straight - shooting of the after gun that did the trick . The enemy aircraft , a torpedo - carrying " Jill " , bore in at the attack transport while flak blossomed about it . Only at the last instant a 5 - inch shell blew the right wing off the " Jill " , sending the plane sliding past " Warren " ' s fantail and into the sea . Later that day , the attack transport witnessed other air attacks in her vicinity and watched while an Army Air Force Lockheed P - 38 Lightning darted daringly through the flak to explode a Japanese fighter in mid - air with a burst from her machine guns . Leyte was still a hot target , so " Warren " ' s unloading was efficient and rapid , discharging her cargo within a few hours and getting underway that evening and then slipping away in the darkness , bound for New Guinea . After stopping at Manus , in the Admiralties , and Oro Bay , " Warren " reached Milne Bay , New Guinea , on 27 November . The attack transport remained at Milne Bay through Christmas Day . Invasion of Luzon . Underway on 26 December 1944 , " Warren " picked up her convoy at Manus and then set out for Leyte again on 2 January 1945 . Nine days later , she reached Lingayen Gulf off Luzon where the ship lost the first members of her crew to enemy action . The first boat to leave the ship during the landings carried half of " Warren " ' s beach party , along with several members of the Army shore party embarked . Due to the heavy smoke screen and a faulty boat compass , the landing craft landed on a Japanese held beach near the town of Damortis . It was a fatal mistake . Before it could get underway , the boat came under artillery , mortar , and machine gun fire , wrecking the vessel , killing several men , and wounding others . The remaining men abandoned the craft and began to swim away from the beach , but the Japanese automatic weapons opened up on them as they struggled to get out of range . Only 17 men out of 28 survived the deadly hail of fire . It was two hours before the survivors - many of them badly wounded - were picked up . By their firing on " Warren " ' s boat , the Japanese gave away positions that pre - attack bombardments and bombings had not reached . Accordingly , destroyer and two fast transports moved in close and joined Army heavy artillery in bombarding the area until all opposition was silenced completely . " Friendly fire " casualties . On the 13th , a Japanese plane came out of the clouds off the ship ' s port bow , apparently intent on crashing into " Warren " . Antiaircraft fire reached up and blossomed in the sky around the intruder . While still several hundred yards away from the attack transport , the plane leveled off , swooped directly over " Warren " and headed for attack transport . As " Warren " ' s men watched , horror - stricken , the drama unfolded before their eyes , as the kamikaze plunged headlong into " Zeilin " . " Warren " herself was raked by machine gun fire from a " friendly " ship . Shells coming from the port quarter pounded the attack transport ' s port side . One man of her boat group , manning a gun in the cockpit in one of the ship ' s landing craft , was killed outright . On the flying bridge alone , there were 22 casualties . " Warren " completed her unloading on 15 January and returned . Ultimately , the attack transport completed one last voyage carrying troops , landing the men of the 1st Battalion , 163rd Regiment , 41st Infantry Division , at Mindoro in the Philippines , after lifting them from Biak Island , New Guinea . Later discharging all surplus supplies and all but two of her landing craft , " Warren " steamed eastward via Eniwetok and stopped at Pearl Harbor on 18 March before heading on toward the west coast of the United States on 20 March . Transport mission to Okinawa . Reaching Portland , Oregon , on the 27th , " Warren " underwent an overhaul there , lasting into June 1945 . Subsequently shifting to San Diego and then to San Francisco , the attack transport departed the west coast on 24 June , bound for the Marshalls , and arrived at Eniwetok on 6 July . From there , she sailed via Ulithi to Okinawa and arrived off that island on 23 July . Over the next few days , " Warren " unloaded the men and material of the 66th Construction Battalion ( " Seabees " ) , undergoing nearly constant air raid alerts as the enemy maintained its pressure on the invading Americans . From 1 to 3 August , " Warren " steamed in circles off Okinawa , riding on the outer edge of a typhoon , and sailed for Ulithi on the 6th . Arriving at her destination soon thereafter , " Warren " lay at anchor in Ulithi lagoon when the word of Japan ' s capitulation was received . After hostilities . " Warren " put into Cebu harbor to load units of the Army ' s Americal Division ; but , before she embarked those troops , her orders were changed . Instead , she was to proceed to Manila . There , she embarked the troops of the Army ' s 43rd Division and headed for Tokyo Bay , reaching that body of water on 13 September , less than two weeks after the formal surrender ceremony on board the battleship . The attack transport subsequently sailed for Okinawa , where she embarked men of the 1st Battalion , 5th Regiment , 1st Marine Division , and their equipment . She sailed from Okinawan waters on 29 September and reached the mouth of the Taku River - the approaches to the city of Tientsin , China - on 2 October . She thus completed the second of her occupation tasks , disembarking the marines over the ensuing days . " Warren " departed Taku Bar on 11 October and reached Manila a few days later . She then left Philippine waters for a three - day voyage across the South China Sea to the Gulf of Tonkin . Reaching Haiphong on 26 October , " Warren " embarked 1 , 800 troops of the Chinese 52nd Army before she departed that port , bound for Manchuria . However , because of unsettled conditions between Chinese Communist and Nationalist forces in Manchuria - a part of the brewing civil war that would reach its climax in the expulsion of the Nationalists from mainland China to Formosa in 1949 - " Warren " sailed instead to Chinwangtao , China , the seaport at the base of the Great Wall . There , she debarked her passengers on 7 November . Two days later , " Warren " dropped down the coast for her second visit to Taku and Tientsin . Operation Magic Carpet . On 16 November , " Warren " sailed for Manila and participation in the mass movement of men back to the continental United States , Operation Magic Carpet . After lifting a contingent of seabees to Guam at the end of November , " Warren " streamed a " homeward bound " pennant on 1 December and set her course for the California coast . Decommission . Reaching San Francisco on 17 December , " Warren " remained at that west coast port until 14 January 1946 , when she got underway for New Orleans . Transiting the Panama Canal soon thereafter , " Warren " pushed on to the coast of the Gulf of Mexico . Decommissioned on 14 March 1946 , " Warren " was struck from the Navy list on 17 April 1946 and turned over to the War Shipping Administration on 1 August of the same year at Mobile , Alabama . Decorations . " Warren " received five battle star s for World War II service . Commercial service . Subsequently acquired by the Waterman Steamship Corporation , the ship apparently kept her original name " Jean Lafitte " , for only a short time . Renamed " Arizpa " in 1947 , the former attack transport was converted for merchant service and operated under the Waterman house flag until 1966 , when she appeared on contemporary merchant vessels registers as operating with Litton Industries Leasing Corp . of Wilmington , Delaware . " Arizpa " operated with Litton until 1976 , when she was transferred to the Reynolds Leading Corp . , also of Wilmington . At some stage she was converted into a container vessel for Sea - Land Service . She was reportedly scrapped at Brownsville , Texas in September 1977 .