MAILBOAT NAME: M/V SAMANA
PAST NAMES: not known – probably none
DIMENSIONS: 100 tons light, 96′ long, 17′ wide, 9′ deep, a single, 6-cylinder Cooper-Bessemer diesel of 425 hp.
CONSTRUCTION: wood
YEAR BUILT: 1940
BUILDER: Austin Levy, owner of the Hatchet Bay plantations, an American from Bistrol Rhode Island who invested heavily in the Bahamas. Records say “built in Bahamas as a motor cargo vessel.”
EARLY CAREER: mail route Nassau – Spanish Wells & Eleuthera
BAHAMAS CAREER: mail route Nassau – Spanish Wells & Eleuthera
CAPTAINS: not known
FATE: not known
OWNERS: Hatchet Bay, Eleuthera Ltd., Bahamas, presumably to export Bahamian produce to US.
NOTES: On October 22, 1942 the US Navy purchased SAMANA from Hatchet Bay Eleuthera, Ltd. Just 3 days later they placed the ship in service as the YAG-28″to transport cargo to outlying Caribbean bases.” A few days after the Japanese surrender, on 13 August 1945 she was struck from the US Navy register and appearently sold back to the Bahamas c/o Mr. Mervin Ferguson in MIami on the 25th of March 1946. She was flagged outside of the US after WWII.
Source: http://www.navsource.org/archives/14/2028.htm
Also: Stephen S. Roberts of Shipscribe kindly adds: “YAG-28 was acquired from Eleuthera Ltd., Hatchet Bay, Bahamas and was designated YAG-28 by OpNav on 28 Jan 43. She was placed in service at Miami, Florida. The vessel was designated for laying up in September 1944 but was instead reassigned to the Amphibious Training Base at Fort Pierce, Florida, where she served until being laid up in July 1945 at Miami. Sold in 1946 to Mervin Ferguson of Miami, Fla., she was not registered for postwar service as an American merchant vessel.”
Source: http://www.shipscribe.com/usnaux/YAG/YAG28.html