Built as a passenger-cargo vessel under yard No 382 by Newport News Shipbuilding, Newport News, Virginia for the American President Lines Inc., San Francisco.
05 February 1940 laid down.
20 November 1940 launched as PRESIDENT GARFIELD, sponsored by Miss Eugenia Merrill.
Tonnage 9.260 gross, 5.160 net, 9.947 dwt., dim. 149.9 x 21.2m.
Powered by two geared steam turbines, manufactured by builder, 1.416 nhp, speed 16.5 knots.
Passenger capacity 96 passengers, crew 135.
26 March 1941 completed and delivered to owners.
She was built as a C3-P P & C type, six ships were ordered by the American President Lines in 1939 for the round the world service from New York westward to New York. A 90 days service. The PRESIDENT GARFIELD was one of these six ships.
01 May 1942 acquired by the USA Navy and converted in a troop and naval transport ship by her builders, renamed USS THOMAS JEFFERSON (AP 60).
Displacement 16.175 ton.
Armament 4 – 3 inch, 2 – 40mm and 18 - 20mm guns.
Crew 58 officers, 535 crew, troop capacity for 68 officers and 1.197 enlisted.
During the landings in Normandy she carried 24 landings-craft, not sure if she all this time carried these boats.
31 August 1942 commissioned under command of Comdr. Chauncey R. Crutcher.
After a short shakedown cruise and amphibious exercises she took part in the North Africa landings from 7 till 26 November 1942.
December 1942 she made a voyage to the South Pacific disembarked troops at New Caledonia and Australia.
01 February 1943 reclassified as an attack transport and redesignated APA-30, and again send to the European theatre of war.
Sicilian occupation in July 1943.
Salerno landings on 08 September 1943.
Invasion of Normandy 06 June 1944, carried there 1.175 troops.
Invasion in southern France from 14 till 16 August 1944.
15December 1944 sailed from Norfolk and via San Francisco sailed for Hawaii; from there she sailed to the South Pacific and took part in the landings of Okinawa between 1 and 5 April 1945.
After the war was she used to shuttle troops back to the U.S.A.
04 January 1946 assigned to the Naval Transport Service, used to transport cargo and passengers between San Francisco and Pearl Harbour the next 10 months.
04 November 1946 arrived at the New York Navy Yard for repairs and an overhaul, which took till March 1947.
Then again to the west coast of America, and used between San Francisco and the Far East.
31 October 1949 assigned to the Military Sea Transportation Service.
When the North Korean forces invaded South Korea on 25 June 1950 she was at San Diego, after a round voyage Yokohama on 28 August 1950 sailed back to the Far East making a call at Yokosuka and Kobe before heading for Inchon, Korea. Later used to shuttle troops and cargo from Pusan to Iwon,
From early 1951 used to transport cargo and troops from San Francisco to Korea and Japan till September 1951, after she was not used again west of Hawaii till 1954.
1954 She made two voyages to the Far East before she returned to San Francisco.
07 March 1955 in reserve at San Francisco.
18 July 1955 decommissioned at San Francisco.
01 October 1958 struck from the Navy List.
01 March 1973 sold to Zidell Exploration Inc., Portland, Oregon for scrapping.
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Her full story you find on http://www.wikipedia.org/wiki/USS_Thoma ... 8APA-30%29
Source: From America to United States by Sawyer and Mitchell. http://www.navsource.org/archives/10/03/03030.htm