Shanghai, Jan. 29. "HE history of the U.S.S, Chaumont, veteran trans-Pacific transport which has been ordered off the Orient run by the U.S. Navy Department after nineteen years service, reads like a chronic ele of the Shanghai wars, Every time war clouds have gathered on Shanghai's murky horizon, every time the security of the International Settlement has been threatened, the sturdy old Chaumont would come puffing into port under full steam, her snub gray snout pushing its way through the turbid waters of the Whangpoo jer, to disembark much needed reinforcements for the hard pressed defenders of the Settlement.
Built at Hog Island, on the East Const of the United, States, in 1920 for the U.S. Army's transportation service, the Chaumont is an 11,100- ton vessel, 48 feet In length and has a beam of §8 feet. The Chaumont ig one of six vessels of the same type built at Hog Island in 1920, these same vessels being often faceviously referred to as. "ninely-day wonders," because of the speed with which they were constructed, addition to the transport two more of these vessels are currently in the US. Navy, the Argonne, sister-ship of the Chaumont, and the Wright. The Argonne is a fleet supply ship while the Wright is an aircraft tender.
The Chaumont was leased from the War Department by the Navy on November 3, 1921, and on August 6, 1024, "passed Into complete Navy. ownership, The home port of the Chaumont Is Norfolk, Virgina, and her schedule throughout the " years has been the same, two trips to the For East and return once a year, (On one voyage the old Chaumont saw: more of the world than most of the ships in the Navy see Ju their entire fe time. Putting out from Norfolk the Chaumont would sail for Port an Prince, Halti, to disembark marines for duty in that tropical treble spot, and then proceed to the Navy's base Guantanamo Bay on the Western tip of Cuba,
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.