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USS Kaula

cargo ship of the United States Navy

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General referenceInterpretive dossier study · Crown Archives visual atlas
Record originEnglish Wikipedia
Text licenseCC BY-SA 4.0
Source revisionSep 26, 2026
Entity authorityQ7870701 ↗
Source-derived summary

USS Kaula (AG-33) was built in 1938 by Henry Robb Ltd, in Leith, Scotland. She was acquired by the U.S. Navy as Cubahama 3 January 1941 from her owner, Balboa Shipping Company of New York and renamed Kaula 15 January then commissioned at Baltimore, Maryland 22 January.

Sailing to Hampton Roads, Virginia, 25 January, Kaula departed 4 February for Hawaii, via the Panama Canal and the West Coast, reaching Pearl Harbor 17 March. Prior to the outbreak of war in the Pacific, she carried cargo from Pearl Harbor and Honolulu to various islands in the Hawaiian chain and to Johnston and Palmyra Islands. During the Japanese raid on Pearl Harbor 7 December, she was en route to Palmyra Island.

Throughout the war with the Japanese Empire, Kaula operated out of Pearl Harbor and Honolulu to principal Hawaiian Islands and to outlying islands west to Midway and south to Palmyra. Usually sailing in convoy, she ranged the Hawaiian Sea frontier carrying military equipment, ammunition, and contingents of Seabees until she sailed for the United States on 18 May 1945, arriving at Seattle, Washington on 26 May.

Following 2 months of overhaul, Kaula departed Seattle 31 July on the first of several voyages to Alaska. Assigned to the 13th Naval District, she steamed for the US Coast Guard to Ketchikan, Juneau, Seward, Kodiak, and Dutch Harbor before returning to Seattle 18 September. She operated in Puget Sound and the Strait of Juan de Fuca before steaming to Blake Island Anchorage, Washington, 6 December and decommissioning 14 January 1946.

Editorial summary

The public source identifies “USS Kaula” as cargo ship of the United States Navy. This brief keeps that definition visible, then builds a research path around Kaula, cargo and ship.

Editorial reviewA dependable orientation record for establishing vocabulary, names and a first evidence trail. The current lead gives the account dated anchors—1938, 1941, 1945, 1946—that can be checked directly. The selected authority fields contribute no independent date. Its value is orientation rather than verdict, with Kaula, cargo and ship providing the first useful test.
Editorial analysis

Why this record matters

A short description can identify a subject without explaining its stakes. For “USS Kaula”, the useful work is to connect “cargo ship of the United States Navy” to the records capable of establishing context and consequence.

Evidence profile

Vocabulary and entity names are the principal evidence signals here, because they determine the precision of every later search. The source revision retrieved here is dated Sep 26, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q7870701. None of the 0 selected statements returned an explicit reference. The first chronological checks are 1938, 1941, 1945 and 1946.

Critical limits

Overview language is designed for orientation and should not be treated as a substitute for the evidence cited beneath it. The source lead contains qualifying language; that uncertainty should survive quotation, summary and reuse. Authority statements aid reconciliation but still require their own references, qualifiers and ranks to be checked.

How to read it

Use the entry as an orientation point, then follow its citations and revision history. Names, dates and institutional relationships should be checked against the original record.

Best used for
  • Subject orientation
  • Search vocabulary
  • Locating named sources
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Three-step research path

  1. Establish the record: confirm the title “USS Kaula”, its source revision and the description used here.
  2. Expand the search: follow USS Kaula primary sources, USS Kaula archive and Kaula research across catalogues and specialist indexes.
  3. Test the account: compare the strongest cited source with the responsible institution’s current record and note any disagreement.

Questions for further research

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Source & attribution

This entry incorporates text from “USS Kaula” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.