The ship
USS LST-472 was a tank landing ship. She was laid down on 31 October 1942 at Vancouver, Washington, by Kaiser, Inc., launched on 7 December 1942, and sponsored by Mrs. Frank C. Huntoon. She was commissioned on 13 March 1943. NavSource names Lieutenant William O. Talley Sr., USN, from that day and carries the tour through 21 December 1944. DANFS does not name her commanding officer. The accounts of the loss do not say he was killed.
DANFS lists the consolidation of the southern Solomons in June 1943, the New Georgia-Rendova-Vangunu occupation in July 1943, the occupation and defense of Cape Torokina in November and December 1943, the Green Islands landings in February 1944, Hollandia in April 1944, and the western New Guinea operations: Toem-Wakde-Sarmi in May, Biak in June, Noemfoor in July, Cape Sansapor in August, and Morotai in September. Mindoro, in December 1944, was the last of them. H-Gram 040 calls it her thirteenth amphibious assault. She earned six battle stars and the Navy Unit Commendation.
15 December 1944
H-Gram 040 says five aircraft came at her off the Mindoro beaches on the day of the landing. Three were shot down. One crashed into the main deck near the superstructure, went through the ship, and knocked out the water mains. The fire was not controlled. She was abandoned with six dead and sunk by U.S. gunfire. O'Brien (DD-725) rescued 198 survivors.
The O'Brien of 1942 is a different ship, DD-415.
The current DANFS entry, published in 2015, says she was sunk off Mindoro on 21 December 1944. The older DANFS text says 15 December 1944. A bracket on that older reprint, which is not the DANFS sentence, says she was damaged by a kamikaze along with LST-738 and scuttled off the southern tip of Mindoro by Hall (DD-583). H-Gram 040 does not name the ship whose guns finished her. The ships it names for 21 December are LST-460 and LST-749. The Navy chronology for 15 December lists LST-472 and LST-738 damaged by suicide planes and sunk by United States forces, at 12°19' N, 121°05' E. That is the chronology's place for the action. It is not a surveyed wreck. She was struck from the Navy list on 19 January 1945.
The broadside shows the bow marked 472 and the ship burning aft. NavSource dates that frame 21 December 1944. The date is not printed on the photograph. The closer view carries a caption dated 15 December 1944. It says the men in the bow were waiting for the order to abandon, and that the picture was taken from PCE(R) 851. The hull number is outside that frame. A third print, NH 103030, shows O'Brien (DD-725) fighting the fire. The destroyer's bow reads 725. The print names LST-472 and dates the photograph December 1944, without a day. Her own number is hidden by the smoke.
