The Matanikau is a river on the northwest coast of Guadalcanal, between Point Cruz and Lunga Point. Marines and Japanese troops fought along it in September and October 1942. Kaiser at Vancouver laid the escort carrier down as Dolomi Bay on 10 March 1944, renamed her Matanikau on 26 April, and launched her on 22 May. Mrs. Robert A. Grant sponsored her. She was delivered on 24 June, and Captain W. L. Erdmann commissioned her at Astoria the same day.
After training in Puget Sound she reached San Diego on 25 July. With 191 passengers and 56 planes she left on 1 August, touched Espiritu Santo and Finschhafen, and reached Manus on 23 August. She brought 112 sailors and 41 damaged aircraft back to San Diego on 19 September. That round trip was as far toward the fighting as she went during the war.
On 14 October she embarked Composite Squadron 93 and became a qualification carrier out of San Diego. Between January and June 1945 she qualified 1,332 aviators, and pilots made 12,762 landings on her deck. On 25 May alone, Marine aircraft made 602 daylight landings.
She left San Diego on 28 July with 65 planes and 158 troops for the Marshalls, reached Roi on 10 August, and was back at Pearl Harbor on 16 August. On 31 August she sailed west for the occupation and, with Task Force 4, reached Ominato on 11 September. She supported operations along the northern coast of Honshu, including the Eighth Army landing at Aomori on 25 September. From Yokosuka she left Tokyo Bay on 30 September and reached San Francisco on 23 October.
On Magic Carpet duty she embarked more than 1,000 veterans at Saipan and reached San Pedro on 5 December. She then took 795 men of the 3rd Marine Division from Guam to Taku, arriving on 3 January 1946, and those Marines went ashore as part of the American force in north China. She entered San Diego on 29 January, reached Tacoma on 5 February, and was decommissioned on 11 October 1946. In reserve she became CVHE-101 on 15 June 1955 and AKV-36 on 7 May 1959. She was struck on 1 April 1960 and sold on 27 July 1960.