Qualla: James River Reserve Fleet

James River Reserve Fleet: Introduction

Sun, 31 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Photographer: PH3 Martin Norman, USN, Public domain. From the air above the James River near Fort Eustis, the gray shapes look at first like an unusually orderly cluster of barges. They aren't. They are mothballed warships and cargo carriers - the James River Reserve Fleet, locally known as the Ghost Fleet, the oldest National Defense Reserve Fleet anchorage in the United States. The fleet opened in 1919. At its peak in the 1950s, it held more than 800 ships, including Liberty ships and Victory ships left over from World War II, some still loaded with surplus wheat that the Department of Agriculture stored in their cargo holds. Today only nine ships remain. They sit at anchor, hulls red with rust, waiting either to be reactivated within twenty to one hundred twenty days - or to be towed away for scrap, target practice, or sinking as an artificial reef.

Image: Photographer: PH3 Martin Norman, USN | Public domain

James River Reserve Fleet: The Oldest Anchorage

Sun, 31 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Photographer: PH3 Martin Norman, USN, Public domain. The James River Reserve Fleet was established in 1919, the first of what became the National Defense Reserve Fleet system. The other large reserve anchorages in the twentieth century were Suisun Bay inland from San Francisco Bay and Beaumont in Texas. At the start of World War II...

Image: Photographer: PH3 Martin Norman, USN | Public domain

James River Reserve Fleet: Grain in the Holds

Sun, 31 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Photographer: PH3 Martin Norman, USN, Public domain. In the 1950s, the United States Department of Agriculture and the Commodity Credit Corporation found a use for all that idle hold space. Liberty ships at the James River anchorage were filled with surplus grain. Hold by hold, hatches sealed, the ships became floating granaries fo...

Image: Photographer: PH3 Martin Norman, USN | Public domain

James River Reserve Fleet: Notable Hulls

Sun, 31 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Photographer: PH3 Martin Norman, USN, Public domain. The roster of ships that have passed through the James River anchorage reads like an industrial-age catalog of American naval history. USS Guadalcanal (LPH-7), an amphibious assault ship that recovered Gemini and Apollo astronauts from the Atlantic, was sunk as a target off the V...

Image: Photographer: PH3 Martin Norman, USN | Public domain

James River Reserve Fleet: Liberty Ships That Sailed Out

Sun, 31 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Leonard G., CC0. Not every ship at the James River became scrap. SS John W. Brown, a Liberty ship laid up here for years, was towed to Baltimore in the 1980s, restored by a volunteer crew, and now operates as a museum ship and one of only two fully operational Liberty ships in the United States. ...

Image: Leonard G. | CC0

James River Reserve Fleet: Nine Ships Left

Sun, 31 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Photographer: PH3 Martin Norman, USN, Public domain. The Maritime Administration manages what remains. Nine ships sit at anchor in the James now, where there were once 800. Some are awaiting scrap. Some are kept for training. Some are designated as artificial-reef candidates. Each year a few more leave, towed out under cloudy skies...

Image: Photographer: PH3 Martin Norman, USN | Public domain