Cyprus; Malta and Gibraltar, her last stop in the Mediterranean before sailing 14 April 1953 for the United States, arriving Norfolk on the 26th. She steamed up and down the East Coast, travelling as far north as Thule, Greenland and as far south as Bermuda until February 1954. She was then assigned another tour of duty in the Mediterranean and revisited the previous ports and such new ones as Iskenderun, Turkey; Genoa and Naples, Italy; Sete and St. Louis du Rhone, France before heading home in June. In January 1955 she departed Norfolk for Gibraltar and a third tour of duty with the 6th Fleet which lasted until May, when she returned to the United States and Norfolk. In the fall and winter of 1955–1956, Nespelen participated in Operation Deep Freeze, a scientific expedition into the frozen wastes of Antarctica. In the years that followed Nespelen resumed her pattern of operations: alternating duty carrying fuel from ports in the Caribbean and on the East Coast to bases in the far northern Atlantic with deployments in the Mediterranean supporting the 6th Fleet. In the summer of 1969 she headed back to the volatile Mediterranean to support American sea strength through the end of the year. Fate Nespelen was laid up in the Reserve Fleet at Naval Amphibious Base Little Creek, Virginia, and struck from the Naval Vessel Register on 1 July 1975. Transferred to the Maritime Administration for disposal, she was sold on 24 March 1976 to Union Minerals & Alloys for scrapping. References Colton Company World War II Construction Record Patapsco-class gasoline tankers World War II auxiliary ships of the United States 1945 ships Ships built in Savage, Minnesota