MAINSTAY AM 261

Ship Name and Designation History

This section lists the names and designations that the ship had during its lifetime. The list is in chronological order.

USS MAINSTAY AM-261
Commissioned April 21 1944 - Decommissioned November 6 1946
MAINSTAY AM-261
Placed In Service November 28 1947 - Out of Service April 16 1948
USS MAINSTAY AM-261
Recommissioned March 1 1949 - Decommissioned January 10 1950
Recommissioned December 12 1950 - Decommissioned September 21 1954
Laid up in Pacific Reserve Fleet, San Diego, CA
Reclassified Fleet Minesweeper (Steel Hull) (MSF) February 7 1955, While in reserve

Struck from Naval Register December 1 1959
Sold August 8 1960 to National Metal and Steel Corp. for scrap

Naval Covers

This section lists active links to the pages displaying covers associated with the ship. There should be a separate set of pages for each name of the ship (for example, Bushnell AG-32 / Sumner AGS-5 are different names for the same ship so there should be one set of pages for Bushnell and one set for Sumner). Covers should be presented in chronological order (or as best as can be determined).

Since a ship may have many covers, they may be split among many pages so it doesn't take forever for the pages to load. Each page link should be accompanied by a date range for covers on that page.

Covers Page 1 (1946-51)

Postmarks

This section lists examples of the postmarks used by the ship. There should be a separate set of postmarks for each name and/or commissioning period. Within each set, the postmarks should be listed in order of their classification type. If more than one postmark has the same classification, then they should be further sorted by date of earliest known usage.

A postmark should not be included unless accompanied by a close-up image and/or an image of a cover showing that postmark. Date ranges MUST be based ONLY ON COVERS IN THE MUSEUM and are expected to change as more covers are added.

>>> If you have a better example for any of the postmarks, please feel free to replace the existing example.

Postmark Type --- Killer Bar Text	Date From to Date To	Thumbnail Link To Postmark Image	Thumbnail Link To Cover Image

1st Commissioning April 24 1944 to November 6 1946

US Army Postal Service Postmark
APO 54

France

1944-10-22

Note:

Other Information

MAINSTAY received two battle stars for World War II service and four battle stars for Korean service

NAMESAKE - A rope or cable which as part of a ship's standing rigging, steadies a mainmast fore and aft and provides primary support for the angle of the mast; hence, the quality of furnishing chief support or strength

If you have images or information to add to this page, then either contact the Curator or edit this page yourself and add it. See Editing Ship Pages for detailed information on editing this page.