I'm pleased that you have found useful information here.
As it turns out there have been a number of vessels named JOHN HENRY but only one that was built during World War II, a Liberty ship. She was built by the Bethlehem Fairfield Shipyard in Baltimore. Her keel was laid 14 April 1942, she was launched 18 June and she was completed on 6 July, a total construction time of 83 days. After the war she was placed in the reserve fleet ("mothballed") in the James River, Virginia, until finally being scrapped in Castellon, Spain, in 1972. See http://shipbuildinghistory.com/history/shipyards/4emergencylarge/wwtwo/bethfairfield.htm and scroll to hull number 2032, also http://www.mariners-l.co.uk/LibShipsJo.html#JohnH and scroll to the name of the ship.
The ship was named after John Henry (1750-1798), Maryland delegate to the Continental Congress, U.S. Senator from Maryland and Governor of Maryland 1798.
You may have found on the Armed Guard website the recollections of Armed Guard gunner's mate Samuel McAdams, who also sailed in JOHN HENRY. McAdams relates that on the last voyage, while loaded with explosives, JOHN HENRY was involved in three collisions with other ships, fortunately without casualties on JOHN HENRY. The ship reached Europe soon after V-E Day, with the result that she was not unloaded (there being no need for ammunition) but was sent back to the U.S. with her cargo of explosives; one of the collisions occurred on the return voyage. You would have to check your information to determine whether your grandfather was aboard at the time. See http://www.armed-guard.com/biogm.html and scroll down to Samuel R. McAdams.
WILLIAM WOLFSKILL was another Liberty ship, built by the California Shipbuilding Company ("Calship") in Los Angeles. Keel laid 23 November 1943, launched 21 December, completed 31 December, 38 days after keel-laying. WILLIAM WOLFSKILL was sold to a private shipping company in 1947, was sold and renamed three times, sailed under the Dutch, Liberian and Somali flags, and was scrapped in Santander, on Spain's north coast, in 1971. See http://shipbuildinghistory.com/history/shipyards/4emergencylarge/wwtwo/kcalifornia.htm and scroll to hull number 275; also see http://www.mariners-l.co.uk/LibShipsW-Z.html and scroll to the name of the ship. Photos of WILLIAM WOLFSKILL (although postwar and under different names) are at http://www.arendnet.com/alderamin.htm (text in Dutch; translate at translate.google.com). (One of the names WILLIAM WOLFSKILL carried after the war was ALDERAMIN, not to be confused with the Dutch ship of the same name that was torpedoed and sunk in 1943. There was also a U.S. Navy ship named USS ALDERAMIN, likewise unrelated.)
The ship was named for William Wolfskill (1798-1866), a cowboy, trapper and agronomist in California who pioneered the orange industry in the Los Angeles area and introduced the Valencia orange.
For possible sources of photographs of the two ships, see http://www.usmm.org/photosource.html.
The two ships apparently had relatively uneventful wartime careers (other than the collisions described above), since I cannot find anything unusual about them on the internet.
Ron Carlson, Webmaster
Armed Guard / Merchant Marine website
www.armed-guard.com
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