Originally designated APM-5, Gunston Hall was launched 1 May 1943 by the Moore Dry Dock Company, Oakland, California, sponsored by Mrs. Harvey S. Haislip; and commissioned 10 November 1943.

After intensive shakedown along the California coast Gunston Hall prepared to sail for the Western Pacific, where she was to participate in every major operation from February 1944 to the end of the war, 18 months later.

The pattern she set here held for her participation in eight further key invasion efforts in the Pacific as the Navy "Island-hopped" Marines and Army troops ever closer to the Japanese home islands.

While not actually involved in an invasion effort, Gunston Hall trained troops and shuttled supplies and men from the rear islands to the staging areas.

After the first invasion waves went ashore at Okinawa, the Pacific's largest amphibious operation, involving over 1,200 ships and half a million men, Gunston Hall remained anchored at nearby Kerama Retto until 1 July to repair small craft.

Departing San Diego 17 April, she reached Bikini Atoll on 6 May via Pearl Harbor for duties in connection with Operation Crossroads, the famous series of atomic bomb tests.

With elements of the 1st Marine Provisional Brigade embarked, Gunston Hall departed San Diego 1 July 1950 and reached Pusan, Korea, via Yokosuka 3 August.

As the Korean War settled into its long and bloody pattern of near stalemate, Gunston Hall continued to shuttle troops and supplies between Japan and Korea.

Gunston Hall was part of one of the Navy's greatest postwar humanitarian efforts in 1955 as she joined TG 90 (Rear Admiral Lorenzo S. Sabin) at Saigon, South Vietnam, for Operation Passage to Freedom.

Since badly depleted French forces could not hope to effect the transfer of so many people, the U.S. Navy detailed nearly 100 ships to carry refugees and equipment from Haiphong to Saigon in a 9-month period.

During the Cuban Missile Crisis, she embarked elements of the 5th Marine Expeditionary Brigade at San Diego and headed for the Caribbean, transiting the Panama Canal on 5 November.

She participated in exercises "Hilltop VII" and "Mudpuppy I" in the Philippines before loading three experimental Navy Patrol Air Cushion vehicles on 15 December for transportation to San Diego.

Gunston Hall was sold to Argentina in 1970, under Military Assistance Program, renamed ARA Cándido de Lasala (Q-43), and used by the Argentine Navy to support the Marines.