Originally laid down as the light cruiser Newark (CL-100), on 26 October 1942 by the New York Shipbuilding Co., Camden, New Jersey; redesignated CV-30 and renamed Reprisal on 2 June 1942; renamed San Jacinto on 30 January 1943, converted, while building, to a light aircraft carrier and reclassified as CVL-30; launched on 26 September 1943; sponsored by Mary Gibbs Jones (wife of U.S. Commerce Secretary Jesse H. Jones); and commissioned on 15 November 1943, Capt.

These were San Jacinto's first offensive missions, and no combat casualties were incurred, but one TBF Avenger was lost and its aircrew listed as missing when it failed to return from an anti-submarine patrol.

During these raids, a San Jacinto fighter pilot was shot down over Guam and spent 17 days in a life raft trying to attract attention and 16 nights hiding on the island.

A brief stop at Eniwetok preceded dawn-to-dusk CAP and ASP duty while other carriers struck at Yap, Ulithi, Anguar and Babelthuap, pinning down Japanese air forces while the Palaus were being assaulted on 15 September.

On 2 September, while piloting a TBF Grumman Avenger #46214 from VT-51, future-President George H. W. Bush was shot down by anti-aircraft fire while attacking Japanese installations on the island of Chichijima.

[5] Following a replenishment stop at Manus, Admiralty Islands, San Jacinto joined in strikes against Okinawa and furnished photographic planes to get information necessary for future invasion plans.

During operations on 17 October, a fighter plane made a very hard landing and inadvertently fired its machine guns into the ship's island structure, killing two men and wounding 24, including her commanding officer, and causing considerable damage to radar.

After completing repairs at Ulithi, San Jacinto and the rest of her fast carrier force entered the South China Sea and launched massive air attacks on the airfields of Formosa and against shipping at Cam Ranh Bay, French Indochina, and at Hong Kong.

By refueling and replenishing at sea, Task Force 38 was able to continue its pressure on the enemy and strategic support for the American invasion of Luzon by strikes against the Ryukyu Islands.

Her mission of covering the Okinawa invasion entailed heavy air activity and kept the ship almost constantly at general quarters while supporting ground forces and repelling frequent attacks by suicide planes.

On 7 April, San Jacinto's's bombers torpedoed the Japanese destroyers Hamakaze and Asashimo, part of a naval suicide attack in which the super battleship Yamato was also sunk.

San Jacinto then returned to the dangerous job of defending against the suicide plane attacks, striking at the kamikaze airfields on Kyūshū, and providing close air support for ground forces fighting on Okinawa.