USS Tulsa (PG-22), nicknamed the Galloping Ghost of the South China Coast,[1] was an Asheville-class gunboat of the United States Navy that was in commission from 1923 to 1946.

The ship spent the next five years on station in Central American waters, "showing the flag" and calling at such places as Tuxpan and Vera Cruz, Mexico; Guantanamo Bay, Cuba; and at ports in Puerto Rico and the Canal Zone.

When not engaged in these duties, the patrol gunboat conducted routine training exercises in waters near the Panama Canal Zone and visited ports in Honduras.

On 10 December 1941, two days after the outbreak of war in the Philippines, a heavy Japanese air attack devastated Cavite, the base of the Asiatic Fleet, near Manila.

After a brief stay at that port, she called at Makassar before receiving orders to proceed to Surabaya, Java, in the Netherlands East Indies, where she spent Christmas.

Then, steaming independently, she cruised to Tjilatjap, on the south coast of Java, where her landing force began to receive training in jungle warfare.

The plan to use Tulsa's bluejackets as infantry in a last-ditch defense of Java never progressed beyond the initial training stage, and her erstwhile ground troops returned to the ship as she was being outfitted to become a convoy escort vessel.

Equipped with a home-made depth charge rack constructed by the ship's crew, Tulsa now boasted an antisubmarine capacity and began escorting merchantmen along the south coast of Java to Tjilatjap, the only port on the island still out of reach of Japanese bombers.

While engaged on convoy duty in late February, Tulsa received orders to proceed to a point 300 mi (260 nmi; 480 km) to the south of Java.

While the other three ships steamed resolutely onward, Asheville soon developed engine difficulties and fell behind, only to be trapped and sunk by superior Japanese surface forces.

In the short, sharp action which followed, Tulsa put up a spirited defense with her 3-inch and 20 mm guns antiaircraft battery, driving off the attackers with no damage to herself, while dodging 12 bombs.

Under the control of Commander, Escorts and Mine-craft Squadrons, 7th Fleet, she served in the Finschafen-Buna area and participated in the Hollandia strike on 26 April and the Wakde landing on 17 May.

As the U.S. Navy swept northward towards the Japanese home islands, and fierce fighting ensued on Okinawa and Iwo Jima, Tacloban performed the necessary tasks of convoy escort and local patrol vessel at fleet anchorages.

Aged and worn, Tacloban was decommissioned on 6 March; struck from the Navy list on 17 April; and turned over to the War Shipping Administration, Maritime Commission on 12 October for disposal.