The ship was laid down under a Maritime Commission contract (MC hull 1489) as Chattanooga on 21 April 1943, at Sturgeon Bay, Wisconsin, by the Leathem D. Smith Shipbuilding Company.

Following shakedown in the Caribbean and a brief visit to Charleston, South Carolina, Uniontown joined Task Force 61 at Hampton Roads, Virginia, on 27 December 1944 for duty as a convoy escort.

While en route to Algeria, Uniontown received word that German forces had surrendered at Rheims on 7 May, ending the long European war.

Arriving at Oran on the 13th, Uniontown soon got underway for the United States and reached Philadelphia, on 8 June for conversion to a weather ship.

After being turned over to the State Department Liquidation Commission, she was then sold to the Argentine government in July 1947, in whose service she was renamed ARA Sarandi (P-33).