Pacific Theatre

As soon as she moored, Yosemite went to work. For the next six months, the ship's company made repairs on over 200 ships. She remained at Oahu until February 1945. On the 15th, she exited the harbor and set a course for Eniwetok Atoll in the Caroline Islands. She arrived there on the 22d but remained for only five days before moving farther westward to the forward base at Ulithi Atoll. She entered the Ulithi anchorage on 3 March, and her crew set again to work repairing the veteran ships of the war in the Pacific.

On 25 May, Yosemite departed Ulithi in a convoy bound for Leyte Gulf in the Philippines. She arrived in San Pedro Bay on the 28th and resumed her work supporting the Fleet in its march toward Japan. She remained at Leyte through the end of the war but, soon thereafter, got underway for Japan.

After hostilities

The destroyer tender arrived in Sasebo on 22 September and began tending ships assigned to the occupation forces in the Far East. That assignment lasted until March 1946. On the 15th, she stood out of Yokosuka on her way home. Yosemite transited the Panama Canal in mid-April and arrived in New York on the 22nd.

Cuban Missile Crisis

On 1 April 1962, Yosemite's role changed somewhat when the Atlantic Fleet cruisers and destroyers were brought together into a single type command. At that time, she became flagship for the new command, Cruiser-Destroyer Force, Atlantic Fleet. Late that fall, during the Cuban Missile Crisis and the American quarantine of the island, Yosemite departed Newport for a time and headed south via Norfolk to Kingston, Jamaica, where she tended the ships engaged in that operation. In December, she returned to Newport and resumed her normal schedule.

Over the next six years, the destroyer tender remained at Newport except for occasional overhauls and for short voyages to the West Indies early each year to tend Atlantic Fleet ships participating in the annual "Springboard" exercise.

Resumption of overseas deployments

In 1969, the complexion of her operations changed somewhat. In April, she resumed overseas deployments after a hiatus of 10 years. She departed Newport on 7 April and arrived in Naples, Italy on the 19th. During that tour of duty in the Mediterranean, she served as flagship for the Commander, Service Force, 6th Fleet. The repair ship USS Grand Canyon (AR-28) relieved her of tender duties on 14 August, the Service Force commander shifted his flag to the oiler USS Mississinewa (AO-144), and Yosemite sailed for the United States on the 15th.

USS Yosemite in 1988.

On the voyage home, she took on board a badly burned West German seaman from SS Sinclair Venezuela and transported him to the naval hospital at Newport. On 24 October, Yosemite's home port was changed from Newport, Rhode Island, to Naval Station Mayport, Florida; and the destroyer tender got underway for that city three days later. The ship arrived at Mayport on the 30th and began tending ships.

Yosemite was then based at Mayport, serving as flagship for various units of the Cruiser-Destroyer Force, Atlantic Fleet—notably Cruiser-Destroyer Flotilla 2 and Cruiser Destroyer Group 12. She made two additional deployments to the Mediterranean, one from July to December 1974 and the second from September 1977 to March 1978. She resumed tender duties at Mayport on 12 March 1978, continuing to engage in those duties through the 1980s. Her final deployment was to the Persian Gulf as part of the ongoing Operation Desert Storm campaign, departing Mayport in October, 1991, with stops in Bahrain and the U.A.E., returning in March, 1992. She was decommissioned in 1994.