USS Karnes, one of 117 Haskell-class attack transports, was built to a modified Victory ship design at Vancouver, Washington, and was commissioned in December 1944. After shakedown on the West Coast, she arrived at Pearl Harbor in February, then proceeded to Saipan and brought wounded Marines back to Pearl Harbor in March. Karnes arrived off Iwo Jima in early May with reinforcement troops and supplies from Pearl, and then carried over 800 survivors of ships damaged by kamikazes to Saipan and Pearl. In July she carried replacement troops and cargo to Manila and then returned to Pearl to prepare for the invasion of Japan.

After the Japanese surrender, Karnes transported occupation troops to Sasebo, Japan, in September and then carried out two voyages under Operation "Magic Carpet," returning veterans from the Pacific theater of war to San Francisco in November 1945 and January 1946. In March she arrived at Norfolk, where she was decommissioned and returned to the Maritime Commission in April, stricken from the Navy List in May, and placed in the Maritime Commission's reserve fleet. She was sold for scrapping in 1974.