To service the New Zealand Navy's cruisers, the Government hired a tanker of the Royal Fleet Auxiliary, in 1924.  This was necessary because at that time there were no oil fuel facilities in this country and few in the Pacific.  Nucula regularly refuelled the cruisers at the islands of the Pacific, as far afield as the Marquesas and Tahiti and on occasions in places such as Mexico.  The name of the ship is the Latin name for the scallop shell.