Category Archives: littoral

Blockade Prizes and Bounty Money, 1898

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Spanish-American War, 1898. The prize crew going to take possession of the Spanish Colon after she was run aground after the Battle of Santiago, Cuba, July 1898. From Journal of Naval Cadet C.R. Miller, USN. 1898. Description: NH 2201

As the war in the Hormuz and the resulting blockade stretch into their 10th and fifth weeks respectively, and following up to yesterday’s Warship Wednesday on the blockade-enforcing lighthouse tender Mangrove, here is a closer look at the prizes from the Spanish-American War.

The first Spanish ships, the steamers Buena Ventura and Pedro, were captured on 22 April 1898 by the battleship USS New York and her accompanying escorts, with the gunboat Nashville claiming the prior.

The USS Nashville (Gunboat No. 7) fired the first shots of the war across the bow of the Spanish steamer Buena Ventura, outbound with a cargo of Mississippi pine lumber from Pascagoula to Rotterdam, to bring her to a stop on 22 April 1898, nine miles from Sand Key Light.

The capture took place just before the formal declaration of war, while the U.S. was establishing a blockade of Cuba, and the seizure was later upheld by the Supreme Court, 175 U.S. 384 (1899). Her cargo was released, as it was headed to the Netherlands, while Buena Ventura was sold at auction for $12,200, with a portion of that divided by the crew of Nashville and her squadron.

On the 23rd, the schooners Matilda and Condita were impounded. The 24th brought the steamer Miguel Jover and the schooners Sofia and Catalina.

This snowballed to 18 ships by the end of April, another 14 collected in May, just four in June, 19 in July, and one in August, with a total of at least 56 large commercial vessels impounded and sent to the court for adjudication.

All but four impounded vessels were “condemned with cargo” by the courts and sold, with 10 owners pushing the outcome to the Supreme Court.

The outliers that escaped sale included the British steamer Restormel Barry, which was released after her cargo was impounded. The British sloop Pilgrim was ordered released with cargo intact, as was the Mexican steamer Tabasqueno. The Spanish tug Humberto Rodriguez, seized off Nuevitas just two weeks before the end of the war by the auxiliary cruiser USS Badger, was ordered released by a New York Court as the tug carried red cross markings.

Some $701,034.36 was realized after auctions, deposited into the U.S. Treasury– with portions of said prizes paid to the crews of the vessels that captured them, an American tradition going back to 1798 and carried over from the British.

From the government records:

The above doesn’t include small coastwise vessels, of which an untold armada was collected, and were sold locally without being towed back to the U.S.

A prime example given is the auxiliary cruiser USS Dixie, which alone captured 89 lighters and sailing vessels at Ponce, considered a “good haul.”

Carrying 10 6-inch guns, the auxiliary cruiser USS Dixie, under CDR Charles H. Davis, had a very good war in 1898, entered the harbor at Ponce, Puerto Rico, on July 27, forcing the town to surrender and securing a landing place for the U.S. Army forces, claiming 89 of 91 small vessels in the harbor for her trouble. Post-war, she became the Navy’s first destroyer tender, AD-1, and continued to serve until 1922.

It should also be noted that this is above and beyond claims for Bounty filed by U.S. warships for destroyed and/or captured Spanish naval vessels, with the monies distributed to the crews, with squadron commanders included at a larger share.

For reference, Dewey was awarded $28,070 in bounty and prize money for the Battle of Manila Bay (his “cut” of $244,400) while Sampson pocketed a more paltry $8,335 (out of $166,700) for the destruction of the Spanish squadron off Santiago. Keep in mind that the base rate for rear admirals of the era was $4,675 per annum.

All awards of prize money and bounty money to U.S. Navy personnel were abolished by Congress via the Act of March 3, 1899 (30 Stat. 1121), with later much-hyped instances, such as the capture of the German cargo ship Odenwald in 1941 by the USS Omaha and Somers, being paid under salvage rights granted under maritime law, not as “head” money.

Warship Wednesday 13 May 2026: Unexpected Blockade Enforcer

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Here at LSOZI, we take a break every Wednesday to explore the old steam/diesel navies from 1833 to 1954, profiling a different ship each week. These ships have a life, a tale all their own, which sometimes takes them to the strangest places.- Christopher Eger 

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Warship Wednesday 13 May 2026: Unexpected Blockade Enforcer

Photo from the collection of Rosalie and Bascom Grooms, Sr., courtesy of Florida Keys Public Libraries

Above, we see the U.S. Lighthouse Service Tender Mangrove around 1897, when she entered service.

Though not built with military service in mind, Mangrove would serve in three wars under Navy orders, including one where she fired the last shot and captured one of the largest enemy prizes.

Background on the Lighthouse Service’s steel tenders

The foundations of the Lighthouse Service, also known as the U.S. Light-House Board, were advanced by a Congress whose Senate was headed by John Adams and approved by President Washington on 7 August 1789.

While not a military branch, Navy officers often filled many roles in the organization, and its men and tenders clocked in for the greater good during times of war. For instance, during the War of 1812, the keeper of the lighthouse at Havre de Grace, Maryland, is reported to have defended that town from an attack by the enemy.

The USLHT Van Santvoort was transferred to the Union Navy in 1861 and served as the gunboat USS Coeur de Lion during the Civil War, while USLHT Shubrick— which carried several small guns in order to protect light keepers and citizens from Indian attacks on the Oregon coast– transferred to the Revenue Cutter Service. Famously, the service’s head in 1860 was one CDR Raphael Semmes, USN, soon to be captain of the CSS Alabama, while at least five USLHTs were seized in Southern states, with most pressed into service with the CSN.

At the end of FY1893, the USLHS had 1,312 lighthouses and beacon lights, 419 day beacons, 1,751 post lights, 4,315 assorted buoys in position, 39 lightships, and 32 tenders to service them, including two sail and 30 steam, the latter often with auxiliary sail rigs. Staffed by 1,139 lightkeepers, 1,503 laborers, and 821 “other employees, including crews of lightships and tenders,” the service was spread thin across 16 coastal districts as well as several large inland river systems. All this was paid for by an outlay of $2,558,500, with the largest expense ($670,000) being that of lightkeeper salaries. Vessel and crew expenses for tenders came in at a paltry $250,000, or about one tenth of the overall budget.

The 1893 period saw the USLHS add two new large steel-hulled sea-going steam tenders, the 800-ton/164-foot Maple, built for $93,888 in New Jersey for use with the 5th LH District out of Baltimore, and the $92,125 Ohio-built Columbine (643-tons/155-foot oal), for the 13th LH District in Oregon. Columbine’s twin sister Lilac had been delivered the year prior.

US. Lighthouse Tender Columbine, steaming, at 15 knots, Columbia River, May 10, 1894. She later served in the Navy twice during wartime, was in commission for over 32 years, and steamed a total of 400,920 miles. Courtesy of Rear Admiral A. Farenholt, (MC), USN. NH 55298

Lighthouse Board plan for Lilac and Columbine

Other modern tenders delivered in the years prior included the Madrono (1885) and the Armeria (1890), both of similar 164-foot designs.

Tender Madrono, 164-foot USLHS tender commissioned 1885

Complete with compound steam engines, Scotch-type boilers, twin propellers, and a deck that featured a wooden derrick with a steam-powered winch, these were a new breed of general-purpose vessels and had a general layout that the service would stick with for the next forty years. They proved capable of supplying fuel, mail, and materials to remote lighthouses; transporting work crews and equipment up and down the coastline, towing lightships, and setting even the heaviest of buoys. Further, they typically proved to be excellent sea boats while still being able to operate in shallows as low as nine feet.

This sets the stage for our subject.

Meet Mangrove

A steam tender of the new sea-going type was approved in FY1896 to service the 7th Lighthouse District (from Miami to Mobile Bay) and the 8th (Mobile Bay to the Rio Grande). The contract was awarded to Crescent Shipyard, Elizabethport, New Jersey, and construction began. The final $37,500 of the tender’s $74,997.63 cost was appropriated on 4 June 1897 by the sundry civil appropriation act.

She was to be 164 feet overall with a 30-foot beam and draw just over eight feet under her hull with a standard 821-ton displacement. Rated for 10 knots, she had two Page Burton watertube coal-fired boilers and two compound inverted reciprocating steam engines driving two four-bladed props.

Among her outfit was a hydraulic hoisting winch, a new piece of equipment for the service, and a naphtha “alchol-vapor” powered launch acquired from the Valor Engine Company for $1,371.90.

The new tender, the first to be named Mangrove in the LHS standard “tree” naming convention, was launched on 26 June 1897, sponsored by Miss Mabel Snow, wife of CDR (later RADM) Albert Sidney Snow, USN. A veteran of the Civil War and 1871 Korean expedition, Snow, at the time, was holding the post of Inspector for the 3rd Lighthouse District.

A near sister, the 164-foot USLHT Mayflower, was completed at Bath Iron Works at the same time.

Mangrove was commissioned on 1 December 1897 and assigned to Key West. Arriving aboard Mangrove was a new skipper, Captain Phillip Louis Cosgrove, Sr., a Key West fixture who had been with the USLHS since 1873 and was pretty salty at age 64, having previously commanded the tenders Arbutus and Laurel for many years.

Leaving Tompkinsville, New York, on 27 December 1897, Mangrove arrived at her new home in Key West on 8 January and soon got to work establishing new buoys in the Dry Tortugas. In the first quarter of 1898, she steamed 2,634 nm on USLHS missions, burning some 404 tons of coal in the process. In that time, her crew cleaned and painted 115 buoys, changed 83, and worked three days at the district’s light house depot.

On the evening of 15 February 1898, the battleship USS Maine sank while at anchor in Havana following a terrific explosion, and Mangrove, just heading into her fifth week on station at Key West, was the closest and most prepared American vessel to the stricken warship.

Mangrove, with Captain Clendenin, Assistant Surgeon, U.S. Army, and his hospital steward aboard, left for Havana from Key West immediately at 0300 on 16 February under the orders of CDR  James M. Forsyth, commander at the naval station there, followed by the 160-foot gunboat USS Fern (which, ironically, was a former USLHST).

Arriving on scene the next morning, Mangrove loaded the Maine’s 60 wounded survivors for return to the United States. A second sortie from Key West to Havana and back soon after would carry salvaged guns and evacuated U.S. civilians from Cuba.

USS Maine, sunk in Havana Harbor, Feb. 15, 1898

Refugees from Havana brought by Mangrove to Fort Taylor in Key West, along with the original graves of the lost Maine crew

A court of inquiry was held in Mangrove’s salon to try to ascertain the cause of the destruction of the Maine. With much of the inquiry held in Havana over the first two weeks of March, Mangrove’s searchlights were in continuous use each night, assisting divers and other activities as the Navy officers made their home on the humble tender.

USS Maine Court of Inquiry, 1898. Members of the Navy Court of Inquiry examining Ensign Wilfrid V. Powelson, on board the U.S. Light House Tender Mangrove, in Havana Harbor, Cuba, circa March 1898. Those seated around the table include (from left to right): Captain French E. Chadwick, Captain William T. Sampson, Lieutenant Commander William P. Potter, Ensign W.V. Powelson, and Lieutenant Commander Adolph Marix. “The Court made a most patient, thorough, and searching investigation into all matters pertaining to the destruction of the Maine, examining the wreck in detail, above and below the water line, with the assistance of expert Naval Constructors and divers, and examining all witnesses whose testimony promised to throw light, in the faintest degree, on the subject.” NH 46764

After meeting on Mangrove for 18 days of hearings, the Court shifted to the more regal and accommodating battleship USS Iowa, newly arrived at Key West from Hampton Roads, from whose deck it released its report on 21 March, stating they felt Maine had been destroyed by a submarine mine of unknown origin.

On 10 April, Mangrove was transferred to the Navy Department and retained her name but became USS rather than USLHST. Mangrove received a new, more warlike skipper, LCDR William Henry Everett (USNA 1867), borrowed from the old gunboat USS Michigan, along with a quick coat of grey paint, two 6-pounder guns, and a 1-pounder. Everett also had a young ensign assigned to him, one John H. Dayton, and an even younger midshipman– one of 123 such cadets pulled from class and rushed from Annapolis to help flesh out the ranks for the war. Ole Phil Cosgrove remained on board as first mate and sailed to war as such.

Additionally, Mangrove was fitted with cable repair and grappling tackle with the idea that she would be useful in cutting the telegraph lines around Cuba and Puerto Rico. Meanwhile, her 30-man crew would get on-the-job training as instant bluejackets, sans crackerjacks.

War (her first)

On 21 April 1898, two months after the sinking of the battleship Maine in Havana and 11 days after Mangrove transferred to the Navy, the United States declared war on Spain.

The blockade began in earnest on the morning of 23 April, with Mangrove reporting to Capt. Henry Clay Taylor of the battleship USS Indiana, which also had the armed tug USS Algonquin in retainer.

After helping to cut the submarine cable out of Havana on the evening of 25 April, Taylor ordered Mangrove North to Key West on a mail run, then sped Indiana south toward RADM Sampson’s flagship, USS New York. At around 5:25 p.m., Mangrove spotted a large ship approaching Havana. It turned out to be the Trasatlántica company liner, SS Panama (2,080 GRT), en route from New York to Havana, Progresso, and Vera Cruz, carrying 29 mostly Spanish passengers, mail, and general cargo.

Caught on the high seas, Panama was prepared for service as an auxiliary cruiser should war come, carrying a pair of 18-pounders (Hontroia 90mm guns, with 30 shells for each) as well as a Maxim gun on the bridge, two signal guns, 20 Remington rolling block rifles, and 10 Mauser bolt action rifles, all with ammunition, as well as a companion supply of bayonets and swords. Further, Panama was capable of 12 knots while Mangrove was closer to 8.5 at her overloaded condition, meaning even if she didn’t want to fight, the Spaniard could have simply outrun the armed tender.

After firing three shots across the bow, Mangrove was able to get the Panama to heave to for boarding at a range of 4,800 yards, with the intrepid Ensign Dayton rowed across for the task as the sole member of a VBSS team.

Everett had put in a requisition for a crate of rifles, along with a box of revolvers, with proper belts, cartridges, bayonets, etc., and it had been duly approved and forwarded, but the arms never made it to Mangrove. In the morning, she encountered Panama, the only weapons to be found among the crew included one revolver– the private property of the cadet midshipman– and the dress swords of the three officers. In fact, the crew who manned the cutter to put the boarding officer on the Panama (the Ensign Dayton) rowed over in their civilian dungarees as no Navy uniforms had arrived either.

Nonetheless, Mr. Dayton came aboard to the shrieks of female passengers, went to the bridge, advised the Spanish captain his elegant vessel was a prize, war having been declared between the United States and Spain, and he acquiesced.

Simple as that.

The NYT on the capture:

As Mangrove couldn’t spare the manpower, Indiana, which had closed on the scene, supplied 15 Marines and an Annapolis Cadet (Walter Maxwell Falconer, one of 13 Mids on the battleship) as prize crew while the tender escorted Panama to Key West.

Panama was later sold at public auction by the U.S. Marshal in New York on 20 June, with the U.S. Government being the high bidder at $41,000 (vessel only, her cargo garnered another $14,523.12). This was one of the highest prices realized from among the more than 50 captured Spanish vessels sold during the war, eclipsed only by the fine steamers Rita, which was bought by the Army for $120,000, the Guido, which went for $130,000, and the Pedro, which was sold to the U.S. Navy for $200,000. The Army went on to use her as a livestock transport.

After bringing Panama as a trophy to Key West, Mangrove returned to Cuban waters, serving as a dispatch vessel for Admiral Sampson and in general blockade duties.

Mangrove seen with torpedo boat USS Ericson 2024.01.0014

Mangrove helped seize the small Spanish schooner Oriente on 2 May, along with the tug USS Tecumseh and gunboat Vicksburg.

On 7 June, LCDR Everett was dispatched to the Asiatic Squadron to join Dewey’s staff and replaced on Mangrove by another Navy regular, LCDR Daniel Delehanty Vincent Stuart (USNA 1869). The tender-turned-gunboat also landed her loaned cadet midshipman (presumably with his celebrated pistol!), in exchange for Ensign Charles A. Brand (USNA 1890), who had been sent down from detached service on the survey schooner USC&GSS Endeavor.

On July 22, Mangrove captured her third prize, the Spanish sloop Anguedita, singlehandedly, and duly convoyed said vessel to Key West.

Ordered in early August to support the Cuban expedition aboard the schooners Dellie and Ellen F. Adams at Cayo Francés in Buena Vista Bay on the north-central coast of Cuba, Mangrove stood picket near Caibarien to spoil any attacks on the beachhead by a collection of Spanish gunboats known to be sheltering there. Chief of these was Hernand Cortés, commanded by LCDR (teniente de navío de 1.ª clase) Angel Izquierdo Pozo, and three small launches, Cauto, Viliente, and Intrepida, the latter armed with 1 pounders. The Spanish mosquito boat flotilla had previously sortied out and engaged U.S. blockaders twice before, on May 10th and 18th.

A fine Clydebank-built Pizarro-class gunboat (canonero), Hernan Cortes was a brand-new 300-tonner equipped with 57mm Nordenfelts and designed to intercept filibuster expeditions. Capable of 13 knots, the stiletto-hulled 155-foot patrol boat had a 50-man crew. All the above should have more than made her a match for a gently armed buoy tender.

Should have.

Spanish gunboat (canonero) Hernan Cortes, probably photographed early in 1896 while undergoing trials at the Builder’s Yard, Clydebank, Scotland. Note the two single Nordenfelt 75mm guns mounted fore and aft. These were replaced before 1898 by two smaller 57mm guns and two 7mm Maxim guns. NH 88600

On the morning of 14 August, some 3 miles east of Caibarien at approximately 10:55 a.m., Mangrove’s crew spotted a large Spanish gunboat and opened fire with her port-side 6-pounder gun, slowly gaining range. Cortes retaliated, and for the next 90 minutes, a long-range artillery duel continued, with Cortes largely stationary and the three smaller Spanish launches, armed with short-range 1-pounders, also returned fire as Mangrove alternated passing gun runs on her port and starboard sides.

Breaking contact around 12:30, the small Spanish launch Cauto soon approached with a white flag aloft and advised the garrison had just been informed by wire that the hostilities between Spain and America had ceased the day prior, leaving Mangrove with the distinction of firing the last war shots of the conflict. In all, the tender fired 103 rounds from her 6-pounders and three from her 1-pounder. According to most reports, at least four of the larger shells found themselves in the engine room of the Cortes, explaining the vessel’s stationary position for most of the engagement.

According to a dispatch published in the Army & Navy Journal, Mangrove bombarded the town as well, letting loose some 87 shots at the fort and village.

With that, Mangrove’s war service ended.

Similarly, the lighthouse tenders Armeria, Maple, and Mayflower were also taken into Naval service for the duration of the conflict, though none saw the combat and success that Mangrove did.

The closest was Mayflower, which, as USS Suwanee, was given a much bigger battery than Mangrove and provided gunfire support for Marines engaged in consolidating the American position at Guantanamo Bay in June 1898 and again for the Army troops advancing on Aguadores in July.

USLHT Mayflower in 1898 at Norfolk Navy Yard, complete with service insignia on her bow. Note she has twin 6-pounders fore and aft, as well as two 3″/50s.

The United States Navy auxiliary cruiser USS Suwanee (ex-United States Lighthouse Service lighthouse tender USLHT Mayflower) (center) underway off Siboney, Cuba. The troop transports USS St. Louis is at left, and the patrol yacht USS Vixen is at right. NH 85649

The most enduring change that came to the USLHS during the War of ’98  was the temporary militarization of 78 lighthouses for use as coast watching stations. This saw 92 miles of land telegraph and telephone lines laid, along with 43 miles of submarine cables, to establish round-the-clock contact with these often-remote locations. Further, each keeper was provided with a set of first-class binoculars, signal flags, and code books.

Mangrove was cited by the Navy Department for “Conspicuous Service” during the war, while her crew was authorized the Naval Campaign West Indies (Sampson) Medal in 1901 with “Mangrove” ribbon clasp.

They ultimately split the prize money for Panama in 1903 after lengthy legal efforts to successfully exclude the much larger crew of the battleship Indiana, with the Supreme Court noting, “The adventure of the Mangrove may not have been a brilliant event that will live in story, but it was sufficient to give its officers and crew the profit of the law.”

She was returned to the Lighthouse Service on 18 August 1898 and remained moored at Key West’s Man-of-War Harbor until 19 October 1898 to land her guns and military equipment. She was then sent to Mobile for drydocking and repairs– including replacing the port propeller plate whose edge had been shot off by one of Cortes’s guns at Caibarien, her only wartime damage.

Leaving Mobile on 15 December 1898 with a refreshed USLHS livery, she resumed her post serving in the 7th LH District.

Back to the Lighthouse Trade

One of Mangrove’s first post-war assignments was, somewhat appropriately, heading to Havana in March 1899 to relieve and reset all channel and harbor boys. She also planted buoys to mark the wreck of USS Maine.

She remained a busy beaver. For instance, the Annual Report of the Light-House Board of the United States to the Secretary of the Commerce Department details that, for FY1901, Mangrove cleaned and painted 79 buoys, worked 25 days at the depot, and steamed 8,722 nm, burning 1,038 tons of bituminous coal in the process.

She was also an angel on the sea and a savior to those in peril upon it, repeatedly.

In September 1900, Mangrove was ordered from Key West along with the Revenue Cutters Algonquin, Onondaga, and Winona to bring 25 tons of provisions and medical supplies across the Gulf to Galveston, which had been hit by the worst hurricane to ever make landfall in the U.S., claiming the lives of more than 10,000. The crews of the relief vessels pitched in where they could in the massive cleanup effort.

From 14 July 1906 to 25 April 1907, Mangrove was under overhaul and repair at the League Island Navy Yard.

In October 1909, Mangrove rendered assistance for several days to the U. S. Revenue Cutter Forward, stranded by a hurricane at Key West. She also rendered assistance the following June, to the steamer Lassell, of New York, aground on Carysfort Reef.

In January-February 1911, Mangrove was part of the joint naval task force, including the USRC Forward, the tug USS Massasoit (YT-15), and four destroyers, lining the 90 miles from Key West to Havana for the attempt by Canadian aviation pioneer John Alexander Douglas McCurdy to make the trip in his Curtiss flying machine. Keep in mind, this was only a bit over seven years after the Wright Brothers’ first flight.

J.A. McCurdy before his flight on February 7, 1911. Monroe County Library Collection.

The flight was unsuccessful, and the aviator had to be rescued from the Florida Straits by the nearest support ship, USS Terry (DD-25), just within sight of the Cuban coast.

The Navy crews from USS Terry recovered McCurdy’s plane after his failed attempt to fly from Key West to Havana on January 30, 1911. Gift of Senator Warren Henderson.

On 12 February 1912, our tender picked up the dismasted American schooner Otis about 2.5 miles from Rebecca Shoal light station, Florida, and towed the vessel to Key West. The same year saw Mangrove commended for hauling the British steamer Antaeus off French Reef, and assisting the stranded schooner Igo.

Mangrove spent much of 1913 in overhaul, with most of her officers and crew cross-decked to man the near-sister Lilac, which had just emerged from overhaul sans crew.

The same year, she picked up her sixth skipper, Capt. Ernest O. Tull. Tull entered the Lighthouse Service in 1889 in the Fifth district and served during the SpanAm War on Mayflower/Suwanee. In 1912, while first officer on the tender Orchid, Tull jumped into the water and rescued an unconscious member of the crew of that vessel, who was knocked overboard as the result of an accident to the derrick. He would become a staple of Mangrove’s history for the next 13 years.

On 7 February 1915, Mangrove would rescue the crew of the wrecked schooner William H. Yerkes, which was lost on the Frying Pan Shoals with a cargo of phosphate rock bound for Baltimore. The trusty tender brought the waterlogged crew to Wilmington the next day.

In January 1916, the tender came to the assistance of the submarine USS K-5 (SS-36), which had been out of communication with command. For this, the USLHS and Commerce Department received an official note of thanks from the Navy Department.

Showing how versatile her type was, Mangrove that year also helped move the 51×56 foot keeper’s dwelling of the Georgetown Light Station some 1.25 miles across Winyah Bay– while the keeper’s family remained inside.

War (again)

The Naval Appropriations Act of 29 August 1916 (39 Stat. L., 556, 602) authorized the USLHS to transfer to the Navy and/or War Department in time of emergency as directed by the President. The plan was for the War Department to take some tenders to supplement Army Coast Artillery Corps mine planters for the establishment of minefields outside U.S. ports, while the Navy would absorb others– as well as coastal stations, depots, and lighthouses– for use in patrol work.

Though a civilian agency of a neutral country, the USLHS had already tasted war from the Germans, courtesy of U-53 in October 1916, when the submarine torpedoed three vessels off Nantucket Island, and the Nantucket Shoals Light Vessel sheltered 115 shipwrecked men and 19 lifeboats for several days.

The United States declared war on the Kaiser on 6 April 1917 and just five days later, President Wilson signed Executive Order #2588 activating the provisions of the August 1916 Navy Act, including the transfer of USLHS installations, ships, and personnel to the Navy although the CNO soon made it clear that when it came to actual lighthouses, “that it would be preferable to take over as few as possible.”

Speaking of “as few as possible,” in the end, the War Department felt it didn’t need any lighthouse tenders and allowed the Navy to take over all 50 of the service’s vessels for better or worse.

As detailed by Theodore J. Panayotoff in the November 2011 Lighthouse Digest:

Upon transfer, all officers and crewmembers were inducted into the US Naval Reserve Force (USNRF) with the officers receiving commissions with the rank of LTJG or ENS. Counting the tenders, light stations, and lightships, there were 1,284 Lighthouse Service personnel transferred to the Navy Department, or about ¼ of the Lighthouse Service at the time.

The word went out via Western Union telegram in most cases during the week of 18 April.

This figure later grew to 1,132 LHS personnel, while 152 employees of the service that had not been transferred in turn resigned and joined the Army or Navy directly as volunteers.

On 19 April 1917, Mangrove, Ernest O. Tull commanding, assisted in floating the ship Nevisian.

Again, we fall back to Panayotoff on the role the tenders played in 1917-19 Navy operations:

The tender deck log holdings of the National Archives were reviewed to shed light on what these “military” duties may have been. An interesting discovery was that, based on the few cases where deck log holdings are listed for both the Naval vessel and the Lighthouse Service tender, dual logs were kept on board the vessels. Entries in the Department of Commerce Form 304, the Lighthouse Service deck logbook, were handwritten, and the Navy Department Bureau of Navigation logbook sheets were typewritten. The log entries were word-for-word identical. It is possible that the Lighthouse Service log served as a rough log, and the Navy Department log was the smooth log. The respective organizations retained their logs, signed by the Commanding Officer, USNRF, and Master, USLHS, respectively. Although not every entry of the available logs was read, it appears that the tender activities were all lighthouse-related.

As further explained by the USLHS Annual Report in 1923, looking back on the Great War:

“The naval representatives on an interdepartmental board stated: “The service being performed by these tenders in the various naval districts is extremely valuable. In some cases, they are the main reliance of the district commandants for seagoing vessels; in some instances, the work being performed by these tenders is of a nature for which the Navy has no suitable vessels, for example, the laying of the defensive submarine nets.”

While Mangrove survived her second war without a scratch, not all were so lucky. The Diamond Shoal Light Vessel (LV-71), off Cape Hatteras, was sunk on 6 August 1918 by U-140 after the submarine discovered the light ship was broadcasting warnings of her presence. All 12 of her crew, however, managed to escape by launch as the sub’s deck guns were smashing about their light ship.

All USLHS men who served with the fleet were awarded Victory medals by the Navy Department. In July 1919, all vessels and personnel were retroceded to the Department of Commerce.

Mangrove in the last days of the USLHS

Mangrove, with Tull still commanding, on 20 October 1920, rendered assistance in extinguishing a fire on the gasoline launch of the USS Dixie while in Charleston Harbor.

Our tender affected her biggest rescue in the case of the Clyde Line steamship SS Lenape in October, when the 7,000-ton liner went aground on the Nassau Bar, transferring 247 passengers to another one of the Line’s vessels.

As detailed in the 1922 Lighthouse Service Bulletin:

In 1922, Mangrove was shifted up the Eastern Seaboard and assigned to the 6th Lighthouse District, based out of Charleston, South Carolina, where she operated for the rest of her government career.

On 6 February 1923, Mangrove went to assist the crew of a stranded oyster barge and towed them to a safe anchorage in the Ashepoo River.

While in the thick winter fog along the Savannah River on 3 January 1924, Mangrove came to the assistance of the steamship City of Savannah, which was unable to turn around in the narrow channel.

Capt. Tull medically retired from the USLHS in early 1926, leaving Mangrove after 13 years as Master. A veteran of both the SpanAm War and the Great War, he passed on 29 July 1926 in Charleston, having completed 37 years of service.

(Yet another) War

By the time Mangrove’s third war came around, the 150-year-old USLHS no longer existed, its assets and 5,800 employees having been absorbed by the USCG in July 1939, including all 64 of its assorted tenders. The service’s 1,195 regular tender and lightship crewmen and officers were given a three-option choice: accepting a rank/rate in the uniformed service, retiring if they had enough time in the pension system, or moving on to other endeavors.

In turn, Executive Order 8929 of 1 November 1941 transferred the entire Coast Guard to the Navy for the coming “Big Show” against the Axis. By this time, the 44-year-old Mangrove had picked up a pennant number  (WAGL-232), gray paint, and guns. By the end of the war, she carried not only a pair of 20mm Oerlikons and depth charges but also a SO-1 type surface search radar set.

Her fellow SpanAm and Great War veteran near-sister, Mayflower, likewise, served as USCGC Hydrangea (WAGL-236) during WWII to avoid being confused with the Navy’s USS Mayflower.

Mangrove continued naval service as a buoy tender until 1 January 1946, when she was returned to the Treasury Department. Her service during WWII was uneventful, and she decommissioned on 22 August 1946.

Unneeded in a Coast Guard that had 39 brand-new 180-foot Balsam-class seagoing buoy tenders on hand, ex-Mangrove was sold for scrap in March 1947.

Epilogue

A few relics of our subject endure.

The Key West Lighthouse & Keeper’s Quarters Collection holds both Mangrove’s SpanAm War streamer pennant and a Quarantine Flag flown from the tender.

Her 1897-marked bell has also been spotted in circulation.

Of Mangrove’s Caibarien nemesis, Hernan Cortés survived the war and was repaired enough to return home to Spain in the Spring of 1899 in a sad convoy of survivors of the conflict, including her sister, Vasco Nunez de Balboa, the cruiser Magallanes y Marqués de la Ensenada, the auxiliary cruisers Patriota and Rapido, torpedo boats (cañoneros-torpederos) Nueva España, Martín Alonso Pinzón, Marqués de la Ensenada, and Vicente Yáñez Pinzón. The convoy assembled at Fort de France (Martinique) and sailed on 7 March, arriving at Cadiz on 1 April via El Hierro, a slow running 3,900 miles, with several ships being towed. Shifted to Morocco, Cortes proved especially handy in capturing smugglers and fighting the Rif, remaining in further Spanish service until 1924.

Mangrove’s first skipper, the venerable Capt. Cosgrove, in charge of the lightning response to the stricken Maine and served as Mate during the ’98 War, resigned from the USLHS in 1906, capping a 33-year career. He passed in Key West just six years later, aged 78. Buried on the Key, his home remains and is a noted historic building.

Of Mangrove’s two Navy skippers in the SpanAm War, LCDR Everett, who commanded her during the capture of the steamer Panama, retired from the service as a rear admiral in 1906, completing 43 years in uniform, including his time as a midshipman. He passed away in 1912, aged 65. LCDR Daniel Stuart, who inadvertently ordered the last shots of the war, also retired as a light admiral. Stuart’s decorations, including an exceedingly rare “Mangrove” marked Sampson medal, recently sold at auction for $8,000.

What of the young ensign who confidently took command of Panama in 1898, armed only with a borrowed personal revolver and a dress sword? VADM John Havens Dayton (USNA 1890) retired from the Navy after being an early skipper of the dreadnought USS Arizona, earning a Navy Cross as captain of the battleship USS Michigan in the Great War, and commanding the European Squadron in the 1920s. He passed in 1953, aged 84, and is buried in the cemetery at Annapolis– as you would expect.

Thanks for reading!

Meminisse est ad Vivificandum – To Remember is to Keep Alive

***

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ROK OPV for PI, Now with OTO, Ok? OK!

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The Philippine Navy holds an arrival ceremony on May 8, 2026, for Offshore Patrol Vessel 2, the future BRP Rajah Lakandula, at Naval Operating Base-Subic. The event is led by PN Flag Officer in Command Vice Admiral Jose Ma Ambrosio Ezpeleta with Philippine Military Academy Superintendent Vice Admiral Caesar Bernard Valencia. Photo courtesy: Philippine Navy

The Philippine Navy’s newest offshore patrol vessel, the future BRP Rajah Lakandula (PS-21), has arrived in the country from Hyundai in Korea for a pending commissioning, just 14 weeks after her sister.

The 2,400-ton/310-foot Rajah Sulayman-class OPV is a heavy hitter for her size, carrying a 76mm/62 cal OTO Super Rapid forward, two 30mm RWS mounts, and two stabilized .50 cals backed up by a Leonardo 2D air/surface surveillance radar, an EW suite including IR and RF decoys, a heli/UAV-deck and hangar, and a mission bay that supports a towed array sonar.

Philippine Navy’s BRP Rajah Sulayman (PS20), with the BRP Jose Rizal (FF150), during a pass ex evolution on January 17, 2026.

BRP Rajah Sulayman OPV (PS-20)

It would be nice to see the U.S. Navy and USCG move back to a 76mm (if not 5-inch) gun from the current 57mm Mk 3/Mk 110 Bofors mount.

And maybe some ASW stuff.

Just saying.

We used to be a proper country.

Future Fast Frigate…Follies?

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Whelp, looks like the FFX has been funded, to a degree. You know, the (almost) missile-less gray hull 418-foot National Security Cutter.

Sure, it is not perfect, but it is a better plan than not having a frigate at all, which is what we are doing now. Just wish they at least had 16 VLS cells and some torpedo tubes along with the sensors to use them, that’s all I’m saying…

Via DoW:

Huntington Ingalls Industries, Ingalls Shipbuilding, Pascagoula, Mississippi, is being awarded a $282,885,933 cost-plus-award-fee contract for FF(X) class frigate lead yard support. Work will be performed in Pascagoula, Mississippi, and is expected to be completed by April 2028. Fiscal 2026 shipbuilding and conversion (Navy) funds in the amount of $59,092,397 (73%); and fiscal 2026 research, development, test and evaluation (Navy) funds in the amount of $21,500,339 (27%), will be obligated at time of award and will not expire at the end of the current fiscal year. This contract was not competitively procured in accordance with 10 U.S. Code 3204(a)(2) (unusual and compelling urgency). Naval Sea Systems Command, Washington, D.C., is the contracting activity (N00024-26-C-2306).

Of course, there is also a push to perhaps buy COTS surface escorts from Japan and/or South Korea, which brings us to the launch this week of the ROK Navy’s fourth FFX Batch-III Frigate, ROKS Jeju (FFG-832).

Jeju is a 3,600-ton-class next-generation frigate, with a full-load displacement of approximately 4,300 tons. The ship is 423 feet long and can reach a maximum speed of 30 knots on a CODEOG plant. She will carry a 5-inch gun (YES!), 16-cell VLS, two triple ASW tubes, 8 TLAM/SLAM-ER equivalents, and a CIWS.

I mean, folks love Hyundai, Kia, LG, and Samsung over here…

Of Blockades and Commerce Raiders, 2026 Edition

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So can we just talk for a minute, not of politics, but of naval tactics at work in the Persian Gulf, Gulf of Oman, and Arabian?

As any fan of the blog knows, we lean pretty hard into the stories of the old steam/diesel navies from 1833 to 1954, which in turn is heavily punctuated by surface/commerce raiders and naval quarantine/blockade.

With that foundation under us, it has become super interesting that the Navy has delivered its first disabling gunfire against a large surface vessel since 1988, with several 5″/62 rounds delivered into the engine room of the M/V Touska by the USS Spruance (DDG 111) while operating as part of the Abraham Lincoln Carrier Strike Group.

It was certainly the old “cruiser rules” with Sprunace firing five warning shots and opting to use nine BLP (Blind Loaded Projectile, the blue, steel projectile loaded with inert contents) to wreck Touska’s engine room after several broadcasted warnings and a six-hour pursuit.

Dead in the water, Touska was soon boarded in a night operation by Marines from the 31st MEU carried via helicopter from USS Tripoli (LHA 7). Some real deal VBSS stuff on a 73,000-ton/968-foot Panamax-sized container ship– not your more typical seizure of an unflagged dhow that the Navy has typically done in the past several decades.

Such an incident shows the value of a 5-inch gun aboard a grey hull for just such a moment– and underlines why the Navy’s next frigates (and the Coast Guard’s larger cutters) need such a weapon installed. Bofors 57s aren’t going to get it.

Either way, you know Spruance’s already colorful forward mount will receive some extra paint on its gun house.

U.S. Navy Arleigh Burke-class guided-missile destroyer USS Spruance (DDG 111) approaches fleet replenishment oiler USNS Henry J. Kaiser (T-AO-187) before a replenishment-at-sea Jan. 17, 2026. (U.S. Navy photo by Mass Communication Specialist 2nd Class Jordan Steis)

Then came the interception of the Iranian-chartered “Botswanan-flagged” (officially stateless) crude carrier M/T Tifani— 156,967 gross tons of shipping– on the 21st in the Bay of Bengal.

Of interest, she was seized by a converted tanker design, with an Expeditionary Sea Base, possibly the Lewis B. Puller-class USS Miguel Keith (ESB 5), seen just off her bow in the photos released by CENTCOM and DoW.

There is no way you can look at that as other than a direct call back to the auxiliary cruisers of the Russo-Japanese War, WWI, and WWII, which typically saw gently converted mail steamers and ocean liners modified with a few guns, some paint, and a military crew, then sent out to halt enemy blockade runners and similar auxiliary cruisers flying the flags of the other guys.

On 22 April, CENTCOM said that it had intercepted a total of 29 ships as part of the now nine-day-old blockade, including five Iranian-flagged/contracted/controlled tankers (Diona, Sevin, Dorena, Derya, and Deep Sea).

To wit, the IRCG has also said they have bagged a couple of ships of their own.

Sal catches us up on that.

In Coast Guard News…

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In honor of 4/20 (haha), this seemed appropriate.

Just catching folks up on the operations of the country’s most unsung maritime force.

How about this cutter task group steaming in the Florida Straits, 23 March 2026. They include the 1960s-vintage 210-foot Reliance class cutters Vigorous (WMEC 627), left, and Resolute (WMEC 620), right, with the center being held by two much newer 154-foot Sentinel (Webber) class FRCs Raymond Evans (WPC 1110), center-forward, and William Flores (WPC 1103), center-rear.

It is a decent little OPV SAG, with 200~ assorted Coasties embarked and spots for two MH-65 Dolphin helicopters (and/or assorted UAVs), four RIBs (two 26-foot OTH-IVs and two 19-footers), making it capable of some serious littoral interdiction.

If things get kinetic, they have four (two stabilized Mod 2 and two older Mod 0) Mk 38 25mm mounts and 16 crew-served .50-cals to fall back on, plus well-stocked small arms lockers for their boarding teams.

Of note, Vigorous, seen above, just returned to her home port in Virginia Beach last week following a 26-day patrol.

Busy Tampa

Speaking of returning from patrol, the 270-foot Famous (Bear) class cutter USCGC Tampa (WMEC 902) just offloaded “enough cocaine to kill more than 1.4 million Americans” in Miami after two interdictions in international waters of the Eastern Pacific Ocean through Operation Pacific Viper on a 74-day patrol.

Note that she is one of the last cutters with a Mk 75 76mm OTO. Her sisters are getting them replaced with a Mk 38 Mod 2 25mm (!) during refits

Typical of such patrols, Tampa had a HITRON helicopter detachment aboard, who surgically riddled several go-fast outboards with .50 cal rounds from afar.

They brought back the engine covers for trophies:

Coast Guard Cutter Tampa’s (WMEC 902) crew poses for a group photo during a drug offload at U.S. Coast Guard Base Miami Beach, Florida, April 16, 2026. Tampa’s crew offloaded nearly $28.7 million in illicit narcotics interdicted in international waters of the Eastern Pacific Ocean. (U.S. Coast Guard photo by Petty Officer 3rd Class Reese Hindmarsh)

Bertholf returns after 80 days

U.S. Coast Guard Cutter Bertholf (WMSL 750) departs the San Francisco Bay on Jan. 21, 2026. Bertholf departed for a deployment to the Eastern Pacific Ocean. (U.S. Coast Guard Courtesy photo) 260121-G-G0200-1001

Likewise, the class-leading 418-foot Legend-class USCGC Bertholf (WMSL 750) just returned to her Alameda homeport after an 80-day counter-narcotics deployment to the Eastern Pacific.

Bertholf departed Alameda on Jan. 21 to support Operation Southern Spear in the Caribbean, but prior to transiting the Panama Canal, the cutter was retasked to remain in the Pacific theater, shifting focus to counter drug trafficking and transnational criminal threats on the high seas in support of Operation Pacific Viper.

Bertholf traveled nearly 20,000 nautical miles during the deployment, crossing the equator multiple times while patrolling maritime smuggling routes from Central and South America. The cutter conducted 24 approaches or boardings of suspected drug trafficking vessels and responded to two search and rescue cases, including a vessel fire near Costa Rica.

Bertholf’s crew conducted more than 180 flight operations with helicopter aircrews from Air Station San Francisco, Air Station Ventura, and Air Station San Diego, refining proficiency in shipboard landings, in-flight refueling, and vertical replenishment. The crew completed more than 120 hours of small boat training, strengthening the capabilities of law enforcement teams and cutter boat pursuit crews. Additionally, Bertholf executed two live-fire gunnery exercises, employing minor caliber weapons as well as major weapon systems including the 57 mm and the Phalanx Close-In Weapons System.

In other news, the service just announced it intends to homeport the first two (of up to 11) new Arctic Security Cutters in Alaska, a change from basing polar vessels in Seattle.

Green Knights in the Arabian Sea

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Via CENTCOM comes these amazing images of VMFA-121 F-35B night ops from the Arabian Sea aboard an LHA serving in a “Lightning Carrier” sea control/denial role, something that would no doubt make the ghost of Elmo Zumwalt very happy.

Official caption: “An F-35B stealth fighter jet is prepared for flight aboard USS Tripoli (LHA 7) as the amphibious assault ship sails in the Arabian Sea. Tripoli and its 3,500 Sailors and embarked Marines are executing the mission to blockade ships entering and departing Iranian ports. The blockade is being enforced impartially against vessels of all nations.”

The “Green Knights” of Iwakuni-based Marine All Weather Fighter Attack Squadron (VMFA) 121 trace their lineage back to 1941 and were charter members of the Cactus Air Force during the Guadalcanal campaign, then went on to produce 14 aces– more than any other Marine squadron during WWII– downing 208 Japanese aircraft in the process.

They went on to fight in Korea (flying Skyraiders), Vietnam (Skyhawks then Intruders), became the first Marine F-18D night attack squadron in 1989 once the A-6 was retired, logged over 2,000 combat sorties during GWOT, and have been riding the Lightning since 2012.

Their motto is “Have Gun Will Travel,” which tracks.

Train Wreckers at Work

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Some 75 years ago today.

Official caption: “Commandoes of the 41st Royal British Marines plant demolition charges along railroad tracks of enemy supply line, which they demolished during a commando raid, 8 miles south of Songjin, Korea. 10 April 1951.”

NARA FILE #: 080-G-428242

If you are curious as to why the RMs of 41 (Independent) Commando are equipped with U.S. arms (the M1 Garands slung), its because the scratch unit was assembled from 219 men sent to Japan in civilian clothes in September 1950, then later married up with their green berets, battle dress, and boots, but had to rely on winter uniforms, weapons, and kit drawn from American stocks.

The above raid, which “involved transporting quantities of limpet mines and explosives ashore in rubber dinghies through the surf and currents” from the submarine USS Perch (ASSP-313), was highly successful in disrupting enemy rail lines and soon gave rise to the nickname the Royal Marines proudly adopted as a trademark of their mission in Korea, “the train wreckers.”

British Commando Unit on Deck of the USS Perch, at Japan, en route to Korea, 1 November 1950. NARA 80-G-421629

The RMs lost 31 very brave men in Korea, with 17 captured as POWs.

For more on the operation of 41 Cdo, check out “Train Wreckers and Ghost Killers,” by Leo J. Daugherty III (free PDF).

Innovative Portuguese Drone Carrier takes to the water

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Damen Shipyards Galati in Romania this week launched the future NRP Dom João II, a Multi-Purpose Vessel (MPV) 10720 series ship for the Portuguese Navy.

The 353-foot, 7,000-ton vessel is designed for minimal manning (48 full-time crew) and can conduct everything from scientific research and drone experimentation to humanitarian relief and disaster support.

With a 308×36 foot flight deck and 650m² of hangar space, the vessel can transport and launch unmanned underwater, surface, and aerial vehicles, as well as carry up to 12 TEU containers housing mission-specific modular systems like a Role 2 NATO hospital or ROV equipment.

Dom João can carry a light battalion (300~ men) for brief periods and 10-12 RIBs to land them in a maritime raid force situation, backed up by at least two Agusta-Westland AW101 helicopters and assorted UAVs. The regiment-sized Portuguese Marines are certainly capable of providing such a force. 

Alternatively, Dom João can embark a force of light armor, provided a port is available, with her decks able to stow 18 vehicles, landed on a pier via an onboard 30-ton crane. The country’s army operates a decent quantity of Pandur 8x8s, 90mm-armed Commando V-150s, etc., and could make that happen.

In terms of UAVs, Dom João can also operate as a drone carrier with as many of the bad boys as you can stuff aboard her.

The fixed-wing UAVs are launched via a ski jump. Portuguese Navy image.

The mothership is shown with two notional fixed-wing UAVs on deck (they look like MQ-1C Grey Eagle, but the new MQ-9B STOL may be a better fit) as well as 6 quad-copter UAVs and one NH90 helicopter. The design seems to lack an aviation hangar. Below decks is a modular area to launch and recover AUV, UUV, and USV. Portuguese Navy image.

As noted recently by Jane’s:

The Portuguese Navy has acquired a wide range of unmanned systems in recent years, including unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) such as UAVision Aeronautics’ Spyro 4N and OGS42N/VN, Beyond Vision’s VTOne and HEIFU Pro, and Autel Robotics’ EVO II Dual 640T Enterprise V2 and EVO Nano; the LSTS’ Seacon-3 unmanned underwater vehicle (UUV); and a shelter-based deployable ground control station.

The €132 million tender for Dom João was signed in 2023 and laid down in October 2024.

She will carry the name of the 15th-century Portuguese King who championed maritime exploration, broadening the work of his great-uncle, Henry the Navigator, and is scheduled for sea trials later this year.

While Dom João has no armament fitted, the MPV could be escorted in operations by the Damen-built former Dutch Karel Doorman-class frigates NRP Bartolomeu Dias (F333, ex-Van Nes) and NRP D. Francisco de Almeida (F334, ex-Van Galen) or the three newer Vasco da Gama (German MEKO 200) class frigates, which do.

Warship Wednesday 18 March 2026: A Lake by any Other Name

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Here at LSOZI, we take a break every Wednesday to explore the old steam/diesel navies of the 1833-1954 period, profiling a different ship each week. These ships have a life, a tale all their own, which sometimes takes them to the strangest places.- Christopher Eger

If you enjoy my always ad-free Warship Wednesday content, you can support it by buying me a cup of joe at https://buymeacoffee.com/lsozi As Henk says: “Warship Coffee – no sugar, just a pinch of salt!”

Warship Wednesday 18 March 2026:  A Lake by any Other Name

Via the New Zealand Navy Museum, Torpedo Bay, photo AAT 0005

Above we see the very Commonwealth-oriented Loch-class frigate HMNZS Tutira (F 571) with a bone in her teeth off Korea between August 1950 and April 1951.

Built in Tyneside, she served with a Canadian crew under a different name during WWII before shipping to her new home a world away with a Kiwi crew– and a much different war against a new enemy.

The Lochs

The 151 frigates of the River class, built in 29 yards across three continents between May 1941 and May 1946, were a baseline for anti-submarine escorts in the British Royal and Commonwealth nations. While built in five slightly different groups, the Rivers were all generally 1,500 tons light/2,000 tons full load displacement, 301 feet overall length, and with a 36-foot beam. Using twin reciprocating steam engines that could generate about 5,500 shp, they could make 20 knots and steam for 7,000 at an economical 12.

Manned by a ~100-man crew, they carried a couple of 4″/40s augmented by an AAA suite but were primarily outfitted as sub-busters with a Hedgehog projector, up to eight depth charge throwers, two depth charge rails, and allowance for as many as 150 “ash cans.”

River-class frigates fitting out at Vickers Canada, 1944

Where the Lochs were an incremental improvement over the Rivers was that they were gently larger (307 feet oal), were simplified in construction, used mercantile engineering machinery, and had an allowance for a single 4″/40 mount, then ditching the Hedgehog for a pair of triple-barreled Mark IV Squid ASW mortars. Each Squid could project three 440-pound depth bombs to 275 yards abeam.

The overall layout of the Loch class frigates. Note the single 4″/40 mount forward, followed by two Squids on the forecastle. Her quad 40mm Mark VII QF 2-pounder Pom Pom gun was aft, while two 40mm singles and as many as eight 20mm Oerlikons were arrayed abeam.

Installed on only some 70 RN and Commonwealth frigates and corvettes during the war, Squid’s first successful use was by the Loch-class frigate HMS Loch Killin on 31 July 1944, when she sank U-333.

HMCS Iroquois and Swansea at Halifax with two Squid ASW mortars shown forward. The system was credited with sinking 17 submarines in 50 attacks over the course of the war – a success ratio of 2.9 to 1. MIKAN SWN0284

Anti-Submarine Weapons: Anti-submarine Mortar Mark IV Squid launchers and loading apparatus on the forecastle of Loch class corvette, HMS Loch Fada, in Gladstone Dock, Liverpool. 27 October 1944 IWM (A 26153)

Royal Navy sailors loading a Squid anti-submarine mortar.

Battle class destroyer HMS Barrosa steams through the wake of her Squid anti-submarine mortar system, showing the usefulness of its triple-barreled format. IWM (A 33111)

The Loch design catered to small yards with limited infrastructure through the miracle of prefabricated modular construction techniques. No subassembly of the ship would be larger than 29 feet long, 8.5 feet wide, and 8.5 feet tall, with a maximum weight of 2.5 tons to allow for easy lift by even the most modest of crane and rail systems. As much as 80 percent of the ship could be prefabbed and then sent for assembly in the graving dock, with great effort meant to eliminate curves in favor of straight-line construction.

The late-war sensor fit was advanced compared to what RN escorts were working with just a few years earlier, with the Lochs carrying Type 277 radars (good for detecting high flying aircraft out to 40 miles and surface contacts at 20) and Type 144 ASDIC with Type 147B depth finding sonars.

Using a pair of  VT4cyl (18.5, 31 & 38.5, 38.5 x 30ins) engines and two Admiralty 3-drum boilers, they could gen up 5,500 hp and push it out on twin screws. With 724 tons of fuel oil carried, these ships were slightly slower than the 20-knot Rivers, typically hitting 19.5 knots on trials and 18 or so when dirty and fully loaded at 2,200 tons displacement, but had a higher cruising speed (15 knots vs 12) for a 7,000nm range.

Loch class frigate HMS Loch Insh, October 1944 IWM (FL 14742)

With class leader HMS Loch Achanalt (K424) ordered from Henry Robb Limited, Leith in July 1942, the first completed Lochs only started arriving in the fleet in early 1944.

While 110 hulls were planned and 82 ordered from at least 10 yards, peace intervened, and only 28 were completed, the rest being canceled or, in the case of 26, converted to Bay class AAA frigates for Pacific service with a much reduced depth charge capacity and no Squid mortars to allow room for a roughly doubled gun battery.

Meet Loch Morlich

Our subject is the only warship named for the peaceful 5,000-foot freshwater loch (Mhor Thalamic in Gaelic) in the Badenoch and Strathspey area of Highland, Scotland, near Aviemore. Ordered 13 February 1943 as Yard No. 1784 from the fine Tyneside firm of Swan Hunter, Wallsend, for construction at the Neptune Yard in Low Walker, the future HMCS Loch Morlich (K 517) was laid down five months later on 15 July 1943.

Loch Morlich was one of eight Loch class frigates ordered from Swan Hunter, with sister Loch Shin (K 421) ordered five months prior. Sister Loch Cree was instead completed by Swan as the South African Navy’s SAS Natal (K 10). Meanwhile, two other Swan-built sisters, the planned Loch Assynt and Loch Torridon, were instead completed post-war as the unarmed depot ships Derby Haven and Woodbridge Haven. Of the rest, Swan was told to cancel the planned Loch Griam, Loch Kirbister, and Loch Lyon as the war ended.

Morlich’s sister, HMSAS Natal (K 10), a South African Loch class frigate fitting out, 5 March 1945. One of three Lochs completed for the South African Navy, she would go on to sink the German submarine U-714 on 14 March, only four hours after having left Swan! IWM A 28216

Launched 25 January 1944, Loch Morlich was bound for Canadian service and fully Canadian manned with her first skipper, T/A/LCDR Leslie Lewendon Foxall, RCNVR, assuming command while she was fitting out on 6 March 1944. Foxall had commanded the smaller Flower-class corvette HMCS Chilliwack (K 131) for two years on Atlantic convoy runs, so he knew his trade.

War!

With WWII well into its sixth year, Loch Morlich broke out her colors on 17 July 1944 and was assigned to the 8th Canadian Escort Group. Two other Lochs likewise went to the Canadians, Loch Achanalt (to the 6th CEG) and Loch Alvie (9th CEG), in July and August, respectively.

Morlich’s workups in the Western Approaches were delayed due to accidents while training, but she eventually made ready and sailed with her first convoys, MKS 067G and SL 176MK, on 17-18 November.

Loch Morlich CTB016772

HMS Loch Morlic (K 517) secured to a buoy on the Tyne. IWM FL 6042

She would clock in on at least six other convoys over the next five months, most of them under the command of Lt. George Frederick Crosby, RCNVR, who took over from Foxall in December 1944.

The Lochs were on hand to corral the last of Donitz’s steel sharks at sea in May 1945.

Loch class frigate HMCS Loch Alvie (K 428), and a surrendered U-boat, May 1945. (Library and Archives Canada Photo, MIKAN No. 4950920, color)

The class is credited with assisting in the sinking of at least 17 U-boats as vetted by post-war examination boards.

After VE-Day, it was decided that the three Canadian-manned Lochs should return to England to prep for possible Pacific service under RN control. Morlich returned to Sheerness, and her Canadian crew was released on 20 June 1945, apparently returning home with the ship’s HMCS-marked bell. Paid off, the frigate was reduced to Reserve status.

Her RN crew never came, preempted by VJ Day.

No Lochs were lost in combat.

Meet Tutira

While some had thought the post-WWII New Zealand Squadron should be built around one of the RN’s many surplus aircraft carriers–after all, Canada and Australia had gotten into the flattop game as well– and, indeed, the Colossus-class carrier HMS Glory had operated from New Zealand as part of J Force in 1946, taking RNZAF Squadron No. 14 to Japan for occupation duties, RADM George Walter Gillow Simpson CB, CBE, head of the New Zealand Navy Staff in the late 1940s, instead championed for a smaller, more anti-submarine, force.

A series of non-violent mutinies among the ships of the NZ fleet in April 1947 over poor living and working conditions, coupled with outrageously low pay, further emphasized the downshift from such lofty carrier goals, and J Force returned home from occupation duties by September 1948, its mission complete.

While over 10,000 men served in the RNZN and RNZNVR during WWII on 60 commissioned ships, by the late 1940s, the peacetime New Zealand fleet shrank to just 2,900 officers and men, enough to man two 5,900-ton light (5.25-inch gunned) Dido class cruisers (HMNZS Black Prince and Bellona, later Royalist), six surplus ASW frigates, four 1,000-ton Bathurst-class escort minesweepers, eight minesweeping trawlers (including the famous Kiwi and Tui), the disarmed River-class frigate Lachlan used as a survey ship, a dozen 72-foot MLs, as well as miscellaneous tenders and tugs.

The half-dozen above-mentioned “surplus ASW frigates” were laid up Lochs that were sold to NZ for the princely sum of £1,500,000 for the lot, weapons included, transferred between 13 September 1948 and 11 April 1949 after refits. Loch Morlich in particular went for £228,250.

Taking a page from their original loch names, in NZ service they earned names of lakes from their new home country, with Loch Eck becoming HMNZ Hawea, Loch Achray – Kaniere, Loch Achanalt – Pukaki, Loch Katrine – Rotoiti, Loch Shin – Taupo, and our Loch Morlich now HMNZS Tutira. They kept their old pennant numbers, just changing the K to an F, with Loch Morlich (K 517), for example, becoming Tutira (F 517) in New Zealand service.

HMNZS Pukaki (formerly Loch Achanalt) and two other Loch class frigates of the Royal New Zealand Navy

HMNZS Taupo, a Loch class frigate of the Royal New Zealand Navy, Auckland Anniversary Regatta, 29 January 1951

Loch-class frigate HMNZS Hawea (F422), formerly HMS Loch Eck (K422), photographed in 1955

HMNZS Tutira F 517

The NZ Lochs were soon frolicking in their home waters in exercises with the British East Indies Fleet and RAN.

15 March 1950. Ships of the Australian and New Zealand naval fleets are arriving at Auckland for combined naval exercises. HMNZS Tutira (left) and Pukaki (middle). Auckland Libraries Heritage Collections 1370-U045-08.

March 1950. HMNZS Pukaki (F424) and other frigates in Akaroa Harbour during combined naval exercises of the Royal New Zealand and Australian Navies. The exercises included the British submarine HMS Telemachus, the Australian aircraft carrier HMAS Sydney, four New Zealand frigates-HMNZS Taupo, Rotoiti, Tutira, and Pukaki-the Australian frigate HMAS Murchison, the destroyers HMAS Bataan and Warramunga, and the cruisers HMNZS Bellona and HMAS Australia. Auckland Libraries Heritage Collections 1370-313-15.

March 1950. The cruiser HMAS Australia (D84) in the foreground with other ships in Akaroa Harbour during combined naval exercises of the Royal New Zealand and Australian Navies. The exercises included the British submarine HMS Telemachus, the Australian aircraft carrier HMAS Sydney, four New Zealand frigates-HMNZS Taupo, Rotoiti, Tutira, and Pukaki-the Australian frigate HMAS Murchison, the destroyers HMAS Bataan and Warramunga, and the cruisers HMNZS Bellona and HMAS Australia. Auckland Libraries Heritage Collections 1370-313-12

March 1950.Aircraft and crew on the deck of HMAS Sydney (note her 805 Squadron Hawker Sea Furies and 816 Squadron Fairey Fireflies) with an unidentified frigate behind during combined naval exercises of the Royal New Zealand and Australian navies in Akaroa Harbour. The exercises included the British submarine HMS Telemachus, the Australian aircraft carrier HMAS Sydney, four New Zealand frigates-HMNZS Taupo, Rotoiti, Tutira, and Pukaki-the Australian frigate HMAS Murchison, the destroyers HMAS Bataan and Warramunga, and the cruisers HMNZS Bellona and HMAS Australia. Auckland Libraries Heritage Collections 1370-313-18

On 12 May 1950, LCDR Peter James Hill Hoare, RN, assumed command of Tutira. Born just months before Jutland, the 34-year-old Hoare had graduated from the Nautical College at Pangbourne and earned his lieutenant’s stripe in 1938, going on to command the sloop HMS Bridgewater (L 01) and frigate HMS Hoste (K 566) on Atlantic convoy duties during WWII. He would soon be in his and Tutira’s second war.

Korea

Just three days after North Korea invaded its democratic neighbor to the South, New Zealand answered the call of the United Nations and said it would be dispatching two warships.

Those ships were our Loch Morlich/Tutira and Loch Achanalt/Pukaki, which ironically were two-thirds of the Lochs that had served with the Canadians during WWII.

As noted by the NZ Navy Museum, Torpedo Bay:

On the 3rd of July, HMNZS Tutira and Pukaki left Auckland. The ships arrived in Korea on the 27th of July and were given an escort role with up to four convoys a week. The assigned task of the frigates was described as the most thankless of the sea war – ‘dull, daily routine patrol’. However, this work was of vital importance to the United Nations cause in Korea. The commander of the U.S. Naval Forces, Vice Admiral Joy, noted ‘The unspectacular role of carrying personnel and supplies to Korea was perhaps the Navy’s greatest contribution’.

Skipped over in that description is the fact that the two NZ frigates were on hand for the famed amphibious landings at Inchon on 15 September 1950 as part of TG 90.7 (the screening and protective group) and patrolled the waters just off the bridgehead to guard the Marines ashore from potential seaborne attack.

Then came use with the U.S. Navy task group off Wonson in October. It was there that one of Loch Morlich’s crew, Petty Officer Henry Matthew Blizzard, was killed by shrapnel from an exploding mine, one of just three RNZN personnel killed during the war.

The NZ frigates remained in Korean waters until early November, when they were sent to Sasebo, Japan, for quick refit.

An RN photographer caught up to Tutira in Japan in November 1950 and captured some great images of her crew, which included several English lads and at least one Scot.

November 1950. The Asdic team of the Tutira kept constant watch for 42 days. In the harbor, they are engaged in depth charge equipment. A/B M Anderson, Tekuiti, North Island, New Zealand; A/B M M Clark, Wellington, New Zealand; L/S J Belcher, Torbay; A/B M W Bailey, Waitara, N Island, New Zealand; A/B R Allister, Liverpool; A/B M R Lewis, Christchurch, New Zealand. IWM 31760.

AB J Teaika, Christchurch, New Zealand, Tutira’s Quartermaster. IWM A 31759.

HMNZS Tutira’s port Oerlikon crew at action stations. Note the old tin plate helmets, certainly quaint in 1950. Leading Seaman B J Mason, Taihape, N Island, New Zealand; and Able Seaman A B Tripp, Wembley, England. IWM A 31754.

HMNZS Tutira. On the signal platform, left to right: Signalman R H (Curly) Richardson, Masterson, North Island, New Zealand; Signalman R P Davies, Morden, Surrey, England; Signalman C J Pitcher, Ringwood, Hants, England; Leading Signalman P J Stewart, Dunedin, South Island, New Zealand. IWM A 31755.

Tutira Galley staff, right to left: P/O Cook R Lowndes, Worthing, Sussex; Cook D Hornsby, Sheffield; Cook D W Jackman, Guildford, Surrey; Cook (O) A Davidson, New Plymouth, New Zealand; Cook M Pickard, Christchurch; Cook T Goddard, Southampton. IWM A 31757

Some of Tutira’s engine room company. Stoker Mech V G Brightwell, Auckland; Stoker Mech W Coppins, Ashford, Kent; Stoker Mech J O’Grady, Manchester; Stoker R A Blann, Epsom, Surrey; Stoker P/O J V Murray, Hythe, Kent; Stoker P/O A C Cameron, Auckland; Stoker Mech B A Gabb, Larkworth, New Zealand; Stoker Mech K D Bickham, Auckland, New Zealand; Stoker Mech W A Page, Deptford; ERA W S Watson, Christchurch, New Zealand; Stoker P/O J Adams, Aberdeen, Scotland; ERA C J de Larue, Auckland, New Zealand. IWM A 31758

Early 1951 saw Tutira and Pukaki patrolling Korea’s coast, supporting the evacuations from Inchon and Chinampo, and later supporting ROKN mine-clearing operations. In particular, they took turns operating with the South Korean Navy minesweepers YMS 502 and YMS 503 between 15 March and 7 April.

RNZN frigate crews in Korea often went ashore in several “Nelsonian” night raids against coastal targets and took several prisoners for intelligence gathering. One of Tutira’s former sailors, Able Seaman Robert Marchioni, who joined the crew of her sister Rotoiti, was killed ashore on 26 August 1951 on one such nocturnal raid near Sogon-ni while trying to do a prisoner grab on a Chinese gun emplacement. Marchioni’s body was never recovered.

While Pukaki was relieved by sister Rotoiti in February 1951, Tutira remained on station for three more months until relieved by sister Hawea, only arriving back home in Devonport on 30 May, having steamed 35,400 miles and having been away from New Zealand for nearly 11 months. LCDR Hoare and two ratings were awarded a Mention in Despatches, and the ship earned her only battle honor (Korea 1950-51).

New Zealand’s naval involvement in the Korean War lasted three years and involved all six of its Lochs, with the last, Kaniere, returning home on 2 March 1954. Almost half the manpower of the RNZN– approximately 1,350 officers and ratings-  shipped out for Korean waters over those nearly four years. In their eight tours (Rotoiti and Hawea both went twice), the New Zealand Lochs steamed 339,584 nautical miles and fired 71,625 rounds of ammunition in action.

Kayforce, a New Zealand Army artillery and engineer detachment that served in Korea from December 1950 onward with the 27th British Commonwealth Infantry Brigade, saw 4,600 men rotate through its ranks before it was finally brought home in July 1957, suffering 42 deaths and 79 wounded.

New Zealand’s 16 Field Regiment fired 800,000 rounds in the Korean War- far more than any Kiwi regiment fired in World War II- and the conflict was described as an “artilleryman’s paradise.” National Library PA1-f-113-1861

End time

After service with the 11th Flotilla and fleet exercises with the Australians, in August 1953, the well-traveled Tutira was put into reserve at Auckland, then partially refitted and given limited sea trials in late June 1954. Following these trials, she was partially cocooned and not modernized as her sister vessels had been. Placed in extended reserve, she was slowly and extensively cannibalized for parts to keep her active duty sisters on the job.

In February 1957, with the realization that, under SEATO, a future Pacific War would likely see combat against roaming Soviet submarines, the NZ government ordered a pair of Type 12 (Rothesay) class ASW frigates to be built eight months apart in Britain at Thornycroft and White, respectively. Named HMNZS Otago (F 111) and Taranaki (F 148), the 2,500-ton frigates were modern with a Seacat missile system, Limbo depth charge mortars, and a twin 4.5-inch turret. They were followed by a third, improved Type 12 (Leander) class, HMNZS Waikato (F 55) in 1966, while a fourth Type 12, HMS Blackpool (F 77) was leased from the RN.

These new vessels meant the New Zealand admiralty could divest itself of its obsolete WWII-era cruisers and frigates. Black Prince reverted to RN control and was scrapped in Japan in 1962, while Royalist was decommissioned in 1966, likewise reverting to the RN for disposal.

New Zealand Lochs, Jane’s, 1960

Of the Lochs in NZ service, Taupo and Tutira were sold for scrap to a Hong Kong-based broker on 15 December 1961, with Hawea and Pukaki following in September 1965. The final pair, Rotolti and Kanire, by then classed as 2nd Rate Escorts, served until they were disposed of in 1966.

October 1961. The frigates HMNZS Tutira F517 (right) and HMNZS Taupo (left) off Cape Reinga en route to Hong Kong, where they were sold for scrap. In the center, the Otapiri tows the tug Atlas to Whangaparāoa Harbor for repairs after its towline fouled the seabed five miles north of Cape Reigna. Auckland Libraries Heritage Collections 1370-029-22-02

Auckland Libraries Heritage Collections 1370-029-22-03

HMNZS Rotoiti paying off, 1965, Loch class frigate. Image AAR 0032 

As far as her Loch class sisters still afloat elsewhere, the RN kept a couple in service as F-pennant frigates (Loch Lomond and Loch Killisport) until as late as 1965, while Loch Fada served as a missile test bed until 1970– vetting Sea Wolf. One interesting sister who began life as Loch Eil was converted to a Bay class AAA frigate (Herne Bay), finally became the survey ship HMS Dampier, and was kept until 1968.

Of interest, Dampier, limping along with a broken shaft from Freetown to Chatham in December 1967, hoisted three lug sails and a set of square sails made from awning canvas to gain an extra knot or two to make England just in time for Christmas– thus is the pluck of frigatemen.

HMS Dampier (A303) – ex Loch-class frigate, survey ship. 1967 under sail

The South Africans kept their trio of Lochs active well into the 1970s, with the last, SAS Good Hope (ex-Loch Boisdale) scuttling in December 1978, the final member of the class. She remains part of an artificial reef some 101 feet under False Bay near Cape Town.

Epilogue

One of the Loch Morlich’s/Tutira’s 3-pounder guns has been preserved ashore at the stone frigate HMNZS Philomel, the RNZN base at Devonport, Auckland.

Her 1944-marked HMCS Loch Morlich bell, presumably removed before she went to New Zealand, has long been in private hands and was sold at auction in Boston last year for less than $3,000.

A For Posterity’s Sake page exists for Loch Morlich’s RCN veterans.

She and her sister Pukaki are also remembered in maritime art, immortalized on their Korean deployment.

Painting of HMNZS Pukaki and HMNZS Tutira at Inchon by Colin Wynn.

CDR Peter James Hill Hoare, OBE, Tutira’s Korean War skipper, retired from the RN on 29 January 1966, capping 28 years in uniform. He passed away in 1984, aged 68.

The Loch Class Frigates Association was formed in 1993 but held its last reunion in 2019 and disappeared from the internet in 2023. Before they faded away, they established a memorial cairn at Alrewas in 2005, finished with stones from each of the 28 Lochs completed.

Colin Sweett via IWM

Likewise, a Loch class frigate is featured on the Korean War memorial plaque at Devonport, New Zealand, dedicated by the New Zealand Korea Veterans’ Association in 2000. It rests upon a stone donated by the city of Pusan.

As you may remember, Devonport Naval Base is where Tutira and Pukaki sortied from for Korea on 3 July 1950.

Auckland Libraries Heritage Collections 3003-0217

Thanks for reading!

Meminisse est ad Vivificandum – To Remember is to Keep Alive

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