Yacona
The
first Yacona
retained the name carried by the ship at the time of her acquisition by the
Navy.
I
(Converted yacht: tonnage 527
(gross); length 211'0"; beam 27'3"; depth of hold 15'9"; draft 13'9"; speed 10.0 knots;
complement 67; armament 2 3", 2 .30-caliber Colt machine guns; 10 Mk. I depth
charges)
The
first Yacona—a steel-hulled screw steam yacht formerly named Cem and Amelia—was built in 1898
at Kinghorn, Scotland, by John Scott and Co., shipwrights, and was purchased
around 1906 by Henry Clay Pierce, of
New York City,
a noted
financier and oil
industry pioneer.
The Navy acquired the yacht at New York
City on 29 September 1917, inspecting her at Shewan Shipyard. On the same day (10 October) that that yard
estimated that the alterations necessary to fit the ship out as an armed patrol
vessel could be completed by 1 November, the Navy ordered her to proceed to
Boston where the previous owner’s own workmen could remove the pleasure craft’s
interior woodwork. Yacona got underway on 12 October from the Shewan yard, but grounded in the channel at New York’s Hell Gate.
Taken to the New York Navy Yard for minor repairs, the ship ultimately made the
shift to her original destination (Boston), and fitted out at the Boston Navy
Yard. Assigned the designation SP-917 and regarded as “one of the strongest and
best built vessels of her size…that will make a most serviceable vessel,”
Yacona was commissioned on 10 December 1917, Lt. Comdr. John W. Wilcox, Jr., in
command.
Yacona (SP-617) in wartime camouflage at
the Boston Navy Yard, circa December 1917, with the
converted yacht Isabel (SP-521) on the other side of the pier. Steamers in the
background are Aroostook
(Id. No.
1256, ex-Bunker Hill) and Massachusetts (which would become
Shawmut (Id. No. 1255)
and, later,
Oglala). (NHC Photo NH 102576, original in SP Card File, Ships History
Branch,
Naval Warfare Division)
Yacona put to sea early on 20 December
1917 and anchored off Provincetown, Mass., later that day. The next day, she
test-fired her main battery, firing four rounds from each 3-inch gun and 50
rounds from each Colt machine gun, and “found same to be in good working order.”
The converted yacht returned to the New York Navy Yard three days before
Christmas, and remained there into February 1918, a period punctuated by one
brief interval underway, when the ship got underway, assisted by tug
Mariner (SP-1136), to proceed to the waters off Tompkinsville where she
anchored overnight (29-30 January 1918).
Yacona departed the New York Navy Yard
shortly before the end of the forenoon watch on 6 February 1918 in company with
Mariner and the converted yacht Wadena (SP-158), bound for
New London, Connecticut. The ships proceeded through
increasingly heavy ice floes that impeded their progress the following day as
they neared their destination, Yacona having to take Wadena in tow
at one point when ice damage compelled Mariner – which had twice
extricated Wadena from the floes -- to stop to effect temporary repairs.
Eventually, by maneuvering at various courses and speeds, Yacona managed
to push through the ice and reach her destination, dropping anchor late in the
first watch on 7 February. She got underway from New
London on 22 February, then passed up Narragansett Bay, and reached
the U.S. Naval Coaling Station, Melville, R.I., that afternoon. Pausing briefly at
Newport, R.I.,
on the 23rd, she then cast off from alongside Wadena and put
to sea, bound for Bermuda during the morning
watch on 24 February.
Yacona, steaming in company with
Wadena, Mariner, and the tug Lykens (SP-876),
then rendezvoused
with a convoy of
eleven submarine chasers soon thereafter; the French tug Mohican brought
up the rear. As the
convoy worked its way down the eastern seaboard, however, it encountered
a heavy
southwesterly gale that sprang up on 26 February 1918. A half hour before the end of the forenoon watch, heavy
seas carried away part of the bulwarks on
the starboard bow, and
smashed in the ports on the starboard side of Yacona’s deck house, flooding her pay office and radio
room. Later that day, the ship
developed a leak that inundated some
of her bunker spaces and flooded the
fireroom to a depth of one foot. Heavy seas pounded
her smaller consort Mariner, too, opening her seams. After the tug’s
pumps failed, rising water put out her boiler fires; powerless, she had to be
abandoned, Wadena rescuing her entire crew. Yacona reduced speed
in the gale, and the next day took
submarine chaser SC-256 in
tow. Yacona’s quartermaster noted that
during the afternoon watch on the
27th, the task of removing water from the fireroom bilges occupied all hands.
Reaching Bermuda on 1 March 1918, Yacona, whose crew
discovered hundreds of pounds of water-damaged rations ranging from staples like
sugar and flour to potatoes and pork sausage that had to be disposed-of as the
result of the storm, remained there
into April, undergoing needed voyage repairs. She sailed on the morning of 8 April 1918 to escort a convoy that consisted of two U.S. Army
tugs, Cadmus and Seminole, the tanker Chestnut Hill
(Id.No.2526), the destroyer
tender Leonidas, and submarine
chasers SC-143, SC-147, SC-179, SC-227, SC-338, and
SC-95. En route to the
Azores, Yacona conducted gunnery and
general quarters drills and made part
of the passage under sail to
conserve coal. She and her convoy stood in to Ponta
Delgada on
the morning of 22 April; the yacht moored alongside the Russian bark Montrosa. After coaling ship, Yacona headed for Bermuda on 4 May,
in company with Wadena and the
fuel ship Arethusa, and made
port at Hamilton
ten days later.
Yacona made one more round-trip voyage
to the Azores and back, escorting a group
of six submarine chasers, the cruiser
Salem and the Naval Overseas
Transportation Service tanker John D. Connelly (Id. No.2703)
east-bound and returning
west-bound in company with old
consort Wadena and the
tugs Arctic (SP-1158), Goliah (SP-1494), Undaunted (SP-1950)
on 20 June 1918. After engine repairs
at the British dockyard there and having her hull painted, she
departed Bermuda on 9 July in
company with the minesweeper
Comber (SP-344) and the tug Mojave (SP-15) and headed for New London, with U.S. Vice Consul to Switzerland Louis Lombard
and his son embarked for
transportation “to [the] next port…”
Yacona reached New London on the
afternoon of 12 July 1918 and disembarked her passengers. She
then spent the next several weeks undergoing voyage repairs, first at the New York
Navy Yard (19-25 July) and then at Tietjen and Lang’s
Dockyard, Hoboken,
New Jersey (25 July-27 August). She
shifted to New London (28-30 August), then sailed
for Charleston, South Carolina. One day out of New London, she went to
general quarters early in the mid watch on 31 August and trained her guns on a
“suspicious object.” The dark shape, however, quickly disappeared from sight in
the thick haze and the ship’s own smoke.
Then, after voyage repairs at Charleston (2-6 August), she put to sea as escort
for a convoy of three 110-foot
submarine chasers assigned to the French Navy: SC-365, SC-366, and SC-367. Reaching Bermuda on 10
September, she sailed on the 15th for the Azores in company with
cruiser Chicago and tugs Arctic
and Goliah and a covey of submarine chasers,
and arrived at her destination on 27 September. As the converted yacht prepared to sail
from Ponta
Delgada on 2 October, however, her port anchor fouled the mooring gear. To “expedite
matters and join the convoy” then sailing for Hamilton, she slipped the anchor and 15 fathoms
of chain. Less than a half hour into the first dog watch on 9 October, while steaming in company with
Chicago, Arethusa, Goliah,
Arctic and Undaunted, the yacht spotted another “suspicious object” on the surface and
went to general quarters. She commenced firing three minutes later but,
after identifying her target as a
drifting buoy, ceased fire.
Yacona arrived back at St. George’s Harbor, Bermuda, on 12 October 1918;
departed those waters on 5 November, bound for New York. Making the
initial leg of the voyage in company with the tug Iroquois and her tow,
the freighter Seguranca, the yacht arrived at
the New York Navy
Yard on 11 November 1918, the day that the armistice ended World War
I.
Next
attached to Division 3, Battleship Force 1, United States Atlantic Fleet,
Yacona departed Boston on 10 December 1918, transited
the Cape Cod Canal on the 11th, and anchored off the mouth of the York River on the 13th on account of heavy
fog. The following day, she shifted her
anchorage upriver and, on the 15th, briefly embarked Rear Admiral Thomas
Washington, commander of the
battleship division to which the ship had been attached, when he came on board
from his flagship, Rhode Island (Battleship No. 17). After moving to Hampton Roads the day
after Christmas of 1918, Yacona sailed for New York in company with
converted yacht Aramis (SP-418). The two
ships arrived off Tompkinsville on
the 13th. Yacona then got underway for New
London on the 15th, arriving there the following day.
Placed
in the Reserve Squadron, Antisubmarine Squadron in Training, in January 1919,
Yacona remained at New London into June, principally in a
succession of berths alongside the State Pier there. She departed
New London on 13 June and arrived at the New York Navy
Yard on the
16th to unload her ammunition and have her guns removed. On 26 June
1919, the converted yacht was decommissioned and placed in
reserve at the New York Navy Yard. On 22 April 1920, the Navy decided to sell
the vessel but, on 14 September, cancelled the sale
order.
Taken out of reserve and recommissioned on 11 October 1920, Lt. Comdr. Ralph
E. Simpson in command, Yacona remained at the navy yard into
February 1921,
being cleaned and painted preparatory to a voyage to the Far East. Upon completion of her overhaul,
she departed New York on 1 March and proceeded to
Bermuda, utilizing sails for part of the
passage to conserve coal. After calling at Hamilton from 5 to 14 March, Yacona pressed
on across the Atlantic, visiting Ponta Delgada from 24 to 29 March and reaching Gibraltar on 3
April. She remained at that British bastion for almost a
month, weighing anchor on the 28th
and heading for Malta on the next leg of her passage to the Orient.
While at Malta from 3 to 8 May, Yacona full-dressed
ship in honor of the anniversary of
the accession of King George V to the
throne of England and, along with all other ships and batteries in the harbor,
fired a 21-gun national salute at noon that day to celebrate the event. Yacona stood out of
Grand Harbor, Valetta, on 8 May 1921, bound for
Egypt. After provisioning at Port
Said on 12 May, Yacona transited the Suez Canal on the 13th
and proceeded to Aden, Arabia, arriving a
week later, on 20 May. There, Yacona took on fresh water and coal, and sailed during the first
watch the same day. However, a
board of investigation convened during the mid watch on 21 May determined that
the quantity of coal she had received had proved to be of inferior quality, and
she put back into Aden soon thereafter, where Lt. George M. Snead
(SC), Yacona’s supply officer went ashore to
confer with representatives of Cory Brothers and Company, Limited. A
representative of Cory Brothers visited the ship shortly after Lt. Snead
returned, remaining on board for
only a quarter of an hour (long enough, apparently, to confirm the Americans’
complaint!). She shifted berths the following day and a tug brought two lighters
alongside for the laborious and dirty task of un-coaling ship, a process that
lasted from the afternoon watch on the 22nd to the forenoon watch the
following day – the bad coal was later taken out to sea and dumped.
Yacona resumed her eastward voyage on the 23d and arrived at Bombay, India, on 1 June. There, she coaled
and once again dressed-ship, this time for the King's Birthday on the 3d. The ship departed that
port on the 4th. After calling at
Colombo, Ceylon, from 9 to 24 June and at Singapore from 3 to 7 July, where she
“full-dressed ship in honor of American independence” on 4 July, Yacona
stood into Manila Bay on 14
July, assisted to her berth in Cavite harbor by the tug Tamarao, her voyage from the eastern seaboard of the
United States completed.
Shifting from Cavite to the Coast Guard Dock, Engineer Island, Manila, on the morning of 16 July 1921,
Yacona was decommissioned on 27 July 1921 and turned over to representatives of the
Insular Government.
Robert J. Cressman
13 July
2006
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