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Naval History and Heritage Command

National Museum of the U.S. Navy

<p>NMUSN:&nbsp; WWI:&nbsp; Cyclops</p>

The Cyclops Mystery

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USS Cyclops Mystery

One of the mysteries of the war is the disappearance of the collier USS Cyclops.  Prior to World War I, the collier supported U.S. warships in European waters, off the Atlantic seaboard and in the Caribbean as a unit of the Naval Auxiliary Force.   In early March 1918, while returning from a voyage to Brazil, Cyclops disappeared with all hands.  Numerous ships sailed to locate the collier, as she was thought to have been sunk by a German submarine.  Her wreck has never been found and the cause of her loss remains unknown.

Image:  19-N-13451:  USS Cyclops (1910-1918), October 1911.  Official Bureau of Ships Photograph, now in the collection of the National Archives.