Nahant III (AN-83)
1945-1968
The third Nahant (AN-83) was named in honor of the monitor of that name that served in the Civil War.
III
(AN-83: displacement 775 (trial); length 168'6"; beam 33'10" (extreme); draft 10'10" (limiting); speed 12.3 knots (trial); complement 46; armament 1 3-inch, 4 20 millimeter; class Cohoes)
The third Nahant (AN–83) was laid down on 31 March 1945 at Portland, Oregon, by the Commercial Iron Works; launched 30 June 1945; sponsored by Mrs. Hazel H. Childs; and commissioned on 24 August 1945, Lt. Walter M. Hupfel, D-V(G), USNR, in command.
Nahant departed Portland on 4 September 1945 for San Pedro, Calif., then reached the Small Craft Training Center, Terminal Island, Calif., on 8 September, and began her shakedown training. She completed those evolutions on 20 September when she made arrival at the Naval Net Depot, Tiburon, California. Subsequently, she removed net moorings in San Francisco Bay, and conducted various operations that included laying moorings, removing net sections from Drake’s Bay, towing barges, and working on experimental nets.
Departing San Francisco on 31 October 1945, Nahant transited the Panama Canal on 14 November and pushed on for Orange, Texas, arriving there on 21 November 1945 for temporary duty. She laid moorings, removed pilings, and acted as a tug for barracks ships (APL) and miscellaneous auxiliary vessels (AG) supporting the growing Sixteenth Fleet, until she was decommissioned and joined the “mothball” fleet herself on 31 July 1946.
Recommissioned on 14 February 1952, Lt. Wilbur Joseph in command, Nahant was assigned to the Fifth Naval District. She installed and tended harbor defense nets within that district until 1 March 1954, when she temporarily assumed duties as a salvage vessel. By 28 May, however, diving equipment and a recompression chamber had been permanently installed and Nahant was converted into a ship of dual mission: salvage ship and net tender.
From that time until 1968, Nahant participated in Mine Hunting Unit operations, harbor clearance projects, North Atlantic Treaty Organization and U.S. Atlantic Fleet training operations, mining operations, torpedo net laying and recovery operations, fleet service mine tests, harbor defense operations and training exercises, and experimental mine and net test and evaluation exercises. Such operations took Nahant, homeported first at Little Creek, Va., and later at Charleston, S.C., as far north as Argentia, Newfoundland, and as far south as Cuba.
Decommissioned on 30 September 1968, Nahant was stricken from the Naval Vessel Register on 1 October 1968. On 15 October 1968, she was sold to the government of Uruguay, in whose Navy she served as Rou-Huracan (BT–30).
Updated, Robert J. Cressman
18 May 2022
