Wampatuck (YT-337)
1942-1946
A Native American leader of the Mattakeesett tribe, known to English settlers as Josiah Sagamore. An early friend of European settlers, he sold the English the land upon which the city of Boston was established. He was slain in 1669 when he led a force of his warriors in an attack upon the Mohawk tribe.
(YT-337: displacement 473; length 141'2"; beam 29'9½"; depth of hold 17'6¼"; armament 2 .50-caliber machine guns)
Sea Ranger, a wooden-hulled, single-screw, harbor tug built at Oakland, Calif., by W. F. Stone & Son, and completed in May 1921, was acquired by the Navy under a bareboat charter from the Foss Launch & Tug Co. of San Francisco, Calif., on 28 October 1942 and renamed Wampatuck (YT-337).
Placed in service at Pearl Harbor, Territory of Hawaii, on 22 December 1942, three days before the second Christmas of the war, Wampatuck served as a harbor tug and performed tug and tow services at the vital U.S. Pacific Fleet base through the end of hostilities with Japan. During her tour of duty at Pearl, she was reclassified as a harbor tug (big) on 15 May 1944 at which time she was re-designated as YTB-337.
Subsequently shifted to the west coast, Wampatuck was placed out of service at San Francisco on 6 May 1946 and her name was stricken from the Navy Register on 21 May 1946.
Transferred to the Maritime Commission on 16 August 1946 as surplus, Sea Ranger entered the Reserve Fleet at Suisun Bay, Calif., at noon on that day, where she remained until ultimately sold for scrap circa 1955.
Robert J. Cressman
Updated, 17 August 2022
