USS Adelante

	Yacht Oneida, later Adelante; photographed prior to World War I.
History
Name	USS Adelante (SP-765)
Builder	Delaware River Iron Ship Building and Engine Works, Chester, Pennsylvania
Yard number	226
Launched	1883
Acquired	25 August 1918
Commissioned	17 December 1918
Decommissioned	18 August 1919
Identification	ON 25281
Fate	Sold, 25 March 1920 to J. Daniel Gully, Brooklyn, NY; Abandoned, 1 January 1941 due to age and deterioration.
General characteristics
Tonnage	142 GRT 71 Net tons
Length	138 ft (42.1 m) length overall, 121 ft (36.9 m) length at waterline
Beam	20 ft 7 in (6.27 m)
Draft	9 ft 6 in (2.9 m))
Installed power	2 boilers
Propulsion	1 vertical compound engine, one shaft
Speed	13 Knots
Complement	38
Armament	none

Last updated March 18, 2023

The iron-hulled, single-screw steam yacht Utowana was completed in 1883 at Chester, Pennsylvania, by the Delaware River Iron Ship Building and Engine Works for Washington Everett Connor. On sale to Elias Cornelius Benedict the yacht's name was changed to Oneida (1887), then when Benedict bought a new yacht to be named Oneida and sale of the old yacht and conversion to a tow boat the name was changed to Adelante (1913). During Benedict's ownership Oneida was the covert site of an operation on President Grover Cleveland, a friend of Benedict's and frequent guest on the yacht, to remove a cancerous tumor in his mouth.

She was taken over by the U.S. Navy in August 1918 and commissioned as USS Adelante (SP-765) in December 1918. Employed in setting up radio compass stations along the Maine coast, she was also used as a boarding boat, meeting vessels arriving off the port of Boston. USS Adelante was decommissioned in August 1919 and sold in March 1920, subsequently operating as a commercial tow boat under the names John Gully and Salvager. The ship was abandoned in 1941.^[1]

Construction

Utowana was built by the Delaware River Iron Ship Building and Engineering Works as hull number 226 for Washington Everett Connor and on registration assigned the official number 25254 and the signal letters KBND.^[2]^[3]^[4]^{[note 1]} The vessel had registered characteristics of 141 Gross Registered tons, 71 Net tons, 138 ft 0 in (42.1 m) length overall, 121 ft 0 in (36.9 m) length at waterline, 20 ft 7 in (6.3 m) extreme width, 10 ft 0 in (3.0 m) depth, and draft of 8 ft 6 in (2.6 m) (Lloyd's Register of American Yachts) / 9 ft 6 in (2.9 m)) (Ships' Data U.S. Naval Vessels).^[4]^[5] The maximum and cruising speed was 12 knots (14 mph; 22 km/h) with a rated endurance of 1,850 nautical miles (2,130 mi; 3,430 km) driven by two boilers and a single vertical compound engine of 420 ihp.^[3]^[5]^{[note 2]}

Private ownership

Washington Everett Connor

The yacht's first owner was the financier and stock broker Washington Everett Connor who was a member of the American Yacht Club, Larchmont Yacht Club and Boston Yacht Club.^[6] On 21 May 1883 Connor offered a challenge cup to the Boston Yacht Club with an invitation to members to also join the American Yacht Club in New York. The first race for the cup was on 1 September 1883 with six boats entered and competing for the Connor Cup. Utowana with Mr. Connor and his guests George Gould ^{[note 3]} and Mr. Lawrence aboard attended the regatta for the new yacht's first appearance in Boston.^[7] In a fairly short period during 1885 the yacht suffered two casualties, the first striking a pier in the North River and the second striking a rock in the Connecticut River with damage enough to require dry docking.^[8]Utowana was entered in races and is recorded as winning the Lundborg's Cup, open to yachts of one class with any size or type boiler, in the Second Annual Race of the American Steam Yacht Club from Larchmont, New York to New London, Connecticut.^[9] By August 1885 the yacht was reported to be sold to the Colombian Government to be used as a warship on the Magdalena River fighting insurgents. Before the sale was completed the Colombian revolt was over, the government representative had gone home and the yacht remained in the hands of her original owner.^[3]^[10]

E. Van Rensselaer Thayer

On 5 December 1885 Utowana was sold to E. Van Rensselaer Thayer of Boston.^[11]

Elias Cornelius Benedict

In 1887 Utowana was bought by prominent New York City banker Elias Cornelius Benedict, one of the world's leading yachtsman, and renamed the Oneida. Among the friends and distinguished guests Benedict hosted were Edwin Booth, Thomas Bailey Aldrich and Lawrence Barrett, who conceived The Players club while being entertained on the Oneida in 1887.^[1]^[12] Grover Cleveland was a close friend and was a frequent visitor aboard Oneida having spent considerable time in Long Island Sound or off Cape Cod fishing.^[13]

Secret Presidential surgery

The Oneida served as an impromptu hospital on 1 July 1893, when doctors performed a secret operation on Benedict's close friend, President Grover Cleveland.^[1] The Panic of 1893 was underway and a cancerous growth had been found on the roof of the President's mouth. To avoid creating greater panic with the news of the newly elected Cleveland's condition Cleveland himself decided the best place to have the operation in secret was aboard his friend's yacht where his presence would not be particularly notable. The plan was to perform the surgery as the yacht cruised from New York City to Cleveland's summer home, Gray Gables, on Buzzards Bay in Massachusetts where Mrs. Cleveland would be waiting and the patient could recover under the guise of a normal retreat to his summer home.^[13]

The President's personal physician, Joseph D. Bryant, assembled a surgical team led by William Williams Keen as well as overseeing the preparations aboard Oneida. Those involved stripping the saloon of all furniture except an organ that was fixed to the deck and sterilizing the space. Necessary medical supplies, including tanks of nitrous oxide and oxygen and were delivered quietly to the yacht. There would be no operating table with a large chair lashed to the mast being the substitute. The crew was told the President required removal of teeth as a cover for the preparations. On 30 June Keen and four assisting doctors made their way to the yacht by boat from separate points with Cleveland and Bryant boarding in the evening for the night aboard before sailing the next morning. With calm weather the surgery was done shortly after noon as the ship transited Long Island Sound with the removal of the tumor, five teeth, as well as much of the upper left palate and jawbone. On 5 July Cleveland arrived at Gray Gables to recuperate and was fishing in Buzzards Bay by the end of July. The surgery remained secret even after Cleveland's death in 1908, though journalist Elisha Jay Edwards published the story and his reputation suffered in the subsequent successful denials. Only in 1917, when surgeon Keen published in The Saturday Evening Post and expressed regrets as to how Edwards had suffered accusations of making up the story, did the truth become public.^[13]

Tow boat Adelante

In 1913 Benedict purchased a larger yacht, Atreus (formerly Alcedo, official number 107293) that he christened the Oneida . He sold the "old" Oneida which was renamed the Adelante and converted into a tow vessel.^[14]^[15] The converted vessel had almost nothing of the former yacht's appearance with deckhouse and superstructure much more typical of tugs of the time.^[16]

U.S. Naval service

Inspected by the Navy in the 1st Naval District on 9 July 1918, for potential use as a "tow boat," Adelante was apparently not delivered to the Navy until 25 August 1918. Routing instructions indicate that she spent late July in coastwise operations between Philadelphia, New York, Providence, and Boston. Contemporary Navy documentation lists her as a "tug." Her owner at that time (1918), and master, was Theodore Krumm of Melrose, Massachusetts from whom the vessel was purchased for $57,500.^[1]^[5]

Given the classification of SP-765 (or Id.No. 765 in some sources), Adelante was commissioned at Lawley's Shipyard, Neponset, Massachusetts, on 17 December 1918. After fitting out alongside Battery Wharf, and at the Section Base, Boston, through mid-February 1919, Adelante dressed ship on 24 February in honor of the arrival in Boston of President Woodrow Wilson on board the transport George Washington, and stood out as part of the veritable armada of ships which proceeded to greet the returning Chief Executive as his ship arrived, appropriately enough, in President Roads.^[1]

After having returned to Battery Wharf, Adelante got underway for Portland, Maine, the following day and arrived at Portland an hour before midnight. The following morning, she moved to Damariscove Island where she helped to establish one of a network of radio compass stations along the Maine coast. Such a system had originally been installed during the war to detect enemy submarines operating off the coast, to "home in" on their radio transmissions and to determine their direction and distance. Wartime experience with those stations showed that the concept held great promise for peacetime use. As Secretary of the Navy Josephus Daniels reported in 1919, "The system of radio compasses on shore ... proved such a useful aid to navigation that during the past year additional stations have been constructed."^[1]

Adelante continued this work through the end of March, frequenting, besides Damariscove Island, Boothbay and Portland. Working parties, averaging a dozen men, went ashore almost daily to build the station at Damariscove Island, one of the additional 19 stations being added to the original 29 that had been set up on the Atlantic, Pacific, and Gulf Coasts. While at Boothbay on the last day of March, she received orders directing her to return to Boston. Underway at 04:10 on 1 April, Adelante reached Boston at 13:45.^[1]

After shifting her berth to the opposite side of Boston harbor the next morning, Adelante got underway and met the troop transport Mount Vernon as the "boarding boat" for the customs officers. She put these inspectors on board at 13:00 and returned with passengers that she disembarked a little over an hour later.^[1]

Adelante's temporary duty as "boarding boat" continued through much of April. The ships she met included Agamemnon on the 7th; Mongolia on the 10th; Patricia, a transport, on the 17th; City of Birmingham (also on the 17th); Winifredia on the 21st; Vedic and City of Bombay on the 22d; and New Jersey (Battleship No. 16) on the 23d. Two events highlighted the period: the first came on 5 April when she carried Major General Edwards, USA, and his staff out to board the incoming transport America in President Roads, the second occurred on 21 April, when Lt. Keith gave a talk on the Liberty Loan drive. He apparently proved persuasive and patriotic, for all hands purchased bonds, making Adelante a "100 percent ship," enabling her to hoist a "100 percent pennant" to her foremast signifying the achievement.^[1]

Her temporary job completed, Adelante sailed, on the 24th—via Gloucester, Massachusetts—for Rockland, Maine, which she reached on the 25th to resume her work establishing the compass stations. The ship began work on the station at Cross Island, Northeast Cove, on 28 April, and continued this task until 3 May. She then proceeded, via Rockland, to Boston before returning, via Bar Harbor, to Cross Island on the 6th. Shifting briefly to Machiasport, Adelante embarked an inspection party on the 8th to review the status of the work on Cross Island. The party then inspected the station at Damariscove Island the following day (9 May) before Adelante set course for Boston to take on construction supplies and stores (including lumber). She subsequently resumed work at Cross Island on 21 May; based at Machiasport, Adelante touched at Cranberry Isles and White-head Island (14 June) to inspect the radio compass station there. Between 13 and 15 June, she also carried Capt. Cantwell, USCG, on an inspection tour of Coast Guard bases in the vicinity.^[1]

Adelante's men resumed work at Cross Island on the 23rd before the ship visited Mount Desert Island, and then at Machiasport (28–30 June) before returning to Cross Island on the 30th.^[1]

Adelante returned – via Machiasport and Rockland – to Boston which she reached on 3 July. She was decommissioned there on 18 August 1919.^[1]

Return to private ownership

Sold to J. Daniel Gully, of Brooklyn, N.Y., on 25 March 1920, Adelante was renamed John Gully soon thereafter. In subsequent years, the ship—now classed as a "tow boat"—was renamed Salvager by 1924 and was operated first by the H. J. Wheeler Salvage Co., Inc., of New York (1924–27) and then by the Salvage Process Corp., of New York (1927–40). By 1 January 1941, Salvager had been abandoned, due to age and deterioration.^[1]

Footnotes

↑ Colton has ON 25281, but contemporary registers show 25354 for this vessel. The 25281 is the official number of the larger (414 GRT) Utowana built 1891.
↑ Published reports note the speed as 13 knots (15 mph; 24 km/h) perhaps based on racing records.
↑ Son of Jay Gould. Connor was Gould's stockbroker.

Related Research Articles

Oneida may refer to:

"Adelante" is a Spanish word meaning forward. It may also refer to:

USS Impetuous (PYc-46) was a private yacht purchased by the Navy in August 1940 that served as a patrol boat of the United States Navy in Central America. The yacht was built as Paragon, the first of at least two Davol yachts to bear the name, in 1915 for Charles J. Davol of Providence, Rhode Island. In 1916 Davol sold the yacht to John Fred Betz, 3d of Philadelphia who renamed the yacht Sybilla III which served as the Section Patrol yacht USS Sybilla III (SP-104) from May 1917 to December 1918. Sybilla III remained in Betz's ownership until sale in 1935 to R. Livingston Sullivan of Philadelphia who renamed the yacht Arlis. On 12 August 1940 the Navy purchased the yacht placing it in commission as USS PC-454 on 16 October. The vessel was given the name Impetuous and reclassified PYc-46 on 15 July 1943. The yacht was decommissioned at Philadelphia 31 August 1944 and transferred to the War Shipping Administration for sale.

America was a 19th-century racing yacht and first winner of the America's Cup international sailing trophy.

HMCS Grilse was a commissioned patrol boat of the Royal Canadian Navy during the First World War. Launched in 1912 as the private yacht Winchester of the American industrialist Peter Rouss, the vessel was constructed along the lines of a contemporary Royal Navy torpedo boat destroyer. After the outbreak of war, vessels that could be used by belligerents was prohibited by the government of the then-neutral United States. Canadian millionaire J. K. L. Ross purchased Winchester and returned to Canada with the yacht, where he transferred ownership of the vessel to the Royal Canadian Navy. Renamed Grilse, a pseudonym for Atlantic salmon and converted to a patrol boat, the vessel was deployed as part of Canada's east coast patrol combating the German submarine threat. After the war, she was sold back to private interests, re-converted to a yacht and renamed Trillora. Trillora foundered in 1938 at Long Island, New York during a hurricane.

USS Grebe (AM-43) was a Lapwing-class minesweeper in the United States Navy.

USS G. W. Blunt was a Sandy Hook pilot boat acquired by the Union Navy during the American Civil War in 1861. See George W. Blunt (1856) for more details. She was used by the Union Navy as a gunboat as well as a dispatch boat in support of the Union Navy blockade of Confederate waterways.

USS Hope was a 19th-century wooden yacht schooner, designed and built in 1861 by Henry Steers for Captain Thomas B. Ives of Providence, Rhode Island. She was acquired by the Union Navy during the American Civil War. She was placed into service as a gunboat assigned to support the fleet blockading the ports of the Confederate States of America. However, at times, Hope was assigned extra tasks, such as that of a dispatch boat, supply runner and salvage ship. She was a pilot boat from 1866 to 1891 and in 1891 she was replaced by the Herman Oelrichs, when the Hope was wrecked ashore the Sandy Hook Point.

The third USS Ontario (AT–13), a single screw seagoing tug, was laid down by the New York Shipbuilding Company, Camden, New Jersey on 23 November 1911, launched on 11 April 1912, and commissioned at Philadelphia Navy Yard on 4 September 1912.

USS Wadena (SP-158) was a converted yacht patrol vessel of the United States Navy during World War I. She was built in 1891 in Cleveland, Ohio, as a steam yacht for Jeptha Homer Wade II of Cleveland and New York City. During her Navy career, Wadena made several trips escorting submarine chasers across the Atlantic Ocean, and, later, patrolling in the Atlantic and Mediterranean. on 26 February 1918 Wadena came to the aid of sinking tug Mariner and rescued all of her crew.

An armed yacht was a yacht that was armed with weapons and was typically in the service of a navy. The word "yacht" was originally applied to small, fast and agile naval vessels suited to piracy and to employment by navies and coast guards against smugglers and pirates. Vessels of this type were adapted to racing by wealthy owners. The origin of civilian yachts as naval vessels, with their speed and maneuverability, made them useful for adaptation to their original function as patrol vessels. In the United States Navy armed yachts were typically private yachts expropriated for government use in times of war. Armed yachts served as patrol vessels during the Spanish–American War and the World Wars. In the latter conflicts, armed yachts were used as patrol vessels, convoy escorts, and in anti-submarine duties. In the United States, yachts were purchased from their owners with the owners given an option to repurchase their yacht at the close of hostilities.

USS Utowana (SP-951) – also known as USS Victorine (SP-951) -- was a fishing trawler acquired by the U.S. Navy during World War I. The Navy had planned to use her as a minesweeper based out of Kittery, Maine; however, Utowana spent most of her service time operating as an armed patrol craft, responsible for escorting Allied ships across the dangerous North Atlantic Ocean. She served through the war and the armistice before returning to the United States for decommissioning.

USS Locust (YN-17/AN-22) was an Aloe-class net laying ship built for the United States Navy during World War II. She was later transferred to the French Navy as Locuste (A765). She was sold to Malaysian owners but sank after striking a reef off Cikobia Island, Fiji, on 30 July 1978. She was towing the former French ship Scorpion, which also sank.

USS West Bridge (ID-2888) was a Design 1013 cargo ship in the United States Navy during World War I. She was begun as War Topaz for the British Government but was completed as West Bridge. After being decommissioned from the Navy, the ship returned to civilian service as West Bridge, but was renamed Barbara Cates, and Pan Gulf over the course of her commercial career under American registry.

SS Edward Luckenbach was the first of five new cargo ships to be built for the Luckenbach Steamship Company by Fore River Shipbuilding Corporation. The ship was launched in September 1916, delivered in November and briefly operated as such before being requisitioned for World War I service. The ship was one of the cargo vessels in the first large convoy transporting U.S. Army forces to France. After that convoy the ship served as a U.S. Army Chartered Transport (USACT) until converted by the Army to a troop ship and turned over to the Navy a few months before the war's end. The Navy commissioned the ship as USS Edward Luckenbach assigning the miscellaneous identification number ID-1662 in August 1918. The transport made one wartime voyage with continued voyages returning the Army to the U.S. until August 1919.

USS Owera (SP-167), was an armed yacht that served in the United States Navy as a patrol vessel from 1917 to 1919. The vessel, under the name O-We-Ra, was built as a steam yacht in Leith, Scotland in 1907 for Frederick H. Stevens of Buffalo, New York. In 1915 the yacht was sold to United States Senator Peter G. Gerry of Rhode Island and registered in Providence, Rhode Island as Owera.

Acushnet – a steel-hulled revenue cutter – was launched on 16 May 1908 at Newport News, Virginia, by the Newport News Shipbuilding and Drydock Co.; sponsored by Miss Alayce Duff; and commissioned at Baltimore on 6 November 1908. She saw service as a United States Revenue Cutter Service cutter, a U.S. Navy fleet tug, and as a U.S. Coast Guard cutter. She was taken out of service 8 January 1946.

USS Aramis (SP-418/PY-7) was a yacht acquired by the United States Navy during World War I which served as a patrol boat off New York City, was then fitted with an experimental "underwater detection system" and depth charges as an anti-submarine vessel, and was briefly the flagship of a battleship squadron. She ended her career as a tender and houseboat to a survey vessel off the coast of Cuba, until disposed of in 1933.

USS Oneida (SP-432) was the proposed name and designation of an American steam yacht considered for use as a section patrol craft during World War I. In July 1917 the seagoing yacht was ordered taken by the U.S. Navy for service in international waters, but the yacht was never acquired and instead remained in private hands.

<i>Gunilda</i> Scottish-built steam yacht sunk in Lake Superior

Gunilda was a steel-hulled Scottish-built steam yacht in service between her construction in 1897 and her sinking in Lake Superior in 1911. Built in 1897 in Leith, Scotland by Ramage & Ferguson for J. M. or A. R. & J. M. Sladen, and became owned by F. W. Sykes in 1898; her first and second owners were all from England. In 1901, Gunilda was chartered by a member of the New York Yacht Club, sailing across the Atlantic Ocean with a complement of 25 crewmen. In 1903, she was purchased by oil baron William L. Harkness of Cleveland, Ohio, a member of the New York Yacht Club; she ended up becoming the club's flagship. Under Harkness' ownership, Gunilda visited many parts of the world, including the Caribbean, and beginning in 1910, the Great Lakes.

References

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 Robert J. Cressman, Naval History And Heritage Command (15 September 2016). "Adelante (S. P. 765) 1918-1919". Dictionary of American Naval Fighting Ships. Naval History And Heritage Command. Retrieved 19 September 2018.
↑ Colton, Tim (21 October 2013). "The Delaware River Iron Shipbuilding & Engine Works, Chester PA". ShipbuildingHistory. Retrieved 19 September 2018.
1 2 3 Gould, Charies A. (1897). "As Sped the Winds! — Crack American Steam Yachts and Their Owners". New York Journal and Advertiser (8 August 1897): 31. Retrieved 19 September 2018.
1 2 Lloyd's Register of American Yachts. New York: Lloyd's Register of Shipping. 1914. p. 34. Retrieved 19 September 2018.
1 2 3 Construction & Repair Bureau (Navy) (1 November 1918). Ships' Data U.S. Naval Vessels. Washington D.C.: U.S. Government Printing Office. pp. 266–271. Retrieved 19 September 2018.
↑ Hall, Henry (1895). America's Successful Men of Affairs. Vol. 1. New York: The New York Tribune. pp. 149–151. Retrieved 19 September 2018.
↑ Brayley, Arthur Wellington (1891). A History of the Boston Yacht Club. Boston, Mass.: L. P. Hager. pp. 87–90. LCCN 05023987 . Retrieved 19 September 2018.
↑ "The Utowana Unlucky Again". The New York Times (1 July 1885): 8. 1885. Retrieved 19 September 2018.
↑ "American Steam Yacht Club". Outing. Vol. 7, no. 1. October 1885. p. 117. Retrieved 19 September 2018.
↑ "Graphic; Abbreviated Despatches". The Boston Globe (19 August 1885): 4. 1885. Retrieved 19 September 2018.
↑ "American Steam Yacht Club". Outing. Vol. 7, no. 5. February 1886. p. 606. Retrieved 19 September 2018.
↑ Summers, Capt. James C., "Com. E. C. Benedict, Veteran Yachtsman; In His Two Oneidas He Has Cruised More Than 450,000 Miles". The Rudder, Volume 32, No. 6, June 1916, pp. 261–266
1 2 3 Algeo, Matthew. "A President, A Yacht, And A Secret Operation". BoatUS. No. October/November 2011. Retrieved 19 September 2018.
↑ "Yachts". The Nautical Gazette. Vol. 83, no. 8. 23 April 1913. p. 8. Retrieved 19 September 2018.
↑ Lloyd's Register of American Yachts. New York: Lloyd's Register of Shipping. 1914. p. 192. Retrieved 19 September 2018.
↑ "Photo #: NH 100571 Adelante (American Tug, ex-Yacht, 1883)". Naval History And Heritage Command (Archived page no longer at NHHC at ibiblo.org). 28 April 2002. Retrieved 19 September 2018.