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US COAST GUARD The Other Naval Service - USCG Patches


Garth Thompson

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Salvage Sailor

USCGC VIGOROUS (WMEC-627) 1970's New London, CT - Commissioned in 1969

WMEC 627 USCGC VIGOROUS 001.jpg

WMEC 627 USCGC VIGOROUS 002.jpg

 

USCGC VIGOROUS (WMEC-627) Current patch Virginia Beach, VA - Commissioned in 1969

 

WMEC 627 USCGC VIGOROUS 003.jpg

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Has anyone ever had or seen these unique USCG desert Maritime Safety and Security Team (MSST) patches for Seattle (91101), Galveston (91104), and Boston (91110)? I've been looking for them for years and have only seen them in photos. We had to settle for cropped photos of the Seattle and Galveston MSST patches being worn in our recent book, "Desert Uniforms, Patches, and Insignia of the US Armed Forces", however the Boston MSST photo was of such poor quality we couldn't use it.

 

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Salvage Sailor
USCGC ACUSHNET (WAGO-167) ex-USS SHACKLE (ARS-9) Diver Class Rescue WWII Salvage ship
Transferred from the USN to the USCG in 1946 and commissioned as USCGC Acushnet (WAT-167)

 

WMEC 167 WAGO 167 USCGC ACUSHNET 001.jpg

 

USCG Oceanographic ship 1968-1971 as (WAGO-167), aka "NOAA's Ark" from 1971 to 1978

 

WMEC 167 WAGO 167 USCGC ACUSHNET 002.jpg

 

Redesignated as USCGC ACHUSHNET (WMEC-167) in 1978 homeport Eureka, CA and then Ketchikan Alaska on Bearing Sea Patrol. She had the gold hull numbers for being "Queen of the Fleet", the oldest commissioned cutter in the USCG until her decommissioning in 2011

 

WMEC 167 USCGC ACUSHNET 001.jpg

 

WMEC 167 USCGC ACUSHNET Intl Ice patrol 001.jpg

 

WMEC 167 USCGC ACUSHNET 002.jpg

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Salvage Sailor

USCGC COMANCHE (WMEC-202)

Began life as a USN Sotoyomo class Auxiliary Fleet Tug named USS WAMPANOAG (ATA-202) serving in Okinawa 1944-1948.

 

WMEC 202 WATA 202 USCGC COMANCHE 001.jpg

 

Loaned to the USCG in 1949, then transferred to the Coast Guard in 1959 and designated as COMANCHE WATA-202 and later WMEC-202.

 

WMEC 202 WATA 202 USCGC COMANCHE 002.jpg

 

U.S. Coast Guard History Program https://www.uscg.mil/history/cutters/143/Comanche1959.asp

 

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Salvage Sailor

A ship of many guises and talents.....

 

USCGC GRESHAM (WHEC-387) Market Time High Endurance Cutter, Flagship of USCGC Squadron Three, "The White Dragon of the Sea"

 

Intended to be a Barnegat class Seaplane Tender in 1943 USS WILLOUGHBY (AVP-57), she was reclassified and commissioned as a Motor Torpedo Boat Tender USS WILLOUGHBY (AGP-9) in 1944. She tended her PT boat squadrons in New Guinea, Palau, Leyte, Luzon, Palawan, Borneo and Mindoro.

 

In 1947 she was loaned to the US Coast Guard and commissioned as USCGC GRESHAM (AVP-57) serving as an Oceanographic ship and cutter until 1966 when she was reclassified as a high endurance cutter and redesignated WHEC-387

 

WHEC 387 USCGC GRESHAM 001.jpg

 

She spent 1967 and 1968 in Vietnam with Coast Guard Squadron Three employed on Market Time missions

 

Gresham departed San Francisco for Pearl Harbor, Hawaii, on 16 April 1967 under the command of Commander Norman L. Scherer, USCG. Upon her arrival in Hawaii, Gresham became flagship of Coast Guard Squadron Three, which was designated Task Unit 70.8.6. Captain John E. Day, commander of the squadron, hoisted his flag aboard Gresham upon activation of the squadron on 24 April 1967.
 
USCG Squadron 3 Vietnam 001.jpg
 
Coast Guard Squadron Three was tasked to operate in conjunction with U.S. Navy forces in Operation Market Time, the interdiction of communist coastal arms and munitions traffic along the coastline of Vietnam during the Vietnam War. The squadron's other Vietnam War duties included fire support for ground forces, resupplying Coast Guard and Navy patrol boats, and search-and-rescue operations. Serving in the squadron with Gresham were the cutters USCGC Yakutat (WHEC-380), USCGC Bering Strait (WHEC-382), USCGC Barataria (WHEC-381), and USCGC Half Moon (WHEC-378); like Gresham, they all were Casco-clas cutters and former Navy Barnegat-class ships. They departed Pearl Harbor on 26 April 1967 and reported to Commander, United States Seventh Fleet, for Market Time duty on 4 May 1967. They were joined by U.S. Navy radar picket destroyer escorts (DERs) of Escort Squadrons 5 and 7.
 
The ten Market Time ships arrived at Subic Bay in the Philippines on 10 May 1967. The five Coast Guard cutters and five Navy destroyer escorts continuously manned four Market Time stations off Vietnam, while only Navy warships served on two Taiwan patrol stations. One ship rotated duty as the station ship in Hong Kong. Gresham remained in the Western Pacific until 28 January 1968 and arrived home at Alameda on 10 February 1968.
 
WHEC 387 USCGC GRESHAM 002.jpg
 
She continued her service in Pacific waters through 1969 and then in the Atlantic when in February 1970 she was reclassified as a meteorological cutter and redesignated WAGW-387
 
WHEC 387 USCGC GRESHAM 003.jpg
 
USCGC GRESHAM was finally decommissioned in April 1973 after a long life at sea with both the USN and USCG

 

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Salvage Sailor

Another converted USN Barnegat class small seaplane tender (ex-AVP-36) In service 1944 to 1971

 

USCGC COOK INLET (WHEC-384) High endurance cutter and Market Time veteran of Coast Guard Squadron Three in Vietnam with two campaign stars.

 

WHEC 384 USCGC COOK INLET 001.jpg

 

In 1971 she was transferred to the South Vietnamese Navy. Escaping the fall in 1975, she fled to the Philippines but was never transferred to the Philippine Navy.

 

On 21 December 1971 – the day the Coast Guard decommissioned her – Cook Inlet was transferred to South Vietnam, which commissioned her into the Republic of Vietnam Navy as the frigate RVNS Trần Quốc Toản (HQ-06). By mid-1972, six other former Casco-class cutters – known in the Republic of Vietnam Navy as the Trần Quang Khải-class frigates – also were in South Vietnamese service. They were the largest warships in the South Vietnamese inventory, and their 5-inch (127-millimeter) guns were South Vietnam's largest naval guns. Trần Quốc Toản and her sisters fought alongside U.S. Navy ships during the final years of the Vietnam War, patrolling the South Vietnamese coast and providing gunfire support to South Vietnamese forces ashore.
 
When South Vietnam collapsed at the end of the Vietnam War in late April 1975, Trần Quốc Toản became a ship without a country. She fled to Subic Bay in the Philippines, packed with South Vietnamese refugees. On 22 and 23 May 1975, a U.S. Coast Guard team inspected Trần Quốc Toản and five of her sister ships, which also had fled to the Philippines in April 1975. One of the inspectors noted: "These vessels brought in several hundred refugees and are generally rat-infested. They are in a filthy, deplorable condition. Below decks generally would compare with a garbage scow."
 
The Republic of the Philippines took custody of Trần Quốc Toản after her arrival in 1975, and the United States formally transferred her to the Philippines on 5 April 1976. She did not enter Philippine Navy service; instead she and her sister ship RVNS Trần Nhật Duật (HQ-03) were cannibalized for spare parts to allow the Philippines to keep four other sister ships – all former South Vietnamese ships known in the Philippine Navy as the Andrés Bonifacio-class frigates – in commission in the Philippine Navy.
 
The former Trần Quốc Toản was discarded in 1982 and probably scrapped.

 

WHEC 384 USCGC COOK INLET 002.jpg

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Salvage Sailor

Three war Treasury class high endurance cutter USCGC TANEY (WHEC-37) In service 1935 to 1986. She is now a museum ship in the Inner Harbor of Baltimore, Maryland, and was designated a National Historic Landmark in 1988.

 

WHEC 37 USCGC TANEY 001.jpg

 

WWII Korea Vietnam patch circa 1976

 

WHEC 37 USCGC TANEY 002.jpg

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Salvage Sailor

Nice theater made patch Bearmon, I was about to post my merrowed edge version

 

USCG Squadron One Vietnam 001.jpg

 

US COAST GUARD SQUADRON ONE VIETNAM

 

USCG Squadron One Vietnam 002.jpg

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Salvage Sailor

Medium Endurance Cutter USCGC YOCONA (WMEC-168/WAT-168) ex-USS SEIZE (ARS-26) US Navy Diver class salvage ship in service 1944 to 1996

 

Redesignated Medium Endurance Cutter (WMEC-168) in 1965
Decommissioned, 30 May 1996 and returned to US Naval custody, for disposal
Final Disposition, to be disposed of as a target off Guam in 2006

WMEC 168 WAT 168 USCGC YOCONA ex USS SEIZE ARS-26  001.jpg

WMEC 168 WAT 168 USCGC YOCONA ex USS SEIZE ARS-26  002.jpg

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Salvage Sailor

Medium Endurance Cutter USCGC YOCONA (WMEC-168/WAT-168) ex-USS SEIZE (ARS-26) US Navy Diver class salvage ship in service 1944 to 1996

 

Redesignated Medium Endurance Cutter (WMEC-168) in 1965
Decommissioned, 30 May 1996 and returned to US Naval custody, for disposal
Final Disposition, to be disposed of as a target off Guam in 2006

WMEC 168 WAT 168 USCGC YOCONA ex USS SEIZE ARS-26  003.jpg

WMEC 168 WAT 168 USCGC YOCONA ex USS SEIZE ARS-26  004.jpg

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