USS Katherine (SP-715)

Not to be confused with USS Katherine K. (SP-220).
Career (United States)
Name: USS Katherine (1917-1918)
USS SP-715 (1918)
Namesake: Katherine was her previous name retained
SP-715 was her section patrol number
Builder: J. T. Sharpley, Greenbackville, Virginia
Completed: 1907
Acquired: 18 May 1917
Commissioned: 26 April 1917
Decommissioned: 22 October 1918
Renamed: SP-715 in 1918
Fate: Returned to owner 22 October 1918
Notes: Operated as civilian motorboat Katherine 1907-1917 and from 1918
General characteristics
Type:Patrol vessel
Tonnage:5 gross tons
Length:35 ft (11 m)
Beam:9 ft (2.7 m)
Draft:2 ft (0.61 m)
Speed:7 knots
Armament:None

USS Katherine (SP-715), later USS SP-715, was a United States Navy patrol vessel in commission from 1917 to 1918.

Katherine was built as a civilian motorboat of the same name in 1907 by J. T. Sharpley at Greenbackville, Virginia. In 1917, the U.S. Navy acquired her under a free lease from her owner, the Virginia Fish and Oyster Commission, for use as a section patrol boat during World War I. She was commissioned as USS Katherine (SP-715) on 26 April 1917, although the Navy did not actually take possession of her until 18 May 1917, when Chief Master-at-Arms C. C. Jones took command of her at Norfolk, Virginia.

Assigned to the 5th Naval District and based at Greenbackville, Katherine operated as a shore and section patrol boat in the southern Chesapeake Bay and in Virginia‍ '​s Atlantic coastal waters in and around Chincoteague Bay until just under three weeks before the end of World War I. She was renamed USS SP-715 sometime in 1918.

SP-715 was decommissioned on 22 October 1918 and returned to the Virginia Fish and Oyster Commission the same day.

References