In these circumstances the only ships which could be hastily fitted out and sent across were the larger yachts, about twenty in number, whose owners had enrolled and offered them for service when the war clouds were gathering. It had been expected that these pleasure craft, with their volunteer officers and crews, would be used only in the coastal patrol areas and not for duty in the war zone, and in the naval organization they were defined as belonging to “Class IV,” which had a limited field of operation. This was no obstacle, it is needless to say, for when the greater opportunity offered, the amateur bluejackets who manned these yachts were eager to shift into “Class II,” or combatant ships, and to sign on for the adventure in the war zone.

The story of one of these yachts which bravely endured almost two years of battering service in foreign waters is more than a record of a single ship, for it will convey, I hope, something of the spirit and the experiences which they all shared together and which the Navy at large regards with pride as worthy of its traditions. These ships were flung into work for which they were presumably unfitted, into a kind of warfare which was wholly novel, and they sailed with crews who were mostly greenhorns, but they passed the test with flying colors and their admiral who commanded the American Naval Forces in France took pleasure in writing, not long ago:

U.S.S. Pennsylvania
New York, N.Y.
8 September, 1919

My dear Mr. Paine:

I am glad that you are to write the war story of the Corsair because the story of the yachts that came to France in 1917 is well worthy of record. These vessels, designed for pleasure and manned, in large part, by officers and men of little naval training, but of unconquerable spirit, were by peculiar circumstances given an important rôle in the war.

Copyright by Underwood and Underwood, N.Y.

ADMIRAL H. B. WILSON, COMMANDING THE U.S. NAVAL FORCES IN FRANCE

Because of the lack of destroyers, the yachts contributed a large share of the American naval effort on the French coast during the summer and fall of 1917—trying months of the submarines’ greatest activity. Their work then and subsequently, whether on troop and store-ship escort in the Bay of Biscay, convoy escort through the difficult coastal channels of France, or on the Gironde convoys, was frequently hazardous and was always well done.

Very sincerely
H. B. Wilson
(Admiral, U.S. Navy)