USCGC Crawford (WSC-134)

Crawford was built by American Brown Boveri Electric Corporation at Camden, New Jersey and she was commissioned as USCGC Crawford (WSC-145) on 21 February 1927.[5] She was the seventh of the Active-class patrol boats to be commissioned, which were designed for trailing the "mother ships" that supported the smuggling boats of "rum-runners" during Prohibition. The Active-class ships were also referred to unofficially as the "Buck & a Quarter" class in reference to their 125 ft (38 m) length.[6][7]

Crawford had been designed specifically for prohibition enforcement service and assumed Rum Patrol duty 27 March 1927 with a temporary home-port of Sault Sainte Marie, Michigan and later a permanent station on 28 September 1927 at Two Harbors, Minnesota.[5] Her routine consisted of picketing liquor laden "mother ships" and preventing them from offloading prohibited cargo to smaller contact boats that were used to deliver liquor to shore.[8] With the end of prohibition, she assumed a more traditional role of a Coast Guard cutter, that of search and rescue, law enforcement, merchant vessel inspection, and defense training.[Note 1][9] In 1937, Crawford was assigned the home-port of Buffalo, New York. In mid-1941 Crawford was converted for use to service aids-to-navigation due to a shortage of buoy tenders but was later transferred to U.S. Navy control with patrol duties out of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania and reconfigured as a sub-chaser.[10]

Crawford performed patrol duties out of Philadelphia but was later transferred to San Juan, Puerto Rico, where she performed wartime anti-submarine patrols and convoy escort duty with the Navy Caribbean Sea Frontier Squadron. On 5 June 1944 she is credited with the rescue of survivors from a sunken merchant vessel. On 30 June she took in tow the torpedoed tanker SS Unimak.[11]

Crawford was reassigned duties out of the Tenth Coast Guard District in June 1945 was released from Navy service on 1 January 1946.[11] Crawford was decommissioned on 15 August 1947 and was donated to Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution 28 November 1955.[2]

R/V Crawford at Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution

After Crawford was transferred to Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution she underwent a renovation at Munro Shipyard at Boston, Massachusetts to increase her fuel capacity. She worked in both North and South Atlantic Ocean waters and was mainly used for working on hydrographic stations, long line fishing studies and in surveying sites for Texas towers. R/V Crawford made a total of 175 cruises for Woods Hole. Her capacity was 17 crew and 9 scientists. In 1970 she was sold to the University of Puerto Rico.[12]

On 13 May 1986 USCGC Manitou stopped the 125 ft (38 m) M/V Sun Bird in Seventh District waters and her boarding team discovered 40,000 lb (18,000 kg) of marijuana hidden aboard. The boarding team then located the vessel's builder's plate and learned that the Sun Bird was the decommissioned "buck-and-a-quarter" cutter Crawford. The former cutter and her 14-man crew were taken into custody. A newspaper article describing the incident noted:

If Crawford was a person, Miami would have probably seen it blush . . . The ex-Coast Guard cutter received more publicity for smuggling the drugs than for its 20-year Coast Guard career.[13][Note 2]

Rum Patrol

• Canney, Donald L. (1995). U.S. Coast Guard and Revenue Cutters, 1790–1935. Naval Institute Press, Annapolis, Maryland. ISBN 978-1-55750-101-1.
• Flynn, Jim; Lortz, Ed; Lukas, Holger (March 2018). "Answer 39/48". Warship International. LV (January 2018): 23–25. ISSN 0043-0374.
• Johnson, Robert Irwin (1987). Guardians of the Sea, History of the United States Coast Guard, 1915 to the Present. Naval Institute Press, Annapolis, Maryland. ISBN 978-0-87021-720-3.
• Scheina, Robert L. (1982). U.S. Coast Guard Cutters & Craft of World War II. Naval Institute Press, Annapolis, Maryland. ISBN 978-0-87021-717-3.
• Scheina, Robert L. (1990). U.S. Coast Guard Cutters & Craft, 1946–1990. Naval Institute Press, Annapolis, Maryland. ISBN 978-0-87021-719-7.