USC&GS Yukon (1873)
{{other ships|USC&GS Yukon}}
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{{Infobox ship image |Ship image=Image:USC&GS Yukon (1873).jpg |Ship caption=Yukon }} {{Infobox ship career |Hide header= |Ship country=United States Coast Survey |Ship flag={{Shipboxflag|United States|1867}} |Ship name=USCS Yukon |Ship namesake= |Ship owner= |Ship operator= |Ship registry= |Ship route= |Ship ordered= |Ship awarded= |Ship builder= |Ship original cost= |Ship yard number= |Ship way number= |Ship laid down= |Ship launched= |Ship sponsor= |Ship christened= |Ship completed= |Ship acquired= |Ship commissioned=1873 |Ship recommissioned= |Ship decommissioned= |Ship maiden voyage= |Ship in service= |Ship out of service= |Ship renamed=USC&GS Yukon (1878) |Ship reclassified= |Ship refit= |Ship struck= |Ship reinstated= |Ship homeport= |Ship identification= |Ship motto= |Ship nickname= |Ship honours= |Ship honors= |Ship captured= |Ship fate=Sold 1894 |Ship notes=The U.S. Coast Survey was renamed the U.S. Coast and Geodetic Survey in 1878 |Ship badge= }} {{Infobox ship career |Hide header=title |Ship country=United States |Ship flag={{shipboxflag|United States|1891}} |Ship name=Elwood |Ship namesake= |Ship owner= |Ship operator= |Ship registry= |Ship route= |Ship ordered= |Ship awarded= |Ship builder= |Ship original cost= |Ship yard number= |Ship way number= |Ship laid down= |Ship launched= |Ship sponsor= |Ship christened= |Ship completed= |Ship acquired= |Ship commissioned= |Ship recommissioned= |Ship decommissioned= |Ship maiden voyage= |Ship in service= |Ship out of service= |Ship renamed= |Ship reclassified= |Ship refit= |Ship struck= |Ship reinstated= |Ship homeport= |Ship identification=Signal letters: QVTN |Ship motto= |Ship nickname= |Ship honours= |Ship honors= |Ship captured= |Ship fate=Wrecked 14 December 1895 |Ship notes= |Ship badge= }} {{Infobox ship characteristics |Hide header= |Header caption=as survey ship |Ship class= |Ship type=Survey ship |Ship tonnage=101 |Ship displacement= |Ship tons burthen= |Ship length={{convert|84|ft|m|abbr=on}} |Ship beam={{convert|22|ft|2|in|m|1|abbr=on}} |Ship height= |Ship draught= |Ship draft={{convert|9|ft|m|abbr=on}} |Ship depth= |Ship hold depth= |Ship decks= |Ship deck clearance= |Ship ramps= |Ship ice class= |Ship power= |Ship propulsion=Sails |Ship sail plan=Schooner-rigged |Ship speed= |Ship range= |Ship endurance= |Ship test depth= |Ship boats= |Ship capacity= |Ship troops= |Ship complement= |Ship crew= |Ship time to activate= |Ship sensors= |Ship EW= |Ship armament= |Ship armour= |Ship armor= |Ship aircraft= |Ship aircraft facilities= |Ship notes= }} {{Infobox ship characteristics |Hide header= |Header caption=in commercial service |Ship class= |Ship type=Schooner |Ship tonnage=* {{GRT|97.27}}
|Ship displacement= |Ship tons burthen= |Ship length={{convert|84|ft|m|1|abbr=on}} |Ship beam={{convert|23|ft|m|1|abbr=on}} |Ship height= |Ship draught= |Ship draft= |Ship depth={{convert|8|ft|m|1|abbr=on}} |Ship hold depth= |Ship decks= |Ship deck clearance= |Ship ramps= |Ship ice class= |Ship power= |Ship propulsion=Sails |Ship sail plan=Schooner-rigged |Ship speed= |Ship range= |Ship endurance= |Ship test depth= |Ship boats= |Ship capacity= |Ship troops= |Ship complement= |Ship crew= |Ship time to activate= |Ship sensors= |Ship EW= |Ship armament= |Ship armour= |Ship armor= |Ship aircraft= |Ship aircraft facilities= |Ship notes= }} |
USC&GS Yukon was a schooner that served as a survey ship from 1878 to 1894 in the United States Coast Survey, which was renamed the United States Coast and Geodetic Survey in 1878. She was the pioneering Coast Survey or Coast and Geodetic Survey ship in many of the waters of the Territory of Alaska, including the Bering Sea and the western Aleutian Islands, and she also operated extensively in California and Washington. She later entered commercial service as Elwood and was wrecked in 1895.
Career
=Survey ship=
Yukon was the first Coast Survey ship to bear the name. She entered Coast Survey service in 1873, having been built and outfitted in Kennebunk, Maine, specifically for Alaska service. The Coast Survey was renamed the Coast and Geodetic Survey in 1878.
Yukon is most noted for cruises under Acting Assistant William Healey Dall in 1873, 1874, and 1880, leading to the publication of the Pacific Coast Pilot - Alaska in 1883. The 1873 cruise surveyed the western half of the Aleutian Islands, the eastern half having been surveyed the previous year by the U.S. Coast Survey schooner {{Ship|USCS|Humboldt}}. The 1874 cruise first proceeded to Sitka in Southeast Alaska, and then west along the coast of the Gulf of Alaska as far as Unalaska in the Aleutians, and then entered the Bering Sea and visited Nunivak Island and the Pribilof Islands before returning to Sitka. In 1880, Yukon initially followed much the same course as in 1874, but also included stops at Plover Bay (now Provideniya Bay) on the coast of Siberia, the Diomede Islands, and Point Belcher on Alaska′s Chukchi Sea coast.
A particular focus of these trips was to correct the position of the various bays and islands, which were often misplaced by as much as {{convert|20|nmi}} on the charts of the era, and to document compass variation. These activities depended on astronomical observation to determine location and direction, observations which were notoriously difficult in the cloudy and variable weather of the Bering Sea. The Plover Bay visits of 1880 served to recalibrate marine chronometers against the known longitude of that location. Marcus Baker was the astronomical observer for all three trips.
Another focus was the collection of biological specimens. The 1880 cruise carried Tarleton Bean as biological observer. Bean's focus was to document the fish and other marine resources of the region from both a scientific and a practical perspective. Edward Perry Herendeen – a former whaling captain who later went to Point Barrow on Alaska′s Arctic Ocean coast with the International Polar Expedition of 1881–1883 commanded by United States Army First Lieutenant Patrick H. Ray – was sailing master for all three trips.
Yukon also worked in California and extensively in Washington. In 1877 and 1878, Yukon carried out a hydrographic survey of upper Puget Sound under United States Navy Lieutenant Richard M. Cutts, assisted by Lieutenants Ambrose B. Wyckoff and U. Harris. Wyckoff's observations convinced him that Puget Sound was an ideal location for a naval shipyard. His reports and enthusiastic promotion over the subsequent 13 years led to establishment of the Puget Sound Naval Station at Bremerton, Washington, of which he served the first commander from 1891 to 1893.
Yukon was decommissioned in 1894 and was sold that year at Tacoma, Washington.
=Commercial service=
After her sale, the ship entered commercial service as a schooner with the name Elwood.[https://alaskashipwreck.com/shipwrecks-a-z/alaska-shipwrecks-e/ alaskashipwreck.com Alaska Shipwrecks (E)]
Elwood departed Seattle, Washington, on 1 September 1895 bound for Kodiak on Kodiak Island and Cook Inlet on the south-central coast of Alaska on what was destined to be her final voyage. At 2:00 a.m. on 14 December 1895, she was wrecked on a reef off Gardner Point ({{coord|57|01|N|134|37|W|name=Gardner Point}}) in Southeast Alaska. One member of her crew died when he attempted to reach shore. Her captain and the rest of her crew reached land safely by clinging to her wreckage. Once ashore, they made their way to Murder Cove on the southernmost coast of Admiralty Island in the Alexander Archipelago and then to Killisnoo, where the United States Revenue Cutter Service revenue cutter {{USRC|Wolcott|1873|6}} rescued them. Wolcott transported them to Sitka.
File:WHDall.PNG|William Healey Dall
File:Marcus Baker So Cal Hist Soc.JPG |Marcus Baker
File:Tarleton Hoffman Bean.jpg |Tarleton Hoffman Bean
File:Ambrose B Wyckoff.JPG |Ambrose B. Wyckoff
References
=Footnotes=
{{reflist}}
=Bibliography=
- [http://www.history.noaa.gov/ships/yukon1.html NOAA History, A Science Odyssey: Tools of the Trade: Ships: Coast and Geodetic Survey Ships: Yukon]
- [http://www.history.noaa.gov/stories_tales/lituya.html E. W. Eickelberg, Lituya Bay, Gulf of Alaska. U.S. Coast and Geodetic Survey FIELD ENGINEERS BULLETIN no. 10, December 1936]
- Lewis Publishing Company (1903) A volume of memoirs and genealogy of representative citizens of the city of Seattle and county of King, Washington, including biographies of many of those who have passed away [https://archive.org/stream/volumeofmemoirsg00lewi#page/n479/mode/2up/search/Wyckoff "Ambrose B. Wyckoff"] pp 385–388. Lewis Publishing Company, New York, Chicago.
- Baker, Marcus (1906) [https://books.google.com/books?id=JKoPAAAAIAAJ&q=Dall Geographic dictionary of Alaska, ed 2] United States Geological Survey Bulletin 299 p 27
- Rathbun, Richard (1884) [https://books.google.com/books?id=WnAtAQAAIAAJ&dq=%22In+1871+Mr+William+H+Dall+began+a+second+series%22&pg=PA527 "Fisheries of the United States"] United States National Museum, Bulletin, Issue 27, Part 1 pp 527–8
- [http://www.historylink.org/index.cfm?DisplayPage=output.cfm&file_id=5579 Puget Sound Naval Shipyard] HistoryLink.org Essay 5579.
- [https://books.google.com/books?id=dwEbAAAAYAAJ&dq=Coast+Survey+Yukon&pg=PA573 United States Coast Survey work.] Overland Monthly v 11 p573 1873.
- Bureau of Navigation, US Dept. of Commerce. [https://books.google.com/books?id=qdwYAAAAYAAJ Annual list of merchant vessels of the United States ] . Government Printing Office, Washington.
- United States Coast and Geodetic Survey. [https://books.google.com/books?q=editions%3AUOM39015035393381 REPORT OF THE SUPERINTENDENT OF THE US COAST AND GEODETIC SURVEY SHOWING THE PROGRESS OF THE WORK] 1873, 1874, 1875, fiscal years 1877, 1878, 1879, 1886. Google Books shows these as publication years 1875, 1877, 1878, 1880, 1881, 1881, 1887.
External links
Accounts of the Yukon cruise of 1880
- New York Times (1880) [https://www.nytimes.com/1880/09/17/archives/iliuliuk-on-unalashka-a-graphic-picture-of-a-village-in-alaskathe-a.html?sq=yukon&scp=3&st=p Ililuliuk on Unalashka; A graphic picture of a village in Alaska.] September 17, Page 2
- New York Times (1880) [https://www.nytimes.com/1880/11/21/archives/cruising-in-the-arctic-the-yukon-at-st-paul-and-at-plover-bay.html?sq=yukon&scp=1&st=p Cruising in the arctic; The Yukon at St. Paul and at Plover Bay.] November 21, Page 8
- New York Times (1880) [https://www.nytimes.com/1880/12/06/archives/ten-days-in-the-arctic-the-yukon-cruising-on-the-alaskan-coast.html?sq=yukon&scp=2&st=p Ten days in the arctic; The Yukon cruising on the Alaskan coast.] December 6, Page 2
- {{ cite journal | author=Baker, Marcus | title=Boundary line between Alaska and Siberia | journal=Bulletin of the Philosophical Society of Washington | volume=4 | year=1881 | pages=123–133 | url=https://books.google.com/books?id=KNcAAAAAYAAJ&dq=%22emma+Harbor%22+Naval&pg=PA124 }}
- {{ cite journal | author=Dall, W.H. | title=Notes on Alaska and the vicinity of Bering Strait | journal=American Journal of Science | volume=21 | year=1881 | pages=104–111 | url=https://books.google.com/books?id=Ir0EAAAAYAAJ&dq=Coast+Survey+schooner+Yukon&pg=PA104 }}
- {{ cite journal | author=Dall, William Healey | title=Reminiscences of Alaskan volcanos | journal=Scientific Monthly | volume=7 | year=1917 | pages=80–90 | url=https://books.google.com/books?id=QoYZAAAAYAAJ&dq=Coast+Survey+schooner+Yukon&pg=PA88 }}
- Bean, Tarleton H. [https://books.google.com/books?id=dis-AAAAYAAJ&dq=Tarleton+Bean&pg=PA242 "A NATURALIST'S ADVENTURES"] in Rudolf Kersting (ed) The white world: life and adventures within the arctic circle portrayed by famous living explorers Lewis, Scribner & co., New York pp 249–266 1902
{{1895 shipwrecks}}
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Category:Ships built in Kennebunk, Maine
Category:Ships of the United States Coast and Geodetic Survey
Category:Survey ships of the United States
Category:History of Washington (state)
Category:Pre-statehood history of Alaska