Wreck of USS Grebe (AT-134)

USS Grebe was laid down in 1918 as a Lapwing Class Minesweeper for service with the US Navy and following her May 1919 commissioning she sailed for duty with the US Atlantic Fleet for minesweeping duties in the North Sea.

Remaining with the Atlantic Fleet until 1935, the Grebe had the honor of being the tender and towing ship for the multi-city dual-coast tour of the recommissioned USS Constitution, a trip which took three years to complete. Following her escort duty, the Grebe was assigned to the US Pacific Fleet and homeported at Pearl Harbor, where she was redesignated as a Fleet Tug and began general towing and salvage work with the Pacific Fleet.

Present and under repair during the attack on Pearl Harbor on December 7th, 1941, the Grebe emerged undamaged and her crew were credited with downing a Japanese plane despite only having small arms to fire at the aircraft. Departing Pearl Harbor in January 1942, the Grebe resumed her duties and towed several oil, housing and stores barges across the mid-pacific before she called at Pago Pago in November 1942 to become the station tug for the area. Word soon reached the crew of the Grebe that the cargo ship SS Thomas A. Edison had grounded off the Fijian Island of Vuanta Vatoa, and needed assistance to be pulled off the reef.

Arriving onscene on December 6th, the Grebe and her crew began their salvage operation on the grounded freighter, but three days into the process the Grebe herself became stuck fast on the reef on December 9th and herself became the object of a salvage mission. After spending nearly a month aground and under salvage, The Grebe and the Thomas Edison were both abandoned on January 1st when a massive hurricane began to lash the island with large waves and heavy winds. When salvage parties returned to Vuanta Vatoa on January 3rd, the Grebe was found to have been partially sunk and severely damaged. The Thomas Edison was nowhere in sight. Declared lost and decommissioned on the same day, USS Grebe ended her war with one Battle Star for World War II service.

www.navsource.org/archives/11/02043.htm