Name USS Letter B Completed 1912 Commissioned 20 October 1917 Builder Electric Launch Company | Namesake Previous name retained Acquired 7 May 1917 Length 12 m | |
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Fate Returned to owner 29 April 1919 | ||
USS Letter B (SP-732) was a United States Navy patrol vessel in commission from 1917 to 1919.
Letter B was built in 1912 as a private "runabout"-type motorboat of the same name by the Electric Launch Company (ELCO) at Bayonne, New Jersey. On 7 May 1917, the U.S. Navy acquired her under a free lease from her owner, C. Chester Eaton of Brockton, Massachusetts, for use as a section patrol vessel during World War I. Enrolled in the Naval Coast Defense Reserve on 10 May 1917, she was commissioned as USS Letter B (SP-732) on 20 October 1917 at Norfolk, Virginia, with Quartermaster First Class L. C. Chamberlain, USNRF, in command.
Assigned to the 5th Naval District, Letter B served as a harbor and shore patrol boat at Norfolk and Hampton Roads, Virginia, for the rest of World War I . She also served as a duty and emergency boat for seaplanes at Naval Air Station Norfolk.
The Navy returned Letter B to Eaton on 29 April 1919.