Herreshoff #193507es [Dinghy for Aide de Camp]
Particulars
Type: Columbia Rowboat
Designed by: NGH
Finished: 1935-11-28
Job No.: 1-1552
Construction: Wood
LOA: 14' 0" (4.27m)
Beam: 4' 8" (1.42m)
Rig: None (rowboat)
Centerboard: No centerboard
Built for: Commerford, F.B.
Note: Particulars are primarily but not exclusively from the HMCo Construction Record. Supplementary information not from the Construction Record appears elsewhere in this record with a complete citation.
Model
Model location: H.M.M. Model Room North Wall Right
Vessels from this model:
Original text on model:
"Original COLUMBIA lifeboat for 499 14' [long] scale 1/12 Nov. 1899 gig for #503 506, 507 [unreadable] (cut dinghy 520 16x14 7 1/2" frames dinghy for 624 scale 10 3.4 over 16 * 10-8 [unreadable] / 529, 532, 533, 534 16x14 add-on bow changed and shear raised remeasured Dec. 4, 1909. Boats for 692 and later" (Source: Original handwritten annotation on model. Undated.)
Model Description:
"14' lifeboat of 1899 for the cutter Columbia. Also used, with alterations to scale, mold spacing, freeboard, and with sailing rig added, for many other rowboats, sailing dinghies, and tenders. This shape became HMCo's standard for decades to follow." (Source: Bray, Maynard. 2004.)
Note: Vessels that appear in the records as not built, a cancelled contract, a study model, or as a model sailboat are listed but not counted in the list of vessels built from a model.
Offsets
Offset booklet number(s): HH.4.111.4
Offset booklet contents:
#499 (14' lifeboat and 14 1/2' gas launch), 11 1/2' rowboat ([internal] job no. 6259), #624 (10'8" dinghy), 12 1/2' rowboat.
Offset Booklet(s) in Haffenreffer-Herreshoff Collection. Francis Russell Hart Nautical Collections, MIT Museum, Cambridge, Mass. (Restricted access --- see curator.)
Note: "Reference to offset booklet HH.4.111.4 was added by CvdL because this boat was built from the same construction plan as other sisterships that were specifically mentioned in it." (Source: van der Linde, Claas. April 24, 2021.)
Drawings
List of drawings:
Drawings believed to have been first drawn for, or being first referenced to
Herreshoff #193507es [Dinghy for Aide de Camp] are listed in bold.
Click on Dwg number for preview, on HH number to see at M.I.T. Museum.
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Dwg 028-016 (HH.5.02012); Construction Dwg > Columbia Model 14' x 4'-8" (1936-03-10)
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Dwg 132-000 (HH.5.10799): General Arrangement > Aide De Camp, F.B. Commerford, Esq. Owner (1938-10-27)
Note: The Haffenreffer-Herreshoff Collection is copyrighted by the Francis Russell Hart Nautical Collections of the MIT Museum in Cambridge, Mass. Permission to incorporate information from it in the Herreshoff Catalogue Raisonné is gratefully acknowledged. The use of this information is permitted solely for research purposes. No part of it is to be published in any form whatsoever.
Supplement
Research Note(s)
"The building date, 1935-11-26 is barely legible on plan 28-33 from 1936 and may be wrong (although it does fit the sequence of "one-dash" numbers assigned by HMCo.
One-Dash No. 1-1152, Date 11-28-305[?], L. 14', H1 2' 2 1/2", H2 1' 8 1/2", H3 1' [illegible], H4 1' 10 [illegible], Keel Oak, Apron Oak, Stem Oak, Planking Cedar, Trim Mahog, Footboards Cedar, Deck None, Bulkheads None, Fittings Brz, Remarks No Rudder - For Aide De Camp, Frame Space 7 1/2", Moulds No. F, as per plan 28-16 from 1936." (Source: van der Linde, Claas. October 26, 2009.)
"Aide De Camp
(IX-224: dp. 167; 1. 110'; b. 18'2"; dr. 6'; s. 15.0 k.)
Aide De Camp --- a wooden-hulled motor yacht designed by B. T. Dobson --- was built in 1922 at Neponset, Mass., by the George Lawley & Sons Corporation for the noted yarn manufacturer, Samuel Agar Salvage, whom she served as Colleen.
Among the foremost of the be vy [sic] of other owners who luxuriated in the comforts of this lavishly appointed vessel was the once and future governor of New Hampshire, John Gilbert Winant, whom President Roosevelt would send to England as the wartime United States Ambassador to the court of St. James. When he took possession of the yacht from Karl W. Erikon of New York City in late 1926, or early 1927, he renamed her Ranger. About a year later, H. M. Pierce of Red Lion, Del., owned the ship and renamed her Poinsettia. In 1931, the Boston financier, Frederick Henry Prince, purchased the yacht and dubbed her Aide De Camp, a name which she bore under her next owners, in turn, Frank D. Comerford and Harvard University.
Early in World War II, the yacht was turned over to the university's Underwater Sound Laboratory and was used in experimental work to develop and improve sonar equipment and to devise and to sharpen antisubmarine warfare tactics to combat German U-boat operations against Allied shipping in the Atlantic. Sometime later, (the records of the transfer have apparently perished) the ship came into the custody of the Office of Scientific Research and Development, for whom she continued this vital and secret work.
After the surrender of Germany, the vessel was transferred to the Navy on 31 May 1945 and was placed in service on 18 June 1945, Lt. David W. Warren, Jr., in charge.
Upon her activation, the vessel was delivered to Commander, 7th Naval District and assigned to operations for the Bureau of Ordnance conducting underwater sound research while based at Fort Lauderdale, Fla. At the conclusion of this mission, she was placed out of service on 2 November 1945; and her name was struck from the Navy list on 28 November 1945. The vessel was transferred to the Maritime Administration on 4 September 1946 and sold.
In private hands, she long remained in Florida waters, serving Gustave G. Copeland of Miami in 1949 and Fred Bowman of DeLand in 1951. Still carrying the name Aide De Camp, the yacht shifted her home port to Pensacola in 1953. Some two years later, she was acquired by the Kennedy Marine Engine Co.; began commercial operations for that firm from Biloxi, Miss., under the name Mariner 11; and remained in that status into the 1980's." (Source: http://www.history.navy.mil/danfs/a4/aide_de_camp.htm, retrieved May 10, 2009.)" (Source: van der Linde, Claas. October 26, 2009.)
"This boat's building date was determined from notes on the original plan. Plan 28-16 dates this boat as 11/28/35." (Source: van der Linde, Claas. November 28, 2014.)
Note: Research notes contain information about a vessel that is often random and unedited but has been deemed useful for future research.
Note
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