HMCo #416p YMs 19

"Mar[ch] 26, 1941.
U.S. Mine Sweepers Y.M.S. 1-44
Length O.A. 136'-0".
Length on designed L.W.L. 130'-0.
Extreme beam over planking 24'-0.
10 stations, 13'-0" apart.
Frame spaces 15".
Both begin on FP = forward perpendicular.
Moulded draft 6'-3 1/2".
Thickness of planking 3".
Thickness of frames 5" ? 5 1/2".
Scale of model 3/8" = 1'." (Source: Herreshoff, A. Sidney DeW.? [Penciled note in Offset Booklet HH.4.075.] Haffenreffer-Herreshoff Collection, MIT Museum, Cambridge, MA.)

"Contracts that will provide work for several hundred men up to October of next year have been received by the Herreshoff Manufacturing Company, Bristol concern engaged in the manufacture of minesweepers for the U. S. Navy, it was reliably learned this morning.
Several weeks ago the company was forced to lay off one-third of its personnel due to a shortage of steel. This condition, however, has been corrected, it was learned, and the workmen who were laid off will be placed again within a week or two.
Workers, it was said, have been asked to contact the concern's office so that it will be ascertained whether or not they will be available when called for.
Neither Carl W. Haffenreffer, general manager, or J. H. Garrity, personnel manager, could be reached this morning to confirm the report. However it is known that letters bearing the information have been received by the workers.
The Bristol plant, as well as other boatyards along the coast, was forced to lay-off a large part of its help due to the inability to get Navy-approved and Navy-supplied steel armor plates as well as tensile steel which is used in the construction of hulls of large craft. Delay in receiving Navy-supplied plans also was held responsible.
There are two large crafts [#416p YMs 19 and #415p YMs 18] under construction at the plant and it is reported that the concern has orders for eight more. [The 'eight more' are possibly a reference to the nine Coastal Transports #425p APc1 to #433p APc9.]" (Source: Anon. "Herreshoff Shipyards Ready to Resume Full Operations." Bristol Phoenix, November 25, 1941, p. 1.)

"The ceremonies in connection with the launching of the 135-foot mine­sweeper YMS-19, at the Herreshoff Mfg Co plant, Saturday afternoon [December 27, 1941], were conducted with clocklike precision.
Promptly at three o'clock, the signal was given for the ship to slide down the greased ways and as it started its slow journey to the water, Mrs H. T. Smith, of Quincy, Mass., with one efficient stroke, broke a bottle of champagne over the bow Mrs Smith is the wife of the Naval Captain in charge of supervision of naval construction in the New England area.
The YMS-19 is the second 135-foot minesweeper to be built at Herreshoff's, the first [#415p YMs 18] having been launched earlier this month. Due to wartime regulations the launching ceremony were witnessed by only a few officials and invited guests." (Source: Anon. "New Minesweeper Launched Saturday." Bristol Phoenix, December 30, 1941, p. 1.)

"WASHINGTON, Dec. 5 [1944] The loss of five vessels of the United States Central Pacific Force, four of them by enemy action and the other by an accidental explosion, was announced today by the Navy Department. The ships were: --- the YMS-19, which hit a Japanese mine and sank off Angaur Island in the Palaus ...
The skipper of the YMS-19, Lieut. John Keys Mahaffey of Pittsburgh, described what happened to his minesweeper when it struck the enemy mine.
'It looked like an explosion in a lumber yard,' he said. 'The mine hit the stern and blew it off and the boat sank in two minutes. We got off two life rafts, but three men were killed outright. Five others and an officer were lost. I was lucky. All I got was some lacerations on the leg, so I was able to make it to one of the rafts.'
The YMS-19 was built by Herreshoff Manufacturing Company, Bristol, R. I., in 1942. ... " (Source: Anon. "Navy Lists 5 Ships as Pacific Losses." New York Times, December 6, 1944, p. 13.)

"YMS-19
YMS-1 Class Auxiliary Motor Minesweeper: Laid down 27 June 1941 by the Herreshoff Manufacturing Co., Bristol, RI; Launched 27 December 1941; Completed 20 June 1942; Commissioned, (date unknown); Sunk by a mine 24 September 1944 at 06deg N., 134de E. in Palau Islands area, Caroline Islands; Struck from the Naval Register 11 December 1944.
Specifications: Displacement 270 t.; Length 136'; Beam 24' 6"; Draft 8'; Speed 15 kts; Complement 32; Armament one single 3"/50 gun mount, two 20mm, two dcp; Propulsion two General Motors diesel engines, two shafts." (Source: http://www.navsource.org/archives/11/19019.htm, retrieved March 16, 2007.)

• Alpha and #416p YMs19 (MIT Museum-made index card)
• Note: The vessel index cards comprise two sets of a total of some 3200 cards about vessels built by HMCo, with dimensions and information regarding drawings, later or former vessel names, and owners. They were compiled from HMCo's early days until 1920 and added to in later decades, apparently by Hart Nautical curator William A. Baker and his successors. While HMCo seems to have used only one set of index cards, all sorted by name and, where no name was available, by number, later users at MIT apparently divided them into two sets of cards, one sorted by vessel name, the other by vessel number and greatly expanded the number of cards. Original HMCo cards are usually lined and almost always punched with a hole at bottom center while later cards usually have no hole, are unlined, and often carry substantially less information. All cards are held by the Francis Russell Hart Nautical Collections of the MIT Museum in Cambridge, Mass.

Year: 1942
E/P/S: P
No.: 416p
Name: YM s 19
OA: 136'
LW: 130'

Source: Vermilya, Peter and Maynard Bray. "Transcription of the HMCo. Construction Record." Unpublished database, ca. 2000.

Note: The transcription of the HMCo Construction Record by Peter Vermilya and Maynard Bray was performed independently (and earlier) than that by Claas van der Linde. A comparison of the two transcriptions can be particularly useful in those many cases where the handwriting in the Construction Record is difficult to decipher.

"Launched 1941-12-27, delivered 1942-09-24." (Source: van der Linde, Claas. November 3, 2011.)

"Displacement 270 [long or short?] t." (Source: http://www.navsource.org/archives/11/19019.htm, last visit March 16, 2007.)

Note: Research notes contain information about a vessel that is often random and unedited but has been deemed useful for future research.