(Tahoma, mountain in Washington State, local Native American word for "snow peak")

Type and Characteristics - Turbine driven steam cutter, one of six A-class (165-footers), WPG/WAGE-80, built by Defoe Shipbuilding Co, Bay City, MI at cost of $564,000, launched 5 September 1934, commissioned 22 October 1934, 1,005 tons displacement, 165ft long x 36ft beam x 12ft 3in draft, 12.8kts,armed with 2-3in/2-6pdr (1934), 2-3in/2-20mm/depth charges/Mousetrap mortar (World War 2), 62 crew - 6 officers, 56 men (1934).

Log Period and Areas of Service: 1934-55, Great Lakes, NW Atlantic escort duties in World War 2, US East Coast.

Summary of Service

22 October 1934 – Commissioned; homeported at Cleveland, Ohio, to serve on the Great Lakes.

1 November 1941 – the Coast Guard transferred from the Treasury Department to the Navy; Tahoma was reclassified as gunboat WPG–80.

July1942 – Escorted convoys in Maine, Canadian and Greenland waters.

30 April 1944 – Served on weather and ice patrol duties between Greenland and Iceland and plane guard operations in the same waters.

30 September 1945 – Released from duty with the Atlantic Fleet and returned to the Coast Guard to resume peacetime service. She was homeported at Grand Haven, Michigan for service on the Great Lakes.

24 October 1947 – Due to lack of personnel after demobilization, she was declared in a "Decommissioned for Storage" status and placed in mothballs in Cleveland, Ohio. 

16 July 1952 – Recommissioned  as the examination vessel W-10 at the entrance of the Chesapeake Bay, she required all incoming vessels were requested to supply their identity, cargo, homeport, and last port of call before proceeding. Her hull was painted in yellow and the word "GUARD" was painted on both sides of her hull in black, while her superstructure remained white. 

5 June 1953 – Released from guard duty and decommissioned, and stored at Curtis Bay, Maryland.

17 October 1955 – Sold for scrap to the Bethlehem Steel Company.

Fate: Decommissioned June/July 1953, sold for scrap October 1955.

Links: DANFS, USCG Historian's site

USCGC Tahoma (II) 2

Tahoma (II) in Navy gray

USCGC Tahoma (II) 3

SENTINEL AFLOAT: Painted bright yellow as harbor guard ship

A general note on the sources.