Alert, 1907
Vigilantly attentive; watchful.
Length: 61'
Beam: 11'
Draft: 5 1/2'
Powerplant: Triple-expansion engine.
Displacement: 35 tons
Cutter History:
Built in Mobile as a replacement for the steam launch Alert. She was completed and entered service on 9 October 1907.
With the coming of war in Europe in August 1914, Alert began boarding duty in Mississippi Sound, enforcing the navigation laws. Occasionally, she interrupted her discharge of these duties to carry out special assignments. In March 1915, she took a committee from the Alabama legislature on a cruise to examine oyster beds; and, the following August, carried members of the Alabama National Guard to the target range on Mobile Bay.
Transferred temporarily to the Navy on 6 April 1917 with the American entry into World War I, Alert operated under naval control for the duration of hostilities and into the following summer. Returned to the Treasury Department on 23 August 1919 (her name being stricken from the Naval Vessel Register simultaneously), Alert was subsequently sold to the Mobile Gulf and Navigation Co., Mobile, Ala., on 21 August 1920.
Sources:
Cutter History File, USCG Historian's Office, USCG HQ.
Dictionary of American Naval Fighting Ships, Vol. I, Part A, p. 167.
Donald Canney. U.S. Coast Guard and Revenue Cutters, 1790-1935. Annapolis, MD: Naval Institute Press, 1995.
U.S. Coast Guard. Record of Movements: Vessels of the United States Coast Guard: 1790 - December 31, 1933. Washington, DC: U.S. Government Printing Office, 1934; 1989 (reprint).