USC&GS Carlile P. Patterson
Survey Ship · United States · Lost December 1938 · The Inside Passage & Alaska
For over fifty years she charted Alaska's coast for the government; as a private motor vessel she was finally wrecked there in the winter of 1938.
The Vessel and Her Loss
Commissioned in 1884, Carlile P. Patterson was a pioneering U.S. Coast and Geodetic Survey ship that charted Alaskan waters for more than three decades, including rescuing the crew of the wrecked USRC Tahoma in 1914. After brief U.S. Navy service in 1918-1919 as Forward, she returned to civilian hands, was converted to diesel power, and worked in Alaska as the whaling and trading vessel Patterson. She was wrecked on the Alaska coast in December 1938; survivors were brought off by a Coast Guard cutter.
Vessel
- 1884
- James D. Leary
- Brooklyn, New York
- Wood
- 163 ft
- 27.4 ft
- 604
- Diesel, single screw (converted from steam in 1924)
- United States Coast and Geodetic Survey (1884-1918); United States Navy (1918-1919); Northern Whaling and Trading Company and Alaska Patterson Co. (1924-1938)
Loss
- December 1938
- Not established
- Alaska coast
- Gulf of Alaska
- Not established
- Not established
- Not established
- A U.S. Coast Guard cutter rescued survivors from the wreck in late December 1938; no fatalities are reported in the sources reviewed.
- Not established
The Wreck Today
- Not established
- Not established
- Not established
- Not established
- Not established
Position
- Not established
- Position not established
- Alaska coast (site not specified in sources reviewed)
Evidence
Overall confidence: Sparsely documented (45/100)
The specific wreck location, cause, and any casualties are not established in the sources reviewed.
Hydro International, "Life and Death of a Survey Ship"
Construction details, career history, and eventual 1938 wreck.
Confirms the December 1938 wreck and Coast Guard rescue of survivors.
