USS Wake (PR-3) was a United States Navy river gunboat operating on the Yangtze River. Originally commissioned as the gunboat Guam (PG-43), she was redesignated river patrol vessel PR-3 in 1928, and renamed Wake 23 January 1941. She was captured by Japan on 8 December 1941 and renamed Tatara. After her recapture in 1945, she was transferred to Chinese nationalists, who renamed her Tai Yuan. Communist forces captured her in 1949. On 1 May 1949 Tai Yuan was sunk by Nationalist aircraft in the Caishiji River.

Service history

U.S. Navy

She was launched on 28 May 1927 as Guam by the Kiangnan Dock and Engineering Works in Shanghai, China, and commissioned on 28 December 1927. Her primary mission was to ensure the safety of American missionaries and other foreigners. Later, the ship also functioned as a "radio spy ship," keeping track of Japanese movements. However, by 1939, she was "escorted" by a Japanese warship wherever she went, as China fell more and more under Imperial Japanese control.

In 1930 when it was nearing Yochow it was shot at by rebels, which killed one crew.

On 23 January 1941, she was renamed Wake, as Guam was to be the new name of a large cruiser being built in the U.S.

On 25 November 1941, LCDR Andrew Earl Harris, the brother of Field Harris, was ordered to close the Navy installation at Hankou, and sail to Shanghai. On 28 November 1941, LCDR Harris and most of the crew were transferred to gunboats and ordered to sail to the Philippines. Columbus Darwin Smith—an old Chinese hand who had been piloting river boats on the Yangtze River—was asked to accept a commission in the U.S. Navy and was appointed captain of Wake with the rank of Lt. Commander..

Commander Smith and his crew were confined to a prison camp near Shanghai, where the U.S. Marines and sailors captured on Wake Island were also later imprisoned.

As of 2019, no other ship of the U.S. Navy has been named Wake, though a launched in 1943 was named . Wake Island is a remote Pacific island used as a US military base, and the site of a WW2 Battle in December 1941 (Battle of Wake Island).

Awards

  • Yangtze Service Medal
  • China Service Medal
  • American Defense Service Medal with "FLEET" clasp
  • Asiatic–Pacific Campaign Medal with one battle star
  • World War II Victory Medal
  • ROCS Tai Yuan (Chinese: 太原; DE-27)

Footnotes

References

  • Groom, Winston. 2005. 1942: The Year that Tried Men's Souls. Atlanta Monthly Press, New York.
  • USS "Wake" as "IJN Tatara" and "RCS Tai Yuan".