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NavSource Online: Mine Warfare Vessel Photo Archive

Mallard (ASR 4)



Call sign:
Nan - Item - King - Baker

ex-AM-44
ex-Minesweeper No. 44



Call sign (1919):
George - Boy - Dog - King
Lapwing Class Minesweeper:

  • Laid down 25 May 1918 by the Staten Island Shipbuilding Co., Staten Island, NY
  • Launched 17 December 1918
  • Commissioned USS Mallard, Minesweeper No. 44, 25 June 1919
  • Designated AM-44, 17 July 1920
  • Reclassified as a Submarine Rescue Ship, ASR-4, 12 September 1929
  • Decommissioned 10 December 1947 and stripped at the New York Navy Yard
  • Sunk as a target 22 May 1947 by USS Piper (SS 409).

    Specifications:

  • Displacement 1,400 t.
  • Length 187' 10"
  • Beam 36' 8"
  • Draft 13' 2"
  • Speed 14 kts.
  • Complement 91
  • Armament: One 3"/50 dual purpose mount
  • Propulsion: Two 200psi Babcock and Wilcox saturated steam boilers, one Harlan and Hollingsworth Corp. 1,400shp triple expansion vertical engine, one shaft.
    Click on thumbnail
    for full size image    		 Size Image Description Source
    USS Mallard (AM 44)
    Mallard 84k c. 1920 Dictionary of American Fighting Ships
    Mallard 237k Courtesy of the Boston Public Library, Leslie Jones collection Mike Mohl
    Mallard 352k 16 December 1928
    Boston Navy Yard
    Officers look over the newly installed air manifolds that will be used in salvage operations
    Courtesy of the Boston Public Library, Leslie Jones collection    		 Boston Public Library
    USS Mallard (ASR 4)
    Mallard 56k . Donald Taber via the National Association of Fleet Tug Sailors
    Mallard 47k
    Mallard 59k
    Mallard 67k
    Mallard 134k 5 April 1941
    Cristobal, Panama Canal Zone
    Photo caption: "The 23,225-ton Italian liner Comte Biancamano [later Hermitage (AP 54)], as she was taken over by U.S. Naval units here March 30, by order of the U.S. Government. Alongside is the USS Mallard from which a boarding party went on the liner, one of the twenty-eight Italian ships seized in U.S. Territorial waters. Five hundred members of the crew are to be transferred to New York, it was learned yesterday."
    Wide World photo    		 Tommy Trampp
    Commanding Officers
    01LTJG Harry R. Brayton, USN25 June 1919 - 3 August 1920
    02LT Robert Chester O'Brien, USNRF - Awarded the Navy Cross1919
    03LT Clyde Charlie Laws, USN3 August 1920
    04LT Christopher Murray, USN13 May 1923
    05LT Robert Rohange, USN31 December 1925
    06LT John Brady Hüpp, USN8 September 1928 - 1930
    07LT Arthur Wrightson, USN1930
    08LT Charles Fearns Macklin, Jr., USN1932
    09LT Robley Westland Clark, USN1934
    10LT Edward Loring Dix Roach, III, USN1936
    11LCDR Frank Wesley (Mike) Fenno, Jr., USN - Retired as Rear Admiral1936
    12CDR William Herman Brockman, Jr., USN - Retired as Rear AdmiralJune 1938 - July 1939
    13LCDR Frederick Williams Laing, USNJuly 1939 - August 1941
    14LCDR Frederick George Garvie Molumphy, USNAugust 1941 - September 1942
    15LT Malcolm D. Balbirnie, USNSeptember 1942 - May 1943
    16LT Monroe V. Evans, USNMay 1943 - July 1944
    17LT Berley L. Maddox, USNJuly 1944 - January 1946
    18LCDR Donald Glenn Horsman, USNJanuary 1946 - 10 December 1946
    Courtesy Wolfgang Hechler, Ron Reeves and Joe Radigan
    View the Mallard (AM 44)
    DANFS history entry located on the Haze Gray & Underway website
    Additional Resources and Web Sites of Interest
    Naval Minewarfare Association
    Association of Minemen
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