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NavSource Online: Mine Warfare Vessel Photo Archive

Magpie (AMS 25)
ex-YMS-400



Call sign:
November - Golf - Whiskey - Charlie

Sunk 1 October 1950
YMS-1 Class Auxiliary Motor Minesweeper:

  • Laid down 3 July 1942 by Henry B. Nevins, Inc., City Island, New York, NY
  • Launched 24 March 1943
  • Completed 14 May 1943
  • Commissioned as USS YMS-400, 15 May 1943
  • Detached from the Caribbean Sea Frontier 10 November 1944
  • Named Magpie and reclassified as a Motor Minesweeper, AMS-25, 17 February 1947
  • Struck a floating mine 2 miles off Chusan Po, Korea and sank, 1 October 1950
  • Struck from the Naval Register 20 October 1950.

    Specifications:

  • Displacement 270 t.
  • Length 136'
  • Beam 25'
  • Draft 8'
  • Speed 15 kts.
  • Complement 32;
  • Armament: One 3"/50 dual purpose gun mount, two 20mm mounts, two depth charge tracks, and two depth charge projectors
  • Propulsion: Two 1,000shp General Motors 8-268A diesel engines, Snow and Knobstedt single reduction gear, two shafts.
    Click on thumbnail
    for full size image    		 Size Image Description Source
    Magpie
    Magpie 46k
    Namesake:

    Magpie - Any of numerous birds, especially of the genus Pica, related to the crow, but having a long graduated tail and black and white plumage, who are known for their
    noisy chatter

    		 Tommy Trampp
    USS YMS-400
    YMS-391 & 400 47k YMS-400 moored inboard of YMS-391 R. J. Oliver
    Magpie
    11194002    		 NR 21 Missing as Minesweeper Hits Mine and Sinks Off Korea
    12 Survivors Picked Up and Taken to Pusan; Navy Sure Torpedo Was Not Responsible
    The auxiliary motor minesweeper Magpie (YMS-400) sank after striking a floating mine off the east coast of Korea October 1, the Navy disclosed today.
    Twenty-one men including the ship’s commander, Lt. (j. g.) Warren R. Person of Pacific Grove, Calif., and three other officers are missing.
    Twelve survivors were picked up by a sister ship, the auxiliary, motor mine sweeper, Merganser (AMS-26) and carried to the port of Pusan in Korea.     		Image and text provided by Library of Congress, Washington, DC.
    Text by Evening Star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 05 October 1950, Image 1 courtesy of chroniclingamerica.loc.gov.
    Commanding Officers
    01LT Alan G. Lynn, USNR15 May 1943
    02LTJG Donald S. MacLearn, USNR1944
    03LT Arthur Michael Hayes, USNJanuary 1949 - April 1949
    04LTJG Warren Roy Person, USNApril 1949 - 1 October 1950
    Courtesy of Wolfgang Hechler, Ron Reeves and Joe Radigan
    View the Magpie (AMS 25)
    DANFS History entry located on the Haze Gray & Underway Website
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