USAT Buford

USAT Buford

USAT Buford was a cargo and passenger ship, originally launched in 1890 as SS Mississippi, but requisitioned by the US Army in 1898. She was transferred to the US Navy in 1919 and briefly commissioned as USS Buford (ID 3818), and was returned later that year to the Army. She was sold in 1923 and scrapped in 1929.

In December 1919 she became dubbed by the press of the day as the Soviet Ark (or the Red Ark), when she was used by the U.S. Department of Justice and Department of Labor to deport 249 non-citizens from the United States because of their alleged anarchist, syndicalist, or communist political beliefs.