USS Mercy (AH-4) - USS Mercy

USS Mercy

On 27 September 1917, the U.S. Navy purchased Saratoga from the War Department. On 30 October 1917, she began conversion to a hospital ship at the New York Navy Yard, Brooklyn, New York, and was commissioned USS Mercy on 24 January 1918. Mercy and Comfort (former Ward Line mate, Havana) were the first Navy hospital ships to have female nurses aboard. Both ships were outfitted with state-of-the-art operating rooms and X-ray labs and could accommodate 500 patients each.

Assigned to the Atlantic Fleet, Mercy operated in the Chesapeake Bay area with Yorktown, Virginia, as her home port, attending the war wounded and transporting them from ships to shore hospitals. In October 1918 she sailed for New York to join the Cruiser and Transport Service. On 3 November the hospital ship departed New York on the first of four round trips to France, returning 1,977 casualties by 25 March 1919.

For most of the next 15 years following World War I, Mercy served off the east coast based at Philadelphia. In July 1920, she was redesignated "AH-4".

From 1 December 1924, until 1 September 1925, she was in reserve at the Philadelphia Navy Yard. On 25 November She went into reduced commission, returning to full commission 1 September 1926. In early 1927, Mercy was painted white with no hospital markings, but by the time of a 1931 visit to Vancouver, the markings had been restored.

Mercy remained in commission until loaned to the Philadelphia branch of the Federal Emergency Relief Administration on 23 March 1934. Anchored at Girard Point, the ship served as a home for up to 300 homeless men. On 20 April 1938, she was struck from the Naval Vessel Register and on 16 March 1939 sold for scrapping to Boston Iron & Metals Company of Baltimore.

This article incorporates text from the public domain Dictionary of American Naval Fighting Ships.