Probably the most successful—and certainly the longest-lived—oceangoing naval tugs ever built were the 69 generally similar units of the Navajo (ATF-64), Cherokee (ATF-66), Abnaki (ATF-96), and Achomawi (ATF-148) classes commissioned from 1940 to 1946. Displacing 1,675 tons full load and 205 feet overall, the classes were officially distinguished by the four different quadruple locomotive diesel prime mover installations for their 3,000-shaft-horsepower electric-drive propulsion plants, but the Abnakis could be identified by their lack of the elegant upright false stack; on the Achomawis, the stack cap was raked aftward. The tugs are no longer in active U.S. Navy service, and the last of the five transferred to the Coast Guard was decommissioned in 1994, but 26 continue to serve in 13 foreign fleets, particularly in South America, where they are prized for their long endurance (15,000 nautical miles at 8 knots) and robust construction. Of the total, three were converted as submarine rescue ships while building. Three U.S. Navy units were lost during World War II, another to the October 1945 typhoon at Okinawa, and one to a mine in Korean waters in 1952.
The name-ship of the original 1938- order trio, the Navajo (top) was commissioned in January 1940 and lost in September 1943 in the South Pacific to an explosion possibly caused by one of her own depth charges. Frequently operating alone during long tows, the ATFs had sonars; early units carried four Mk 6 depth-charge K-guns, while by late 1945 all active units but two carried two 3-charge depth-charge racks. Note that the Bethlehem Steel Shipyards, Staten Island-built Navajos had a higher cut-up to their broad stems than did the later versions. Also note the 20-mm antiaircraft guns uniquely mounted at the bow and stern in this June 1943 view.
The less-elegant, stackless Abnaki class is represented here by the Tenino (ATF-115), seen in a December 1944 view showing the then-standard ATF armament of a 3-inch 50-caliber Mk 22 singlefire gun forward, two Army- pattern 40-mm guns flanking the tripod mast, and two single 20-mm mounts on the bridge wings. All were planned to have had the 20-mm installations replaced by twin Mk 24 mountings, but by war’s end, only three had been re-equipped. Tenino, commissioned in November 1944, was mothballed in 1947 and stricken from the Navy List in 1962. In recent years, her hulk was reclaimed from the Maritime Administration, and she has been used for salvage training.
The Achomawi-class group (ATF-148 to -165) is represented by Papago (ATF- 160), commissioned in October 1945 and seen here in 1954. Papago and Paiute (ATF-159), after briefly being relegated to the mothball fleet in 1985, were reactivated in 1988 for patrol duties in the Caribbean and became the last of the wartime ATFs in active U.S. Navy service, finally being decommissioned in summer 1992.