This page provides more detail about the U.S. Coast Guard Cable ship Pequot during World War II. It tells about the facilities, role and strategic importance of the Pequot's home port of Boston in prosecuting the war in the Atlantic Ocean. Our main page for the USCG Pequot provides extra details about the ship, its crew, its purpose as well as links to our other Pequot pages. Research and design by by Chip Calamaio and Richard Walding.

The US Coast Guard Pequot. During WWII this cable ship laid top secret Indicator Loop cables to protect harbors from German U-boats. Her mission ranged from the ports of Virginia up to Argentia, Newfoundland. (Calamaio family).

A convoy of supply ships and escorts steaming East across the Atlantic1942 (Library of Congress Photo)

The Pequot’s home port was located in Boston’s inner harbor.  The atmosphere in which the ship’s officers and men shown on these pages served was highly charged with the seriousness of war.  After Pearl Harbor, Boston’s outer harbor and numerous islands were fortified with coastal gun batteries and anti-aircraft positions. Barbed wire was strung along the coastlines. Coast Guard sailors with guard dogs constantly patrolled the beaches.
 

184B. The Boston Navy Yard was the home port of warships of all sizes and types during World War II. In addition to resupplying vessels between tours at sea the yard repaired and modified ships and quartered seaman and officers (Naval Historical Center)	184C. The Charleston Navy Yard during WWII built and repaired hundreds of US and Allied warships. (Naval Historical Center)

Military installations were everywhere.  The entrance to the harbor was heavily mined, anti-submarine netting was installed, as well as fixed harbor defense Asdics (fixed sonar), and rows of hydrophones. For extra harbor defense Pequot laid four anti-submarine indicator loops from East Point, Nahant in a defensive circle around Boston Harbor to Strawberry Point, Scituate. The Charlestown Navy Yard, within the harbor, repaired American and British ships damaged by the Germans and built destroyer escorts. At peak production 50,000 people labored in the shipyards. They worked seven days a week around the clock. The harbor was constantly bustling with the movement of Navy ships, Coast Guard Cutters, tugboats and cargo vessels. During the “Battle of the Atlantic” more than 3,500 allied convoy vessels and 175 warships were lost to the German U-boats which cost the lives of 30,248 merchant sailors.  Many freighters, tankers, and supply ships steamed out of Boston Harbor by the Pequot and disappeared over the horizon never to be seen again.
 

Photos courtesy Pequot Quartermaster Lou Carhart

193.  USS LST-692 (later the USS Davies County). This landing ship which saw action in France passes by the Pequot. Landing barge 764 is topside which carried soldiers to the beach during invasions. Built in February of 1944, this WWII workhorse is still in service with the Philippine Navy as BRP Benguet (LT-507). (Mike Luongo)	194, 195. During their Coast Guard careers many of the Pequot’s sailors pulled shore patrol and would have to “pound the beaches” often accompanied by specially trained German Shepherds, who with their keen sense of hearing and smell could often give sailors advance warning of an intruder.  More than 2000 dogs were used by the Coast Guard to help patrol the Atlantic, Pacific and gulf coasts during WWII.“ (US Coast Guard photos)

 

Just Vicious: Roger Calamaio said they were scary at times: “Those dogs were very alert and trained to kill. Whoever took it from the cage was it’s Master.  I could spend hours with one of those dogs up and down the coast and we’d be just the best of friends.  But if I put it back in it’s cage, and few minutes later somebody else took it out, and gave it the order to attack me, it would have. They could be just vicious.”