USS Mercury, WWI Troopship

Hull Number: SP-3012 Displacement: 19,500 tons Length: 544 feet Beam: 60 feet; Draft: 26 feet Speed: 14 k.; Crew: 494 Armament: four 6-inch deck guns, two One- pounders, 2 Machine Guns.

The fourth Mercury (SP-3012), was built as Barbarossa by Blohm and Voss, Hamburg, Germany, in 1896, and was operated by the North German Lloyd Line until she took refuge in Hoboken, N.J., at the outbreak of WW I. She was seized when the United States entered the war 6 April 1917. During the time she was in port her German crew tried to damage her prior to seizure so she could not be used but she was repaired and she was commissioned 3 August 1917 with Comdr. H. L. Brinser in command. Shortly after commissioning she was renamed Mercury.

Mercury got underway for her first transatlantic troop ferrying mission 4 January 1918. Before the armistice 11 November 1918, she had completed seven voyages to France, carrying over 18,000 passengers. On July 1, 1918 the Mercury sailing in a West bound convoy with transports Dekalb, Covington, George Washington, Rijndam, Lenape, Dante Aleghieri, Princess Matoika and Wilhelmina and escorted by destroyers Little, Conner, Cummings, Porter, Jarvis, Smith and Roe, came to the aid of the Covington when she was torpedoed. The Mercury took the Covington in tow but the Covington sank after gallant efforts from the Mercury. After the armistice, she reversed the flow of troops, making eight crossings to return more than 20,000 to the United States. After completing her last crossing as a U.S. Navy ship 19 September 1919, she decommissioned and was turned over to the Army Transport Service 27 September 1919.

Photo of the Mercury taking a depth reading. The crewman on the right side is "Heaving the Lead" as it says on the photo. This is a process where a lead weighted wire is lowered to the bottom and the depth of the water is measured. Also samples of the bottom would be brought up and noted on the ships log.

Below are listed some of the Mercury's Crossings and the troops she carried.

Sailing Date	Unit Name	Officers	Enlisted Men
January 4, 1918	116th Trench Mortar Battery, 41st Division	5	148
	21st Aero Squadron	8	153
	446th Depot Engineers	1	149
	Mechanical Repair Shop No. 301	63	1,041
	Replacements		478
	Casuals	23	197
March 6, 1918	416th RR Telegraph Bn Co., D & E	10	208
	Mobile Laboratory, 3rd Division	4	9
	Headquarters Battalion, AEF	5	435
	Casuals	65	261
	Replacements		1,362
April 23, 1918	5th Division Casuals	1	203
	76th Artillery, (less 2nd Bn), 3rd Division	39	685
	HQ Co. San. Tn, 77th Division	9	43
	308th Amb. Co., 77th Division	5	153
	302nd Trench Mortar Battery, 77th Div.	5	160
	Expert Electricians & Engineers, Q.M.C.		14
	Expert Accountants, Q.M.C.	1	32
	Evac. Amb. Co., No.4	1	36
	Hospital Train No. 25	3	29
	Railway Transport Corps	2
	Automatic Replacements Coast Artillery		288
	Automatic Replacements Infantry		493
	Automatic Replacements Field Artillery		99
	Automatic Replacements Engineers		181
	Casuals	38
May 26, 1918	Casuals, 27th Division	1
	320th Infantry, 80th Division	30	904
	313th Machinegun Battalion, 80th Division	29	737
	314th Machinegun Battalion, 80th Division	17	368
	305th Field Signal Battalion, 80th Div.	15	436
	4 Field Hospitals, 80th Division	23	337
June 30, 1918	2d Pioneer Infantry Cos, A-K inclusive	79	2,883

First Hand Account of the USS Covington Sinking

Homer indeed spoke this story with his own lips in the waning years of his life. But the words never tumbled into that familiar black hole of family histories -- the place where memories are recounted less and less often through the years until they quietly evaporate altogether.

Instead, Homer's son, Tom Eldridge, was there to capture every syllable on tape. And Homer's daughter, Myrtle Richards, transcribed every syllable on a manual typewriter with a defective "Q."

"There were two (German) subs out there and one of them came right up and bounced against our ship. ... I happened to be right by the gunner and he couldn't get our one-pounder guns pointed down enough to shoot the sub with, it was so close to the ship. After we got away from there, then the ships from our convoy started circling around and dropping depth bombs, or ash cans as we called them."

Homer Eldridge made 14 round-trip crossings of the Atlantic as a Navy seaman in World War I, all on the USS Mercury. In the hands of his archiving daughter, Homer's war perspectives -- his diary excerpts, photos and audio-taped memories -- paint a picture that's more than nostalgic. It's startling and enlightening.

Homer talks about the day the Mercury tried to tow the torpedoed USS Covington to port. Two pictures accompany the recounting of the tale. The first shows the Covington listing on its side. The second shows the "grave of the USS Covington," a watery wake attended by flocks of gulls.

"It's just amazing, the stories and the things he's done," Tom says. "That ship he was on, the USS Mercury, had been a German ship that was in port in America when we declared war. So we took it over."

This story used by permission. The Bee's Don Bosley can be reached at (916) 321-1101 or dbosley@sacbee.com. Copyright © The Sacramento Bee

Chief Quartermaster G. L. Cluff Joachim Peters had contacted me about a distant relative who served on the USS Mercury during WWI. His name was Chief Quartermaster G. L. Cluff. Unfortunately, Joachim does not have any other information at this time about Chief Cluff's tour of duty. This is the uniform of a WWI Navy Chief and on his right sleeve can be seen the rating badge of a Chief. This photo may have been taken while at home on leave or after the war. Notice at Chief Cluff's feet is a cat. Chief Cluff may have been from the Toledo, Ohio area. His sister, Marion Cluff, was married to George Allyn Zang and they lived in Toledo, Ohio. The picture was probably taken by Marion during a family visit. Another point of interest about Marion Cluff and George Zang is that both of them were involved in Vaudeville back in 1910 – 1920 years.

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