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NavSource Online: Service Ship Photo Archive

USAT Sumner
ex
USNA Cassius (1898 - 1899)

Awards, Citations and Campaign Ribbons

Spanish Campaign Medal

Screw Steamer (Collier):

Built in 1883 by Reiherstieg, Hamburg, Germany, as SS Rhaetia

Launched, 23 November 1882

Purchased by the Navy 24 May 1898

Converted at Norfolk Navy Yard

Commissioned US Navy Auxiliary Cassius, 6 June 1898, CDR. S. W. Very in command

During the Spanish American War Cassius mainly carried coal locally at Norfolk

Reassigned to the Caribbean in October 1898 to supply ships in those waters

Decommissioned, 29 December 1898, at Norfolk

Struck from the Naval Register, 16 September 1899 and sold to the War Department

Refitted by the Army as a transport, renamed USAT Sumner

Final Disposition, wrecked on Barnegat Shoals, New Jersey, 11 December 1916

Specifications:
Displacement 2,182 t. 3,458 t. (gross)
Length 351' 1"
Beam 43'
Draft 26'"
Speed 13 kts.
Complement 76
Cargo Capacity coal, 2,897 tons
Armament one 6-pdr

Propulsion

two coal fired boilers

one triple expansion vertical compound steam engine

single propeller

Click On Image For Full Size Image	Size	Image Description	Source
Merchant Service
	56k	Hamburg American Line emigrant steamer, SS Rhaetia underway prior to acquisition by the US Navy in 1898. Source: Eugene W. Smith, "Passenger Ships of the World , Past and Present (1978),", courtesy Shipscribe.com.	Mike Green
USAT Sumner
	145k	Ex- USNA Cassius in commission as the War Department transport USAT Sumner moored pierside at Norfolk, Navy Yard, Portsmouth, VA., in March 1910. US Naval History and Heritage Command photo # NH 43671, courtesy Shipscribe.com.	Mike Green
	93k	USAT Sumner at anchor between 1900 and 1916. Note the Army Transportation Service flag on the mainmast. US Naval History and Heritage Command photo # NH 75580, courtesy Shipscribe.com.	Mike Green
	131k	USAT Sumner arriving in port, location unknown, circa 1899 to 1916. US Navy photo courtesy Shipscribe.com	Mike Green
	100k	USAT Sumner moored pierside, location unknown, circa 1900 and 1916. US Naval History and Heritage Command photo.	Mike Green
09029906	62k	Ex-USAT Sumner with her back broken on the shoals off Barnegat, N.J. in 1917. Flickr - neckro	John Spivey