United States Navy


USS CYCLOPS - USS NINA "Lost in the Bermuda Triangle"

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USS Niña

USS Niña
Displacement
(tons) 		420 Built / Launched 1864 / 5/27/1865
Length 137 Built By Reaney, Son, and Archbold, Chester, Pa.
Beam 26 Class Palos
Draft 9' 10" Commisioned 1905
Speed (rated) 10.35K Struck 1910
Compliment n/a Disposition Lost at Sea

Niña, a 4th rate iron screw steamer, was laid down by Reaney, Son, and Archbold, Chester, Pa., in 1864; launched 27 May 1865; delivered at New York Navy Yard 26 September 1865; and placed in service as a yard tug at the Washington Navy Yard 6 January 1866, Ensign F. C., Hall commanding that ship and sister tugs Primrose and Rescue.

Niña operated as a yard tug for the Washington Naval Gun Factory through May 1869 and was then converted to a torpedo boat. She commissioned 31 March 1870, LT. Godfrey Hunter in command, and then sailed for Newport R.I., arriving at the Naval Station 14 April. The ship served as a torpedo boat at Newport through 1883, refitting in May 1884 for special service, and next operated from August to October salvaging the wreck of sidewheel gunboat Tallapoosa sunk in Martha's Vineyard Sound. From 1885 to 1889 Niña served in various capacities at New York navy Yard, and then returned to Newport from 1890 to 1891.

The converted tugboat returned to New York Navy Yard in 1892 to resume her original duties, continuing her yard work and towing services there for a decade. On 8 October 1902, she commissioned as tender and supply vessel to the Torpedo Boat Flotilla during winter maneuvers in the Caribbean. The ship returned to New York 15 March 1903 and decommissioned 6 days later, once again taking up her yard towing chores. Niña was next loaned to the Lighthouse Department to verify aids to navigation near Puerto Rican waters to protect the Fleet conducting Winter maneuvers from October 1903 to April 1904. She recommissioned 9 September 1905 for special service with the Board of Inspection and Survey, Rockland, Me.

Niña was ordered converted into a submarine tender on 28 December 1905. On 25 May 1906, she arrived at the Newport Naval Torpedo Station, and following a year's service, was assigned as tender for the 1st Torpedo Flotilla. For the next four years, she served with the Atlantic Fleet's infant submarine force in its pioneer coastal operations form Newport to Annapolis and Norfolk. From 1 December 1908 to 22 February 1909, she participated in the great Review in Hampton Roads following the return of the Great White Fleet from its globe girdling cruise and joined submarines in exercises off the Virginia coast.

At 0630, 6 February 1910 Niña departed Norfolk for Boston and was last sighted off the Capes of the Chesapeake in the midst of a gale. She was never heard from again. The warship was declared lost and struck from the Navy List 15 March 1910, the 30 crewmen and one officer on board being listed as having died on that day. Her loss is one of the continuing mysteries of the sea.

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USS Cyclops (1910-1918)

USS Cyclops #1

The ironclad steamer Kickapoo (q.v.) carried the name Cyclops from 15 June to 10 August 1869, then was renamed Kewaydin.

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USS Cyclops #2

(Collier: full load displacement 19,360; length 542'; beam 65'; draft 27'8"; speed 15 knots.; complement 236)

The second Cyclops, a collier, was launched 7 May 1910 by William Cramp and Sons, Philadelphia, Pa., and placed in service 7 November 1910, G. W. Worley, Master, Navy Auxiliary Service, in charge. Operating with the Naval Auxiliary Service, Atlantic Fleet, the collier voyaged in the Baltic during May to July 1911 to supply 2d Division ships. Returning to Norfolk, she operated on the east coast from Newport to the Caribbean servicing the fleet. During the troubled conditions in Mexico in 1914 and 1915, she coaled ships on patrol there and received the thanks of the State Department for cooperation in bringing refugees from Tampico to New Orleans.

With American entry into World War I, Cyclops was commissioned 1 May l917, Lieutenant Commander G. W. Worley in command. She joined a convoy for St. Nazaire, France, in June 1917, returning to the east coast in July. Except for a voyage to Halifax, Nova Scotia, she served along the east coast until 9 January 1918 when she was assigned to Naval Overseas Transportation Service. She then sailed to Brazilian waters to fuel British ships in the south Atlantic, receiving the thanks of the State Department and Commander-in-Chief, Pacific. She put to sea from Rio de Janiero 16 February 1918 and after touching at Barbados on 3 and 4 March, was never heard from again. Her loss with all 306 crew and passengers, without a trace, is one of the sea's unsolved mysteries.

~*~ USS Cyclops was the Navy's second ship of that name. A 19,360-ton collier, specially designed to keep a mobile battlefleet supplied with fuel, she was built in 1910 by William Cramp and Sons at Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. Prior to World War I, she supported U.S. warships in European waters, off the Atlantic seaboard and in the Caribbean as a unit of the Naval Auxiliary Force.

Cyclops entered commissioned service in 1917, and continued carrying coal and other cargo to facilitate the U.S. Navy's wartime operations. In early March 1918, while returning from a voyage to Brazil, USS Cyclops disappeared with all hands. Her wreck has never been found, and the cause of her loss remains unknown.

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The USS Cyclops was a Battlefleet fuel ship, built in 1910 by William Cramp and Sons at Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. The collier voyaged in the Baltic during May to July 1911 to supply 2d Division ships. During the troubled conditions in Mexico in 1914 and 1915, she coaled ships on patrol there.

She joined a convoy for St. Nazaire, France, in June 1917, returning to the east coast in July. Except for a voyage to Halifax, Nova Scotia, she served along the east coast until 9 January 1918 when she was assigned to Naval Overseas Transportation Service.

In early March 1918, she set sail from the coast of Brazil bound for Baltimore, Maryland.

She was captained by the eccentric Lieutenant Commander George W. Worley. On March 13, when the ship was long overdue, a massive search ensued but no trace of the largest ship in the Navy or the 300 people on board were ever found

The date of death for the 21 officers and 285 enlisted men, serving on Cyclops, is designated as 14 June 1918.

The Navy had to follow up ever possibility with an investigation. Their task was to be Herculean, spanning a decade, several continents, and thousands of people; and to this day there is evidence to suggest almost every theory under the sun. Yet none could ever be proven, for no trace of the Cyclops has ever been found: not one survivor; not one shred. Their results, now amassed at the National Archives in Washington, contain about 1,500 pages of interviews, investigations and testimony.

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The Captain of the U.S.S. Cyclops was George Worley. Captain Worley, for an unknown reason, sailed south instead of north. Worley was poor when it came to seamanship. Worley�s actual name was Johann Friedrich Georg Wichmann. Worley was accused of being a Nazi because he was German. Nobody had a kind word for Worley. Worley would place his officers under arrest at the slightest offense. Worley�s favorite punishment was to make his sailors walk barefoot across the white hot heat of the steel decks. Both officers and crew hated Worley. Captain Worley was known as an eccentric tyrant. The Eccentric Lieutenant Commander George W. Worley frequented the Bridge of the ship wearing "Long Underwear" and a "Bowler Hat", The Literary Digest suggests a giant octopus pulled down the vessel. The Cyclops had two sister ships, Nerus and Proteus

In late November and early December 1941, two the USS Cyclop's sister ships, Proteus and Nereus both vanished on separate runs from the Virgin Islands to the USA.