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Career (US)
Laid down:	31 October 1911
Launched:	14 September 1912
Commissioned:	9 July 1913
Decommissioned:	25 March 1924
Struck:	5 December 1940
Status:	sold, 8 March 1941 Lost at sea at unknown date after 23 November 1941
General characteristics
Displacement:	19,000 tons
Length:	522'
Beam:	63'
Draught:	27' 8"
Speed:	15 kts
Complement:	158
Armament:	four 4-pdrs

The collier USS Proteus (AC-9) was laid down on October 31, 1911, by the Newport News Shipbuilding and Dry Dock Company, and launched on September 14, 1912. With the threat of war looming, she was commissioned on July 9, 1913, to the U.S. Navy, Master Robert J. Easton, Naval Auxiliary Service, in command.

Following her fitting out and shakedown, Proteus steamed out of Norfolk, Virginia, on November 11, 1913, on the first of four runs to Vera Cruz to coal battleships and cruisers of the U.S. Atlantic Fleet off Mexico. On December 17, 1914, Proteus left Hampton Roads carrying men, fuel, and stores to the Philippines. She completed the final of four such runs on August 4 of that year.

Sailing again from Norfolk on September 25, 1914, Proteus supplied coal, oil, men and stores for ships of the Atlantic Fleet at Rio de Janeiro and Montevideo. Assigned to the Naval Overseas Transport Service, she operated between Norfolk, Boston and New York City for the next several years.

Proteus set forth from New York on July 14, 1918, for the British Isles, returning to Hampton Roads on September 19. She left again on Christmas Eve of 1918 for Brest, France, and spent the next 6 months shipping coal from Cardiff and Barry, Wales, to Brest.

Proteus returned to Norfolk, 6 August 1919, and during the greater part of the next three years cruised from Norfolk to replenish the Fleet in the Caribbean.

In the aftermath of the Great War, Proteus cruised from Norfolk to replenish the U.S. Fleet in the Caribbean. Crossing the Panama Canal four times, she delivered fuel and stores to Pearl Harbor in 1920, and to Callao, Peru, in 1921.

Her last supply run to the Caribbean ended at Hampton Roads on April 12, 1923. Proteus spent the remainder of her career in operations between Norfolk and Melville, Rhode Island.

She decommissioned at Norfolk 25 March 1924 and remained inactive until her name was struck from the Navy List 5 December 1940. She was sold 8 March 1941 to Saguenay Terminals Ltd., Ottawa, Ontario.

The "Proteus" was lost at sea {cause unknown/date unknown} after 23 November 1941; there are no German U-boat claims for this vessel-see[[1]]; a memorial listing of her crew can be found at CWGC Halifax Memorial at [[2]]; for possible fate-see [[3]] {reference only-copyrighted websites}

Interestingly, two of USS Proteus' three sister ships, USS Cyclops and USS Nereus, vanished without a trace in the Bermuda Triangle area while doing similar duty during World War I and World War II, respectively. Her third sister, USS Jupiter, was converted into the very first aircraft carrier of the United States Navy.

See USS Proteus for other ships of the same name.

This article includes text from the public domain Dictionary of American Naval Fighting Ships.[4]