This Day in Coast Guard History – July 28

1884- The Senate approved the appointment of Captain Jarvis Patten as Commissioner of Navigation to direct the work of the organization of the Bureau of Navigation, under the supervision of the Secretary of the Treasury.

1942- Coast Guard J4F Widgeon, CG tail number V-214, piloted by Chief Aviation Pilot Henry White and carrying crewman RM1c Henderson Boggs, attacked a surfaced German submarine off the coast of Louisiana with a single depth charge.  After the war, the US Navy credited V-214 with sinking the Nazi sub U-166.  White was awarded the Distinguished Flying Cross and Boggs was awarded the Air Medal.  Nevertheless the U-166 was later learned to have been sunk a few days earlier by a Navy patrol vessel.  White had actually attacked the U-171, which reported in her war diary as having been attacked by an unidentified aircraft in the very location that White reported attacking a U-boat.  The U-171 escaped with no damage.

1944- LTJG Clarence Samuels became the first African-American to command a "major" Coast Guard vessel since Michael Healy and the first to achieve command of a Coast Guard vessel "during wartime" when he assumed command of the Light Vessel No. 115 on 28 July 1944.

(Source: USCG Historian’s Office)