W.W.I. U.S. Navy Mexican Patrol Mission aboard USS Rainier: 19 Photos by Dr. Louis Henry Clerf Documenting Shipboard Life, Fishing, Natural History, and Black Naval Service, 1917–1919

U S. Navy USS Rainier

Photograph

U.S. Navy Mexican Patrol photo archive documenting natural history, provisioning, and wartime shipboard life aboard USS Rainier during World War I. Associated with Lieutenant junior grade Dr. Louis Henry Clerf, the vessel’s medical officer, the photographs record fish, a large shark, a deer, and a dog alongside the daily routines of sailors living and working aboard a small Pacific Fleet auxiliary. Fishing appears as food procurement, recreation, collective labor, and an occasion for observing and photographing marine life. A Black U.S. Navy sailor appears prominently among the men handling and displaying the catches, while the vessel’s mounted cannon, rigging, machinery, and naval uniforms establish the military setting behind these scenes of everyday life.

Photo archive of 19 silver gelatin photographs, most measuring 3.5 x 4.5 inches, aboard USS Rainier and associated Pacific coastal locations, circa 1917 to 1919. Sailors pose with large fish suspended from lines, display individual catches, clean fish across the deck, and gather around food beneath canvas awnings. One photograph records a large shark surrounded by sailors, while others show a sailor displaying a substantial fish and groups gathered around the preparation of the catch. A dog appears at a shipboard table, and a deer stands tethered beside machinery and piping, bringing animals directly into the vessel’s working and social spaces. One photograph prominently shows a Black sailor with the fishing catch, while other images record officers and enlisted men in white and dark naval dress, gathered on deck or beside an automobile ashore. Rigging, winches, railings, mechanical equipment, canvas awnings, and a mounted cannon recur throughout, locating the fishing, meals, and informal gatherings within the confined operational environment of an armed naval vessel.

Built at Portland in 1917 as the civilian schooner Patrol and subsequently known as Angel, Rainier was acquired by the Navy and commissioned at Mare Island on July 30, 1917, then assigned to Division 2, Pacific Fleet, and Mexican Patrol duty. Navy records document the acquisition of small vessels for Mexican patrol service during 1917 and the continuing patrol of Mexican waters during the war. A separate, larger group of photographs from the same Louis Henry Clerf Rainier corpus provides corroborating evidence for his photographic association with the vessel and for the broader range of animal and environmental subjects he recorded during its service; that separate group is not included in the present 19 photographs. The photographs offered here remain focused on the immediate life of the Navy crew, where catches move from sea to deck to preparation and communal use, while the shark, deer, and dog record the animals brought into the sailors’ working environment. The Black sailor’s presence provides direct visual evidence of Black naval service within this wartime crew, while the cannon and working machinery keep these scenes firmly connected to the vessel’s military function. Light surface wear, scattered fading and toning, and occasional edge and corner wear; images remain generally clear and legible. Overall in very good condition. A concentrated visual record of natural history, Black naval service, provisioning, recreation, and wartime life aboard USS Rainier during the Mexican Patrol.

Item #23888

Price: $2,850.00