Charlotte Knight, Colliers War Correspondent, produced a nice article (attached) on AMS operations of COMINDIV Three in Korea during a fall 1951 visit to these minesweepers. These were primarily YMS designs of WWII that were converted to Auxiliary Mine Sweepers, and given ship names. The YMS Series (>425) were only given hull numbers during WWII. Fifty keywords of ship names commanding officers and key personnel are also listed in the complete article.

The Boat Minesweeping Unit (BMS) was the first large scale boat unit organized by the USN for shallow water minesweeping ahead of an invasion in Europe. Allegedly, Boat Unit Eight practicing for the Normandy Invasion in the English Channel months prior to the June 1944 Normandy invasion, was scratched from the invasion due to rough English Channel weather having swamped their LCVP’s during practice.

Lake Ferryville was the WWII name of the salt water lake fed from the Mediterranean by a channel dug by the Phoenecians in the 3rd or 4th century BC. Lake Ferryville (today lake Bizerte) was where the BMS Unit practiced daily.

The invasions began near St Tropez, St Maxine, and continued westward to Toulan, and Marseilles Harbors. Small boat minesweeping had arrived in the U.S. Navy at the unit level. Previous use of motor launches and landing craft had been dabbled with on a much smaller scale since 1942, according to Mine Warfare Notes – a fleet wide classified USN publication published during WWII.

Irving B. Gerson Lt(jg) USNR and Ed Sinclair