USS Concord (PG-3)

USS Concord (PG-3)

USS Concord (Gunboat No. 3/PG-3) was a member of the Yorktown class of steel-hulled, twin-screw gunboats in the United States Navy in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. She was the second U.S. Navy ship named in honor of the town of Concord, Massachusetts, site of the Battle of Concord in the American Revolutionary War.

The contract to build Concord was awarded to N. F. Palmer & Co. of Philadelphia in the 1888 fiscal year. Her hull was subcontracted to the Delaware River Iron Shipbuilding & Engine Works which laid down her keel in May 1888. Concord was launched in March 1890. She was just over 244 feet (74 m) long and 36 feet (11 m) abeam and displaced 1,710 long tons (1,740 t). She was equipped with two steam engines which were supplemented with three schooner-rigged masts. The ship's main battery consisted of six 6-inch (15.2 cm) guns and was augmented by an assortment of smaller caliber guns.

After her 1891 commissioning, Concord spent the next few years sailing along the East Coast, in the West Indies, and in the Gulf of Mexico. Concord cruised on the Asiatic Station—interrupted only by a short stint on the Alaskan sealing patrol—from 1893 until May 1896, when she began a year out of commission at San Francisco. In January 1898, Concord returned to the Asiatic Station, and joined Admiral George Dewey's fleet for 1 May 1898 Battle of Manila Bay, a decisive American victory over the Spanish Fleet in the Spanish–American War. After the battle, Concord supported United States Army operations in the Philippines in the Philippine–American War. For the rest of her active career, Concord patrolled off the Mexican and Alaskan coasts and served on the Yangtze Patrol. She was decommissioned in 1909 and served as a barracks ship until 1914, and as a quarantine ship at Astoria, Oregon for the Public Health Service until 1929, at which time she was returned to the Navy and sold.