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The First Ten Cutters

Cutter Name (click on name for more info.)	Date launched:	Where built:	Station:	First Commanding Officer:	Disposition
Vigilant	March 1791	New York, NY	NY	Patrick Dennis	Sold; Nov 1798
Active	9 April 1791	Baltimore, MD	MD	Simon Gross	Sold; 1800
General Green	7 July 1791	Philadelphia, PA	PA	James Montegomery	Sold; Dec 1797
Massachusetts	15 July 1791	Newburyport, MA	MA	John Foster Williams	Sold; 9 Oct 1792
Scammel	24 Aug 1791	Portsmouth, NH	NH	Hopley Yeaton	Sold; 16 Aug 1798
Argus	1791	New London, CT	CT	Jonathan Maltbie	Sold; 1804
Virginia	1791	Norfolk, VA	VA	Richard Taylor	Sold; 1798
Diligence	June/July 1792	Washington, NC	NC	William Cook	Sold; 1798
South Carolina	1793 ?	Charleston, SC	SC	Robert Cochrane	Sold; 5 Jun 1798
Eagle	1793	Savannah, GA	GA	John Howell	Sold; 14 Sep 1799

NOTE:

The North Carolina, purchased in 1792 for use as a revenue cutter, was not one of the first ten cutters asked for by Hamilton and whose funding and construction were authorized by Congress on 4 August 1790 and is therefore not included in this list. There were a number of vessels, however, that served as revenue boats in the period prior to Congress' authorization to build the ten cutters. Some were operated by the various states during the Confederation Period while others were operated by the federally appointed customs collectors in the ports after the formation of the government in 1789. These "federal" revenue boats and craft varied in type and size, such as Philadelphia collector Sharp Delany's "barge with sails," that served before, during, and well after the General Green entered service in the waters around Philadelphia. But such craft were not "sea-going" vessels capable of sailing well away from a protected harbor as the cutters were specifically designed to do.

Therefore, the above list contains the "first" cutters as recognized by the U.S. Coast Guard.