Description

Cushing (TB-1) was a development by HMCo of the first of class of this new type for the US Navy, based to some extent on USN testing with earlier experimental HMCo torpedo boats, Lightning (1876) and Stiletto (1885). Cushing was substantially larger (138') and specifically designed as a combatant vessel. She was the first oceangoing torpedo boat put into active service by the USN. HMCo built five more USN torpedo boats (up to the 175' Porter) through 1897, three of which were lead vessels of new classes of USN torpedo boats. During this period, HMCo is transitioning away from navy contracts in part because of success with the America's Cup (1893, 1895+) and the expansion of a racing and pleasure boat business associated with this success. This swerve essentially brought HMCo back to the same business that John Brown and Nathanael Greene Herreshoff earned their initial success with in the 1860s. Although building private boats remained a core business from the late 1890s through 1945, HMCo shifted gears again to war work in both WW I and WW II when they built a variety of rescue vessels, seaplane hulls and torpedo boats once again in the final years of the company's existence.