Edward H. Smith

Early life and career Smith attended high schools at Vineyard Haven and New Bedford, Massachusetts. After attending one year at Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Smith was appointed a cadet at the Revenue Cutter Service School of Instruction on 8 May 1910 and after graduation was commissioned as a third lieutenant 7 June 1913. One of his classmates was Coast Guard aviation pioneer Elmer F. Stone. Smith's first assignment was aboard home-ported at Wilmington, North Carolina where he served as the cutter junior engineering officer. |group=Note He remained assigned there until 4 August 1917 when he was transferred to USCGC Manning which escorted troop and supply convoys to Europe during World War I. During his tour of duty aboard Manning, Smith was promoted to second lieutenant on 7 June 1918. After short tours aboard and from January to November 1919, Smith was assigned to , which was one of two cutters assigned annually to the International Ice Patrol. President Woodrow Wilson issued an executive order on 7 February 1914 requiring the Coast Guard to assign two vessels to derelict destruction and patrol work in the North Atlantic for the remainder of the year, except that "the study and observation of ice conditions shall be effectively maintained, in particular from the beginning of February to the opening of the ice season." Although patrol activities had been suspended during World War I, the resumption of patrol work in 1919 included the Coast Guard hydrographer for the first time so that the Interdepartmental Board on International Service of Ice Observation, Ice Patrol and Ocean Derelict Destruction established by Wilson in 1916 could prepare a systematic program of scientific observations and publish the findings.

Smith was promoted to first lieutenant on 12 January 1923. In August 1925, Smith spent three months at the British Meteorological Institute collecting data for use with the Ice Patrol before returning the United States and Ice Patrol duties. He received permission to study at Harvard University when Seneca wasn't on Ice Patrol duties. In 1925, Smith published A Practical Means for Determining Ocean Currents, which was utilized as a work bulletin throughout the Coast Guard.

Pre-World War II career

After his successful completion of the Marion expedition, Smith was reassigned to Rum Patrol duties as commanding officer of several cutters including the Coast Guard destroyers , , , and from 1928 to 1936. He was promoted to lieutenant commander on 21 April 1929. During times when the cutters he was assigned had maintenance availabilities at dockside, Smith worked on his doctoral thesis at Harvard University and was awarded a doctor of philosophy degree in geologic and oceanographic physics on 19 June 1930 using his Marion expedition research as a basis of his dissertation.

Smith was promoted to the rank of commander 1 October 1934. In October 1938 he was transferred to Boston and was designated as Commander, International Ice Patrol and also assumed command of . He commanded the Ice Patrol for the 1939 and 1940 seasons. As part of an agreement with the government of Denmark, Smith organized the Danish and Eskimo manned Northeast Greenland Sledge Patrol to patrol the eastern shores of Greenland in an effort to detect German weather stations. Smith was named as Commander, Northeast Greenland Patrol which consisted of USCGC Bear and as well as Northland.

After the Buskoe incident, the Northeast and South Greenland Patrols were combined under Smith's command as the Greenland Patrol in October 1941. Smith was promoted to the rank of rear admiral 30 June 1942 and on 21 November 1943 became Commander, Navy Task Force 24 which included the Greenland Patrol. Smith was awarded the Navy Distinguished Service Medal for his leadership of the Greenland Patrol and Task Force 24 by Secretary of the Navy James Forrestal. Beginning in 1949 he served as a project leader for the Weapons System Evaluation Group at the Department of Defense and worked in that capacity until his retirement on 30 June 1950.

Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution Through his former Harvard master's degree advisor, Dr. Henry Bryant Bigelow, then scientific advisor to the International Ice Patrol, Smith become elected to the board of trustees of the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution in 1945; a post he served in until 1961 when he became an honorary trustee. On 1 July 1950, Smith was named director of the institution and served in that capacity until 1956. After he retired as director he remained on the staff of the institution until his death. During his tenure as director, he was responsible for the construction of the Laboratory of Oceanography building at the institute as well as the acquisition of Research Vessel Crawford, which was the former Coast Guard Cutter .

Personal history Smith was a member of the American Geophysical Union, the Arctic Institute of North America, the Aero-Arctic Society, and the Propeller Club of New York. He held an unlimited Merchant Marine master mariner license. He was married to Isabel R. (Brier) Smith and was the father to three sons, Porter, Stuart, and Jeremiah. Upon his death he was cremated and is buried at Martha's Vineyard, Massachusetts.