South

Throughout the nation’s history, the people and vessels of the U.S. Coast Guard and its forebears departed from New York to fight for the nation’s freedom and protect its economic interests. During the War of 1812, the Revenue Cutter Vigilant captured the British privateer Dart in nearby waters in one of the war’s most daring captures after hand-to-hand combat during the boarding. New York vessels waged Prohibition’s Rum War in the 1920s, and from the 1970s on, drug interdiction was prosecuted locally and in the Caribbean. For years, cutters based on Governors Island conducted Caribbean operations, rescuing tens of thousands of Cuban refugees in 1980 and Cuban and Haitian refugees in 1994. Brave men and women of the Coast Guard, Coast Guard Reserve, and Coast Guard Auxiliary battled the hostile forces of nature in aircraft and vessels to save lives and aid distressed vessels. The U.S. Life Saving Service, founded in New Jersey in 1848, had a saying: “You have to go out, but you don’t have to come back.” America honors those Coast Guard personnel who went out, especially those who did not come back.

New York, New York · United States