Danmark (USCG)

The auxiliary steel fullrigged ship Danmark, built in 1932 for the Danish Ministry of Shipping and Fisheries for use as a training ship, visited Seattle on a training cruise in 1946, mooring at Pier 54 on the central waterfront and causing considerable tourist traffic for the month of December. Under command of Captain Knud L. Hansen, the little square-rigger and her 116 Danish Merchant Marine cadets arrived after a 13,000-mfle voyage from Copenhagen under sail. One of the welcoming committee was Capt. Harald Fritzner of Seattle who had not seen Capt. Hansen since they both attended the same navigation school in Denmark 23 years previously. Denmark had found herself in the United States at the outbreak of the war and was lent to the United States Coast Guard Academy at New London for use as a training ship in which service this vessel trained 5,000 United States Coast Guard cadets.

In 1939 this vesselvisited the United States to participate in the 1939 Worlds Fair in New York City, but at the outbreak of hostilities in World War II this vessel was ordered to remain in US waters to avoid capture by the Germans. After the attack on Pearl Harbor the ship was offered to the U.S. government as a training vessel. This offer was accepted, and the Danmark moved to New London, Connecticut to train cadets at the United States Coast Guard Academy. Approximately five thousand cadets were trained before the ship was returned to Denmark in 1945.

In 1946 this vesselvisited Esquimalt BC Canada.