Seabees
The Seabee ratings
of today are an outgrowth of World War II, but they did have an earlier counterpart.
The twelfth Public Works Regiment was organized in December 1917 from a number
of public work companies engaged in construction and maintenance of 10 separate
camps at Great Lakes Naval Training Center. The 12th Regiment trained several
hundred men for construction duties in France during World War I, but the regiment
was disbanded after the war.
The concept of assembling construction forces with skilled enlisted men was
rekindled under the name of Construction Battalion when Rear Admiral Norman
Smith became Chief, Bureau of Yards and Docks in 1933. The term Construction
Battalion was used in the mid-30s when it was written into war plans. However,
the U.S. Navy established the World War II date of 5 March 1942 as official
for the founding of the Seabees, and in 1967 the Seabees celebrated their silver
(25th) anniversary. It was not until the post-World War II rating structure
went into effect that Seabee ratings were identified by their own specialty
marks and names. For example, the Water Tender (CB) (WTCB) was the identification
used for the Utilitiesman (UT) rating until after World War II.
Information Courtesy of Naval Historical Center
