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.

[6] Smith's first assignment was aboard USRC Seminole home-ported at Wilmington, North Carolina where he served as the cutter junior engineering officer.

[Note 1] 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.

[1] Because the Coast Guard had been tasked with staffing the International Ice Patrol as a result of the sinking of the RMS Titanic in 1912, the service had always looked for ways to predict the path of icebergs that entered North Atlantic shipping lanes.

Marion left Boston, Massachusetts on 11 July with Smith as commanding officer of a crew of 26 bound for the Strait of Belle Isle off the Labrador coast.

[13] 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 Henley, Downes, Shaw, Tucker and George E. Badger from 1928 to 1936.

[1] Smith was recommended by Harvard University, the American Geographic Society and the National Academy of Sciences to go on an expedition aboard the German dirigible Graf Zeppelin in 1931.

[1] While Smith was assigned to Spencer he was cited by the Department of the Navy for his role in the rescue of the crew of USS Swallow after she ran aground at Kanaga Island on 19 February 1938.

[1] Although the Commandant of the Coast Guard, Admiral Russell R. Waesche, wanted to discontinue the Ice Patrol activities for the 1941 season, it was suggested by President Franklin D. Roosevelt that the Ice Patrol might be a good cover for investigating reports that the German Navy might be attempting to establish weather stations along Greenland's eastern coast.

[1] After the United States declared war on Germany in December 1941, Smith requested additional cutters to support the patrol in its increased mission load.

[19] 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.

[21] 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.

[3] 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.