This was sponsored by Miss Anna T. Craven, the great-great-granddaughter of Commodore Tingey, and commissioned at Norfolk, Virginia, on 7 January 1904.

For the most part, she lay tied up at pierside; but, periodically she got underway to ensure her material readiness should a need for her services ever arise.

However, all three organizations to which she was assigned appear simply to have been different names for the same duty – lying at pier side in reserve.

The disabled Tingey was towed back to Charleston by the naval tug USS Sebago.

John Henry Tibbs, a water tender, died the following day from injuries sustained in the explosion.

A month later on 7 April 1917, she was recommissioned and moved further north to patrol the coastal waters of the 1st Naval District during the period the United States participated in World War I.