USS Yankton (previously named La Cleopatre, Saphire III, Penelope)[1][2] was a steel-hulled schooner built in 1893 at Leith, Scotland, by Ramage & Ferguson.

According to Charles Armstrong, who was the medical officer of Yankton in 1918, Penelope had been the extravagant yacht of Sarah Bernhardt,[1] a well-known French actress.

[4] In World War I she headed for Gibraltar to join the Patrol Forces protecting Allied shipping from German U-boats, and she came under hostile fire during combat.

[4] Eventually, out of fuel and money, steam was raised by chopping up interior woodwork and on 23 May 1923 the master surrendered to customs agents at the quarantine anchorage in New York.

[4][6] Free again the ship ran aground on Nixes Mate in Boston harbor during a January snowstorm.