The General Greene was built by the American Brown Boveri Electric Corp. of Camden, New Jersey, at a cost of $90,000. She was launched on 14 February 1927, and commissioned on 18 March 1927. After commissioning the General Greene was stationed at Boston, Massachusetts, for search and rescue and law enforcement duty. From 1931 to 1933 she was assigned to the International Ice Patrol, and then stationed at Woods Hole, Massachusetts. While on an oceanographic survey off Newfoundland in May 1941, she was ordered to search for survivors from two British freighters torpedoed off the coast of Greenland. She recovered 39 survivors from the SS Marconi, and observed part of the Royal Navy task force engaging the German battleshipBismarck. In November 1941 she "rescued" the whaling ship "Charles W Mo