The fourth USS Relief (ID-2170) was a salvage tug that served in the United States Navy from 1918 to 1919.
Relief was a steel-hulled wrecking tug built during 1907 by Harlan and Hollingsworth at Wilmington, Delaware.
The U.S. Navy acquired her on 8 August 1918 from the Merritt and Chapman Derrick and Wrecking Company of New York, New York for World War I service. The Navy gave her Id. No. 2170 and commissioned her on 19 August 1918. Relief operated as a salvage and wrecking tug in the New York area while assigned to the 3rd Naval District into 1919. She collided with the patrol vessel on 27 September 1918; Williams suffered slight damage.[1]
Relief was sold to her former owner on 14 May 1919, and remained in commercial service between the two world wars. During World War II, Relief, although remaining civilian-owned and -operated, supported the U.S. Navy under the direction of its Bureau of Ships beginning on 14 January 1942. Relief subsequently returned to mercantile service until placed out of service in 1955.