Cigarette was built as a fast, private steamyacht of the same name in 1905 by George Lawley & Son at Neponset, Massachusetts, for C. A. Wood of Cambridge, Massachusetts. She appears to have entered U.S. Navy service by as early as mid-June 1917, but on 17 September 1917, the Navy officially purchased her from her owner for use as a patrol boat during World War I. She was commissioned as USS Cigarette (SP-1234) on 19 September 1917.
Assigned to the 1st Naval District, Cigarette served on section patrol duties in northern New England for the remainder of World War I, performing patrol duty off Boston, Massachusetts; Provincetown, Massachusetts; and Bar Harbor, Maine. She also carried out patrols at Guantánamo Bay, Cuba, probably in 1919.
Cigarette was decommissioned in July 1919 and sold on 29 October 1920. Renamed Pocantico by her new owner, she once again became a private yacht. She was scrapped in 1930.