USS Selfridge (DD-357)
Encyclopedia
The second USS Selfridge (DD-357) was a in the United States Navy
United States Navy
The United States Navy is the naval warfare service branch of the United States Armed Forces and one of the seven uniformed services of the United States. The U.S. Navy is the largest in the world; its battle fleet tonnage is greater than that of the next 13 largest navies combined. The U.S...

. She named for Rear Admiral Thomas O. Selfridge
Thomas O. Selfridge
Rear Admiral Thomas O. Selfridge was an officer in the United States Navy during the Mexican–American War and the American Civil War and was the father of Thomas O. Selfridge, Jr....

 (1804–1902) and his son, Thomas O. Selfridge, Jr.
Thomas O. Selfridge, Jr.
Thomas O. Selfridge, Jr. , son of Thomas O. Selfridge, was an officer in the United States Navy.Born in Charlestown, Massachusetts, Selfridge graduated from the United States Naval Academy in 1854.-Civil War:...

 (1836–1924).

Selfridge was laid down by the New York Shipbuilding Corporation at Camden
Camden, New Jersey
The city of Camden is the county seat of Camden County, New Jersey. It is located across the Delaware River from Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. As of the 2010 United States Census, the city had a total population of 77,344...

 in New Jersey
New Jersey
New Jersey is a state in the Northeastern and Middle Atlantic regions of the United States. , its population was 8,791,894. It is bordered on the north and east by the state of New York, on the southeast and south by the Atlantic Ocean, on the west by Pennsylvania and on the southwest by Delaware...

 on 18 December 1933, launched on 18 April 1936 and commissioned at Philadelphia on 25 November 1936, Commander H.D. Clarke in command..

Shakedown

Selfridge conducted her shakedown cruise in the Mediterranean in January and February 1937 and returned to the east coast, via the Caribbean
Caribbean
The Caribbean is a crescent-shaped group of islands more than 2,000 miles long separating the Gulf of Mexico and the Caribbean Sea, to the west and south, from the Atlantic Ocean, to the east and north...

, in March. From April into August, she underwent post-shakedown overhaul at, and conducted training exercises out of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania
Philadelphia, Pennsylvania
Philadelphia is the largest city in the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania and the county seat of Philadelphia County, with which it is coterminous. The city is located in the Northeastern United States along the Delaware and Schuylkill rivers. It is the fifth-most-populous city in the United States,...

. In September, Presidential escort duties took her to Poughkeepsie, New York
Poughkeepsie (city), New York
Poughkeepsie is a city in the state of New York, United States, which serves as the county seat of Dutchess County. Poughkeepsie is located in the Hudson River Valley midway between New York City and Albany...

; and, in October, she proceeded to Norfolk, Virginia
Norfolk, Virginia
Norfolk is an independent city in the Commonwealth of Virginia in the United States. With a population of 242,803 as of the 2010 Census, it is Virginia's second-largest city behind neighboring Virginia Beach....

, whence she got underway for the Panama Canal Zone
Panama Canal Zone
The Panama Canal Zone was a unorganized U.S. territory located within the Republic of Panama, consisting of the Panama Canal and an area generally extending 5 miles on each side of the centerline, but excluding Panama City and Colón, which otherwise would have been partly within the limits of...

 and duty with the Battle Force in the Pacific. Diverted back to Norfolk for another Presidential escort mission in early November, she got underway again for the west coast on 9 December 1937.

Pearl Harbor

Selfridge transited the Panama Canal and joined the Battle Force as flagship
Flagship
A flagship is a vessel used by the commanding officer of a group of naval ships, reflecting the custom of its commander, characteristically a flag officer, flying a distinguishing flag...

 of Destroyer Squadron (Des-Ron) 4 on 13 December 1937 and reached San Diego, California
San Diego, California
San Diego is the eighth-largest city in the United States and second-largest city in California. The city is located on the coast of the Pacific Ocean in Southern California, immediately adjacent to the Mexican border. The birthplace of California, San Diego is known for its mild year-round...

 on the 22nd. Except for fleet problems and exercises, she remained in the southern California
California
California is a state located on the West Coast of the United States. It is by far the most populous U.S. state, and the third-largest by land area...

 area for the next two years. In 1940, she was reassigned to Pearl Harbor
Pearl Harbor
Pearl Harbor, known to Hawaiians as Puuloa, is a lagoon harbor on the island of Oahu, Hawaii, west of Honolulu. Much of the harbor and surrounding lands is a United States Navy deep-water naval base. It is also the headquarters of the U.S. Pacific Fleet...

, whence she operated until after the Japan
Japan
Japan is an island nation in East Asia. Located in the Pacific Ocean, it lies to the east of the Sea of Japan, China, North Korea, South Korea and Russia, stretching from the Sea of Okhotsk in the north to the East China Sea and Taiwan in the south...

ese attack on 7 December 1941
Attack on Pearl Harbor
The attack on Pearl Harbor was a surprise military strike conducted by the Imperial Japanese Navy against the United States naval base at Pearl Harbor, Hawaii, on the morning of December 7, 1941...

. That day, Selfridge, having just completed an escort run from Palmyra Island, was moored in berth X-9. Within five minutes of the start of hostilities, Selfridge's guns were firing on the enemy planes. By 1300, manned by a mixed crew from various ships, she was underway and soon thereafter joined other ships in patrolling off Oahu
Oahu
Oahu or Oahu , known as "The Gathering Place", is the third largest of the Hawaiian Islands and most populous of the islands in the U.S. state of Hawaii. The state capital Honolulu is located on the southeast coast...

.

During the remainder of the month, Selfridge patrolled the Hawaii
Hawaii
Hawaii is the newest of the 50 U.S. states , and is the only U.S. state made up entirely of islands. It is the northernmost island group in Polynesia, occupying most of an archipelago in the central Pacific Ocean, southwest of the continental United States, southeast of Japan, and northeast of...

an area and, screening Saratoga
USS Saratoga (CV-3)
USS Saratoga was the second aircraft carrier of the United States Navy and the fifth ship to bear her name. She was commissioned one month earlier than her sister and class leader, , which is the third actually commissioned after and Saratoga...

, participated in the abortive attempt to reinforce Wake Island
Wake Island
Wake Island is a coral atoll having a coastline of in the North Pacific Ocean, located about two-thirds of the way from Honolulu west to Guam east. It is an unorganized, unincorporated territory of the United States, administered by the Office of Insular Affairs, U.S. Department of the Interior...

. In January 1942, she continued operations in the Saratoga group until that carrier was torpedoed some 500 miles southwest of Oahu on the 11th. Selfridge then screened the carrier back to Pearl Harbor. Exercises and patrols in the Hawaiian area followed until 20 January when she assumed escort duty for a merchant ship on a Canton Island run. After arriving at Canton on the 27th, she patrolled off the island until the merchant ship completed offloading, then started back to Hawaii. En route, on the 30th, Selfridge depth charged and may have damaged an enemy submarine.

Guadalcanal

Selfridge returned to Pearl Harbor on 6 February 1942 and was underway again on the 9th to escort Saratoga to Bremerton, Washington
Bremerton, Washington
Bremerton is a city in Kitsap County, Washington, United States. The population was 38,790 at the 2011 State Estimate, making it the largest city on the Olympic Peninsula. Bremerton is home to Puget Sound Naval Shipyard and the Bremerton Annex of Naval Base Kitsap...

 for permanent repairs. In mid-March, she returned to Hawaii in the screen of a convoy and, by the end of the month, had escorted more supplies to Canton. In April, she carried Marine Corps
United States Marine Corps
The United States Marine Corps is a branch of the United States Armed Forces responsible for providing power projection from the sea, using the mobility of the United States Navy to deliver combined-arms task forces rapidly. It is one of seven uniformed services of the United States...

 personnel and mail to Palmyra and Christmas islands, and then proceeded to Bora Bora in the Society Islands, to rendezvous with and escort convoys carrying reinforcements to the Samoa
Samoa
Samoa , officially the Independent State of Samoa, formerly known as Western Samoa is a country encompassing the western part of the Samoan Islands in the South Pacific Ocean. It became independent from New Zealand in 1962. The two main islands of Samoa are Upolu and one of the biggest islands in...

n and Tonga
Tonga
Tonga, officially the Kingdom of Tonga , is a state and an archipelago in the South Pacific Ocean, comprising 176 islands scattered over of ocean in the South Pacific...

 groups. On 21 May 1942, she departed the latter group for the New Hebrides
New Hebrides
New Hebrides was the colonial name for an island group in the South Pacific that now forms the nation of Vanuatu. The New Hebrides were colonized by both the British and French in the 18th century shortly after Captain James Cook visited the islands...

 and Australia
Australia
Australia , officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a country in the Southern Hemisphere comprising the mainland of the Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous smaller islands in the Indian and Pacific Oceans. It is the world's sixth-largest country by total area...

; where, by the end of the month, she had commenced coastal escort work. A unit of TF 44, she remained in Australian waters into July; then, with others of the force, proceeded to the Fiji Islands to rehearse for Operation Watchtower, the assault and occupation of Guadalcanal
Guadalcanal
Guadalcanal is a tropical island in the South-Western Pacific. The largest island in the Solomons, it was discovered by the Spanish expedition of Alvaro de Mendaña in 1568...

 and Tulagi
Tulagi
Tulagi, less commonly Tulaghi, is a small island in the Solomon Islands, just off the south coast of Florida Island. The town of the same name on the island Tulagi, less commonly Tulaghi, is a small island (5.5 km by 1 km) in the Solomon Islands, just off the south coast of Florida...

.

Soon after 0120 on 7 August 1942, TF 44, now designated TG 62.6, the screening group for the transports, arrived in the Guadalcanal area. At 0620, Selfridge opened fire on a small gasoline carrier entering Tulagi harbor. A few hours later, the transports moved in toward the beaches. At 1320, the Japanese sent in a high level bombing attack. Shortly thereafter, they followed that strike with a dive bomber attack. On the 8th, Selfridge continued to screen the transports and, after a noon bombing attack, picked up two Japanese airmen. On the morning of the 9th, she assisted survivors of the Battle of Savo Island
Battle of Savo Island
The Battle of Savo Island, also known as the First Battle of Savo Island and, in Japanese sources, as the , was a naval battle of the Pacific Campaign of World War II, between the Imperial Japanese Navy and Allied naval forces...

 and, with Ellet, scuttled the badly-damaged Australian cruiser, Canberra
HMAS Canberra (1927)
HMAS Canberra , named after the Australian capital city of Canberra, was a Royal Australian Navy heavy cruiser of the Kent subclass of County class cruisers...

; then, toward evening, departed the area to escort the transports to Noumea
Nouméa
Nouméa is the capital city of the French territory of New Caledonia. It is situated on a peninsula in the south of New Caledonia's main island, Grande Terre, and is home to the majority of the island's European, Polynesian , Indonesian, and Vietnamese populations, as well as many Melanesians,...

.

For the remainder of the month, the Australian group (TF 44) screened the carriers of the air support group. On 31 August 1942, the ships headed back to Brisbane
Brisbane
Brisbane is the capital and most populous city in the Australian state of Queensland and the third most populous city in Australia. Brisbane's metropolitan area has a population of over 2 million, and the South East Queensland urban conurbation, centred around Brisbane, encompasses a population of...

; and, for the next nine months, Selfridge continued to operate with that force in the Coral Sea
Coral Sea
The Coral Sea is a marginal sea off the northeast coast of Australia. It is bounded in the west by the east coast of Queensland, thereby including the Great Barrier Reef, in the east by Vanuatu and by New Caledonia, and in the north approximately by the southern extremity of the Solomon Islands...

 to prevent a Japanese landing at Port Moresby
Port Moresby
Port Moresby , or Pot Mosbi in Tok Pisin, is the capital and largest city of Papua New Guinea . It is located on the shores of the Gulf of Papua, on the southeastern coast of the island of New Guinea, which made it a prime objective for conquest by the Imperial Japanese forces during 1942–43...

 and to cover Allied shipping to the Papuan peninsula.

Battle of Vella Lavella

In May 1943, Selfridge was reassigned to the 3rd Fleet. On the 12th, she arrived at Nouméa. Through the summer, she operated with cruisers of TF 36, later TF 37, and participated in exercises with TF's 38, 39, and 34. In late September, as a unit of the 3d Fleet's amphibious force, she escorted an LST convoy to Vella Lavella
Vella Lavella
Vella Lavella is an island in the Western Province of the Solomon Islands. It lies to the west of New Georgia, but is considered one of the New Georgia Group...

, then commenced nighttime patrols in the Solomon Islands
Solomon Islands
Solomon Islands is a sovereign state in Oceania, east of Papua New Guinea, consisting of nearly one thousand islands. It covers a land mass of . The capital, Honiara, is located on the island of Guadalcanal...

 up “the Slot” to intercept Japanese shipping.

On the night of 6 October 1943, Selfridge, O'Bannon
USS O'Bannon (DD-450)
USS O'Bannon , a Fletcher-class destroyer, was the second ship of the United States Navy to be named for Lieutenant Presley O'Bannon , the Marine Corps's "hero of Derna"....

, and Chevalier
USS Chevalier (DD-451)
USS Chevalier , a Fletcher-class destroyer, was the first ship of the United States Navy to be named for Lieutenant Commander Godfrey Chevalier....

 intercepted an enemy force of six destroyers, three destroyer transports, and smaller armed craft some 12 miles off Marquana Bay as it attempted to evacuate land forces from Vella Lavella. In the ensuing Battle of Vella Lavella
Naval Battle of Vella Lavella
The was a naval battle of the Pacific campaign of World War II fought on the night of 6 October 1943, near the island of Vella Lavella in the Solomon Islands.-Background:...

, Chevalier was torpedoed and damaged beyond repair. She was sunk on the 7th by an American torpedo. Selfridge and O'Bannon were both heavily damaged; Selfridge by an enemy torpedo, O'Bannon by enemy action compounded by collision with Chevalier just after the latter had gone dead in the water. Personnel casualties on board Selfridge amounted to 13 killed, 11 wounded, and 36 missing.

1944

Temporary repairs to Selfridge were made at Purvis Bay
Purvis Bay
Purvis Bay is located in the Florida Islands, which are part of the Solomon Islands. The bay was used by the US Navy during World War Two....

 and at Nouméa. Permanent repairs, including the installation of a new bow and a complete new gun armament, were made at the Mare Island Naval Shipyard
Mare Island Naval Shipyard
The Mare Island Naval Shipyard was the first United States Navy base established on the Pacific Ocean. It is located 25 miles northeast of San Francisco in Vallejo, California. The Napa River goes through the Mare Island Strait and separates the peninsula shipyard from the main portion of the...

; and, after refresher training out of San Diego, she returned to Pearl Harbor on 10 May 1944 in time to join the forces staging for the invasion of the Marianas Islands. Initially assigned to TG 50.11, she joined TF 58, the fast carrier force, at Majuro
Majuro
Majuro , is a large coral atoll of 64 islands in the Pacific Ocean, and forms a legislative district of the Ratak Chain of the Marshall Islands. The atoll itself has a land area of and encloses a lagoon of...

 in early June; and, on the 11th, screened Bunker Hill
USS Bunker Hill (CV-17)
USS Bunker Hill was one of 24 s built during World War II for the United States Navy. The ship, the second US Navy ship to bear the name, was named for the Battle of Bunker Hill. Bunker Hill was commissioned in May 1943, and served in several campaigns in the Pacific Theater of Operations, earning...

 as sweeps were conducted over Guam
Guam
Guam is an organized, unincorporated territory of the United States located in the western Pacific Ocean. It is one of five U.S. territories with an established civilian government. Guam is listed as one of 16 Non-Self-Governing Territories by the Special Committee on Decolonization of the United...

. On the 13th, she participated in a shore bombardment of Saipan
Saipan
Saipan is the largest island of the United States Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands , a chain of 15 tropical islands belonging to the Marianas archipelago in the western Pacific Ocean with a total area of . The 2000 census population was 62,392...

 to cover minesweeping operations off that target island; then shifted to night fire. On the 14th, she joined the fire support unit; and, on the 15th, screened the transport area as the assault troops landed on Saipan. From then to the 17th, she rotated between daytime screening activities and nighttime harassment duty. On the latter date, word of a Japanese force moving in from the Philippines
Philippines
The Philippines , officially known as the Republic of the Philippines , is a country in Southeast Asia in the western Pacific Ocean. To its north across the Luzon Strait lies Taiwan. West across the South China Sea sits Vietnam...

 reached the assault force, and Selfridge rejoined TF 58 and took station as the linking vessel between TG's 58.7 and 58.3. On the 19th, the Battle of the Philippine Sea
Battle of the Philippine Sea
The Battle of the Philippine Sea was a decisive naval battle of World War II which effectively eliminated the Imperial Japanese Navy's ability to conduct large-scale carrier actions. It took place during the United States' amphibious invasion of the Mariana Islands during the Pacific War...

 raged; but none of the enemy's aircraft came within range of Selfridge's guns. On the 20th and 21st, the Japanese proceeded westward. On the 24th, Selfridge rejoined the transport screen off Saipan; and, on the 26th, resumed fire support duties.
Selfridge departed Saipan on 11 July 1944; and, screening the transports, arrived at Eniwetok on the 15th. Three days later, she was underway again to return to the Marianas with reinforcements for the Guam assault. She arrived off Agat on the 22d, the day after the initial assault and, for the next three weeks, provided screening and fire support services and conducted anti-boat and barge patrols. On 10 August, she sailed for Eniwetok, whence, she returned to Pearl Harbor. On 21 August, she received orders back to the Atlantic.

1945

Transiting the Panama Canal on 7 September 1944, Selfridge proceeded to New York for an abbreviated overhaul after which she joined TF 65; and, serving as flagship, commenced transatlantic escort duty for convoys plying between the east coast and Tunisia
Tunisia
Tunisia , officially the Tunisian RepublicThe long name of Tunisia in other languages used in the country is: , is the northernmost country in Africa. It is a Maghreb country and is bordered by Algeria to the west, Libya to the southeast, and the Mediterranean Sea to the north and east. Its area...

. Continuing that duty until after the fall of Germany
Germany
Germany , officially the Federal Republic of Germany , is a federal parliamentary republic in Europe. The country consists of 16 states while the capital and largest city is Berlin. Germany covers an area of 357,021 km2 and has a largely temperate seasonal climate...

 in May 1945, she completed her last run at New York on 7 June. Upkeep and training exercises in the Caribbean and off the Maine
Maine
Maine is a state in the New England region of the northeastern United States, bordered by the Atlantic Ocean to the east and south, New Hampshire to the west, and the Canadian provinces of Quebec to the northwest and New Brunswick to the northeast. Maine is both the northernmost and easternmost...

 coast took her through August; and, on 15 September, she returned to New York to prepare for inactivation.

On 15 October 1945, Selfridge was decommissioned, struck from the Navy list on 1 November 1945 and scrapped in October 1947.

She earned four battle stars during World War II
World War II
World War II, or the Second World War , was a global conflict lasting from 1939 to 1945, involving most of the world's nations—including all of the great powers—eventually forming two opposing military alliances: the Allies and the Axis...

.
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