USS Wadleigh

Soon after her return from this special escort duty, Wadleigh got underway from Hampton Roads, Virginia, on 3 January 1944 and steamed via Panama to Pearl Harbor.

Her baptism of fire came on 20 March 1944 during the Marshall Islands campaign. Assigned shore-bombardment duties, Wadleigh—in company with McCalla and Sage —supported LCIs and LSTs during the landings on Ailinglapalap and expended 478 rounds of 5 inch shells which destroyed an enemy-held village. Three days later, the new destroyer again took part in shooting up Japanese defenses, shelling a weather station and a radio station on Ebon Island, helping to clear the way for the 1,500 marines who soon took the island.

The ship returned to the Hawaiian Islands for further operational training in preparation for the upcoming conquest of the Marianas. Assigned to Task Group 52.4 (TG 52.4), Wadleigh arrived off Roi Island in the Marshalls on 10 June, five days before D-Day for the invasion of Saipan Island. The day before the first landings, the warship closed Saipan and commenced fire early in the morning, beginning her part in the operations designed to "soften up" the enemy defenses.

On D-Day, Wadleigh lay offshore, providing predawn gunfire support for underwater demolition teams (UDTs) and for the initial waves of troops. After spending the day in shelling enemy positions, she retired seaward to conduct screening patrols. While thus engaged, Wadleigh and Melvin both picked up strong sonar contacts with a submarine west of Tinian. Both ships went to general quarters and attacked, dropping depth charges with deadly precision. A heavy explosion, followed by a widening slick of oil and debris, indicated that whatever had been down there had been heavily hit. Postwar accounting revealed that the two destroyers had teamed to sink the Japanese submarine RO-114.

Assigned to bombard Garapan, the capital city of Saipan, Wadleigh encountered heavy activity of all types in this area, from both friend and foe alike, while expending some 1,700 rounds of 5 inch shells against the Japanese-held island. Not only was Wadleigh fired on by a Japanese shore battery, but the doughty destroyer was also straddled by a stick of bombs from a Japanese plane, mistaken for a low-flying aircraft by American forces, and again taken under fire from shore—all within a hair-raising space of 15 minutes! During the latter days of the campaign Wadleigh shot enemy snipers out of caves, trees, and cliffs; picked up an occasional Japanese prisoner, and rescued downed American aircrews shot down near her position.

Following escort runs to Eniwetok and Guadalcanal, Wadleigh was assigned to support the invasion of the Palaus. On 15 September, she patrolled north of the islands on radar picket duty, standing ready to provide early warning if Japanese planes were sighted.

USS Wadleigh hull damage as a result of mine strike on September 16th, 1944 off the Palau Islands

On the following day, Wadleigh steamed to Kossol Roads to begin assisting minesweepers in clearing the sealanes there. Floating mines swept up by the minesweepers provided the destroyers with "game", and Wadleigh destroyed 22 with 40-millimeter fire. The 23d, however, was deadly. While approaching one mine, the destroyer brushed horns with another, an unswept mine which burst amidships. The explosion ripped into the bowels of the ship, killing three men and injuring 20, while flooding three engineering compartments and one living space. As the crew raced to general quarters, the ship settled five feet by the stern, and listed seven degrees to starboard. Wadleigh, now sporting a 40-foot rend in her bottom, came to an even keel as the crew manhandled all movable weight from starboard to port to correct the list.

Bennett passed a towline and towed the stricken destroyer out of danger. The crippled ship, now sagging noticeably amidships, "worked" noticeably in the swells, prompting initial fears that the ship was breaking in two. In addition, the shock of the blast snapped one radar antenna and jarred both 26-foot motor whaleboats from their blocks.

Wadleigh at Mare Island Naval Shipyard on 10 April 1945

USS Wadleigh crew photograph circa 1945

After temporary repairs, the ship painfully made her way back to Pear

Temporary repairs to the Wadleigh's hull after striking a mine off Palau Island in 1944.

l Harbor and thence proceeded to the west coast to enter the Mare Island Navy Yard for repairs. Nearly rebuilt from the keel up, Wadleigh emerged from Mare Island on 20 February 1945 for speed trials and gunnery shoots. She departed San Diego, California, on 19 April and arrived at Pearl Harbor on 25 April, in company with Charrette, to conduct type-training exercises in the Hawaiian Islands.

She departed Pearl Harbor on 3 May, bound for Ulithi, and arrived there after an 11-day passage. Rejoining her old unit—Destroyer Squadron 54 (DesRon 54)—the destroyer sortied with other 5th Fleet units on 25 May. After serving several tours on radar picket stations with the Fleet, Wadleigh weathered heavy typhoons from 5 to 7 June and subsequently accompanied Alaska and Guam in a shore bombardment mission to Minami Daito Shima (Rasa Island) on the 9th, demolishing radar installations and buildings.

After a rest period in the Philippines, Wadleigh sailed again for Japanese waters to screen the aircraft carriers as they continued to pound the Japanese home islands. On 10 July, the ship embarked a party of dignitaries—including Assistant Secretary of the Navy for Air, John L. Sullivan, and Vice Admiral Aubrey W. Fitch, for transportation to Iwo Jima.

Rendezvousing with Ticonderoga at Guam, she rejoined her task force on 21 July to support offensive operations off Japan's doorstep. While serving on occasion 50 miles from the enemy shore, Wadleigh rescued two downed Navy aircrewmen who had been shot down during a strike on Tokyo.

The destroyer slowed to destroy a derelict mine on 10 August, but excessive turbine vibrations forced the ship to shut down her starboard engine. Detached from the task force, Wadleigh limped back to Ulithi, in a convoy of replenishment ships and tankers, for repairs. While en route, she received word of the Japanese capitulation.

Departing Ulithi on 23 August and hoping to rejoin the Fleet in time for the triumphal entry into Tokyo Bay, Wadleigh stopped at Iwo Jima en route for passengers and mail and arrived 24 hours after the first ships had entered the bay. Ordered to proceed directly to Sagami Wan, Wadleigh went to general quarters in company with Benevolence as the ships passed beneath the once-menacing shore batteries along the Urage Strait. They soon arrived at their destination, the Yokosuka Naval Base, on 29 August.

As the first American troops went ashore at Yokohama and Yokosuka, Wadleigh headed out to sea and rendezvoused with incoming carrier groups. She returned to her anchorage, near Missouri, on 2 September—in time to be on hand when the official surrender accords were signed that day.

Back at sea with the carriers once more, Wadleigh patrolled off the Japanese coast for two weeks, before she departed Nipponese waters on 16 September and proceeded via Eniwetok to Saipan in company with Bennington and Lexington for air group replacements. The destroyer returned to Tokyo Bay after a week at Saipan and arrived on 13 October, escorting Belleau Wood and Lexington.

Departing Japanese waters on 20 October, bound for the Hawaiian Islands, Wadleigh carried a load of men eligible for discharge upon their return to the United States. After a 48-hour layover in the Hawaiian Islands, she pressed on for San Francisco, arriving on 5 November 1945. She commenced a preinactivation overhaul on 5 December and sailed for San Diego, California, on 27 January 1946, for inactivation. The destroyer was placed out of commission, in reserve, in the San Diego group of the Pacific Reserve Fleet, in January 1947.

Wadleigh received six battle stars for her service in World War II.