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USS Fred T. Berry (DD-858)
Encyclopedia
USS Fred T. Berry (DD/DDE-858) was a of 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...
, named for Commander Fred T. Berry
Fred T. Berry
Fred Thomas Berry, born 23 November 1887 in Logan, Iowa, was a member of the United States Naval Academy class of 1908. Through much of his early career he specialized in engineering duty, and during World War I commanded McCall...
(1887–1933).
Fred T. Berry was launched
Ship naming and launching
The ceremonies involved in naming and launching naval ships are based in traditions thousands of years old.-Methods of launch:There are three principal methods of conveying a new ship from building site to water, only two of which are called "launching." The oldest, most familiar, and most widely...
on 28 January 1945 by Bethlehem Steel
Bethlehem Steel
The Bethlehem Steel Corporation , based in Bethlehem, Pennsylvania, was once the second-largest steel producer in the United States, after Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania-based U.S. Steel. After a decline in the U.S...
Co., San Pedro, California; sponsored by Mrs. Fred T. Berry, widow of Commander Berry; and commissioned
Ship commissioning
Ship commissioning is the act or ceremony of placing a ship in active service, and may be regarded as a particular application of the general concepts and practices of project commissioning. The term is most commonly applied to the placing of a warship in active duty with its country's military...
on 12 May 1945, Commander N. J. Frank, Jr., in command.
Service history
Sailing from San Francisco, CaliforniaCalifornia
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...
on 29 August 1945, Fred T. Berry trained with aircraft carrier
Aircraft carrier
An aircraft carrier is a warship designed with a primary mission of deploying and recovering aircraft, acting as a seagoing airbase. Aircraft carriers thus allow a naval force to project air power worldwide without having to depend on local bases for staging aircraft operations...
s in 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 waters and completed a tour of occupation duty in the Far East before returning to her home port, San Diego
Naval Station San Diego
Naval Base San Diego is the largest base of the United States Navy on the west coast of the United States, in San Diego, California. Naval Base San Diego is the principal homeport of the Pacific Fleet, consisting of 54 ships and over 120 tenant commands. The base is composed of 13 piers stretched...
, on 21 February 1947. A second Far Eastern cruise, between 2 December and 7 August 1948, preceded a modernization overhaul in 1949, during which her anti-submarine warfare
Anti-submarine warfare
Anti-submarine warfare is a branch of naval warfare that uses surface warships, aircraft, or other submarines to find, track and deter, damage or destroy enemy submarines....
capabilities were augmented.
Fred T. Berry left San Diego on 25 August 1949 for her new home port, Newport, Rhode Island
Naval Station Newport
The Naval Station Newport is a United States Navy base located in the towns of Newport and Middletown, Rhode Island. Naval Station Newport is home to the Naval War College and the Naval Justice School...
, arriving on 11 September. The Atlantic Fleet exercise schedule took her from Greenland
Greenland
Greenland is an autonomous country within the Kingdom of Denmark, located between the Arctic and Atlantic Oceans, east of the Canadian Arctic Archipelago. Though physiographically a part of the continent of North America, Greenland has been politically and culturally associated with Europe for...
to Guantanamo Bay
Guantanamo Bay Naval Base
Guantanamo Bay Naval Base is located on of land and water at Guantánamo Bay, Cuba which the United States leased for use as a coaling station following the Cuban-American Treaty of 1903. The base is located on the shore of Guantánamo Bay at the southeastern end of Cuba. It is the oldest overseas...
, Cuba
Cuba
The Republic of Cuba is an island nation in the Caribbean. The nation of Cuba consists of the main island of Cuba, the Isla de la Juventud, and several archipelagos. Havana is the largest city in Cuba and the country's capital. Santiago de Cuba is the second largest city...
, in the ten months that followed. Fred T. Berry was reclassified an Escort Destroyer, DDE-858, on 4 March 1950. Alerted for temporary duty in the Mediterranean at the opening of the Korean War
Korean War
The Korean War was a conventional war between South Korea, supported by the United Nations, and North Korea, supported by the People's Republic of China , with military material aid from the Soviet Union...
, Fred T. Berry sailed from Newport on 5 July 1950, and at the end of the summer, sailed on through the Suez Canal
Suez Canal
The Suez Canal , also known by the nickname "The Highway to India", is an artificial sea-level waterway in Egypt, connecting the Mediterranean Sea and the Red Sea. Opened in November 1869 after 10 years of construction work, it allows water transportation between Europe and Asia without navigation...
to join the 7th Fleet
United States Seventh Fleet
The Seventh Fleet is the United States Navy's permanent forward projection force based in Yokosuka, Japan, with units positioned near Japan and South Korea. It is a component fleet force under the United States Pacific Fleet. At present, it is the largest of the forward-deployed U.S. fleets, with...
in the Far East. She screened fast carriers launching strikes on targets in North Korea
North Korea
The Democratic People’s Republic of Korea , , is a country in East Asia, occupying the northern half of the Korean Peninsula. Its capital and largest city is Pyongyang. The Korean Demilitarized Zone serves as the buffer zone between North Korea and South Korea...
, and escorted battleship
Battleship
A battleship is a large armored warship with a main battery consisting of heavy caliber guns. Battleships were larger, better armed and armored than cruisers and destroyers. As the largest armed ships in a fleet, battleships were used to attain command of the sea and represented the apex of a...
to her bombardment duty at Hŭngnam
Hungnam
Hŭngnam was the third largest city in North Korea.It is a port city on the eastern coast, in South Hamgyong Province, on the Sea of Japan . The city covers an area of 250 square kilometers...
during the withdrawal from that port. Detached from Task Force 77 (TF 77) on 5 February 1951, Fred T. Berry sailed eastward to complete her circumnavigation
Circumnavigation
Circumnavigation – literally, "navigation of a circumference" – refers to travelling all the way around an island, a continent, or the entire planet Earth.- Global circumnavigation :...
of the world with her return to Newport on 14 March 1951.
During each of the next three years, and again in 1957 and 1960, Fred T. Berry served tours of duty with the 6th Fleet in the Mediterranean, joining in exercises, patrolling this key area, and paying good will visits to many ports. NATO "Operation Mainbrace
Operation Mainbrace
Exercise Mainbrace was the first large-scale naval exercise undertaken by the newly established Allied Command Atlantic , one of the two principal military commands of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization . It was part of a series of NATO exerciseS jointly commanded by Supreme Allied Commander...
" took her to British
United Kingdom
The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern IrelandIn the United Kingdom and Dependencies, other languages have been officially recognised as legitimate autochthonous languages under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages...
ports in 1952, and during the 1956 midshipman
Midshipman
A midshipman is an officer cadet, or a commissioned officer of the lowest rank, in the Royal Navy, United States Navy, and many Commonwealth navies. Commonwealth countries which use the rank include Australia, New Zealand, South Africa, India, Pakistan, Singapore, Sri Lanka and Kenya...
training cruise, she called at Barcelona
Barcelona
Barcelona is the second largest city in Spain after Madrid, and the capital of Catalonia, with a population of 1,621,537 within its administrative limits on a land area of...
, Spain
Spain
Spain , officially the Kingdom of Spain languages]] under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages. In each of these, Spain's official name is as follows:;;;;;;), is a country and member state of the European Union located in southwestern Europe on the Iberian Peninsula...
, and Greenock
Greenock
Greenock is a town and administrative centre in the Inverclyde council area in United Kingdom, and a former burgh within the historic county of Renfrewshire, located in the west central Lowlands of Scotland...
, Scotland
Scotland
Scotland is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. Occupying the northern third of the island of Great Britain, it shares a border with England to the south and is bounded by the North Sea to the east, the Atlantic Ocean to the north and west, and the North Channel and Irish Sea to the...
.
With her primary employment anti-submarine warfare development from 1954 through 1963, Fred T. Berry sailed the western Atlantic from Canadian
Canada
Canada is a North American country consisting of ten provinces and three territories. Located in the northern part of the continent, it extends from the Atlantic Ocean in the east to the Pacific Ocean in the west, and northward into the Arctic Ocean...
ports to Argentina
Argentina
Argentina , officially the Argentine Republic , is the second largest country in South America by land area, after Brazil. It is constituted as a federation of 23 provinces and an autonomous city, Buenos Aires...
, operating with experimental hunter-killer groups.
"Fred T. Berry" sailed from Newport, RI, in January 1966 with DESRON 12 for the Pacific via the Panama Canal. She earned two campaign stars and the Combat Action Ribbon for Vietnam service. Returning to Newport via the Suez Canal the "Fred T. Berry completed her round the world cruise in August 1966.
On 15 September 1970, Fred T. Berry was stricken from the Naval Vessel Register
Naval Vessel Register
The Naval Vessel Register is the official inventory of ships and service craft in custody of or titled by the United States Navy. It contains information on ships and service craft that make up the official inventory of the Navy from the time a vessel is authorized through its life cycle and...
. On 14 May 1972 she was scuttled at 24°27.8′N 81°33.3′W, in 55 fathoms (100 m) to form an artificial reef
Artificial reef
An artificial reef is a human-made underwater structure, typically built to promote marine life in areas with a generally featureless bottom, control erosion, block ship passage, or improve surfing....
off Key West
Key West
Key West is an island in the Straits of Florida on the North American continent at the southernmost tip of the Florida Keys. Key West is home to the southernmost point in the Continental United States; the island is about from Cuba....
, Florida
Florida
Florida is a state in the southeastern United States, located on the nation's Atlantic and Gulf coasts. It is bordered to the west by the Gulf of Mexico, to the north by Alabama and Georgia and to the east by the Atlantic Ocean. With a population of 18,801,310 as measured by the 2010 census, it...
.
In 1973 the research submersible
Submersible
A submersible is a small vehicle designed to operate underwater. The term submersible is often used to differentiate from other underwater vehicles known as submarines, in that a submarine is a fully autonomous craft, capable of renewing its own power and breathing air, whereas a submersible is...
Johnson Sea Link
Johnson Sea Link
Johnson Sea Link was the name of a deep-sea scientific research submersible built by Edwin Albert Link in 1971. Link built the submersible at the request of his friend Seward Johnson, founder of the Harbor Branch Oceanographic Institution....
became entangled in her wreckage, resulting in the deaths of two of its four occupants.