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MAYO seen anchored off the New York Navy Yard on 14 August, 1944 in a Measure 32/3D camouflage scheme.
The USS MAYO (DD-422) was laid down May 16, 1938 by the Bethlehem Shipbuilding Corp, Fore River, Massachusetts. She was launched in March 1940 and set a top speed of 38 knots on sea trials. Passing sea trials with flying colors, the Navy commissioned the USS Mayo on September 18, 1940. The Mayo was to be designated United States Destroyer 422, and would be the second ship to be built in the Benson class.
Mayo joined the U.S. Neutrality Patrol after her shakedown cruise and escorted Marines to Iceland in July 1941; as they took protective custody of that island to halt German expansion in the North Atlantic. As President Roosevelt and Winston Churchill agreed to the Atlantic Charter in August 1941, the Mayo safeguarded their meeting by patrolling the waters off Argentia, New Foundland.
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Commanding Officers |
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Lieutenant Commander Campbell D. Emory, US. Navy |
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Commander Irving T. Duke, US. Navy |
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Commander Frederic S. Habecker, US. Navy |
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Commander Albert D. Kaplan, US. Navy |
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Lieutenant Commander Wayne Herkness II, US. Navy |
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Lieutenant Commander Arthur B. Glidden, USNR |
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Lieutenant Commander Wayne Herkness II, US. Navy |
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After December 7, 1941, her convoy duties were lengthened to include both the Atlantic seaboard of the U.S. and the Western Atlantic. The escorting of slow merchant convoys from Boston quickly changed into guarding fast troop transports from New York. The danger of U-boats and the treacherous weather of the North Atlantic were constant dangers. While escorting a convoy back to the States, the troopship U.S.S. Wakefield (ex- SS Manhattan) caught fire and was immediately engulfed in flames. The Mayo swiftly moved alongside the burning ship and removed 247 survivors.
Along with other destroyer's from DesRon 7, Mayo joined the 8th fleet in the Mediterranean Sea in August 1943. She gave fire and anti-aircraft protection at Salerno, Italy, and again at the beachhead of Anzio. It was here at Anzio, on the 24 of January 1944, that the Mayo experienced a sudden explosion that killed seven and wounded twenty-five of her crew. Being almost split in two, the crew took immediate action to save the ship. Only, the gallant and immediate damage control efforts by the ship's crew saved her from sinking. With a gaping whole at her waterline, the Mayo was towed to Naples, Italy for temporary repairs to enable her to make the transit across the ocean back to the United States. Here she would stay for four months of repairs and modernization.
Desperate to get back into the fight, Mayo made four convoy voyages to Europe before Germany Surrendered. The Mayo was then transferred to the Pacific Theater of Operation, where she escorted both fast-attack carrier groups and troop convoys to Okinawa. The morning of 2 September, 1945, USS Mayo and other elements of DesRon7 entered Tokyo Bay, Japan for the surrender ceremony having just arrived at 1000 hours after escorting the first occupation troops of the US First Calvary to the Japanese mainland. With the war's end on September 2, 1945, the USS Mayo's duties included heading back to the states while escorting the home-coming troops; and her crew also served as part of the Occupational Force of Japan. On March 18, 1946, the Mayo was decommissioned and put into the Atlantic Reserve fleet in Orange, Texas.
She earned 2 battle stars for her service . The Mayo was a major participant in the naval engagements of Salerno, Anzio, Battle of the Atlantic, Okinawa, and the assembling of the fleet at Tokyo Bay for the Japanese surrender in WWII. After 24 years in the reserve fleet, the Mayo was officially stricken from the Naval Register on December 1, 1970
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