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Photo # NH 99521:  USS Perkins leading other ships of Destroyer Division Eleven, circa 1954-1955

Online Library of Selected Images:
-- U.S. NAVY SHIPS --

USS Perkins (DD-877, later DDR-877 and DD-877), 1945-1973

USS Perkins, a 2425-ton Gearing class destroyer, was built at Orange, Texas. Commissioned in early April 1945, she was soon converted to a radar picket destroyer, work that was completed in July. In the middle of August 1945, when Japan agreed to surrender, Perkins was at Pearl Harbor. Continuing on to Tokyo Bay, where she arrived in early September, she operated in the western and central Pacific until April 1946. Two more Far Eastern deployments took place in 1947 and 1949. In 1948 she went to the Marshall Islands for atomic weapons tests. While in Chinese waters in February 1949 she was redesignated DDR-877, a belated recognition of the radar picket capabilities she had received some three and a half years earlier.

In mid-1950 Perkins made a cruise in the central Pacific and executed Korean War aircraft carrier escort and shore bombardment missions in February-September 1951. A second combat deployment followed in 1952, during which she suffered the loss of one crewman when enemy shore battery shells near-missed her off Kojo, Korea, on 15 October. For the rest of the decade, and into the early 1960s, Perkins regularly served with the Seventh Fleet in the often tense Far Eastern waters, as well as operating elsewhere in the Pacific.

Between March and December 1962 Perkins was converted to FRAM II configuration, trading her special radar picket gear and three-inch guns for anti-submarine torpedo tubes and the capability of operating drone anti-submarine helicopters (DASH). Her designation reverted to DD-877 while this work was in progress. The updated destroyer began her next series of Seventh Fleet cruises in October 1963, continuing them nearly to the end of her U.S. Navy career. Perkins performed Vietnam war carrier escort, bombardment and search and rescue duties during deployments in 1966-1967, 1967-1968, 1969 and 1970-1971. Assigned to Naval Reserve training service after her last western Pacific visit, she spent most of 1971 and all of 1972 operating along the U.S. West Coast, with side trips to Alaska and Hawaii. USS Perkins was decommissioned in mid-January 1973 and transferred to Argentina. Renamed Comodore Py, she served in that nation's navy until 1984.

USS Perkins was named in honor of Commodore George H. Perkins (1836-1899).

This page features, and provides links to, all the views we have concerning USS Perkins USS Perkins (DD-877, later DDR-877 and DD-877).

For more images related to this ship, see:

  • USS Perkins (DD-877, later DDR-877 and DD-877) -- Part II; and
  • USS Perkins (DD-877) -- Inclining Experiment Views.


    If you want higher resolution reproductions than the digital images presented here, see: "How to Obtain Photographic Reproductions."

    Click on the small photograph to prompt a larger view of the same image.

    Photo #: NH 99515

    USS Perkins
    (DD-877)

    At the Mare Island Naval Shipyard, 30 January 1947.
    Note the tripod mainpast and extra antennas fitted for her role as a radar picket destroyer.

    Official U.S. Navy Photograph, from the collections of the Naval Historical Center.

    Online Image: 73KB; 740 x 545 pixels

     
    Photo #: NH 99516

    USS Perkins
    (DD-877)

    At the Mare Island Naval Shipyard, 30 January 1947.

    Official U.S. Navy Photograph, from the collections of the Naval Historical Center.

    Online Image: 75KB; 740 x 625 pixels

     
    Photo #: NH 99517

    USS Perkins
    (DD-877)

    At the Mare Island Naval Shipyard, California, 30 January 1947.

    Official U.S. Navy Photograph, from the collections of the Naval Historical Center.

    Online Image: 80KB; 740 x 625 pixels

     
    Photo #: NH 99518

    USS Perkins
    (DDR-877)

    Operating off the coast of Korea, 26 August 1951.
    Photographed by McClure, of USS Sicily (CVE-118).

    Official U.S. Navy Photograph, from the collections of the Naval Historical Center.

    Online Image: 98KB; 740 x 615 pixels

     
    Photo #: NH 99519

    USS Perkins
    (DDR-877)

    Underway, circa 1953.
    This image was received by the Naval Photographic Center in December 1959, but was taken several years earlier, soon after removal of her mainmast and replacement of her 40mm guns with 3"/50 twin mounts

    Official U.S. Navy Photograph, from the collections of the Naval Historical Center.

    Online Image: 76KB; 740 x 605 pixels

     
    Photo #: NH 99520

    USS Perkins
    (DDR-877)

    Refueling at sea from USS Yorktown (CVA-10), August 1953.
    Photographed by W.L. Pooler.

    Official U.S. Navy Photograph, from the collections of the Naval Historical Center.

    Online Image: 136KB; 740 x 610 pixels

     
    Photo #: NH 99521

    USS Perkins
    (DDR-877)

    Leading other ships of Destroyer Division Eleven, Pacific Fleet, circa 1954-1955.
    The next ship astern is USS Orleck (DD-886).

    Official U.S. Navy Photograph, from the collections of the Naval Historical Center.

    Online Image: 111KB; 600 x 765 pixels

     
    Photo #: NH 99522

    USS Perkins
    (DD-877)

    Underway following her FRAM II modernization, circa the mid-1960s.

    Official U.S. Navy Photograph, from the collections of the Naval Historical Center.

    Online Image: 113KB; 740 x 615 pixels

     


    For more images related to this ship, see:

  • USS Perkins (DD-877, later DDR-877 and DD-877) -- Part II; and
  • USS Perkins (DD-877) -- Inclining Experiment Views.


    If you want higher resolution reproductions than the digital images presented here, see: "How to Obtain Photographic Reproductions."


    Return to Naval Historical Center home page.

    Page made 17 September 2004