USS Jeffers, a 1630-ton Gleaves class destroyer built at Kearny, New Jersey, was commissioned in November 1942. She escorted a convoy to Morocco in February-April 1943, briefly patrolled off Newfoundland, then recrossed the Atlantic in June to join the forces preparing to invade Italy. During the Sicily campaign in July and early August she provided gunfire support and anti-submarine escort services. Jeffers returned to the U.S. in August 1943 and was thereafter mainly employed as a trans-Atlantic convoy escort.
In June 1944 Jeffers participated in the invasion of Normandy, operating off "Utah" Beach as a fire support ship and escort. She next went to the Mediterranean to take part in the Southern France campaign during August and September. Converted to a high speed minesweeper after the conclusion of that operation, she was redesignated DMS-27 in November 1944.
Jeffers went to the Pacific in January 1945 and, beginning in late March, was an active participant in the brutal fight to capture Okinawa. She initially performed minesweeping duties in advance of the landings, then undertook anti-submarine and radar picket work, including helping to defend against Japanese suicide planes during April. Jeffers spent the last weeks of the Pacific War sweeping mines north of Okinawa. She was present in Tokyo Bay on 2 September 1945, when Japan formally surrendered, and took part in mine clearance operations off Japan and China for most of the rest of the year.
Returning to the U.S. in December 1945, Jeffers steamed to the Atlantic Coast in early 1946. She served in the western Atlantic and Caribbean for the next nine years, and also deployed four times to the Mediterranean sea between September 1949 and early 1954. Jeffers reverted to destroyer status in January 1955, again being designated DD-621, and was decommissioned in May of that year. After more than a decade and a half in the Atlantic Reserve Fleet, she was stricken from the Naval Vessel Register in July 1971 and sold for scrapping in May 1973.
USS Jeffers was named in honor of Commodore William N. Jeffers, USN, (1824-1883), who was briefly Commanding Officer of USS Monitor in 1862 and was later Chief of the Bureau of Ordnance.
This page features the only view we have concerning USS Jeffers (DD-621, later DMS-27 and DD-621).
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 #: 80-G-479910 USS Jeffers (DMS-27) Underway, 23 July 1951. Official U.S. Navy Photograph, now in the collections of the National Archives. Online Image: 124KB; 740 x 615 pixels Reproductions of this image may also be available through the National Archives photographic reproduction system. |
![]() |
In addition to the view referenced above, the National Archives appears to hold at least one other photograph of USS Jeffers (DMS-27, previously and later DD-621). The following listing describes this image:
The image listed below is NOT in the
Naval Historical Center's collections.
DO NOT try to obtain it using the procedures described in our
page "How to Obtain Photographic Reproductions".
USS Jeffers (DMS-27) underway, 23 July 1951. Starboard quarter aerial view.
Reproductions of this image should be available through the National Archives photographic reproduction system for pictures not held by the Naval Historical Center. The image listed above is NOT in the Naval Historical Center's collections. DO NOT try to obtain it using the procedures described in our page "How to Obtain Photographic Reproductions". |
If you want higher resolution reproductions than the digital images presented here, see: "How to Obtain Photographic Reproductions." |
Page made 7 February 2004