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Photo # NH 99994:  USS Lewis Hancock underway, circa 1951

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

USS Lewis Hancock (DD-675), 1943-1967

USS Lewis Hancock, a 2050-ton Fletcher class destroyer, was built at Kearny, New Jersey. Following her late September 1943 commissioning, she performed shakedown training in the vicinity of Bermuda and in December steamed to the Pacific to join the war against Japan. In her first combat operations, in February 1944, the new ship screened aircraft carriers during the invasion of Kwajalein and raids on Truk. She continued in this role as Task Force 58 struck enemy targets in the central Pacific and New Guinea during March-May and the Marianas campaign in June and July. She also used her five-inch guns to bombard Japanese positions on Saipan in mid-June and participated in the Battle of the Philippine Sea later in that month.

Beginning in September 1944 Lewis Hancock and her carrier group moved into the western Pacific in a series of attacks that led to the invasion of Leyte and the Battle of Leyte Gulf during October. In February and March 1945 she took part in raids on the Japanese home islands, and then was a participant in the fight to capture Okinawa. Overhauled on the West Coast in July and August 1945, Lewis Hancock was still in shipyard hands when the war ended and received no further active assignments before being decommissioned in January 1946.

Following a half-decade in the Pacific Reserve Fleet, in May 1951 the destroyer came back into commissioned service. That autumn Lewis Hancock joined the Atlantic Fleet, but between October 1952 and January 1953 went to the Far East for her only Korean War combat tour, a cruise that took her westward around the World. For the next four years she mainly served in the western Atlantic and Caribbean, with regular visits to European waters, but in 1956 and again in 1957 made longer deployment that took her through the Mediterranean Sea and Suez Canal to operate in the Red Sea, Indian Ocean and Persian Gulf.

Decommissioned for a second time in mid-December 1957, Lewis Hancock was part of the Atlantic Reserve Fleet for nearly another decade. In August 1967 she was loaned to Brazil and renamed Paiui. Formally sold to that nation in 1973, she remained part of the Brazilian Navy until 1989.

USS Lewis Hancock was named in honor of Lieutenant Commander Lewis Hancock, Jr. (1889-1925), who lost his life when the airship Shenandoah crashed on 3 September 1925.

This page features all the views we have concerning USS Lewis Hancock (DD-675).


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 99994

USS Lewis Hancock
(DD-675)

Underway circa 1951, soon after being recommissioned.

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

Online Image: 108KB; 740 x 615 pixels

 
Photo #: NH 99995

USS Lewis Hancock
(DD-675)

Officers and crew members salute as the National Ensign is raised during recommissioning ceremonies at Long Beach Naval Station, California, on Armed Forces Day, 19 May 1951.
Participating in the ceremonies (though not visible in this photograph) was Lewis Hancock's Sponsor, Captain Joy Bright Hancock, USN(W), Director of Women Personnel. The ship was named in honor of her late husband, Lieutenant Commander Lewis Hancock, Jr., USN, who lost his life when the airship USS Shenandoah (ZR-1) crashed on 3 September 1925.

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

Online Image: 124KB; 595 x 765 pixels

 
Photo #: NH 99996

USS Lewis Hancock
(DD-675)

Installing the ship's repaired and rebalanced port propeller, while she was in dry dock during the 1950s.

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

Online Image: 149KB; 740 x 615 pixels

 
Photo #: NH 99997

USS Lewis Hancock
(DD-675)

Laid up in the Atlantic Reserve Fleet, at the Philadelphia Naval Shipyard, 8 September 1959.
Note chains used as mooring lines.

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

Online Image: 96KB; 740 x 615 pixels

 
Photo #: 80-G-478506

USS Ajax (AR-6)


Tending destroyers and patrol vessels at Sasebo, Japan.
Photo is dated 14 December 1952.
Ships nested along her port side include (left to right):
USS The Sullivans (DD-537);
USS McGowan (DD-678);
USS Lewis Hancock (DD-675) and
Korean frigate Imchin (# 66, ex USS Sausalito, PF-4)
Nest of five minesweepers in the left distance includes:
USS Heron (AMS-18);
USS Curlew (AMS-8);
USS Mockingbird (AMS-27);
USS Gull (AMS-16) and
USS Chatterer (AMS-40)

Official U.S. Navy Photograph, now in the collections of the National Archives.

Online Image: 115KB; 740 x 605 pixels

Reproductions of this image may also be available through the National Archives photographic reproduction system.

 
Photo #: 80-G-478507

USS Ajax (AR-6)


Tending destroyers and patrol vessels at Sasebo, Japan.
Photo is dated 14 December 1952.
Ships nested along her port side include (left to right):
USS The Sullivans (DD-537);
USS McGowan (DD-678);
USS Lewis Hancock (DD-675) and
Korean frigate Imchin (# 66, ex USS Sausalito, PF-4)

Official U.S. Navy Photograph, now in the collections of the National Archives.

Online Image: 120KB; 740 x 625 pixels

Reproductions of this image may also be available through the National Archives photographic reproduction system.

 
Photo #: 80-G-81255

USS Lewis Hancock (DD-675)


The ship's sponsor, Lieutenant Joy Bright Hancock, USNR, prepares for the christening, during launching ceremonies at the Federal Shipbuilding and Drydock Company, Kearny, New Jersey, 1 August 1943.
The ship was named in honor of Lieutenant Hancock's late husband, Lieutenant Commander Lewis Hancock, USN, who was killed in the crash of USS Shenandoah (ZR-1) in 1925.

Official U.S. Navy Photograph, now in the collections of the National Archives.

Online Image: 110KB; 605 x 765 pixels

Reproductions of this image may also be available through the National Archives photographic reproduction system.

 
Photo #: NH 71598-KN (color)

USS Lewis Hancock (DD-675)

Jacket patch of the ship's insignia.

Courtesy of Captain G.F. Swainson, USN, 1970.

U.S. Naval Historical Center Photograph.

Online Image: 160KB; 650 x 675 pixels

 
Photo #: NH 65539-KN (Color)

Insignia: USS Lewis Hancock (DD-675)

This emblem was on file at the Naval Historical Center in 1968. It had probably been received during the 1950s.

U.S. Naval Historical Center Photograph.

Online Image: 107KB; 650 x 675 pixels

 


In addition to the images presented above, the National Archives appears to hold other views of USS Lewis Hancock (DD-675). The following list features some of these images:

The images listed below are NOT in the Naval Historical Center's collections.
DO NOT try to obtain them using the procedures described in our page "How to Obtain Photographic Reproductions".



  • Photo #: 80-G-81948
    USS Lewis Hancock (DD-675) underway at sea, off New York City, 17 October 1943. Photographed from an aircraft based at Naval Air Station, New York.
    High aerial view, taken from directly ahead of the ship.

  • Photo #: 80-G-81949
    As 80-G-81948, but port bow (rather toward the broadside) high aerial view. The ship is painted dark overall, probably Camouflage Measure 21.

  • Photo #: 80-G-81951
    As 80-G-81948, but port quarter high aerial view.


  • Photo #: 80-G-445014
    USS Lewis Hancock (DD-675) underway at sea off Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, on 15 July 1952. Photographed by W.T. Place, of Naval Air Station Guantanamo Bay.
    Port bow aerial view. The ship has been refitted with a tripod foremast, but still has World War II era air search and main battery fire control radar antennas.


  • Photo #: USN 1045415
    USS Lewis Hancock (DD-675) at rest offshore, circa the middle 1950s. This photo was received by the Naval Photographic Center in December 1959, but was taken some years earlier.
    Starboard bow aerial view. The ship has been refitted with a tripod foremast and a small (round) radar antenna atop her Mark 37 gun director, but still carries a World War II era air search radar antenna.


    Reproductions of these images should be available through the National Archives photographic reproduction system for pictures not held by the Naval Historical Center.

    The images listed in this box are NOT in the Naval Historical Center's collections. DO NOT try to obtain them 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."


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    Page made 31 January 2005