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DEPARTMENT OF THE NAVY -- NAVAL HISTORICAL CENTER
805 KIDDER BREESE SE -- WASHINGTON NAVY YARD
WASHINGTON DC 20374-5060

Photo # NH 89418:  USS Meredith at Suva, Fiji

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

USS Meredith (DD-434), 1941-1942

USS Meredith, a 1620-ton Gleaves class destroyer built at the Boston Navy Yard, was commissioned in March 1941. After operating off the U.S. east coast and in the Caribbean area until September 1941, she was sent to Iceland, where she served in the semi-wartime conditions that prevailed until 8 December 1941, when Adolf Hitler's Germany formally declared war on the United States. Meredith escorted a convoy back to the U.S. in late January 1942 and was ordered to the Pacific in March as an escort for the aircraft carrier Hornet. In that role, she participated in the April 1942 Doolittle Raid on Japan.

Meredith escorted ships to and from the south Pacific in May and June 1942. She returned to that area in late-August, as the campaign to hold newly-seized positions on Guadalcanal was becoming increasingly intense. For the next several weeks, she served in escort and patrol duties. On 15 October 1942, while helping to bring badly-needed aviation gasoline to Guadalcanal's defenders, USS Meredith was attacked and sunk by aircraft from the Japanese aircraft carrier Zuikaku. In a tragedy sadly like those of USS Juneau a month later and USS Indianapolis in July 1945, her men and those from USS Vireo endured three days in shark-infested waters before they were rescued. Less than a third of Meredith's crew survived this ordeal.

This page features all our views of USS Meredith (DD-434).


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-K-16432 (Color)

USS Meredith (DD-434)

Steaming astern of USS North Carolina (BB-55), during the latter's shakedown operations, circa Summer 1941.
Note North Carolina's wake as she turns to port, her aircraft crane and muzzles of her after 16"/45 guns.

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

Online Image: 94KB; 740 x 625 pixels

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

Note:
The original image was a 35mm slide.

 
Photo #: NH 67840

USS Meredith (DD-434)


Photographed circa late 1941, while wearing Measure 1 camouflage.
Note that her hull number is painted just forward of the forecastle break.

Courtesy of Donald M. McPherson, 1969

U.S. Naval Historical Center Photograph.

Online Image: 30KB; 740 x 450 pixels

Note:
Image quality of this photograph is rather poor.

 
Photo #: NH 89418

USS Meredith (DD-434)


At Suva, Fiji Islands, 23 June 1942.
Photographed by USS Tangier (AV-8).
Note her camouflage.

U.S. Naval Historical Center Photograph.

Online Image: 76KB; 740 x 585 pixels

 
Photo #: 80-G-13134

USS Meredith (DD-434)


At sea in the Fiji Islands area, 22 June 1942.

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

Online Image: 88KB; 740 x 600 pixels

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

 
Photo #: 80-G-13074

USS Long Island (AVG-1)
(upper center)

Underway in company with USS Augusta (CA-31), in left front, off Cape Sable, Nova Scotia, on August 1941. Augusta had President Franklin D. Roosevelt embarked to witness Long Island's operations.
Among the other ships present are USS Tuscaloosa (CA-37), partially visible at far right, and USS Meredith (DD-434), steaming astern of Long Island.

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

Online Image: 102KB; 740 x 615 pixels

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

 


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


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Page made 20 December 2001