USS Warrington (DD-843) was a that served the U.S. Navy from the end of World War II to the Vietnam War, when she was damaged by two underwater explosions, causing her to be listed as "beyond repair" and excessed to the Navy of the Republic of China.
Built in Bath, Maine
The third U.S. Navy ship to be so named, Warrington (DD-843) was laid down on 14 May 1945 at Bath, Maine, by the Bath Iron Works Corporation; launched on 27 September 1945; sponsored by Mrs. Katherine Chubb Sheehan; and commissioned at the Boston Naval Shipyard on 20 December 1945.
Naval service
Post-World War II service
Warrington conducted shakedown training and winter exercises in the West Indies during February and early March and then returned to Boston, Massachusetts, for duty in Destroyer Division (DesDiv) 82, Destroyer Squadron (DesRon) 8.
During the next year, the destroyer cruised almost the length of the eastern seaboard plane-guarding for carriers such as . Late in the spring of 1946, she joined in an extended cruise to Europe and visited ports in England, Scotland, Sweden, Denmark, Belgium, Portugal, and the Netherlands before entering the Mediterranean for her first tour of duty with the U.S. 6th Fleet. That assignment ended on 8 February 1947 when she passed through the Strait of Gibraltar on her way back home. Warrington arrived at New York City on 19 February and entered the naval shipyard there for voyage repairs.
At the conclusion of the yard work on 8 March, she steamed to her new home port, Newport, Rhode Island, and for two years cruised along the U.S. East Coast, serving primarily as gunnery training ship for the Atlantic Destroyer Force. In April 1949, the ship was reassigned to DesDiv 222, which she served as flagship, and to DesRon 22. Late that summer, she departed the New England coast for a two-month training voyage to the West Indies. After a brief stop at Norfolk, Virginia, at the conclusion of those maneuvers, Warrington headed north at the end of October for cold weather training near the Arctic Circle, returning to Newport on 20 November.
On 3 January 1950, the destroyer sailed from Newport in company with her squadron and for hunter/killer exercises along the U.S. East Coast and in the vicinity of Bermuda. The following month, she conducted antisubmarine warfare (ASW) exercises with out of Newport News, Virginia, before returning to that port for a brief yard availability.
The ship next returned north to Newport for a tour of duty with the Operational Development Force detachment during which her division tested ASW tactics in company with along the coast of Newfoundland and in the waters around Iceland. That assignment lasted from 10 July to 8 August, at which time she returned to Newport to prepare for her second deployment to the Mediterranean. That tour of duty lasted only two months and one day. The destroyer returned to Newport on 10 November and resumed normal east coast operations.
Mediterranean cruise period
In January 1951, Warrington changed from DesDiv 222 to DesDiv 142 for which she served as flagship. Over the next eight years, the destroyer settled into a fairly repetitive routine, alternating four deployments to the U.S. 6th Fleet with operations out of Newport. Her Mediterranean cruises came in the spring of 1952, the summers of 1954 and 1956, and in the spring of 1957.
12 January 1955, Warrington collided with near Puerto Rico.
Her U.S. 2d Fleet duties consisted primarily of ASW training in company with U.S. Atlantic Fleet aircraft carriers and took her from the coast of New England south to the Caribbean and the West Indies.
Providing cadet training
In May 1959, Warrington was reassigned to DesDiv 102. In June, she embarked U.S. Naval Academy midshipmen at Annapolis, Maryland, for a unique training cruise. Instead of Europe or the West Indies, the area of activity for that voyage was the Great Lakes.
Warrington passed through the newly constructed St. Lawrence Seaway and participated in the opening ceremonies for the waterway led by Queen Elizabeth II of Great Britain and President Dwight D. Eisenhower of the United States. At the conclusion of those ceremonies—held at Montreal, Canada, on 26 June -- Warrington continued on her mission, visiting a series of American ports on the Great Lakes, including Chicago, Illinois, Detroit, Michigan, and Sault Ste. Marie, Michigan, among others before returning to Newport on 4 August.