A Tin Can Sailors Destroyer History
USS SNOWDEN DE-246
The Tin Can Sailor, January 1991
Wars tend to produce specialized weapons; some are successful, some are not. The destroyer escort was a specialized weapon, designed to “fit” in the Navy’s plans somewhere between the submarine chasers of World War I and the more modern large destroyers built during the 1930’s. Commander Robert B. Carney suggested the design as a rapidly constructed, relatively inexpensive convoy protector and sub hunter. Seldom has the United States Navy received more for its money than when it decided to build destroyer escorts.
USS SNOWDEN, DE-246, was named for Thomas Snowden, a career naval officer. Snowden was born in 1857 and graduated from the Naval Academy in the class of 1879. Snowden began his service in the “modern” Navy; a fleet of “new” iron vessels serving with “classic” steam sloops and frigates. It was the Navy of Mahan, Sampson, and “Teddy” Roosevelt; an extension of America’s newly felt power abroad.
Snowden learned well. By World War I, he was a Rear Admiral, serving as Commander of Squadron 1, Battleship Force, Atlantic Fleet. His expertise kept the American battle line in position to checkmate potential German moves into the Atlantic. Snowden’s administrative abilities were appreciated as well.
From 1919 through 1921, Rear Admiral Thomas Snowden served as both military governor of Santo Domingo and military representative for the United States to the government of Haiti.
Admiral Snowden retired in 1921 and passed away on January 27, 1930.
USS SNOWDEN was one of eighty-five EDSALL class destroyer escorts. Designed to be more than 300 feet long, she was nearly as long as a World War I “four piper.” Her Fairbanks-Morse diesel engines were modifications of those used in railroad switchers, but they could move her at a steady twenty knots. Her armament was especially lethal to submarines; as designed, her three 3” 50’s 2 – 40mm’s, and 10 – 20mm’s were supplemented by triple set of torpedo tubes, a hedgehog projector, eight “K” guns, and two depth charge racks.
DE-246 was laid down at the Brown Shipbuilding yard in Houston, Texas on the first anniversary of the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor, December 7, 1942.
Because of her relatively high priority for completion, she was launched in less than three months. By August 1943, SNOWDEN was commissioned, captained by Lt. Commander A. Jackson, Jr., USNR.
SNOWDEN’s shakedown cruise was typical of the period. Although the Battle of the Atlantic was inexorably shifting toward the allies, German U-Boats still represented a threat to coastal America and the Caribbean, so SNOWDEN was quickly pressed into service, protecting coastal convoys. She protected ALMAACK (AK-27) on a voyage to Panama and helped deliver SLOAT (DE-245) to New York.
DE-264 drew convoy duty for the remainder of 1943. Two convoys benefited from SNOWDEN’s special talents on the run from New York to Casablanca before Christmas, while the New Year found her on the Norfolk to Gibraltar route. A brief training period prepared SNOWDEN’s crew for an even more aggressive stance.
By 1943, the Navy had developed a new tactic for combating U-Boats. While it efficiently protected merchant ships, convoying was wasteful for escort resources; it required shackling superb anti-submarine weapons to an essentially defensive role. To better combat rampaging U-Boats, the Navy began to assign escort carriers and a screen from four to six destroyers or destroyer escorts as Hunter-Killer groups. The groups proved very successful.
In March 1944 DE-264 became a member of Task Group 21.15, a Hunter- Killer team made up, of five destroyer escorts and the “jeep” carrier CROATAN (CVE-25). One day out of Norfolk, the group made its first sonar contact, without positive result. It was a preview of more than a year of operations with one of the most successful task groups in the Atlantic.
An oil slick was spotted at the end of April. Leaving their screening positions around the carrier, SNOWDEN, FROST (DE-144), and BARBER (DE-161) pinged the area. The vessels were ordered to drop two 39-charge patterns on a sonar contact by DE-264. Two strong explosions marked the end of U-488, a submarine tanker, called a “milch cow” by the Kreigsmarine. The German had been stationed to resupply wolf packs operating in the area.
Spring and summer brought increased activity. On May 5, the task group was forced to return to Norfolk to replenish depleted depth charge stocks, without another confirmed contact or kill. In June, hunting improved.
SNOWDEN, along with FROST (DE-144) and INCH (DE-146), made a radar contact which proved to be a surfaced submarine. Although out of range herself, SNOWDEN helped vector her task group to the spot. FROST’s accurate 3” fire scored; a loud explosion marked the end of U-490. The escorts retrieved sixty German submariners from yet another “milch cow.” The wolf pack operating in the area had lost a sizable portion of its resupply capability.
FROST and INCH scored the next kill, with SNOWDEN dashing in to confirm and pick up debris. A class labeled IXC by the Germans, this “shark” had been a more traditional undersea raider; a “killer” rather than a supply sub. The task group was methodically decimating German forces in the Atlantic.
SNOWDEN transferred to TG 22.5, operating in the Caribbean until the end of December. After weather conditions in the Atlantic, the assignment must have seemed almost a vacation. It was all too brief; by the end of December, SNOWDEN was back in Norfolk for refit and resupply. Her successful association with CROATAN was to continue.
In March 1945, the task group sailed into the north-central Atlantic on another extended hunt. Contacts were sparse until mid-April. On April 15, SNOWDEN dropped back from her position as barrier patrol to protect CROATAN, while STANTON (DE-247) and FROST beat the water. Six minutes later an explosion was heard, while early the next morning a blast, recorded by ships more than ten miles away, shook the escorts. U-1235, a Type IXC/40 sub, comparable to American fleet type submarines, had been a long-range variant intended specifically to operate for extended periods in the Atlantic.
The task group continued sweeps along the continental shelf, arriving at Argentia, Newfoundland on April 25, 1945. A three-day layover was followed by two more weeks of the hunt. By now, SNOWDEN was in need of a partial refit, so DE-246 spent two weeks in May at the Brooklyn Navy Yard before returning to Norfolk.
The war in the Atlantic was over, so SNOWDEN, along with the large numbers of ships, was ordered to the Pacific. By August, DE-246 was at Pearl Harbor, where she served through the final Japanese surrender. She was awarded three battle stars for her World War II service.
Like most of her sisters, SNOWDEN faced refit and decommissioning. Upon the completion of her ovhaul at Norfolk again, she sailed to green Cove Springs, Florida, to be placed in the Atlantic Reserve Fleet as of March 1946. Her rest was a short one. The Korean War and the growing threat of Soviet subs in the Atlantic meant reactivation for DD-246. Her recommissioning, June 6, 1951, was followed by refresher training at Guantanamo Bay. SNOWDEN’s new homeport, Newport, RI, was the center for Atlantic Fleet activity so the destroyer escort became a focus of training exercises and fleet operations. DD-246 also participated in NATO exercises in 1952, visiting ports in Norway and Scotland. A brief tour at Guantanamo was followed by more exercises, stretching her operations area from Labrador to the Caribbean. A second NATO exercise in 1957 gave the crew a chance to visit French ports. For the next three years, DD-246 operated off the East Coast.
At eighteen years of age, SNOWDEN was old by warship standards, so a change was in order. DD-246 was decommissioned in August and became a Naval Reserve Training Ship at Philadelphia. In the following year, she was recommissioned and sailed for Key West, Florida, to serve in a similar training role. The following year found her back in Philadelphia, this time to remain as a Group II Naval Reserve Training Ship. She stayed in that service until 1968.
SNOWDEN was stricken from the Navy list on September 23, 1968 and sunk as a target on June 27, 1969.
Naval historians disagree as to the weapon which “won” the battle of the Atlantic, but there can be no disagreement about the, contribution made by the destroyer escorts in that victory. SNOWDEN, and the ships like her, proved to be a crucial factor in first placing U-Boats on the defensive. DE-246’s long-term service proved her worth in peace and war; her crews proved that the proud traditions of the Navy were still strong.
