USS Burrows (DE-105) - World War II North Atlantic Operations

World War II North Atlantic Operations

The destroyer escort left Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, on 30 December 1943 for shakedown training off Bermuda and returned to Philadelphia on 9 February 1944 for post-shakedown repairs before steaming to Norfolk, Virginia, for duty as a training ship for prospective destroyer escort crews. After less than three weeks, she received orders to New York City to await assignment to her first convoy.

On 27 February, the warship sailed for the first of 16 transatlantic crossings. In company with Marblehead, Milwaukee, four destroyers, and seven other destroyer escorts, Burrows sailed through the cold and stormy North Atlantic and arrived safely in Belfast, Northern Ireland. She proceeded to Derry to join Escort Division 28 (CortDiv 22); and, on 17 March, Burrows began her return voyage to New York. Upon arriving there on 28 March, she entered the navy yard for an overhaul.

Burrows' typical cycle for escort duty was to steam overseas, return to New York for overhaul, undergo brief refresher training, and then steam back to New York to join another convoy. She served in the screen of a convoy to England in April and, upon return to New York, she interrupted her convoy-escort routine to conduct experiments at Quonset Point, Rhode Island, with the Navy's FXR (foxer) gear, an underwater noise-making device that trailed behind ships as a defense against German acoustic torpedoes. Back in New York by early June, Burrows stood out of port on the 13th with her longest and largest convoy, more than a hundred ships bound for Bizerte, Tunisia. The voyage took the convoy through the Strait of Gibraltar, where reports of Luftwaffe attacks prompted Burrows and the other escorts to lay smoke screens twice daily over the ships. Although German bombers passed within two miles, they did not strike; and the convoy arrived on 1 July. Burrows sailed on 10 July for the United States.

Following overhaul, the warship steamed to Casco Bay, Maine, for extended training in torpedo evasion techniques. On 20 August, the destroyer escort got underway for New London, Connecticut, where she put this training to good use during service as a practice target for American submarines. For 34 days, dummy torpedoes passed under Burrows while prospective commanding officers and submarine crews sharpened their fighting skills.