Tarawa
After overhaul at Puget Sound, she steamed via Pearl Harbor to Wellington, New Zealand, 29 October for duty with the 5th Fleet Assault Force. She departed Efate, New Hebrides, 13 November and sailed as part of the fire support group of the southern task force (TF 53) for the invasion of the Gilbert Islands. She screened cruisers and provided shore bombardment support during the bitterly contested assaults on Betio Island, Tarawa, 20 November.
Two days later, Meade made an underwater sound contact while screening to westward of the transport area. Between 1530 and 1736, Meade and Frazier launched five intensive depth charge attacks. Meade's final barrage forced I-35 to surface, and both destroyers directed "a devastating fire upon the target with all batteries." Five minutes later, Meade checked her fire and at 1751, Frazier rammed the sub, hitting her port quarter abaft the conning tower. I‑35 settled and sank, stern first, at 1754.
The destroyers launched boats to recover four survivors. One was killed during a brief exchange of gunfire; as Meade's boat returned with a second, seriously wounded prisoner, an American dive bomber mistook it for a submarine conning tower and bombed it with a 500‑pound delayed fuze bomb. It landed 3 feet away, and the underwater explosion lifted the boat out of the water and holed it. Meade recovered the motor whaleboat crew who were "shaken up somewhat."
Read more about this topic: USS Meade (DD-602)