USS Turner (DD-648) - Convoy Duty

Convoy Duty

Turner completed outfitting at the New York Navy Yard and then conducted shakedown and antisubmarine warfare training out of Casco Bay, Maine until early June. On the 9th, she returned to New York to prepare for her first assignment: a three-day training cruise with the newly-commissioned aircraft carrier Bunker Hill. Returning to New York on 22 June, she departed again the next day on her first real wartime assignment, service in the screen of a transatlantic convoy UGS 11. First, she sailed with a portion of that convoy to Norfolk, Virginia, arriving that same day. On the 24th, the convoy departed Hampton Roads and shaped a course eastward across the Atlantic. After an uneventful voyage, she escorted her convoy into port at Casablanca, French Morocco, on 18 July. She departed with return convoy GUS 10 on the 23rd and arrived back in New York on 9 August. Later that month, she was in the screen of a convoy to Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, making a brief stop at Hampton Roads along the way. On the return trip, she rendezvoused with the British carrier HMS Victorious and accompanied her to Norfolk.