USS Hutchins (DD-476) - 1943

1943

After completing shakedown cruise in Casco Bay, Maine, Hutchins got underway from Boston 17 March 1943 and escorted two tankers to Galveston, Tex. From there she proceeded through the Panama Canal to San Diego, where she arrived 11 April. Following an escort voyage to New Caledonia and Espiritu Santo, Hutchins arrived Pearl Harbor 30 May for armament alterations. While testing her guns in Hawaiian waters 25 June, an electrical failure caused the gun to fire into Hutchins' stack, killing nine men and wounding twenty. While repairing at Pearl Harbor, the ship was fitted with the newest Combat Information Center (CIC) equipment.

The ship returned to San Diego 11 July 1943 for training, and got underway with an LST group seven days later for the voyage to Adak Island in the Aleutians. She took part in the occupation of Kiska 15 August as the Japanese gave up their Aleutians foothold, and in the months that followed patrolled the islands and engaged in fleet training maneuvers.

Hutchins departed the bleak northern Pacific 18 November 1943 for the steaming and bitterly-contested coast of New Guinea. She arrived Milne Bay 19 December and soon afterward screened LSTs during the landings at Cape Gloucester. Designed to secure the important straits between New Britain and New Guinea, the landings began 26 December. Hutchins and the other screening vessels came under severe air attack in the days that followed, with Hutchins downing one aircraft and assisting with another. After escorting a support convoy to Cape Gloucester from Buna on mainland New Guinea, the destroyer steamed with another LST group to Saidor, farther up the coast of New Guinea. During a rain squall she collided with another destroyer in the congested assault area, and was forced to steam to Cairns, Australia 16 January 1944 for bow repairs.