San Diego, California. 22 October 1930. Officers and crew of six Wickes class “flush decker” four-piper destroyers: USS Rathburne (DD-113); USS Talbot (DD-114), USS Dent (DD-116), USS Waters (DD-115), USS Lea (DD-118), and USS Dorsey (DD-117).
Naval Station Treasure Island, NHHC photo. Accession #: UA 571.06
Seen interbellum, most of the above were built in the last few weeks of the Great War and served on late 1918 cross-Atlantic convoy escort. Surplus to the Navy’s needs by the 1930s, they would be marked for disposal with WWII saving them from premature scrapping.
Of the six, Rathburne would serve as a training ship and high-speed “Green Dragon” transport (APD-25), downing two Japanese aircraft; as would Talbot (APD-7), Waters (APD-8), and Dent (APD-9). Dorsey, meanwhile, served as a high-speed mine sweeper (DMS-1) during WWII. At the same time, Lea would revisit her Great War service, riding shotgun on a series of Atlantic convoys and earning a Presidential Unit Citation with the Bogue hunter-killer group in 1943.
USS Lea off Boston Navy Yard, 9 April 1943. Note stacks of depth charges on her stern and at least four DC throwers. 19-N-42631
All would survive the war, decommissioned in 1945– most while the war was still on– and be sold for scrapping in 1946.