Looking for Uncle Vince

Researching family history has led me down some very interesting paths. Lately, I have been looking into Grandpa Tom Darby’s military records.

While I haven’t found very much about his service, I have located the ship on which his brother, Vincent was assigned. This also led me to a second cousin, whom I had never spoken to until recently.

Also named Vincent Darby, my cousin is about ten years older than me. Out of the blue he called me one afternoon and we began to talk.

And while he knew little to nothing about Grandpa Tom – he told me a lot about his Dad.

Uncle Vince, as I always heard him called by Dad, was a couple of years older than Grandpa Tom. And like Grandpa Tom, he too served in the U.S. Navy during World War II.

While I have yet to find out what ship or boat or barge Grandpa Tom was aboard, Cousin Vince did point me in the direction of a ship his Dad was assigned. That was the USS DuPont (DD152/AG-80.)

I hope that by discovering the ships history – I’ll discover some long-lost family story.

Uncle Vince joined the US Navy in 1942 — shortly following the attack by the Japanese on Pearl Harbor, December 7th, 1941. It’s from there I pick up the ships history.

The Du Pont rescued 30 survivors from a torpedoed merchantman on March 15th, 1942 as she continued through January 19th, 1943, to guard convoys from New York and Norfolk to Key West and Guantanamo Bay. After an overhaul, the Du Pont returned to the Caribbean to escort tanker convoys between Aruba, Netherlands West Indies, and Guantanamo Bay until May 17th, 1943 when she sailed from Aruba to the Mediterranean.

She arrived at Algiers, Algeria, June 1st, and put into Casablanca five days later. The destroyer sailed on June 9th, for New York in the escort for Card, rescuing four men from downed aircraft during hunter-killer operations en route. She arrived at New York, July 6th.

Between July 17th and September 12th, 1943, the Du Pont made two voyages to Ireland on convoy escort duty. On September 25th, she sailed from Norfolk for an antisubmarine patrol with a hunter-killer group centered on Card.

By October 6th she had joined the screen for aircraft carrier USS Bogue during exercises in Casco Bay and Long Island Sound. The group sailed from Norfolk November 14th to give close support to a Gibraltar-bound convoy.

During the return passage December 12th, one of the Bogue’s aircraft sighted and bombed a German U-Boat. The Du Pont and USS George E. Badger continued the attack, driving the submarine to the surface on the morning of the following day.

The destroyers opened fire and after the submarine’s conning tower exploded, the DuPont rescued 46 survivors including the captain of the U-172, as it sank. The Du Pont shared in the Presidential Unit Citation awarded the Bogue task group for distinguished success in operations against submarines.

The Du Pont escorted a convoy to Gibraltar and back to Boston between January 25th and March 9th, 1944, and then returned to escort duty in the Caribbean. She left Norfolk June 11th in the screen of the seaplane tender, USS Albemarle sailing by way of Casablanca to Avonmouth, England, arriving June 28th.

The Du Pont returned to Boston July 13th with the Albemarle, carrying casualties from the June 6th D-Day invasion at Normandy, France. After overhaul and refresher training, the Du Pont put into Charleston Navy Yard September 16th, 1944 to undergo conversion to an auxiliary vessel.

Reclassified AG-80, September 25th, 1944, she sailed from Charleston October 9th and arrived at Key West two days later to act as target ship for Fleet Air Wing 5. She rescued two downed aviators on November 24th, and two days after that transferred her doctor to a Norwegian merchantman to render emergency treatment.

She continued to serve off Florida aiding aviation training until April 1st, 1946 when she arrived at Boston. In addition to the Presidential Unit Citation received in 1943, the DuPont was awarded three battle stars for her service during World War II.

The Du Pont was decommissioned May 2nd, 1946 and sold for scrap March 12th, 1947.

While my research as only scratched the surface of Uncle Vince’s background, I now have a place to look. And even if I fail to discover any further details in my great-uncle’s life during World War II, I hope that sharing this finger-nail account of the ship he was assigned to will open the door for you to start searching too.