>From the “Dictionary of American Naval Fighting Ships,” 

(1969) Vol. 4, p.433.





MOORE





	Fred Kenneth Moore, born 17 December 1921 at Campbell, 

Tex., enlisted in the U.S. Navy 31 July 1940.  On board 

battleship ARIZONA (BB-39) at Pearl Harbor, 7 December 1941, 

Seaman Moore remained at his station on antiaircraft gun 

No. 1 in spite of orders to take cover when the Japanese 

strafing became severe.  With two other members of the gun 

crew, he assisted in keeping the gun in operation until he 

was killed by an explosion.  Seaman 1st Class Moore was 

posthumously awarded the Navy Cross “for distinguished 

service, extraordinary courage and devotion to duty, and 

disregard for his own safety.”





DE-240

Displacement:  1,200 t.

Length:  306’

Beam:  36’7”

Draft:  8’7” (mean)

Speed:  21 k.

Complement:  186

Armament:  3 3”; 2 40mm; 8 20mm;

	2 depth charge tracks;

	8 depth charge projectors;

	1 hedge hog

Class:  EDSALL



	MOORE (DE-240) was laid down 20 July 1942 at the Brown 

Shipbuilding Co., Houston, Tex.; launched 20 December 1942; 

sponsored by Mrs. Fred Moore, mother of Seaman Fred K. 

Moore; and commissioned 1 July 1943, Lt. Comdr. H. P. 

Michiels in command.



	Following shakedown off Bermuda, MOORE steamed to 

Norfolk where she reported for duty with TF 63, then 

escorted merchant convoys, beginning 10 September 1943.  

Before the end of the year she had transited the Atlantic to 

north Africa twice.  On 13 January 1944, she relieved 

destroyer escort DECKER (DE-47) for a month of operations 

off the New England coast under ComFleet Air Wing, Quonset, 

R.I.  In March, she sailed to Casco Bay, Maine, for 

abbreviated training exercises and then headed south to 

Norfolk where she joined TG 24.14 and sailed, on the 15th, 

in the screen of escort carrier TRIPOLI (CVE-64) for 

antisubmarine patrol duty west of the Cape Verde Islands.  A 

unit of the 4th Fleet for under 2 months, she returned to 

Norfolk, 27 April, and, in May, continued her patrols with 

TRIPOLI in the North Atlantic, from Bermuda to Argentia in 

TG 22.4.



	Detached for the month of July, she conducted coastal 

operations and escort work, and completed one escort run to 

Bermuda before resuming operations with TG 22.4, assigned 

this time to escort carrier CORE (CVE-13).  For the 

remainder of the war in Europe, she operated with CORE, 

cruising along the east coast and in the western Atlantic 

from Cuba to Newfoundland.



	On 11 May 1945, she put into Tompkinsville, shifting 

later to Brooklyn and then to Boston, for overhaul 

preparatory to her reassignment to the Pacific Fleet.  She 

got underway for the Pacific, with others of her division, 

CortDiv 7, for which she served as flagship, 24 June.  On 4 

August, she arrived at Pearl Harbor, where, 10 days later, 

she received word of the Japanese agreement to Allied 

surrender terms.  On the 20th, she resumed her westward 

voyage and arrived, on the 29th, at Saipan.  There, she 

reported to TF 94 for post war duty under ComMarianas area.  

Assigned to the Bonin-Volcano area she anchored off western 

Iwo Jima, 3 September, and a few days later commenced 

air-sea rescue operations with Fleet Air Wing 18.



	MOORE returned to the United States in late 1946 with 

orders to report to the Atlantic Reserve Fleet for 

inactivation.  That work, begun in January 1947, was 

completed 30 June, when MOORE decommissioned and joined the 

16th Fleet.  Berthed originally at Green Cove Springs, Fla., 

she was later transferred to the Norfolk Reserve Group, 

where she remains into 1969.



	[Stricken from the Navy Register on 1 August 1973, 

MOORE was sunk as a target off Virginia on 13 June 1975.



K. Jack Bauer and Stephen S. Roberts, “Register of Ships of 

the U. S. Navy, 1775-1990,” p.225.]





Transcribed by Michael Hansen

mhansen2@home.com