Figure 1: USS Preston (DD-795) arriving at Pearl Harbor, Hawaii, on 19 March 1964. Picture was taken by Photographer's Mate 3rd Class B.J. Long. Official US Navy Photograph, from the collections of the Naval Historical Center. Click on photograph for larger image.
Figure 2: USS Preston (DD-795) off the San Francisco Bay Naval Shipyard, Hunters Point, California, 22 October 1966. Official US Navy Photograph, from the collections of the Naval Historical Center. Click on photograph for larger image.
Figure 3: USS Preston (DD-795) off the San Francisco Bay Naval Shipyard, Hunters Point, California, 22 October 1966. Official US Navy Photograph, from the collections of the Naval Historical Center. Click on photograph for larger image.
Figure 4: USS Preston (DD-795) off the San Francisco Bay Naval Shipyard, Hunters Point, California, 22 October 1966. Official US Navy Photograph, from the collections of the Naval Historical Center. Click on photograph for larger image.
Figure 5: USS Preston (DD-795) off the San Francisco Bay Naval Shipyard, Hunters Point, California, 22 October 1966. Official US Navy Photograph, from the collections of the Naval Historical Center. Click on photograph for larger image.
Figure 6: USS Preston (DD-795) at the San Francisco Bay Naval Shipyard, Hunters Point, California, 22 October 1966. Official US Navy Photograph, from the collections of the Naval Historical Center. Click on photograph for larger image.
Figure 7: USS Preston (DD-795) anchored off Naples, Italy, circa 1955. USS Irwin (DD-794) is at right, beyond Preston's stern. Courtesy of the Naval Historical Foundation, from the Collection of Admiral Robert B. Carney, USN. Official US Navy Photograph, from the collections of the Naval Historical Center. Click on photograph for larger image.
Figure 8: USS Preston (DD-795) in the South Pacific, approaching USS Virgo (AKA-20) for replenishment. This photograph is from Marc Schenck, who obtained it from his father, Lt. JG. Bernard Schenck, when he served aboard USS Virgo. The year would be 1957, during Virgo's Seventh Fleet deployment. Click on photograph for larger image.
Figure 9: USS Preston (DD-795) during the Fleet Review at San Francisco, California, 13 June 1957. US Navy photograph. Click on photograph for larger image.
Named after Lieutenant Samuel W. Preston, a Union naval hero who was killed at Fort Fisher, North Carolina, on 13 January 1865, USS Preston (DD-795) was a 2,940-ton Fletcher class destroyer that was built at the Bethlehem Steel Company at San Pedro, California, and was commissioned on 20 March 1944. This was the sixth ship to bear this name and it was approximately 376 feet long and 39 feet wide, had a top speed of 35 knots, and had a crew of 320 officers and men. Preston originally was armed with five 5-inch guns, ten 40-mm guns, seven 20-mm guns, ten 21-inch torpedo tubes, and numerous depth charges, although this armament changed significantly in later years.
Following a shakedown cruise off the coast of California as well as naval exercises in Hawaiian waters, Preston was sent to the Marianas combat zone on 1 July 1944. She participated in the invasion of Guam on 17 July and, during the last four months of 1944, Preston supported the US landings in the Palau Islands. Preston also escorted aircraft carriers during the Battle of Leyte Gulf in the Philippines and she participated in raids against Japanese targets in the western Pacific and along the Asian mainland. Preston resumed escorting aircraft carriers during the first two months of 1945 as US forces attacked the island of Luzon in the Philippines and Iwo Jima. Preston went on to assist in raids on the Japanese home islands and in March 1945 participated in the assault on the Ryukyu Islands, providing gunfire support for troops ashore, guarding against Japanese suicide boats, and serving as a radar picket ship while escorting ships to and from Okinawa (which is the largest of the Ryukyu Islands).
Preston returned to the US west coast in September 1945, shortly after the Japanese surrendered. The destroyer remained inactive until it was officially decommissioned in April 1946. But with the start of the Korean War, Preston was brought back into service and was re-commissioned in January 1951. She was transferred to the Atlantic Fleet later that year and was deployed to the Mediterranean in 1952. But in 1953, Preston was sent to the Far East and participated in the Korean War. She arrived in Japan in early May and was assigned to the fast carrier Task Force 77. In June, Preston joined Task Force 95, which was the United Nations Blockade and Escort Force. Once the war ended on 27 July 1953, Preston returned to the United States via the Suez Canal, the Mediterranean, and the Atlantic, and arrived in Boston, Massachusetts, in October.
Following a major overhaul that lasted from May to September 1954, Preston was assigned to the Atlantic Fleet and then returned to the Mediterranean for yet another deployment in 1955. Preston steamed back to the Pacific in the spring of 1956 and spent the rest of her career in the Far East, although she did make regular trips back to America’s west coast for overhauls and training cruises.
Preston’s work in the Far East included four Vietnam War cruises between 1964 and 1968, during which she performed naval gunfire support missions, served as a plane guard and escort for Seventh Fleet aircraft carriers, and participated in search and rescue missions. USS Preston was decommissioned on 15 November 1969, but then was transferred to Turkey. She was renamed Icel and remained in the Turkish Navy until she was broken up and sold for scrap in 1981.
USS Preston served in three wars and in two navies in a career that spanned roughly 37 years, proving how well-armed, durable, and versatile the Fletcher class destroyers were.
