USS Farquhar (DE-139)

History

United States
Name:	USS Farquhar
Namesake:	Norman von Heldreich Farquhar
Builder:	Consolidated Steel Corporation, Orange, Texas
Laid down:	14 December 1942
Launched:	13 February 1943
Commissioned:	5 August 1943
Decommissioned:	14 June 1946
Struck:	1 October 1972
Honours and awards:	1 battle star for World War II service
Fate:	Sold 21 March 1974, scrapped
General characteristics
Class and type:	Edsall-class destroyer escort
Displacement:	1,253 tons standard 1,590 tons full load
Length:	306 feet (93.27 m)
Beam:	36.58 feet (11.15 m)
Draft:	10.42 full load feet (3.18 m)
Propulsion:	4 FM diesel engines, 4 diesel-generators, 6,000 shp (4.5 MW), 2 screws
Speed:	21 knots (39 km/h)
Range:	9,100 nmi. at 12 knots (17,000 km at 22 km/h)
Complement:	8 officers, 201 enlisted
Armament:	3 × 3 in (76 mm)/50 guns (3 × 1) 2 × 40 mm AA guns (1 × 2) 8 × 20 mm AA guns (8 × 1) 3 × 21 in (530 mm) torpedo tubes (1 × 3) 8 × depth charge projectors 1 × depth charge projector (hedgehog) 2 × depth charge tracks

USS Farquhar (DE-139) was an Edsall-class destroyer escort built for the U.S. Navy during World War II. She served in the Atlantic Ocean and the Pacific Ocean and provided destroyer escort protection against submarine and air attack for Navy vessels and convoys.

She was named in honor of Rear Admiral Norman von Heldreich Farquhar, who graduated from the U.S. Naval Academy in 1859 and had a distinguished record of accomplishments.

Farquhar (DE-139) was launched 13 February 1943 by Consolidated Steel Corp., Ltd., Orange, Texas; sponsored by Miss S. B. Carton, great-granddaughter of Admiral Farquhar; and commissioned 5 August 1943, Lieutenant Commander L. E. Rosenberg, USNR, in command.

Farquhar arrived at Norfolk, Virginia, 3 October 1943, and next day sailed on the first of three convoy escort voyages to Casablanca. She returned from each to New York for replenishment and repairs before joining a new convoy at Norfolk. On 3 April 1944, she sailed for Casablanca once more, this time in a hunter-killer group formed around Core. The group guarded the passage of a convoy, hunting submarines in the general area through which the convoy sailed.

Returning to New York 9 June 1944, Farquhar trained in antisubmarine warfare at Bermuda with the Wake Island hunter-killer group, then sailed on the Casablanca convoy route once more. Homeward bound, on 2 August she went to the rescue of Fiske who had been torpedoed while away from the group searching for a previously sighted target, and arrived in time to rescue 186 survivors. These she took into Argentia, Newfoundland, for medical attention and clothing, then on to Boston, Massachusetts, where they were landed. In September, she began patrols and convoy escort duty in the South Atlantic with the Mission Bay hunter-killer group. She voyaged from Bahia, Brazil, to Dakar, French West Africa, and Cape Town, Union of South Africa, and during a submarine hunt off the Cape Verde Islands on 30 September, made a contact against which she and her sisters operated 6 days, finally sighting a large oil slick, but no other evidence of a sunken submarine.

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