USS McGinty - DE-365

logo

For those who may have stumbled upon this site and are unfamiliar with the USS McGinty, I offer this brief history of the ship and the man he was named for.

The ship, one of the John C. Butler class of destroyer escorts, was built by Consolidated Steel in Orange, Texas and commissioned in September, 1944. As was Navy tradition for this type of ship ⁽¹⁾, it was named for a real Navy hero.

Franklin Alexander McGinty ⁽²⁾ was a soundman (someone who would listen to sonar) on the gunship USS Plymouth. In 1943 the ship was hit by the submarine U-566. With the ship on fire, McGinty rushed into the magazine (a place where explosives are kept in a ship) to rescue a shipmate. Neither made it out and the ship sank. McGinty was posthumously awarded the Navy Cross.

The USS McGinty served in the Western Pacific. First based at Pearl Harbor, McGinty did escort duty between Guam, Eniwetok ⁽³⁾, and Ulithi ⁽⁴⁾. Later making runs to Okinawa and Tokyo Bay after WWII, McGinty eventually returned to San Diego and was made part of the reserve fleet in 1947.

The McGinty was brought back into active service during the Korean War in March, 1951, making five deployments to the Far East. McGinty participated in blockades and bombardments, patrol duty and peacekeeping missions. In September, 1959, McGinty was decommissioned and berthed at Portland, Oregon.

That decommissioning didn't last long. In August, 1961, when the Berlin Wall went up, President John F. Kennedy reactivated the McGinty. The ship deployed in October, and traveled to the Sea of Japan and South China Sea. McGinty was decommissioned for the final time in August, 1962. It was during this deployment that part of this web site is dedicated.

After her last tour, the McGinty was stricken from Navy records in 1968 and was sold for scrap.

Sources:
Hazegray.org: http://www.hazegray.org/danfs/escorts/de365.txt
Navsource.org: http://www.navsource.org/archives/06/365.htm
Ibiblio.org: http://www.ibiblio.org/hyperwar/USN/ships/DE/DE-365_McGinty.html

1) "A new ship type, the destroyer escort (DE), retained the name source of its "parent" ship type, the destroyer. Most of these mass-produced antisubmarine patrol and escort ships were named in honor of members of the naval service killed in action in World War II. Some were named for destroyers lost in the early stages of that war."
From http://www.history.navy.mil/faqs/faq63-1.htm

2) "Franklin Alexander McGinty, born 22 November 1911 in Atlanta, Ga., enlisted in the U.S. Naval Reserve 17 August 1942 and joined PLYMOUTH (PG-57) 1 January 1943 for duty as soundman third class. On 5 August, the gunboat was hit by a torpedo as she prepared to depth charge U-566 off Cape Charles. Despite raging fires, McGinty entered the ship’s magazine where he attempted to rescue a trapped shipmate. He, too, was trapped by the flames and was unable to escape before PLYMOUTH sank. For extraordinary heroism without regard for his own safety, McGinty was awarded the Navy Cross posthumously."
From the "Dictionary of American Naval Fighting Ships," (1969) Vol. 4, pp.300-301, and transcribed online at http://www.hazegray.org/danfs/escorts/de365.txt

3) "Circular atoll, central Pacific, one of the Ralik Chain in the Marshall Islands... Mandated to Japan by the League of Nations in 1920, Enewetak was captured in World War II by U.S. forces. Designated an atomic proving station, it was the site of atomic tests from 1947 to 1962."
From http://www.bartleby.com/65/en/Enewetak.html

4) "Atoll comprising 40 islets ... The main atoll has an excellent lagoon for anchoring large ships, and after the American capture (1944) of Ulithi in World War II, it was used as a rendezvous station for naval units."
From http://www.bartleby.com/65/ul/Ulithi.html