USS Barry (DD-933) was one of eighteen Forrest Sherman–class destroyers of the United States Navy, and was the third US destroyer to be named for Commodore John Barry. Commissioned in 1954, she spent most of her career in the Caribbean, Atlantic, and Mediterranean, but also served in the Vietnam War, for which she earned two battle stars. Another notable aspect of her service was the Cuban Missile Crisis in 1962.
Decommissioned in 1982, she became the "Display Ship Barry" (DS Barry), a museum ship at the Washington Navy Yard in Washington, D.C., in 1984.
Renovation of DS Barry to allow her to continue as a museum ship was deemed too expensive to justify. Furthermore, the planned construction of a fixed-span bridge to replace the Frederick Douglass Memorial Bridge, a swing bridge, would have trapped her at the Washington Navy Yard permanently. Scrapping was therefore the only realistic option. An official departure ceremony for the ship took place on 17 October 2015, and she was towed away on 7 May 2016 to be scrapped in Philadelphia. Scrapping was completed by 2/11/2022.
Construction and commissioning
Barry was laid down on 15 March 1954 at Bath, Maine, by the Bath Iron Works Corporation; launched on 1 October 1955; sponsored by Mrs. Francis Rogers, a great-grandniece of Commodore Barry; and commissioned at the Boston Naval Shipyard, Charlestown, Massachusetts, on 7 September 1956; Commander Isaac C. Kidd, Jr.,in command.
1956–1959
Barry fitted out at the Boston Naval Shipyard through November, testing her new electronics, ASW gear, and gunnery systems into December. After a brief underway period in Narragansett Bay, she departed 3 January 1957 for Guantánamo Bay, Cuba, to continue her shakedown. Her training exercises were interspersed with port visits to Kingston, Jamaica; Culebra, Puerto Rico, and Santa Marta, Colombia, before she departed for Colón, Panama.
The destroyer transited the Canal Zone on 26 February and anchored at Salinas, Ecuador, two days later to begin the first of three "goodwill" visits to Latin American ports. After a five-day visit, she departed for Callao, Peru. Arriving 5 March, she hosted the United States Ambassador to Peru, the Honorable Theodore C. Achilles, and the Prefect of Callao, before sailing for Valparaíso, Chile, on 9 March. Three days later, Barry's Captain received official calls from the Chilean provincial governor, the Commander in Chief of the Chilean Navy, Vice Almirante Francisco O'Ryan; the American consul to Valparaíso, and the American Commandant, First Naval Zone; all on the same afternoon. After refueling operations, she cleared Valparaíso on 17 March and shaped course for Panama. Transiting the Canal Zone on 23 March, where she damaged a ship's-boat boom in Gatun Locks, she reached Boston on 29 March with her shakedown completed.
The destroyer underwent post-shakedown alterations and repairs at the Boston Naval Shipyard. She cleared the harbor on 15 May for a schedule of local operations off New England. On 27 June Barry departed for Rosslare, Ireland, and her first deployment to Europe. She visited St. Nazaire, France, and Lisbon, Portugal, before arriving at Gibraltar on the morning of 16 July. Assigned to the 6th Fleet, the destroyer escorted carriers, operated as plane guard, and conducted ASW barrier patrols before returning to Newport, Rhode Island, in August.
On 24 September, after several weeks of post-deployment repairs and upkeep, she steamed into Narragansett Bay to assist the Norwegian freighter Belleville which lay aground off Seal Rock. On 26 September, she helped escort the nuclear submarine , carrying President Dwight D. Eisenhower, as she conducted a diving demonstration off Newport. After several months of routine operations, including antisubmarine warfare (ASW) exercises and plane guard operations with the carriers and , the destroyer spent May 1958, preparing for her next deployment to the Mediterranean.