page_title: USS Higbee
section_title: World War II
hierarchical_section_title: USS Higbee / World War II
caption_attribution_description: English: The U.S. Navy destroyer USS Higbee (DD-806) at anchor, circa 1945-1948. Higbee was configured as a radar picket ship, and was redesignated DDR-806 in March 1949.
context_page_description: USS Higbee was a Gearing-class destroyer in the United States Navy during World War II. She was the first U.S. warship named for a female member of the U.S. Navy, being named for Chief Nurse Lenah S. Higbee, a pioneering Navy nurse who served as Superintendent of the U.S. Navy Nurse Corps during World War I.
  Higbee was launched 13 November 1944 by the Bath Iron Works, Bath, Maine; sponsored by Mrs. A. M. Wheaton, sister of the late Mrs. Higbee; and commissioned on 27 January 1945, Commander Lindsay Williamson in command.
context_section_description: Higbee immediately sailed to Boston, where she was converted to a radar picket destroyer. After shakedown in the Caribbean, she sailed for the Pacific on 24 May, joining Carrier Task Force 38 less than 400 miles from Tokyo Bay on 19 July. "Leaping Lenah", as she had been dubbed by her crew, screened the carriers as their planes launched heavy air attacks against the Japanese mainland until the end of hostilities on 15 August. She helped clear Japanese mine fields and supported the occupation forces for the following seven months, finally returning to San Diego on 11 April 1946. The post-war years saw Higbee make two peacetime Western Pacific cruises as well as participate in fleet exercises and tactical training maneuvers during both these cruises and off the West Coast. On her second WestPac cruise, Higbee escorted the heavy cruiser Toledo (CA-133) as they paid official visits to the recently constituted governments of India and Pakistan in the summer of 1948.
caption: USS Higbee in 1945
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