USS Spangenberg ( DE - 223 ) USS " Spangenberg " ( DE / DER - 223 ) , a of the United States Navy , was named in honor of Gunner ' s Mate Kenneth J . Spangenberg ( 1922 - 1942 ) , who died as a result of wounds suffered during the Naval Battle of Guadalcanal , while serving aboard the heavy cruiser . He was posthumously awarded the Navy Cross . " Spangenberg " , a destroyer escort , was laid down on 5 April 1943 by the Philadelphia Navy Yard ; launched on 3 July 1943 ; sponsored by Mrs . Gussie Spangenberg ; and commissioned on 15 April 1944 , Lieutenant Thomas H . P . Whitney in command . Service history . World War II , 1944 – 1945 . After completing trials around Philadelphia and Norfolk , Virginia and shakedown in the vicinity of Bermuda , " Spangenberg " returned to Norfolk on 1 June . She served temporarily as school ship for student officers and as escort to coastwise merchant traffic before beginning duty with transatlantic convoys . On 13 July , the destroyer escort joined Escort Division 66 ( CortDiv 66 ) and put to sea the next day from Hampton Roads , Virginia , in the screen of a convoy bound for the Mediterranean Sea . The convoy , UGS 48 , made a fairly quiet passage until the day before it reached Bizerte , Tunisia . At 01 : 00 on 1 August , a flight of about 20 German bomber s attacked the formation . " Spangenberg " was able to lay a good smoke screen which helped to prevent the German attack from damaging the American ships . This was " Spangenberg " s only brush with the Luftwaffe . The convoy made Bizerte on 2 August , and " Spangenberg " stayed for 11 days before sailing for the United States on the 13th . She reached Boston on the 28th . From 9 to 17 September , CortDiv 66 conducted training exercises at Casco Bay , Maine . " Spangenberg " returned to Hampton Roads on 20 September and , two days later , sailed in the screen of convoy UGS 55 , headed for North Africa . She was at Bizerte from 12 to 18 October ; then she screened the convoy back to the United States and arrived in Boston on 6 November . " Spangenberg " and the other ships of CortDiv 66 conducted more exercises at Casco Bay and , at the end of November , moved to Argentia , Newfoundland , to act as killer group for Task Unit 27 . 1 . 2 . She conducted anti - submarine searches around Argentia and Halifax until February 1945 and , on one occasion , made a depth charge attack on a sound contact , but scored no kill . The destroyer escort spent the month of February operating with friendly submarines in Block Island Sound , Long Island Sound , and in the area south of Block Island . " Spangenberg " began an availability period at Boston on 3 March . After a short cruise to Casco Bay on 20 and 21 March , she got underway for Horta in the Azores , en route to England . She arrived in Liverpool on 3 April . From that port , she moved to Derry in Northern Ireland . There CortDiv 66 , under British control , operated as an anti - submarine escort group out of Derry and out of Milford Haven , England . " Spangenberg " returned to the United States at New York on 1 June 1945 and was converted to a radar picket destroyer escort . Post - war activities , 1945 – 1947 . At the completion of her conversion and post - conversion trials , " Spangenberg " sailed from New York for Port Arthur , Texas , to participate in the Navy Day celebration . On 3 November 1945 , she headed toward Guantanamo Bay , Cuba , for three weeks of refresher training . The destroyer escort departed Cuban waters on the 26th and returned to Norfolk , Virginia . For the next 18 months , " Spangenberg " sailed up and down the eastern coast of the United States engaged in training exercises . During that period , she left that area only once , in May and June 1947 , to carry scientists of the Naval Research Laboratory south of the equator to observe an eclipse of the sun . She returned the scientists to Washington , D . C . on 9 June , stopped at Norfolk for a month , and then reported to Charleston , South Carolina , on 18 July 1947 for inactivation . In reserve , 1947 – 1966 . " Spangenberg " remained berthed at Charleston as a unit of the Atlantic Reserve Fleet for almost 18 years . In March 1949 , she was redesignated a radar picket destroyer escort , DER - 223 , but , on 1 December 1954 , reverted to a destroyer escort , DE - 223 . " Spangenberg " s name was struck from the Navy List on 1 November 1965 and , on 4 October 1966 , her hulk was sold to the North American Smelting Company of Wilmington , Delaware , for scrapping .