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USS Barry (DD 933)

- decommissioned -

Commissioned as the third FORREST SHERMAN - class destroyer, the USS BARRY was the third ship in the Navy to bear the name. In the mid-1960s, BARRY was one of the eight FORREST SHERMAN - class destroyers chosen to receive an anti-submarine warfare capability upgrade which included the replacement of one of the Mk-42 5-inch guns with a Mk-16 ASROC missile launcher. The ships that underwent the conversion then formed the BARRY - class.

USS BARRY was decommissioned after more than 26 years of service on November 5, 1982. She was stricken from the Navy list on January 31, 1983, and was subsequently opened as a display ship at the Washington Navy Yard, Washington, DC, in 1984. Click here for a photo tour of the BARRY at the Washington Navy Yard.

In October 2015, the construction for a new bridge designed to replace the existing Frederick Douglass Memorial Bridge started. The old bridge - a swing bridge - allowed BARRY to be towed out while the new bridge - a fixed-span bridge - would trap the BARRY on the Anacostia River. This, as well as the fact that the BARRY was in need of $2,000,000 in repairs led the Navy to decide to remove the ship and sell it for scrapping. On May 7, 2016, the BARRY left Washington under tow for the former Philadelphia Naval Shipyard where she spent the following years laid up and waiting for her sale. On October 15, 2020, BARRY arrived under tow at International Shipbreaking at Brownsville, Tx., for scrapping.

General Characteristics:Awarded: December 15, 1952
Keel laid: March 15, 1954
Launched: October 1, 1955
Commissioned: July 9, 1956
Decommissioned: November 5, 1982
Builder: Bath Iron Works, Bath, Maine
Propulsion system: four-1200 lb. boilers; two steam turbines; two shafts
Propellers: two
Length: 413 feet (125.9 meters)
Beam: 45,3 feet (13.8 meters)
Draft: 22 feet (6.7 meters)
Displacement: approx. 4,000 tons full load
Speed: 32+ knots
Aircraft: none
Armament: two Mk-42 5-inch/54 caliber guns, Mk-32 ASW torpedo tubes (two triple mounts), one Mk-16 ASROC missile launcher
Crew: 17 officers, 287 enlisted


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Crew List:

This section contains the names of sailors who served aboard USS BARRY. It is no official listing but contains the names of sailors who submitted their information.


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USS BARRY Cruise Books:


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Accidents aboard USS BARRY:

DateWhereEvents
September 27, 1963Newport, Rhode Island
USS BARRY accidently discharges a torpedo into the deck house of the USS DECATUR (DD 936) moored alongside in Newport, Rhode Island. There are no injuries or significant damage.


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About the Ship's Name:

Born in County Wexford, Ireland, in 1745, John Barry was appointed a Captain in the Continental Navy December 7, 1775. He commanded LEXINGTON and ALLIANCE during the Revolutionary War. He was seriously wounded May 29, 1781, while in command of ALLIANCE during her capture of the British ships HMS ATLANTA and HMS TRESPASSY. Appointed Senior Captain upon the establishment of the US Navy subsequent to the ratification of the US Constitution in 1788, Captain Barry commanded the frigate UNITED STATES in the Quasi-War with France. Commodore Barry died on September 13, 1803, at Strawberry Hill near Philidelphia, PA. He was buried in St. Mary's Cemetery in Philidelphia, PA. Commodore Barry was honored by the United States Congress in 1906, when a statue was commissioned and later placed in Lafayette Park, Washington, D.C., and honored again some fifty years later when President Eisenhower ordered a statue of Commodore Barry to be presented on behalf of the people of the United States to the people of Ireland at County Wexford, Ireland. On August 21, 1981, President Ronald Reagan designated September 13, 1981 as Commodore John Barry Day, a tribute to one of the earliest and greatest American Patriots. Three other ships have been named in honor of this naval hero.


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History of USS BARRY:

USS BARRY was built at Bath, Maine. She was commissioned in September 1956 and early the next year made her shakedown cruise to the Caribbean area and the west coast of South America. In mid-1957 BARRY operated with the Sixth Fleet in the Mediterranean Sea, the first of some eight deployments to that often troubled part of the World. While on a second such cruise in June-September 1958 she supported carrier operations during the Lebanon crisis. Later in 1958 and into 1959, the destroyer was fitted with a large SQS-23 sonar, giving her a distinctive "clipper" bow profile that she has carried ever since. She spent the next few years participating in sonar tests and demonstrations, plus anti-submarine warfare (ASW) exercises, in the western Atlantic and in Northern European waters.

BARRY returned to the Mediterranean in June-August 1962 as part of an ASW task group and that fall took part in Cuban Missile Crisis operations. She revisited Northern Europe and the Mediterranean in 1964. During late 1965 and the first months of 1966, she conducted her only Pacific deployment, which included Vietnam War combat duty. This "round the World" cruise featured transit of the Panama Canal outbound and the Suez Canal while steaming homeward. Late in 1966, BARRY served as test ship for the Mark 86 fire control system, then entered the shipyard for a two-year-long modernization that significantly altered her appearance and greatly enhanced her ASW capabilities.

Recommissioned in April 1968, BARRY made her next overseas voyage, to Northern Europe, during August-December 1969 and conducted a brief Mediterranean cruise in October 1970. Between August 1972 and July 1975 she was homeported in Greece. In addition to conducting NATO exercises and anti-submarine operations, she was also present during the 1973 Middle Eastern war and the 1974 Cyprus crisis. Another Sixth Fleet deployment took place in 1977-1978, followed by a cruise through the Baltic Sea that took her as far east as Finland.

During her final Sixth Fleet tour, in March-September 1979, BARRY passed through the Suez Canal to join the Middle East Force for Persian Gulf service during the very tense period that accompanied the Iranian Revolution. A second deployment to those distant waters, which were becoming increasingly familiar to U.S. Sailors, took place in 1981-1982. In November 1982, shortly after the end of that cruise, USS BARRY was decommissioned. Stricken from the Naval Vessel Register in January 1983, the ship was towed to the Washington, D.C., in the fall of that year. Moored at the historic Washington Navy Yard, she has since served as the Navy's display ship in the Nation's Capital.


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USS Barry after her ASW conversion


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The photos below were taken by me on November 8, 2008, during a visit to the USS BARRY museum at the Washington Navy Yard in Washington, DC. Unfortunately, during my visit there was a ceremony aboard the BARRY and not all areas of the ship were accessable.

Click here to view more photos.


The photos below were taken by Michael Jenning and show the BARRY laid up at the former Philadelphia Naval Shipyard on October 17, 2016.



The photos below were taken by Michael Jenning and show the BARRY laid up at the former Philadelphia Naval Shipyard on October 7, 2018.



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