In October 2002 came the announcement that the wreck exploration craft Seeker had located the bow of the U.S. Navy Benson (DD- 421)-class destroyer Murphy (DD-603) some 80 nautical miles off Long Beach Island, New Jersey. Lying in 260 feet of water, it will remain in place as a war grave. The bow had detached from the 2,030-ton Murphy when she was hit on the port side between the bridge and forward stack by the 13,090-gross-registered-ton tanker Bulkoil on the night of 21 October 1943. The Murphy, escorting a convoy bound from New York to the United Kingdom, lost 38 officers and enlisted personnel in the collision, but the after two-thirds of the ship remained afloat and was towed to the New York Navy Yard at Brooklyn for seven months of repairs, during which an entirely new bow was constructed. Returning to service in time to participate in the Normandy invasion in June 1944, the Murphy provided fire support at Omaha Beach and fought off numerous attacks by German torpedo craft.
Named for Acting Lieutenant John McLeod Murphy, commander of the armored Mississippi River paddle gunboat Carondelet during the Civil War, the Murphy was commissioned on 25 July 1942, only 14 months after her keel had been laid at Bethlehem Steel’s Staten Island yard. The destroyers first combat experience came directing landing craft during the Operation Torch landings in North Africa; the ship lost 3 men and had another 25 wounded by a French shore battery but continued to fight and helped to silence the guns.
After repairs at Boston, the Murphy turned to convoy escort work until July 1943, when she joined in the invasion of Gela, Sicily. She was near-missed several times by German dive-bombers but shot down two of her attackers. Subsequent to the Normandy invasion, she was assigned to escorting carriers during the invasion of southern France, where she again provided shore bombardment. The ship joined the escort for President Franklin D. Roosevelt’s early 1945 trip to conferences at Malta and Egypt and was detached to transport King Ibn Saud of Saudi Arabia from Jiddah to the latter conference. After another period of convoy escort duties, the Murphy was modified with an enhanced antiaircraft gun battery and departed Boston for the Pacific on 10 July 1945, arriving too late for combat action but picking up occupation duties until detached to return to home waters at the end of November 1945. The much-traveled Murphy was decommissioned at Charleston, South Carolina, on 9 March 1946. Placed in mothballs, she saw no further service, being stricken on 1 November 1970 and sold for scrap on 10 June 1972.
The 348-foot Murphy in August 1942 (top) wore Modified Measure 12 dappled camouflage and carried her initial armament of four single 5-inch dual-purpose gun mounts, one quintuple 21-inch torpedo tube mount, two twin 40-mm and four single 20-mm antiaircraft guns, two depth charge racks, and four depth charge mortars. Note the row of portholes along the sides of the forecastle; these would soon be plated over. Super heated steam from the ship’s four boilers could produce more than 51,000 shaft horsepower and provide speeds in excess of 36 knots. Range was 6,500 nautical miles at 12 knots. The 96 destroyers of the Benson and Livermore (DD-429) classes had accommodations for 16 officers and 260 enlisted personnel by war’s end.
A risen phoenix, the Murphy is seen in New York Harbor on 8 April 1944 (above) on completion of extensive repairs, including construction of a new bow section that differed very little from the original. An additional 20-mm gun was added on a platform forward of the pilothouse and two more on the bridge wings, for a total of seven, and two additional depth charge mortars also were installed. During the destroyer’s 1945 refit, the torpedo tubes were removed and the antiaircraft gun suite was increased to two quadruple and two twin 40-mm mounts and two twin and two single 20- mm mounts. The Murphy’s fire-control system also was considerably enhanced.