USS Samuel B. Roberts (DE-413)

USS Samuel B. Roberts (DE-413)

Samuel B. Roberts at sea, c. October 1944
History
United States
Name	USS Samuel B. Roberts
Namesake	Samuel Booker Roberts Jr.
Builder	Brown Shipbuilding, Houston, Texas
Laid down	6 December 1943
Launched	20 January 1944
Commissioned	28 April 1944
Honors and awards	1 Battle Star; Presidential Unit Citation
Fate	Sunk during the Battle off Samar, 25 October 1944 Shipwreck found, 22 June 2022
General characteristics
Class and type	John C. Butler-class destroyer escort
Displacement	1,350 long tons (1,372 t)
Length	306 ft (93 m)
Beam	36 ft 8 in (11.18 m)
Draft	9 ft 5 in (2.87 m)
Installed power	12,000 shp (8,900 kW)
Propulsion	2 × geared steam turbines 2 × boilers 2 × shafts
Speed	Designed: 24 kn (28 mph; 44 km/h) Achieved: 28.7 kn (33.0 mph; 53.2 km/h)
Range	6,000 nmi (11,000 km; 6,900 mi) @ 12 kn (22 km/h; 14 mph)
Complement	14 officers, 201 enlisted
Sensors and processing systems	SF multi-purpose radar[1]
Armament	2 × single 5 in (127 mm) guns 2 × twin 40 mm (1.6 in) AA guns 10 × single 20 mm (0.79 in) AA guns 1 × triple 21 in (533 mm) torpedo tubes 8 × depth charge throwers 1 × Hedgehog ASW mortar 2 × depth charge racks

USS Samuel B. Roberts (DE-413) was a John C. Butler-class destroyer escort of the United States Navy which served in World War II, the first of three U.S. Navy ships to bear the name.

Samuel B. Roberts was named after Coxswain Samuel Booker Roberts Jr., a Navy Cross recipient, who had been commended for voluntarily steering a Higgins boat towards enemy forces at Guadalcanal, in order to divert fire from evacuation efforts being undertaken by other friendly vessels. The ship was nicknamed the "Sammy B".

Samuel B. Roberts was sunk in the Battle off Samar, in which a small force of U.S. warships prevented a superior Imperial Japanese Navy force from attacking the amphibious invasion fleet off the Philippine island of Leyte. The battle formed part of the larger Battle of Leyte Gulf of October 1944.^[2] The ship was part of Task Unit 77.4.3 ("Taffy 3"), escort carriers only protected by relatively few destroyers and destroyer escorts. Task Unit 77.4.3 was inadvertently left to fend off a fleet of heavily armed Japanese battleships, cruisers, and destroyers off the island of Samar.

Steaming through incoming shells, Samuel B. Roberts scored one torpedo hit and several shell hits on larger enemy warships before she was sunk. After the battle, Samuel B. Roberts received the appellation "the destroyer escort that fought like a battleship."^[2] As of June 2022, she is the deepest shipwreck ever discovered.^[3] Her last known survivor died on 20 March 2022.^[4][5]