USS Warrington (DD-30) - Pre-World War I

Pre-World War I

After fitting out at the Philadelphia Navy Yard, Warrington moved on 5 August to the Torpedo Station at Newport, Rhode Island, where she loaded torpedoes in preparation for training with the Atlantic Torpedo Fleet. During most of the fall and early winter, the warship conducted battle drills and practice torpedo firings with the submarines and destroyers of the torpedo fleet. She also joined the cruisers and battleships of the Atlantic Fleet for training in broader combat maneuvers. Those training evolutions took her as far north as Cape Cod, Massachusetts, and as far south as Cuba.

On 27 December 1911, the destroyer departed Charleston, South Carolina, in company with the ships of Destroyer Divisions 8 and 9, bound for Hampton Roads. At about 1240 the following morning, the two divisions of destroyers reached the vicinity of the Virginia capes. Suddenly, an unidentified schooner knifed her way through the darkness and mist, struck Warrington aft, and sliced off about 30 ft (9.1 m) of her stern. The collision deprived her of all propulsion and forced her to anchor at sea some 17 mi (27 km) off Cape Hatteras. Sterett responded to her distress call first; but, soon, Walke and Perkins joined the vigil. The three ships struggled through the morning and forenoon watches to pass a towline to their stricken sister, but it was not until the revenue cutter Conondaga arrived at 1300 that the latter ship succeeded in taking Warrington in tow. The revenue cutter towed her into the Norfolk Navy Yard where she was placed in reserve while undergoing repairs which were not completed until 2 December 1912.

Upon her return to active service, Warrington resumed operations with the torpedo forces assigned to the Atlantic Fleet, by then designated the Atlantic Torpedo Flotilla. For a little over four years, she plied the eastern coastal waters of the United States, participating in various gunnery drills and torpedo-firing practices with the torpedo flotilla as well as in fleet maneuvers and battle problems with the assembled Atlantic Fleet. During part of that interlude, the destroyer was based at Newport and worked out of Boston, Massachusetts during the remainder.