Length: Overall: 376' 5½"; Between perpendiculars: 369' Maximum Molded Breadth: 39' 4½" Extreme Beam: 39' 8" Normal Displacement: 2,050 long tons Draft: Light: 8' 1"; Mean: 13' 5" Deep: 22'8" Designed Complement: Officers, 34; Enlisted, 295 Designed Shaft Horsepower: 60,000 Designed Speed: 36 knots Screws: Two x three blades. Rudder: DDs 445–800: one; DDs 801–804: two Stacks: Two Tactical diameter: 950 yards at 30 knots Endurance: 4,800 nautical miles at 15 knots
In retrospect the Fletchers are often described as the most successful of all American destroyers; fast, roomy, capable of absorbing enormous punishment, and yet fighting on. They fought in the classic destroyer action of World War II, the unequal battle off Samar, in which a few Fletchers and destroyer escorts faced the Japanese battle line; a few hours later [sic] Fletchers delivered the last US destroyer surface torpedo attack in the Battle of Surigao Strait. The Fletchers fought through most of the Pacific war, from the night battle of Guadalcanal (November 1942) onward. So successful were they, and so fondly were they remembered, that the first postwar mass-production destroyer, the Forrest Sherman, began as a project for an updated Fletcher.
