
The USS Eldridge was a destroyer escort built for the United States Navy during World War II. It was part of the Cannon class and was named in honour of Lieutenant Commander Eldridge.
Construction of the ship began in early 1943, and it was launched in July and commissioned in August of the same year.
The USS Eldridge primarily served in the Atlantic during the war, making several voyages between January 1944 and May 1945 to escort convoys transporting troops and supplies to North Africa and Southern Europe. It safely delivered nine such convoys. Later in 1945, it was sent to the Pacific, where it performed escort and patrol duties around Okinawa after encountering an unidentified underwater object on its journey.
After the end of the war, the USS Eldridge was put into reserve in June 1946. It was later transferred to Greece in 1951 under a defence assistance act, where it was renamed HS Leon (D-54). The ship served the Greek Navy for many years before being decommissioned in 1992 and subsequently sold for scrap in 1999.
The USS Eldridge received several awards for its service in World War II, including campaign medals for its participation in the American, European-African-Middle Eastern, and Asiatic-Pacific theatres, as well as the World War II Victory Medal and the Navy Occupation Service Medal.
It's important to note that the ship is widely associated with the "Philadelphia Experiment," a story claiming the ship was involved in invisibility experiments. However, according to the provided text, this is generally considered a hoax.