Photos taken by Joseph V. Scaletti during the April 1946 decommissioning of the USS Bostwick DE-103. Joseph appears in photos 1, 3,5, and 18. (For additional descriptions provided by Mark Roberts of http://www.destroyersonline.com, please scroll down to the text below the photo gallery):
Many thanks to Mark Roberts (http://www.destroyersonline.com) for his insights as to where and when these photos were taken. He writes:
In short, I pretty confident these photo’s were taken in early 1946 near, or most likely, at the time of decommissioning in April that year.
Evidence:
1. Photo’s 8 and 9, the preservation / mothballing shrouds on the forward 3″ guns. These are preservation measures to enclose the guns and prevent weather deterioration. This would further entail the addition of a hemispheric dome (added no doubt after these photo’s were taken) to further protect the guns.
2. In photo 15, the US flag is not flying at the stern flag pole. Any US ship, at dockside, is flying the Stars and stripes at the stern. When the ship is underway, it’s flying from the mainmast. The fact the US flag is not seen is further evidence the colors have been lowered, and the ship is now decommissioned.
3. In photo’s 13 – 17, on either side of the flag pole, there are no depth charges in the depth charge racks, further evidence the ship has off-loaded all of it’s ammunition prior to preservation efforts and decommissioning.
4. Photo’s 4 &  5. All of the ships anchored in the background is further evidence that these photos were taken post-war and the Navy at this time was in a draw-down of wartime ships. No war. . . . . no need to be sailing the seas in search of the enemy.
5. Photo 18: This flag is war-worn. With budgets the way they were after a long costly war, probably not [even] enough money to justify replacing a weathered flag.
6. Sailors manning the rail on the ship just beside the Bostwick, further evidence that this ship was honoring the ceremony as well.
7. When I first looked at these photo’s, the two ladies in the ceremony threw me for a loop, but when I added all of the above, and my experince with ceremonies like this in the 1970’s and 1980’s, where elaborate seating was provided for guests, it hit me that these are most likely the Commanding Officers and/or the Executive officers wives/daughters.
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All the other photo’s are, in my view, pictures taken by fellow shipmates who wanted to get a photo of their fellow shipmates before they all split up and went off into post-war peacetime.
Mark Roberts
DestroyersOnline
USS Whipple (FF 1062)
1977 – 1980