USS Gustafson
1943 Cannon-class destroyer escort
USS Gustafson (DE-182) was a Cannon-class destroyer escort in service with the United States Navy from 1943 to 1946. In 1950, she was transferred to the Royal Netherlands Navy where she served as Hr.Ms. Van Ewijck (F808) until 1967. She was scrapped in 1968.
History
United States Navy (1943-1950)
USS Gustafson was launched on 3 October 1943 by the Federal Shipbuilding & Drydock Co., Newark, New Jersey; sponsored by Mrs. Eva Smythe Stevens, widow of Lt. Gustafson; and commissioned on 1 November 1943.
Following shakedown training, Gustafson escorted coastal convoys in waters ranging from New York to Galveston, Texas. On 20 February 1944 she departed New York in the screen of two escort carriers for duty with Admiral Jonas H. Ingrain's U.S. 4th Fleet based at Recife, Brazil. This fleet kept down the German U-boat and raider menace in waters running south from Trinidad to the tip of South America, and across to the coast of Africa.
Begin with the source’s own compact description: “USS Gustafson” is 1943 Cannon-class destroyer escort. The dossier treats that line as a proposition to test through Gustafson, Cannon-class and destroyer, not as a finished interpretation.
Why this record matters
The phrase “1943 Cannon-class destroyer escort” supplies a clear boundary for inquiry. It also exposes the unanswered questions: who defined that boundary, when it became stable and which sources sit outside it.
Named sources, stable identifiers and responsible institutions provide the strongest route from overview to verifiable evidence. The source revision retrieved here is dated Dec 12, 2025. The linked authority identifier is Q7869920. None of the 0 selected statements returned an explicit reference. The first chronological checks are 1943, 1946, 1950 and 1967.
The absence of detail may reflect summary conventions rather than a lack of surviving documentation. The lead is largely declarative, so disagreement and counter-evidence require a deliberate search beyond the opening account. Authority statements aid reconciliation but still require their own references, qualifiers and ranks to be checked.
How to read it
Use the entry as an orientation point, then follow its citations and revision history. Names, dates and institutional relationships should be checked against the original record.
- Subject orientation
- Search vocabulary
- Locating named sources
The closest primary source, responsible institution and strongest cited specialist reference.
Three-step research path
- Establish the record: confirm the title “USS Gustafson”, its source revision and the description used here.
- Expand the search: follow USS Gustafson primary sources, USS Gustafson archive and Gustafson research across catalogues and specialist indexes.
- Test the account: compare the strongest cited source with the responsible institution’s current record and note any disagreement.
Questions for further research
- Which source most directly establishes the central claim about “USS Gustafson”?
- Which institution is responsible for the underlying evidence?
- Which cited source is closest to the event, object or claim?
Search terms from this dossier
This entry incorporates text from “USS Gustafson” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.