Ships
- USS Converse (DD-509) Captain, 20 November 1942 – 1 December 1943
DeWitt Clinton Ellis Hamberger was born in Fredericksburg, Virginia, on 2 April 1903. He graduated from the United States Naval Academy with the class of 1926. He was promoted to lieutenant on 30 June 1936 and to lieutenant commander on 1 May 1941. On 28 November 1941 he took command of the destroyer Decatur. He was still in that ship when the United States entered the war, and he left her on 15 October 1942. In August of that year he received the temporary rank of commander.
His next command was a new Fletcher-class destroyer. On 20 November 1942 he placed Converse in commission at Bath, Maine, and became her first commanding officer. The ship trained at Guantanamo Bay and then at Pearl Harbor before crossing to the South Pacific. She reached Noumea on 17 May 1943. Through the summer Hamberger kept her on the Solomon Islands supply line, covering convoys that carried men and cargo to New Georgia and escorting ships that ran between Espiritu Santo and Guadalcanal.
On 16 September 1943 Converse arrived at Port Purvis and joined Destroyer Squadron 23, the squadron Captain Arleigh A. Burke was making into a fast night-fighting unit. Bernard L. Austin commanded Destroyer Division 46 in that squadron, and Hamberger's ship worked with the division as the campaign moved toward Bougainville. Late in October the destroyers sortied with the cruisers assigned to cover the landings at Empress Augusta Bay. On the night of 31 October–1 November 1943, Converse took part in the bombardment of the airfields at Buka and Bonis and of targets in the Shortland Islands.
The Japanese fleet answered the landing the following night. On 1–2 November 1943 a force of cruisers and destroyers came down to strike the new beachhead, and the American covering group met it off Empress Augusta Bay. Hamberger took Converse into the dark with the rest of the squadron and fought her with guns and torpedoes while the task force turned the raid back. Japanese ships were sunk and others damaged in the action, and that result belongs to the task force. The beachhead on Bougainville held. For his leadership as commanding officer that night, Hamberger received the Navy Cross.
He had one more night battle before he left the ship. On 24–25 November 1943 Burke led five destroyers of the squadron, Converse among them, against Japanese destroyers running toward Buka. Off Cape St. George the American column struck in the dark, and the squadron sank three Japanese destroyers and came away without losing a ship of its own. Hamberger's handling of Converse in that engagement brought him a Gold Star in lieu of a second Navy Cross. On 1 December 1943 he turned the command over to Ellis Hole McDowell.
Converse stayed in the squadron after he left. John Barr Colwell commanded her during part of 1944, and the ship continued through the later Pacific campaigns, including the months off Okinawa when her gunners fired at suicide aircraft. The squadron's operations from 1 November 1943 into February 1944 earned a Presidential Unit Citation. Hamberger had been on her bridge for the two November battles that opened that record. He remained in the Navy, served as a captain, and retired as a rear admiral. He died in Virginia Beach, Virginia, on 1 July 1974.