Ships
- USS John D. Ford (DD-228) Captain, 5 July 1942 to 26 October 1943
Norman Ernest Smith was born in Wyoming on 20 December 1908 and died on 7 May 1990. He was a lieutenant in the United States Navy with a date of rank of 1 July 1939. On 15 June 1942 he became a temporary lieutenant commander, and on 23 August 1943 a temporary commander. The ship that fixes his wartime record is the destroyer John D. Ford.
John D. Ford (DD-228) was a Clemson-class destroyer, laid down at Philadelphia in 1919, launched in 1920, and commissioned at the end of that year. In 1922 she left the Atlantic for long service with the Asiatic Fleet. After war reached the Pacific she fought in the Java campaign. The night attack at Balikpapan in January 1942, and the rest of that campaign, came before Smith’s tour. Jacob Elliott Cooper was her commanding officer through those months.
Smith took command of John D. Ford on 5 July 1942, relieving Davis Wing Olney, and remained until 26 October 1943. For the rest of 1942 and into the spring of 1943 the ship went on with Pacific duty. In May 1943 she moved to the Atlantic Fleet, and Smith was still in command when he was advanced to temporary commander that August. On 26 October 1943 he turned the destroyer over to John Sim Slaughter.
Atlantic work continued after he left. In the early months of 1944 John D. Ford served with a hunter-killer group formed around the escort carrier Guadalcanal. Thomas Alexander Watkins commanded her from 21 May 1944 to 27 June 1945, and Gilbert Ira Patterson had her from then until she was decommissioned on 2 November 1945. She was stricken that November and sold for scrap in 1947.
Smith’s next command was the destroyer Doran (DD-634), from 24 November 1943 to 6 March 1945. He then commanded Newman K. Perry (DD-883) from 26 July 1945 to 14 September 1946, a span that began in the last weeks of the Pacific war and ran through the first year of peace.