John C. Butler (DE-339) was the name ship of the John C. Butler class of destroyer escorts. She was named for Ensign John Clarence Butler, a Bombing Squadron 3 pilot off Yorktown, lost at Midway on 4–5 June 1942 and awarded the Navy Cross. Consolidated Steel at Orange, Texas, laid her down on 5 October 1943, launched her on 12 November 1943, and commissioned her on 31 March 1944 under Lieutenant Commander John E. Pace. Pace was a survivor of Pearl Harbor and of Lexington at Coral Sea. The portrait is Navy photograph 80-G-264041, taken in the Pacific on 1 March 1945, hull 339 on the bow.
She joined the other three escorts of the division, Dennis, Raymond, and Samuel B. Roberts, with the escort carriers of Taffy 3. On 25 October the carriers launched everything they had, and John C. Butler and her sisters laid smoke to blind the Japanese batteries. Samuel B. Roberts was sunk. John C. Butler was not, and she got out with the carriers that lived. The unit received the Presidential Unit Citation. Pace received the Navy Cross.
She returned to Okinawa with a convoy on 4 July 1945 and spent the last month of the war on convoy duty between Okinawa and the advance bases. She reached San Pedro on 23 November 1945 and decommissioned on 26 June 1946 into the Pacific Reserve Fleet at San Diego. Recommissioned on 27 December 1950 for Naval Reserve training and the Fleet Sonar School at San Diego, she decommissioned again on 18 December 1957, was stricken on 1 June 1970, and was sunk as a target off California in December 1971. Five battle stars, the Presidential Unit Citation, and the Navy Unit Commendation.