The USS Slater (DE-766) is a Cannon-class destroyer escort that served with distinction during World War II, primarily tasked with protecting critical Allied supply convoys from enemy attacks. Commissioned in May 1944, the ship was named in honor of Frank O. Slater, an Alabama sailor and sharecropper's son who was tragically killed in action during the Naval Battle of Guadalcanal. Throughout the final years of the war, the 306-foot vessel braved both the hostile waters of the Atlantic, where she battled Nazi U-boats, and the dangerous expanses of the Pacific Theater, where she defended major naval task forces against Japanese submarines and kamikaze air strikes. Following her American service, the ship was transferred to the Greek Navy in 1951, where she was renamed Aetos ("Eagle") and spent four decades as a training vessel and patrol ship before being decommissioned in 1991.
Today, the USS Slater holds a monumental place in naval history as the last destroyer escort remaining afloat in the United States out of the 563 built during World War II. Saved from the scrap heap by dedicated veterans and historical preservationists, the vessel was towed back to the U.S. in the 1993 and is now permanently moored on the Hudson River in Albany, New York, operating as the Destroyer Escort Historical Museum. Designated as a National Historic Landmark, the ship has undergone extensive, meticulous restoration over the decades to return her completely to her 1945 wartime configuration. Visitors can tour the Slater from stem to stern, exploring authentic spaces like the Combat Information Center (CIC), the radio rooms, and the tightly packed enlisted berthing quarters, offering an immersive, living history experience of what life was like for the young sailors who served aboard her.