isle of Okinawa included the rescue of five men from a raft from the fast transport Dickerson (APD-21); fishing out a crashed fighter pilot from the fleet carrier Bennington (CV-20); and exploding a drifting mine with gunfire. Remarkably, in contrast to some of her sister-ships that suffered grievous damage at the hands of the suicidal kamikaze, Wickes suffered only three casualties: all wounded when a plane strafed the ship.Wickes departed the Okinawa area on 15 May, bound for Ulithi, while the campaign continued on. She screened a convoy of auxiliaries and merchantmen to the Western Carolines, reaching her destination on the 21st. She then nested alongside the destroyer tender Prairie (AD-15) and received a 10-day availability. The time spent there at the sprawling, busy, advance base was, truly, "a welcome rest" after the long hours of general quarters and alerts that were part and parcel of duty off Okinawa. "Although all hands had gained a great deal of confidence in our ability to handle air attacks", wrote the ship's historian, "it was difficult, after more than a month of picket duty, not to feel like fugitives from the law of averages, as so many other ships had been hit."Wickes—her availability alongside Prairie completed by early June—departed Ulithi on 7 June, escorting another slow convoy. Her destination was again Okinawa. She safely reached there with her charges on the 13th and took on board another fighter-director team. In company with two or three supporting destroyers, Wickes then returned to the picket lines. Most enemy air activity then took place nocturnally. Her second stay at Okinawa proved briefer than the first. The ship headed for Saipan on 23 June with a slow convoy but with onward routing approved to Pearl Harbor. Reaching Saipan on the 29th, Wickes departed that same day, bound for the Hawaiian Islands in company with Picking and Hall (DD-583). Making port at Pearl Harbor on 7 July, Wickes' time in Hawaiian waters proved brief; for, on the 8th, she was bound "stateside", her bow "very happily pointed" toward the Golden Gate. She made the last leg of the voyage in company with her old companion, Picking, and two other ships, Sproston (DD-577) and Brackett (DE-41). All ships arrived on the morning of 14 July and proceeded to the Naval Ammunition Depot at Mare Island to unload ammunition. Upon completion of that task, Wickes got underway for Hunters Point,