thoroughly before banking away and heading for the coast. Anderson made arrival at the Naval Torpedo Station at Newport the following day, 9 September, and over the next few days served as the underway "target" for torpedo practice conducted by on the testing range in Narragansett Bay. On 16 September, Anderson arrived back at the New York Navy Yard, her shakedown completed, for the installation of her main battery director. After brief periods underway for testing fire control equipment (21–22 September), Anderson took a departure from New York for NOB, Norfolk, arriving on 24 September. Anderson conducted gunnery exercises on the Southern Drill Grounds off the Virginia Capes, firing at a target towed by on 26 September before firing antiaircraft battery practice on 28 September. She arrived at the New York Navy Yard for post-shakedown availability on the morning of 1 October; these repairs and alterations continuing through the end of January 1940. The destroyer then touched briefly at the Boston Navy Yard before she ran her final acceptance trials off Rockland, Maine, on 7 February 1940, with Rear Admiral H. L. Brinser, president of the Board of Inspection and Survey, embarked. Anderson then paid a return visit to the Boston Navy Yard on 9 February before returning to New York, via the Cape Cod Canal, Buzzards Bay and Oyster Bay, on 12 February. Anderson remained at the Navy Yard through the end of March, after which time she sailed for Newport, for torpedo firing tests on 10 April. At 1130 on 12 April, the destroyer embarked the Honorable John Z. Anderson, a California Congressman and member of the House Naval Affairs Committee, and got underway shortly thereafter, reaching NOB, Norfolk, and mooring to Pier 7, at 2008 the following day, disembarking her passenger the next morning. Underway in company with , Anderson stood out, headed for Guantanamo Bay, on the afternoon of 15 April. The next day, 14 hours out of Norfolk, the ships ran into heavy weather. At 0440 on 16 April, the strongback of the port lifeboat was reported to be cracked. Lieutenant George R. Phelan, the executive officer, gathered men of the deck force in the lee of the galley, amidships, as the ship steered various courses in an attempt to lessen the roll and thereby facilitate efforts to secure the port lifeboat. Between rolls, Lieutenant Phelan and his men attempted to recover the boat and