The class was designed under project SCB 131 as a cost-effective version of an anti-submarine warfare (ASW) ship that could be built quickly in case of rapid mobilization.

[4] The Claud Jones class were given four Fairbanks Morse 38ND8 diesel engines rated at 9,200 brake horsepower (6,860 kW).

[c] For ASW, the destroyer escorts were equipped with two forward-firing hedgehog anti-submarine mortars, two fixed 12.75-inch (324 mm) Mark 32 Surface Vessel Torpedo Tubes and one depth charge rack placed over the stern.

[2][3] In 1961, Charles Berry and McMorris received a Norwegian-designed Terne III ASW rocket-propelled depth-charge system.

Monginsidi (ex-Claud Jones) and Ngurah Rai (ex-McMorris) kept their two 3-inch mounts and had twin-mounted 25 mm guns added.