Spruance would later rise to the rank of admiral and commanded the United States Fifth Fleet in the Pacific Theater during World War II.

She performed her first significant service for the Navy at Trepassey Bay in May 1919 when she served as one of the pickets for the transatlantic flight attempt by three Curtiss NC flying boats.

Her first assignment there consisted of a month of salvage operations in Angeles Bay, Baja California, Mexico, to recover a downed Army DH.4B observation plane and the bodies of its crew who had been murdered by Mexican fishermen.

Recommissioned on that day (in response to President Franklin D. Roosevelt's establishment of the Neutrality Patrol following the outbreak of war in Europe at the beginning of the month), she became flagship of DesDiv 65, Pacific Fleet.

Transferred to Britain as one of the 50 old destroyers leased to that nation in return for the right to establish American bases on British possessions in the Western Hemisphere, she was commissioned in the Royal Navy that same day as HMS Castleton.

Castleton was modified for trade convoy escort service by removal of three of the original 4 in (102 mm)/50 caliber guns and one of the triple torpedo tube mounts to reduce topside weight for additional depth charge stowage and installation of a Hedgehog anti-submarine mortar system.