Onboard Bagley, Radio Seaman Recruit Robert P. Coles from Machias, Maine exited the port side mess decks and saw the Japanese planes attacking Hickam Field.

The destroyer immediately went to general quarters, firing her .50-caliber machine guns at the torpedo-carrying Nakajimas passing down the port side to attack the American battleships.

Bagley, under the temporary command of Lieutenant Philip W. Cann, paused only long enough to pick up the skipper of destroyer Patterson, who was subsequently transferred to his own ship at sea.

Minutes after that, one bomber attempted to crash Bagley's stern, but fire from Aylwin helped splash the "Betty" some 200 yards (200 m) distant on the starboard quarter.

Joined by other convoy elements on the 26th, including three more cargo ships, Bagley guarded the transports as they conducted rehearsal landings at Koro Island.

Assigned to "Southern Force", one of three picket patrols, Bagley and Patterson accompanied Australia, Canberra, and Chicago in protecting the transports south of Tulagi.

Australia, with Rear Admiral Victor Alexander Charles Crutchley, RN, on board, left formation for a command conference at Lunga Roads at 2130.

Just over two hours later, with visibility low owing to overcast sky and rain showers, unidentified ships loomed into view about 3,000 yards (3,000 m) distant on the port bow.

[2] Bagley then turned left again and her gunners scanned the passage between Guadalcanal and Savo Island; but, as the Japanese cruiser force had already passed by to the north, they saw no enemy ships.

That warship, along with Quincy and Vincennes, had been mortally wounded in the short, but violent, Battle of Savo Island before the Japanese force retired to Rabaul.

Meanwhile, Bagley's medical officer and pharmacist's mates treated shell-fragment lacerations and second-degree burns before the wounded were transferred to President Jackson that afternoon.

Underway from Townsville on 27 June, Bagley, in company with Henley and SC-749, escorted six LSTs carrying 2,600 Army troops and airfield equipment to Woodlark Island.

After steaming to Buna on 23 December, Bagley joined the seven LSTs of TU 76.1.41, carrying the 7th echelon of 1st Marine Division's engineers, artillery, and stores for the Cape Gloucester operation.

Returning to Buna on 28 December, Bagley then helped leapfrog elements of the 32nd Infantry Division to Saidor, New Guinea, bypassing a strong Japanese garrison at Sio.

Anchoring in Majuro Atoll on 3 June, Bagley joined one of the four fast carrier task groups, putting out to sea with Bunker Hill and TG 58.2 on the 8th.

On 6 July, after receiving more ammunition from Montpelier, she closed shore and fired on "caves and crevasses near waters edge on Saipan", expending 537 5-inch and over 1,000 rounds of 20-millimeter and 40 mm shells.

Bagley's only part in the Battle for Leyte Gulf was to join the ad hoc cruiser-destroyer group dispatched in futile pursuit of the retreating flattops, mere decoys with only half their air component on board.

In order to destroy Japanese aircraft staging into the central Philippines, TG 38.4 launched attacks on Luzon from its patrol area east of Leyte Gulf on 30 October.

Retiring to Seeadler Harbor on the 27th, the destroyer spent the next month training, or receiving repairs from Briareus, all in preparation for Operation Musketeer, the landings on Luzon, Philippine Islands.

Late in the afternoon of the 4th, after a day of false alarms and "snooper" alerts, a single twin-engine Japanese kamikaze crashed into Ommaney Bay, setting off explosions and fires which destroyed that escort carrier.

Although the first two waves were driven off by CAP, Bagley's crew saw suicide planes from the third attack crash Columbia, Manila Bay, Australia, and Stafford, damaging the latter badly enough to force her retirement to Leyte.

On 21 February, after a mere six days to conduct repairs and replenish, the warship embarked upon the last major amphibious operation of the war, the invasion of Okinawa.

Over the next several weeks, numerous small Japanese air raids appeared on her radar screen, but only one closed the formation, an ineffective attack by a lone plane on the 12th.

On 28 April, while the escort carriers launched raids on Sakishima Gunto, the crew spotted an Ohka kamikaze pass harmlessly overhead at 26,000 feet (7,900 m).

Bagley spent the next five weeks operating as a minefield marker ship, assisting minesweeping efforts, and providing courier services between Sasebo, Nagasaki, and Wakayama.

Her name was struck from the Naval Vessel Register on 25 February 1947, and she was sold to the Moore Dry Dock Company, Oakland, California, on 8 September 1947.