Calvert began the consistently superior service which was to win her a Navy Unit Commendation when she sailed from Norfolk, Virginia on 25 October 1942 for the invasion of North Africa.

By 3 August 1943, Calvert was back at Norfolk, a veteran of assault landings in the Atlantic, and now Pacific-bound for stepping stone invasions to the Japanese homeland.

She returned to Pearl Harbor in August carrying 420 Japanese and Korean prisoners of war, and the following month was again westward bound to take part in the invasion of the Philippines.

Calvert completed her conversion as the war ended in the Pacific, and on 24 August 1945 cleared for the Philippines to lift troops to Hiro Wan for the occupation of Japan.

Following this war Calvert remained on active service with the fleet, alternating west coast operations with cruises to the western Pacific, continuing through 1960.

During this service she took part in the Passage to Freedom operation in the summer of 1954 when she lifted over 6,000 Indochinese civilians from Communist-surrounded Haiphong to southern Vietnam.

Ports of call included Yokosuka, Nagoya, Shimoda, Kobe, Nagasaki, Sasebo, and Kure, Japan, Okinawa, Subic Bay, Manila, Hong Kong and Pearl Harbor.

Other stops included Manila, Subic Bay, Hong Kong, Chinhae Korea, and troop exercises on an island in North Borneo.