Assigned to the South Pacific forces, she spent the next three months giving convoy protection to troop and supply ships reinforcing Guadalcanal from New Caledonia; the New Hebrides; Wellington and Auckland, New Zealand.

This duty terminated 18 March 1943, when Gansevoort departed Espiritu Santo, New Hebrides, to become a unit of Rear Admiral Charles H. McMorris' Northern Covering Group of cruisers and destroyers in the approaches to Attu, Aleutian Islands.

She departed Kulka Bay 24 August for repairs in the Puget Sound Naval Shipyard until 28 September, then steamed via Hawaii with Destroyer Division 27 to Wellington, New Zealand.

Here, Gansevoort became a unit of Rear Admiral Hill's Southern Attack Force which carried Major General Julian Smith's 2d Marine Division to Tarawa Atoll, Gilbert Islands.

Gansevoort provided continuous gunfire support to Marines during the initial landings on Tarawa 20 November, closing the beach to blast enemy strongpoints with point blank fire.

Gansevoort departed San Francisco 13 March 1944 to join the screen of a convoy bound from Hawaii to Majuro Atoll in the Marshall Islands where she arrived 1 April.

Gansevoort joined Destroyer Squadron 48 in guarding transports of Vice Admiral Theodore S. Wilkinson's Southern Attack Force off the beachhead of Leyte 20–21 October.

[1] Despite recurring air attacks and several near misses by bombs, the destroyer escaped further damage and was made seaworthy after a full month of hazardous and exhausting repairs.

Despite periodic air attacks, salvage operations continued until 2 February 1945 when Gansevoort was taken in tow for San Pedro Bay, thence to Ulithi where emergency repairs were completed by 21 April.