For the next four years she operated along the eastern seaboard and in the Caribbean Sea, several times transiting the Panama Canal for combined Fleet battle practice ranging from California to Hawaii.

Pensacola returned to Pearl Harbor on 19 January 1942, and put to sea on 5 February to patrol the approaches to the Samoan Islands.

[3] Pensacola continued to help guard Lexington on offensive patrol in the Coral Sea until Yorktown joined the task force on 6 March.

[3] Pensacola departed Pearl Harbor on 28 May with the Enterprise task force for a rendezvous on 2 June northeast of Midway with units of TF 17.

Yorktown was dead in the water when Pensacola arrived, and the cruiser assisted in shooting down four enemy torpedo bombers during a second attack.

As Marines stormed the shores of Guadalcanal, the cruiser set course for the Solomons in the screen of Saratoga, Hornet and Wasp to support the leathernecks in that bitter campaign.

[3] Pensacola arrived at Nouméa, New Caledonia on 26 September, and departed with Hornet on 2 October to strike the enemy in the Santa Isabel–Guadalcanal area.

On 24 October, Hornet′s task group joined Enterprise and the combined force steamed to intercept enemy warships approaching the Guadalcanal-Tulagi area.

On 26 October, search planes located a Japanese carrier and battleship formation, beginning the Battle of the Santa Cruz Islands which was fought without contact being made between surface ships of the opposing forces.

[3] Pensacola helped fight off a coordinated dive bombing and torpedo plane raid which damaged Hornet so severely that she had to be abandoned.

The task force had turned back a Japanese attempt to regain Guadalcanal, sunk Yura, and damaged a number of enemy capital ships.

[3] Pensacola departed Nouméa on 2 November to guard transports landing Marine reinforcements, and supplies, at Aola Bay, Guadalcanal.

Just before midnight of the 30th, the American ships transited Lengo Channel and headed past Henderson Field on Guadalcanal as the Japanese task group steamed on a southerly course west of Savo Island to enter "Ironbottom Sound".

Minneapolis took two torpedo hits that blasted her bow downward like an immense scoop and left her forecastle deck awash, but she continued to fight on.

Her engine room flooded, three gun turrets went out of commission, and her oil tanks ruptured to make a soaked torch of her mast.

As troops stormed ashore on Tarawa on 20 November, the cruiser screened carriers launching air strikes supporting the landings.

Pensacola continued to hit hard at Taroa, Maloelap Atoll through 18 February, destroying coastal defenses and air bases of the enemy in the eastern Marshalls.

She again served in the screen of fast carriers conducting raids in the Caroline Islands (30 March–1 April), against Japanese defenses at Palau, Yap, Ulithi and Woleai.

[3] Pensacola departed Majuro on 25 April sailing via Pearl Harbor and Mare Island for duty in the Northern Pacific, arriving in Kulak Bay on 27 May.

She and her sister cruisers and destroyers stirred up a fire melee in their "impersonation" of Halsey's 3rd Fleet to lead the Japanese into thinking the ladder of islands to the Bonins was next on the American timetable for invasion.

Meanwhile, Adm. Halsey's units advanced on the Philippines while Fast Carriers rained destruction on the enemy air and Fleet bases at Okinawa and Formosa.

[3] Pensacola made rendezvous with the units of the Fast Carrier Task Force retiring from the great air battles over Formosa.

[3] Pensacola screened fast aircraft carriers striking Luzon and directly supported the invasion of Leyte beginning on 20 October.

Her deadly guns fought day and night into 1 March when she silenced enemy shore batteries which had hit Terry amidships.

[3] On 25 March, Pensacola bombarded enemy defenses and covered the operations of minesweepers preparing the way for the Okinawa invasion landings.

[3] Pensacola gave direct bombardment support to the initial invasion of Okinawa on 1 April and continued to blast at enemy targets until the 15th.

[3] Pensacola departed Ominato on 14 November to embark 200 veterans at Iwo Jima, then touched Pearl Harbor en route to San Francisco, California, arriving on 3 December.

Five days later, she put to sea for Apra Harbor, Guam, where she embarked nearly 700 veterans for transport to San Diego, arriving on 9 January 1946.

[3] Pensacola departed San Pedro on 29 April to stage with units of Joint Task Force One at Pearl Harbor in preparation for Operation Crossroads, the atomic bomb experiments at Bikini Atoll.

[5] Pensacola received 13 battle stars for World War II service[3] including:[6] This article incorporates text from the public domain Dictionary of American Naval Fighting Ships.