A combination of factors—increased operating costs, manpower shortages, and the general anti-military climate which followed World War I—resulted in a reduction of the Navy's active Fleet.

Towards the end of the destroyer's sojourn in San Diego's "red lead row", Germany invaded Poland on 1 September 1939.

To augment the "Neutrality Patrol" which President Franklin Roosevelt had placed around the eastern seaboard and Gulf ports, the Navy quickly set the wheels in motion to recommission 77 destroyers and light minelayers which had been in reserve at either Philadelphia or San Diego.

As flagship for DesDiv 64, DesRon 32, Twiggs initially operated out of San Diego on shakedown and training cruises through November.

Soon after reaching her new base at Key West, Florida, Twiggs got underway to shadow the British destroyer HMS Hereward.

Later in the month, she joined sister ship Evans and the heavy cruiser Vincennes in keeping a close watch on the Australian light cruiser HMAS Perth as she prowled the Gulf of Yucatan on the alert to intercept the German liner SS Columbus which was attempting to slip through the Royal Navy to safety in Germany.

"[citation needed] During her subsequent operations with DesDiv 64, Twiggs conducted neutrality patrols, training cruises for Naval Reserve contingents, battle practices, and exercises through the summer of 1940.

Meanwhile, by the spring of 1940, the Allied cause had taken a decided turn for the worse, as Norway fell after a disastrous British-Norwegian defense, and France and the Low Countries crumbled under the German blitzkrieg.

In addition, German submarines—preying upon the convoys in the Atlantic which served as England's lifeline—began taking heavy tolls on both the cargo ships and their escorts.

With British destroyer forces in bad shape (the beatings taken in Norway, in the Atlantic convoy lanes, and in the Dunkirk evacuation had cut deeply into the Royal Navy list of escort ships), Prime Minister Winston Churchill appealed to the U.S. for aid.

En route to Belfast, Northern Ireland, she and her sister ships passed through the scene of the action fought on 5 November 1940 by the armed merchant cruiser HMS Jervis Bay, in defense of the homeward-bound Convoy HX 84, against the German pocket battleship Admiral Scheer.

After workup and training, the destroyer was allocated to the 2nd Escort Group, Western Approaches Command, based at Londonderry Port.

[5][14] She experienced extremely bad weather, with extensive icing conditions, while operating in the North Atlantic in late 1942 and early 1943.

At one point, the ship reached Halifax after a severe gale on 22 January 1943, coated from bridge to forecastle deck with ice varying from 2–10 ft (0.61–3.05 m) thick.

She served under the Russian flag through 1949 and was returned to Great Britain in 1950, when she starred in the Trevor Howard film Gift Horse as the fictional "HMS Ballantrae", (ex- "USS Whittier") which depicted the St Nazaire Raid.