On 29 April, "Roper" rescued fourteen survivors from the British merchantman , which had been torpedoed and sunk by five days earlier. On 1 May, she rescued another thirteen survivors from "Empire Drum". They were landed at Norfolk, Virginia, that day. At the end of May, "Roper" began a series of coastwise escort runs, from Key West to New York, which took her into 1943. In February of that year, she shifted to Caribbean–Mediterranean convoy work and remained on that duty until October when she entered the Charleston Navy Yard for conversion to a high speed transport.