"Shields"' shakedown cruise, interrupted by a nine-day escort assignment with the battleship , lasted from 7 March to 18 April 1945. She departed Puget Sound on 6 May and, after several days of operations in the vicinity of Pearl Harbor, Hawaii, shoved off for Eniwetok Atoll with convoy #PD-413-T. Her short period of combat service in World War II, 24 May – 15 August 1945, consisted almost entirely of escort duty between and patrol duty around Eniwetok, Ulithi, Leyte, Okinawa, and Borneo. "Shields" saw actual combat only once during the war; she shelled Japanese shore installations at Miri, Borneo, in support of Australian ground forces, on 26 June 1945.