After shakedown off Bermuda, the new destroyer escort left Norfolk, Virginia on 12 May 1944 with 13 other destroyer escorts and a convoy of 100 transport ships bound for North Africa. The British relieved the escort ships at Bizerte, Tunisia, on 1 June; nine days later "Lloyd" and her sister ships departed to escort another convoy on the westward passage home. While en route, "Lloyd" was reclassified APD-63 on 5 July 1944 and ordered to report to the Philadelphia Navy Yard on 29 June for conversion to a .