USS Tarbell (DD–142) was a Wickes-class destroyer in the United States Navy during World War I. She was the first ship named for Captain Joseph Tarbell.

Tarbell was laid down on 31 December 1917 at Philadelphia by William Cramp & Sons Ship & Engine Building Company. The ship was launched on 28 May 1918, sponsored by Miss Virgie Tarbell, and commissioned on 27 November 1918, Commander Halsey Powell in command.

Tarbell operated along the eastern seaboard until September 1919, when she was reassigned to the Pacific Fleet. Based at San Francisco, she served with Destroyer Division 15, of Destroyer Flotilla 5 and Destroyer Squadron 4, until late January 1920 when she joined Division 13 of the same flotilla and squadron. In February, her home yard was changed to Cavite in the Philippines, and in March, the destroyer joined the Asiatic Fleet. Tarbell served on the Asiatic Station until mid-1921, when she returned to the Pacific Fleet with her home yard at Puget Sound. She operated with the Pacific Fleet until she was decommissioned on 8 June 1922 and berthed at San Diego, California.

On 29 May 1930, Tarbell was recommissioned and assigned to Destroyer Division 11, Destroyer Squadron 10, Destroyer Squadrons, Battle Fleet. Her home port was San Diego until January 1931, when it was changed to Charleston, South Carolina. However, she remained assigned to the same administrative organization until March, when she was reassigned to Destroyer Division 3 of the Scouting Force. Sometime between July and October 1934, the destroyer changed home ports back to San Diego, but remained a part of the Scouting Force Destroyers. Late in 1936, Tarbell returned to the east coast to prepare for her second decommissioning, this time at Philadelphia.

She remained there until after war broke out in Europe in September 1939. To keep the war out of the Americas, President Franklin D. Roosevelt issued two Neutrality Acts on 5 September and ordered the Navy to form a Neutrality Patrol. A month later, on 4 October 1939, Tarbell was placed back in commission at Philadelphia. She operated in the Atlantic with the Neutrality Patrol for over two years before the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor jolted the United States into the war.

Tarbell's duties remained much the same after the United States entered the conflict. The destroyer continued to escort convoys and perform antisubmarine work in the northern Atlantic. She shuttled merchant ships back and forth across the ocean and operated out of the east coast ports on rescue missions to pick up survivors of torpedoed ships.

One such rescue mission occurred on 26 March 1942. A Socony tanker, Dixie Arrow, was torpedoed off Cape Hatteras, North Carolina, and Tarbell's lookouts sighted her distress flares a little before 0900. The destroyer rang up full speed; and, one-half hour later, she arrived at the scene of the attack. She dropped a depth charge barrage to drive off any U-boats lurking in the vicinity and then picked up 22 survivors. After a futile search for the enemy submarine, she disembarked the survivors at Morehead City, North Carolina.

In May 1942, the destroyer began helping in the surveillance of Vichy French warships in the Caribbean Sea. To assure that those French ships were not turned over to the Germans and that, in accordance with the Panama Declaration, there be no transfer of European possessions in America to any non-American power, she was assigned a patrol area around Pointe-à-Pitre, Grand Terre Island, Guadeloupe, and her specific charge was the old training cruiser Jeanne D'Arc.