A secret agreement had been drawn up between Britain and America early in 1941, before Pearl harbour and America's entry to the war. The deal saw the infrastructure for a major US base being agreed in return for liberty ships. Derry became the first US Naval base in Europe and the terminal for USD convoys to Europe and was seen as crucial in the fight and winning of the Battle of the Atlantic.

The importance of Derry was witnessed by the formal surrender of  eight German U-Boats at Lisahally in May of 1945. Admiral Horton, Commander in Chief of the Western Approaches felt it fitting to do this at the location which played the most important role in the battle against the U-Boats.

Eventually nearly sixty u-boats would come into Lisahally before being scuttled in the Atlantic.  Today cargo still comes up the Folye to Lishally which serves as the cities commercial port.

On a fine Saturday afternoon in May, 1932, a small red Lockheed Vega approached the city from Moville direction and circled the Shantallow area, it did a very low pass then climbed and circled a couple of  times before coming in to land, touching down and coming to a halt at Cornshell, Ballyarnett. On board was Amelia Earhart, the first women to cross the Atlantic alone.

She was greeted by James  McGeady and Dan McCallion who were working in a nearby field and watched the events unfold, Amelia wanted to make a phone call and the owner of the field Robert Gallagher took  her to  Derry Post Office where she called the Press Association:

’ "Hello, this is Amelia Earhart speaking " she said. " I've done it, although I had to land here in the pastures outside Derry. I'm not a bit hurt and I think the plane is all right. I had trouble with my exhaust manifold which has burnt out. I had this trouble for about ten hours, and for a lot of the way I was flying through storms - rain, mist and a little fog. On this go I was flying low the whole time and had to rely on myself.