"UNPARALLELED BATTLE"

Cruiser Sunk, 1,196 Casualties; Took Atom Bomb Cargo to Guam (NY Times, July 30, 1945)

After a tremendous double explosion, believed caused by one or two torpedoes fired by an undetected Japanese submarine in a moonlit sea, the Indianapolis sank within fifteen minutes near Peleliu just past midnight July 30 [East Longitude date].

The 315 survivors were picked up 100 hours and more later after an unparalleled battle with the sea in which the only armor for most of the men were kapok lifejackets and courage. At least 200 lost the battle and drowned, some insane from exhaustion and the effects of sea water, sun and thirst. The remainder went down with the ship.

The ship's commander, Captain McVay, son of a retired admiral, was saved by one of the rescue vessels summoned to the scene when a Navy plane on routine anti-submarine patrol happened to sight some of the men in the water three and a half days after the ship had gone down. Captain McVay was one of the fortunate few in a life raft; the vessel sank so rapidly that only six rafts were released in time.

The Indianapolis was traveling without escort. This had been her frequent practice, and the men aboard were in the habit of saying to each other, three-fourths in jest, that "some day she was going to get it."

And "Get it she did," a haggard survivor, his skin blotched with the great running scabs of "immersion ulcers," remarked grimly today.

Like, we're sure, most of you, we first heard of the USS Indianapolis and the horrific events surrounding its sinking in the movie Jaws.  You'll recall the Robert Shaw character telling about being adrift in the waters of the Pacific as sharks circled and attacked the helpless men.  This story has such a compelling fascination that it has spawned a series of books, documentaries and even a TV movie.  Doug Stanton's In Harm's Way can take its place with the very best of them.  Drawing heavily on interviews with survivors and on Captain Charles Butler McVay's account of the sinking and the ensuing ordeal, Stanton
presents the story with an immediacy and intimacy that makes it all the more terrible. Most recommended. Posted by Orrin Judd at July 30, 2003 11:58 AM