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Audience Development Group
A Sea Story    October 5, 2011
Tim Moore
Tim Moore, Managing Partner Audience Development Group

Managing Partner

Audience Development Group

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Greetings!

It was July, 1945 as the battle cruiser Indianapolis eased its way out of San Francisco. Captain Charles Butler McVay was among a handful of Americans who knew the identity of his secret cargo; components of the atom bomb dubbed "Little Boy" with orders to make the far Pacific island of Tinian on schedule. True to her history the beautiful "Indy", loved by officers and crewmen who had served aboard her, delivered the precious cargo ahead of schedule, setting a speed record that still stands. The atom bomb was dropped only days later.

 

Captain McVay had enjoyed a spotless Navy career since graduation from the Academy. Assignment complete, before leaving Tinian he carefully processed information for the next segment of the Indy's voyage to Leyte where it would lay-in for reassignment. He asked about submarine sightings along the route and if the Indy would have the benefit of an escort. "Negative" to both. Plotters keenly interested in the Indy's route outbound paid virtually no attention to the ship's subsequent routing; thus the nightmare began under condition FUBAR (effed up beyond all recognition).

 

On the night of 30 July only a handful of Japanese submarines still existed. Though McVay had been told there were no submarine sightings on his route, in fact a report of at least one operational enemy sub had been in the general area. McVay took precautions as he turned-in with instructions to "zig-zag" course if his executive officer felt it necessary. The night was black with only occasional moon-breaks over the Pacific. A few miles away Commander Hashimoto, taking a routine periscope sighting, spotted the Indianapolis making 17 knots. At 12:40 AM the first torpedo carrying enough explosives to wipe out a city block hit the Indy forward of mid-ships, blowing 65 feet off her bow. The second torpedo struck mid-ships and was even more devastating. 300 American sailors and officers were either killed on impact or sealed in blazing compartments below decks; the Indy had only 9 minutes to live. In the ensuing chaos almost 900 men abandoned ship in various stages of injury; burns, broken bones, head trauma and shock. Some wore preservers, some swam, while others clung to flotsam with the most fortunate finding rafts. Captain McVay and the ship's doctor Lewis Haynes began organizing floaters as the currents were already separating groups watching the Indy stand on end, then plunge to the greatest depths of the Pacific. Yet expectations ran high...surely tomorrow they'd be seen!

 

Unknown to McVay and his crew, the Indy remained undetected. It had sent a distress signal but that was assumed a hoax. Plotters had forgotten to post the ship's course and ETA. In short, 900 men were in the water but no one knew it. For nearly 5 days survivors were battered by the sea; body temperatures fell by a degree per day, while relentless sun and oil burned and hallucination giving way to cold nights in the water punctuated by the terror of unending shark attacks killing many. Almost 5 days passed with the Indianapolis overdue-but-unnoticed until an accidental rescue began thanks to a Navy plane on a routine training flight. McVay and Doctor Haynes joined other heroes in repeated acts of valiant leadership, saving countless sailors near death. Of the original 1100 crewmen, only 321survived by the time air-sea rescue was complete.

   

Subsequent to the tragedy in the face of evidence documenting shore-bound negligence failing the ship and its skipper, Captain McVay was court-martialed. Years hence on a November day in Litchfield, Connecticut, unable to live in ignominy, Charles Butler McVay III took his life. In all the years that followed shipmates annually gathered in Indianapolis to commemorate their survival and to continue to appeal their hero-captain's fate. In 1996, 28 years after McVay's death, a review court reaffirmed the judgment, even though testimony from the Japanese sub commander Hashimoto bluntly stated nothing in McVay's province could have avoided his "long-lance" torpedoes.

 

The Pacific war began with a tragedy and ended with an even greater one. The dwindling surviving crew members to this day appeal Congress to remove "felon" from the language in Captain McVay's service record. Sometimes even the most powerful can't reconcile mistakes.

Sincerely,

Tim Moore

Tim Moore

Managing Partner 

Audience Development Group

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