A Gallant Warship Went Down

Report from the Pacific

by Leo M. Litz, War Correspondant for The Indianapolis News

Illustrations by J. Hugh O'Donnell, Staff artist of the Indianapolis News and lately of the 509th Millitary Police Batalion

An appalling sea disaster, virtually unparalleled and the most tragic in waters beyond the International Dateline, struck in the waning days of the war. Once again, I had to write something I didn't care to write when I went to Peleliu to cover the loss of the gallant cruiser, USS Indianapolis.

Just twelve days prior to Japan's first overtures for peace, and immediately following a highly secretive mission to Tinian for delivery of the atomic bombs which hastened the end of the Pacific war, the Indianapolis went down about 300 miles north by west of Peleliu in the Palau Islands. Two simultaneous explosions rocked the heavy cruiser at 12:07 a.m., Monday, July 30, Peleliu date. The loss of life exceeded the toll exacted in the bombing the carrier USS Franklin. These were the most costly individual sea losses of the entire war.

Damage from the terrific blast completely silenced all communications on the warship. Radio calls for assistance never reached the air because of the lack of power. Listing quickly, with the entire prow severed back to the first frame, the ship turned on her side and slipped beneath the waves in a bare fifteen minutes. Most crewmen were in life jackets as the ship settled too rapidly to permit the launching of boats. Comparatively few managed to find life rafts cut away after the order to abandon ship was relayed by word of mouth.

Not until Thursday, nearly four days later, was there any intimation of a major sea tragedy. Shortly before noon that day, the pilot of a plane on routine anti-submarine patrol saw several survivors in the water. Rescue planes and surface vessels were dispatched to the area immediately. Late in the afternoon Lt. Adrian Marks, twenty-eight-year-old Navy airman of Ladoga, Indiana, landed a Dumbo to rescue fifty-six survivors, but most of the others remained in the water overnight and were not rescued until the forenoon of the following day.

Figures released in Washington placed the death toll at 883 lives, out of a total complement of 1,196 men and officers, the highest for any Navy disaster in World War II. Miraculously surviving a harrowing ordeal of fire and explosion, the aircraft carrier Franklin reported 832 killed and missing and 270 wounded -- more than one-third of her total personnel. Every survivor of the Indianapolis, of course, was listed as a casualty. Rescue ships brought 170 survivors to Peleliu, while the others were taken to Leyte. Original reports said 324 men were taken from the water, but subsequent deaths reduced the number to 313 ultimate survivors.

Official sources ascribed the midnight blast to torpedoes fired from an enemy submarine. None of the survivors, however, reported tangible observations to indicate submarine activity. Among the survivors was the ship's skipper, Captain Charles Butler McVay III, Washington, D.C., who said the type of explosion caused him to believe it was a submarine attack. This theory was bolstered in subsequent court-martial proceedings through the testimony of a Japanese submarine commander who claimed he scored torpedo hits on a warship of the Indianapolis tonnage.

Although the Indianapolis was long overdue, correspondents were informed no search was made and there was no overdue report until some time Friday -- hours after the first coded message had been put on the air advising of the loss of the cruiser. Captain McVay said the ship was due thirty miles off Leyte at 6:00 a.m., Tuesday, July 31. He said he had made arrangements for sleeve-towing planes to meet them in order to provide target practice for the ship's gunners. They were due at the anchorage at 11 a.m. the same day, he added.

Correspondents were assured this matter of failure to make an overdue report earlier would receive immediate attention from a board of inquiry. We had expected the board's report to be available by the time the story was released for publication. Insofar as I know, such a report never was forthcoming. This phase of obvious negligence was investigated, but the facts and circumstances were not given public dissemination in findings announced nearly seven months later.

Captain McVay and officers who assisted in rescue activities from Peleliu said it was their understanding no inquiries were made as to the whereabouts of the cruiser until Friday. In response to a question, Captain McVay gave an "off-the-record" answer to the effect he believed some kind of an inquiry should have been made after the ship was an hour overdue at the anchorage.

If any one man can be singled out for service approaching heroic proportions in the rescue of survivors from the ill-fated cruiser, Lt. Marks deserves something more than mere commendation for leading an outstanding mission of mercy. His flying crewmen also deserve a full share of credit for the successful life-saving effort. It was one of the most notable rescues of the war.

Lt. Marks insisted he merely performed the duties expected of a plane commander under such circumstances. Without any intention of embarrassing him with fine words of praise he would be the first to disclaim, and not in deference to a friendship formed when he was flying air-sea rescue from Iwo Jima, I take the liberty of insisting that Lt. Marks and the splendid members of his crew went far beyond the normal call of duty. The took a risk they didn't have to take -- could not have been criticized justly had they not taken this risk -- and thereby saved the lives of several survivors who had reached the point of complete physical exhaustion and were hovering between life and death.

Flying a PBY5A, a type of aircraft equipped with retractable wheels for land and a pontoon hull for water, Lt. Marks arrived in the area around 4 o-clock in the afternoon. Estimating there were about 200 survivors over an area of ten square miles, he dropped life rafts and other equipment. Inasmuch as no surface craft was in the immediate vicinity, and knowing many in life jackets might not survive through the night, he decided on al open sea landing.

Directed by a plane overhead, Lt. Marks taxied over the area to pick up survivors in life jackets, some of whom were being attacked by sharks. Survivors were placed on the wings after the fuselage was filled to capacity. Rescue work continued until long after dark, with a total of fifty-six men being taken from the water. Counting the crew of nine, the plane had sixty-five persons aboard. Contact was made with a destroyer escort, the USS Cecil J. Doyle, one of the several ships ordered to the scene.

Survivors were transferred to the Doyle between midnight and 3 a.m. Lt. Marks and his crew remained aboard the seaplane until daylight. Badly damaged in the rescue works, the Dumbo was destroyed by gunfire and the crew also boarded the vessel.

My description may not sound particularly impressive to the casual reader unacquainted with air-sea rescue work. Perhaps I should explain that an open sea landing by a PBY5A, a Catalina flying boat that may land on either water or land is extremely hazardous. Unlike other seaplanes such as the PBM's and Coronados, the hull of the PBY5A was weakened by the construction necessary for landings wheels. Navy orders strictly prohibited open sea landing in the type of aircraft unless it was absolutely necessary to save life and there were no friendly ships in the immediate vicinity, plus other conditions.

Lt. Marks believed all the necessary conditions prevailed when he decided on an open sea landing. Luckily, the water was smooth, although deep swells prevailed. All members of the plane crew were well aware the weather might change and they could find themselves in plenty of trouble before surface craft could get to the area. Once again, they were fortunate, as the weather remained smooth until the survivors were transferred aboard ship.

One of the survivors, Lt. Comdr. Lewis L. Haynes, USN, Fairfield, Conn., senior medical officer of the cruiser, warmly praised the work of the seaplane crew and told me several survivors would not have lived through the night if they had been forded to remain in the water. Rear Admiral Elliott Buckmaster, commander of the Western Carolines Sub Area, and his chief of staff, Captain E. T. Oats, also told of the splendid work of Lt. Marks and other members of his crew.

Lt. Marks was the first to know the survivors were from the USS Indianapolis and that the cruiser had gone down with a heavy loss of life. He was so busy with rescue work he didn't want to take time out of code a message to his base. Several hours later, a coded message was sent from the Doyle. Oddly enough, this coded message, the first word ashore as to the identity of the ship that had been lost, was decoded by a Hoosier, Lt. (jg) E. David Edwards, 34, 1202 Dodge avenue, Ft. Wayne, who had the night duty in the Navy communications office.

Stories of indescribable horror, of being tortured by hallucinations that drove men to madness and to death, were told by the small band of survivors who drifted aimlessly in the Pacific for seemingly endless days and nights, alternately hoping and praying for rescue.

Recovering from an ordeal they could scarcely comprehend, these men told me of their constant struggle against the temptation to drink salt water, of frightening experiences with the shark's that followed them, of seeing plane after plane fly overhead while they waved frantically and set off signals to attract attention, of being burned painfully by the equatorial sun by day and chilled by night. Mass hallucinations of a nearby tropical island with a plentitude of cold water, dove many to a vain search in which they perished.

There is no way of knowing how many went down with the ship, but it is known hundreds of men were in the water with nothing more than life jackets to keep them afloat. Some did not even have life jackets. Deeds of heroism were legion as the uninjured sought to aid the burned and wounded, then desisted at the last moment and raced madly to save themselves as the mighty warrior of the seas turned on her starboard side and settled quickly by the prow into a watery grave.

The story of William L. Gooch, 19, F-2C, son of Mr. and Mrs. Donald L. Gooch, Route 3, Martinsville, was not typical. A veteran of most major operations of his ship in the Pacific, this young man was fortunate -- most fortunate. He had no life jacket, and he couldn't swim. He waited until the ship had turned on her side -- until the stacks were half submerged. Then he jumped into the water and managed somehow to keep afloat until he found a five-inch ammunition can. Two or three minutes later a life raft drifted by and he climbed onto it.

"I was asleep in a gun turret," he said. "It seemed as if the explosion went off right under me. I never had been able to swim, but I learned in a hurry when I slid into the water. I must have swum at least fifteen feet to get to that ammunition can. There were four rafts in my group with nineteen men aboard. As the ship went down, I was struck on the head by something -- perhaps a mast of lifeline -- and knocked under water. We were about fifty feet away and were lucky that the suction didn't pull us under. None of us noticed any suction as the ship went down."

Clad only in underdrawers, Fireman Gooch was badly sunburned on the arms and legs but was up and around and didn't seem to mind it. He told me about seven-foot long sharks that followed their life rafts all the time. The group found some provisions on the raft, he said, but had no water to drink until they were rescued on Friday, August 3, at 11:30 a.m., after being in the water for 107 hours. Gooch was a former carrier of The News -- carried the patter in Martinsville for three years while going to high school. He told me of winning a trip to Cincinnati in a circulation contest.

The story of Kenneth E. Mitchell, 37, a radar operator, whose wife, Mable, and seven-year-old son, Earl Dean, lived at 706 West Grove Street, Mishawaka, was typical -- typical because he was among the larger number of survivors who were unable to find rafts and was one of the few of the hundreds who managed to survive in life jackets.

"I had just come off duty and was taking a shower," he said. "When the explosion hit I grabbed a battle lantern and took a man who was badly burned to the mess hall. Then I went topside in search of a hospital corpsman. The ship listed to the starboard so suddenly I barely had time to get in the water as she went down."

Suffering from exposure, sunburn and salt-water sores, Kenneth said he was quite irrational during the last day or so on the water and did not remember exactly what happened. But he did remember that 175 men were in his immediate party and only sixty-three survived. Although he could not remember in, he was one of fifty-six men rescued by Lt. Marks. Kenneth formerly lived in Indianapolis for a year and a half while his father, Ben Mitchell, was doing contracting work on an apartment house at Sixteenth and Pennsylvania Streets. Before going to service in January 1944, Kenneth was a foreman for the U.S. Rubber Company in Mishawaka.

Lindsey L. Carter, 20, S-2C, of McVeigh, Kentucky, whose wife, the former Rosemary Letiff, lived with her parents at 1821 Southeastern Avenue, Indianapolis, left the ship without a life jacket. He found a floating bundle and hung onto it for fifteen hours. During most of this time, he was also supporting a badly burned shipmate who died during the first day. Carter finally got hold of a life jacket and was one of the groups rescued by Lt. Marks in the seaplane.

Many survivors undoubtedly were saved through the heroic efforts of the ship's senior medical officer. Unmindful of the hardship involved, Dr. Haynes swam from group to group, cautioned them against drinking seawater, gave others instructions and boosted morale for an ultimate rescue. At the time he tried to administer what first aid he could, without supplies, to the burned and wounded. He was clad only in the bottom half of his pajamas, but he took this off and tore it into strips to dress wounds. He had men lock arms and tried to keep them together.

The work of Dr. Haynes was all the more amazing because he was badly burned on one foot and hand, was one of a few wheel chair cases among survivors in the hospital. Although he was burned shortly after the blast rocked the ship, Dr. Haynes went to the quarterdeck and administered first aid to the wounded until the ship took a 90-degree list. Then he got life jackets for the patients and went into the water with them. He told a graphic story of mass hallucinations during the last two days in the water.

"These mass hallucinations started on the third day," he said. "One man told of swimming to an island only two miles away where he was given so much cold tomato juice he was sick at his stomach. Obviously, he had drunk seawater. Yet, the men listened intently to his frantic story of a partly submerged island with rooms to rent and started to swim toward it in large groups despite all efforts to dissuade them. Some came back and said there was no such island, but fully fifty per cent returned with verification of such a haven of refuge. They said it was a secret island, talked about it in whispers. All planned to go back the next day.

"Our last night in the water was the worst of all. Men were screaming and fighting, clawing at their faces and bodies. I witnessed several cases of deliberate drowning -- where one man would drown another by holding him under water. Once I was shoved under water by a man who muttered, 'I'm going to kill you!" I managed to get away. The group was out of control, with many men demented because they had drunk seawater."

Four of the rubber boats dropped by Lt. Marks before he landed his seaplane on the water were obtained by Dr. Haynes. After the seaplane landed, he swam two miles to the plane to request water for the men in the boats. He did not go aboard the seaplane, but remained with his men until rescued by surface craft several hours later. Lt. Marks was trying to conserve the limited space aboard the seaplane for those drifting in life jackets. For this reason he urged men in boats and rafts to await rescue by surface craft. Dr. Haynes said several lives were saved by this procedure, as many of the men in life jackets didn't have much chance of living through another night.

Among the last survivors to be rescued, Captain McVay, in the command of the cruiser since November 18, 1944, dramatically related his story of the harrowing experience. He said he ordered an immediate flash of the ship's position and condition to radio listening posts, then gave the order to abandon ship as soon as it became apparent the vessel was sinking rapidly. The order to abandon ship had to be passed by word of mouth as the twin blast had destroyed all communications. He said the radio distress call was keyed, but apparently never got on the air because of the lack of power.

"I was making my way aft for a personal inspection when the ship took a 90-degree list to the starboard and I was washed overboard," Captain McVay said. "I swam as far away as I cold, then there was a big wave. I heard a swish of water, looked around and the ship was gone. By a stroke of luck, I was not caught in the undertow. I climbed astride a box of potatoes and later found two rafts. I heard men calling for help and yelled for them to swim toward me. Eventually we had nine men aboard the rafts. We saw so few people we believed for a while we were the sole survivors."

Captain McVay said they saw many planes in the ensuing four days and fired several Veri signals -- this equipment was found in the life rafts -- without attracting attention. He told how the group held religious services every night at sundown under his direction. They found some emergency rations, but were without water for the entire period. This group was not rescued until 10:20 a.m. Friday, after being in the water for more than 106 hours.

Intensely proud of the ship he commanded, Captain McVay told me there had been some discussion in the wardroom of sending a battle-torn ship's ensign that figured in the Tokyo strikes of February 16-17, 1945, to Mayor Robert H. Tyndall, Indianapolis. The matter was discussed several times, he said, but it seemed no one ever got around to doing int. I assured him Mayor Tendall would have been most grateful, would have arranged suitable exhibition in the City Hall for a memento emblematic of the vigorous and historical roll of the USS Indianapolis in the Pacific war.

Delivery of the atomic bomb materials to Tinian was a well-kept secret. Neither correspondents nor survivors had the slightest idea of the significant mission assigned to the Indianapolis during the first interviews at Peleliu. It was easy to guess a few days later, however, when the announcement came through the use of the atomic bomb, coupled with the disclosure Tinian-based Superfortresses had dropped the bombs.

Survivors immediately recall the "special cargo" the cruiser had carried on the hangar deck, guarded day and night by Marines with orders not to permit anyone near it. They described it as being in two boxes. One box was twelve feet long, four feet in height and width, and labeled as weighing seven tons, they said, while the smaller box was about eighteen inches in all dimensions.

Unescorted, the USS Indianapolis departed from San Francisco on July 16. All speed records for surface craft were broken on the voyage to Pearl Harbor. Another new record was claimed for the trip from Pearl Harbor to Tininan. The ship had been in the Mare Island Navy yard at San Francisco for some time for an overhaul and the repair of damage sustained in a Kamikaze attack at the start of the Okinawa campaign. They arrived at Tinian July 26 and then went to Guam. Sailing from Guam at 9 a.m. Saturday, July 28, the cruiser was en route to Leyte at the time of the disaster.

Captain McVay later stood a court-martial trial on charges of culpable inefficiency and negligence . . . . Really, this was his second time to face a court-martial board over the loss of his ship. His first court-martial was that Sunday afternoon on Peliue when he faced a battery of war correspondents who were insistent on getting the facts -- the true facts. He knew, as did the correspondents, that a skipper can make a grievous mistake in not following the traditions of the sea and going down with his ship in a catastrophe of such proportions.

Though the medium of the press, Captain McVay was called upon to explain first of all just how he happened to be among the survivors. Moreover, he had to convince hundreds of sorrowing wives, mothers and fathers -- the entire American public as well -- that he was neither inefficient nor negligent. He knew the correspondents would write the verdict of whether he had deserted his shipmates to save himself in the dire emergency, whether he had failed in duty toward the ship or the men in his command.

Let the record show here that Captain McVay acquitted himself well in that first court-martial. It was not easy to give adequate answers to the questions flung from all sides. Other survivors would be interviewed and the stories checked for any differences. My own inquiry, which included interviews with many survivors, did not develop facts to support criticism. Other correspondents probably arrived at a similar conclusion; there was no unfavorable comment that I can recall.

Misery loves company, it is often said, while good fortune is not so particular. Frail as it is, human nature can be solaced by finding a quarter to attach blame. In other words, a scapegoat frequently can serve a useful purpose to stay the hue and cry over misfortune.

The second court-martial in Washington, to determine the fate of a man with an otherwise brilliant and unblemished record as a Navy officer, failed to adduce major facts that were not known and published the same day hostilities ceased in the Pacific. If charges of culpability could be sustained in the light of known facts, it would be against the failure to order a proper search after the cruiser was overdue. Many lives undoubtedly would have been saved, had proper search been made.

Captain McVay was acquitted on the inefficiency count based on an alleged failure to issue and see carried out a "timely" order to abandon ship. He was convicted, however, on the negligence charge of failure to cause a zig-zag course to be steered through water where enemy submarines might be encountered. But all punishment was remitted "in view of his previous outstanding record."

Chances have to be taken in wartime, for timidity doesn't pay dividends in armed conflict. Ships and men are bound to be lost, regardless of the efficiency and alertness of their command. Other vessels were lost without a hue and cry against their commanding officers. Findings of the court-martial board left serious doubts as to whether Captain McVay erred. He testified a zig-zag course was not ordered that night because he considered visibility conditions made it unnecessary. Evidently, there was some concurrence in the belief he exercised good judgment, or the recommendations for leniency would not have prevailed.

Purely secondary was the important issue of failure to institute a timely search for the missing ship. Coupled with the McVay findings was an acknowledgement of failure to act promptly when the cruiser became overdue. The net result was letters of reprimand and admonition. Letters of reprimand were issued to Commodore N. C. Gillet, in temporary command of the Philippine Sea frontier headquarters at the time of the sinking; Captain A. M. Granum, operations officer at headquarters, and Lt. Stuart B. Gibson, a member of the operations staff. A letter of admonition was issued to Lt. Comdr. Jules C. Sancho, acting port director at headquarters then located at Tacloban, Leyte.

Some elements of strange mystery seemed to cling around the sinking of the USS Indianapolis. The explosion was of such force and intensity as to raise doubts whether enemy torpedoes alone could have been so effective. Official assurance was given that no atomic bomb material was aboard, yet the explosion was so severe and acted with such suddenness as to suggest the possibility enemy torpedoes could have touched off an even more destructive and explosive substance.

Built in 1937 (1932), this cruiser was one of the fastest and one of the best constructed in the fleet. On the basis of experience in other sinkings, there seemed to be some thought along the line that such a well-built ship should have remained afloat longer after being hit. Survivors reported two simultaneous explosions, yet the enemy sub commander was quoted as saying he scored three hits on a warship of the same tonnage.

Submarine activity, of course, was the only plausible explanation for the loss of the ship. Nevertheless, the circumstances provoked discussion, and in the absence of verified details, speculation naturally arose as to whether contributing factors might have been present.

Survivors of the USS Indianapolis stood at rigid attention on the recreation field of Navy Base Hospital 18 at Guam. They were about to receive the Purple Heart from their top-ranking shipmate of many combat cruises in the Pacific, Admiral Raymond A. Spruance, a Hoosier with official residence in Indianapolis.

"I had hoped to be aboard the Indianapolis for any operations that might be necessary in the future," Admiral Spruance said, "Unfortunately none of us will have the privilege of going aboard her again. I am glad to see many survivors and I join with you in mourning the loss of those who cannot be here."

This presentation was just nine days after the survivors had been rescued. Admiral Spruance, who knew many of the men personally, walked down the lines and pinned on the award with word of greeting to one and all. Later he went to the hospital wards and presented the Purple Heart to those unable to come to the field.

Several enlisted men from the lost cruiser gathered in a little group nearby. They recalled the trips Admiral Spruance mad with them while using the Indianapolis as his regular flagship, remembered his daily walks up and down the deck to keep in physical trim and commented on his suntan. There was a strong comradeship between Admiral Spruance and the men who served on his lost flagship.

||| TEXT INDEX |||