In Harm’s Way: The Sinking of the USS Indianapolis and the Extraordinary Story of Its Survivors by Doug Stanton
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

In Harm’s Way is the story of the sinking of the USS Indianapolis just before the end of World War 2 in the Pacific. The Indianapolis had delivered parts of the “Little Boy” atomic bomb to the island of Tinian, and then was making its way to Leyte in the Philippines when it was torpedoed by the Japanese submarine I-58. The ship sank rapidly with heavy loss of life. Many sailors were able to get off the ship, but then were stranded in the water for four days because the Navy had lost track of the Indianapolis, and no alarm was raised when she didn’t arrive in Leyte on time.

The fact that over 300 men were eventually rescued is amazing, but the four days they spent in the ocean battling, thirst, hunger, the sun, their own injuries and sharks is horrifying. Hundreds of men died in the water before the rescue planes and ships arrived.

It remains a puzzle as to why the Navy decided to court martial Captain McVay for the loss of the ship. He was the only ship’s captain to face a court martial solely for the loss of his ship. The base of the charge against him was that the Indianapolis wasn’t zigzagging when it was torpedoed, so the captain was somehow at fault. One of the prosecution witnesses was the captain of the I-58 and he explained that zigzagging wouldn’t have made any difference. McVay was found guilty regardless.

It is a compelling story, but I have some reservations about this book. There are many, many minor errors that should have been caught by proofreading. None of them affect the main story though. I also found the author’s repeated use of the word “boys” to describe the crew to be somewhat annoying. There are better books than this one about the USS Indianapolis