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In the final days of World War II, the USS Indianapolis completed a top-secret mission delivering components connected to the atomic bomb before setting sail across the Philippine Sea.
Then, shortly after midnight on July 30, 1945, a Japanese submarine torpedoed the ship.
The Indianapolis sank in approximately 12 minutes, throwing hundreds of sailors into the open ocean with few lifeboats and little hope of immediate rescue. For days, survivors battled dehydration, exposure, injuries, exhaustion, and shark attacks while waiting for help that should have arrived much sooner.
But Abandon Ship! doesn't end with the rescue.
Richard F. Newcomb also investigates what happened afterward, particularly the controversial treatment of Captain Charles B. McVay III, who was court-martialed following the disaster. Newcomb's original 1958 account was among the earliest to question whether McVay was being unfairly blamed for a catastrophe involving much larger failures.
Harrowing and deeply human, Abandon Ship! is a story of war, survival, unimaginable endurance, leadership, loss, and the fight to uncover the truth about one of the darkest chapters in U.S. naval history.
In the final days of World War II, the USS Indianapolis completed a top-secret mission delivering components connected to the atomic bomb before setting sail across the Philippine Sea.
Then, shortly after midnight on July 30, 1945, a Japanese submarine torpedoed the ship.
The Indianapolis sank in approximately 12 minutes, throwing hundreds of sailors into the open ocean with few lifeboats and little hope of immediate rescue. For days, survivors battled dehydration, exposure, injuries, exhaustion, and shark attacks while waiting for help that should have arrived much sooner.
But Abandon Ship! doesn't end with the rescue.
Richard F. Newcomb also investigates what happened afterward, particularly the controversial treatment of Captain Charles B. McVay III, who was court-martialed following the disaster. Newcomb's original 1958 account was among the earliest to question whether McVay was being unfairly blamed for a catastrophe involving much larger failures.
Harrowing and deeply human, Abandon Ship! is a story of war, survival, unimaginable endurance, leadership, loss, and the fight to uncover the truth about one of the darkest chapters in U.S. naval history.