At the Unseen Eye,  we have so far reviewed fiction. Be it comics or novels, all of the reviews and critiques have been for fictional stories.

In Harms Way is not one of those stories. It is based on the real life sinking of the U.SS Indianapolis in July 29, 1945. This was 5 days after the Indianapolis had dropped off the uranium of the bomb that would be detonated on Hiroshima a mere three weeks later.

That’s just the beginning of what became a horrific tragedy. 1100 soldiers served on the Indianapolis. Only 300 soldiers would survive the sinking of the ship, and the trials they endured while they were lost at sea for 5 days.

In Harms Way tells the story of the trials they endured, as well as the descents of madness that various members of the crew fell under while being besieged by tiger sharks and starvation in the Pacific Ocean.

The book also brings to plight the tragedy of the ships captain, Charles Mcvway. Mcvay would be haunted by these events for the rest of his life. For over 50 years, he would be the only US Naval captain that was court martialed for military actions in the event of a war patrol.

Mcway would later commit suicide in 1968. For years he would receive threatening letters from family survivors about his actions during the horrific night of the Indianapolis explosion.

Here is where the true events of In Harms Way comes to light.  It redeems Captain Mcvay, and tells the story of a man who refused to give in to starvation or madness.

Mcvay held the survivors together, and also didn’t have the right intelligence for his ships patrols into the Phillipines. If he had been made  aware of the right intelligence, he would have known that Japanese submarines were known to be patrolling his ships routes near the Phillipines and the ships port of call.

Without the right intelligence, the USS Indianapolis was doomed to failure.

Doug Stanton humanizes a national tragedy and also brings to light the heroics that were made during severe hardship. Its truly inspiring to note how the crew members survived, and lived to tell there story.

Shortly after publication of this book in 2002, the Navy rescinded their condemnation of Mcvay and restored his reputation in Naval history. It took a combined 50 years of protest from ALL the survivors, the author of the book, and a concerned high school student.

We give this book our highest recommendation.

Related posts:

1. A Literary Review of the Terror by Dan Simmons