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| USS Indianapolis in Pearl Harbor, Hawaii in 1937. US Navy Photo |
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| U.S. Naval Institute |
On July 16, 1945, the Indianapolis sailed from California with a top secret cargo to Hawaii for refuelling, then to Tinian where it unloaded its cargo, the uranium and major components of the atomic bomb to be dropped on Hiroshima by the Enola Gay on August 6. The Indianapolis was then routed to Guam that the seeds for the destruction of the Pacific had long since ceased. The Japanese surface fleet no longer existed as a threat, and 1,000 miles to the north preparations were underway for the invasion of the Japanese mainland. These conditions resulted in a relaxed state of alert on the part of those who were to route the Indianapolis across the Philippine Sea."
ussindianapolis.org includes a list of evidence as to the details of the ship's fateful final journey:
- Although naval authorities at Guam knew that on July 24, four days before the Indianapolis departed for Leyte, the destroyer escort USS Underhill had been sunk by a Japanese submarine within range of his path, McVay was not told.
- Although a code-breaking system called ULTRA had alerted naval intelligence that a Japanese submarine (the I-58 by name which ultimately sank the Indianapolis) was operating in his path, McVay was not told. (Classified as top secret until the early 1990s, this intelligence -- and the fact it was withheld from McVay before he sailed from Guam -- was not disclosed during his subsequent court-martial.)
- Although no capital ship (unequipped with antisubmarine detection devices such as the Indianapolis) had made the transit between Guam and the Philippines without a destroyer escort throughout World War II, McVay's request for such an escort was denied.
- Although the routing officer at Guam was aware of dangers in the ship's path, he said a destroyer escort for the Indianapolis was "not necessary" (and, unbelievably, testified at McVay's subsequent court-martial that the risk of submarine attack along the Indianapolis's route "was very slight").
- Although McVay was told of "submarine sightings" along his path, none had been confirmed. Such sightings were commonplace throughout the war and were generally ignored by navy commanders unless confirmed.
"Thus, the Indianapolis set sail for Leyte on July 26, 1945, sent into harm's way with its captain unaware of dangers which shore-based naval personnel knew were in his path. Captain McVay's orders were to "zigzag at his discretion." Zigzagging is a naval maneuver used to avoid torpedo attack, generally considered most effective once the torpedoes have been launched. No Navy directives in force at that time or since recommended, much less ordered, zigzagging at night in poor visibility. At about 11pm on Sunday night, July 29, the Indianapolis traveling alone was about halfway across the Philippine Sea. There was heavy cloud cover with visibility severely limited. Captain McVay gave orders to cease zigzagging and retired to his cabin. Minutes later the ship was spotted as an indistinct blur by Japanese submarine commander Mochitura Hasimoto of the I-58. It was coming directly toward him from the east. Shortly after midnight the ship was struck by two torpedoes and sank in about twelve minutes.
When the ship failed to arrive at Leyte on Tuesday morning, a series of blunders ensued. First, there was confusion as to which area the Indianapolis was to report when it arrived. Second, there was no directive to report the non-arrival of a combatant ship. And, third, there was no request to retransmit a garbled message which would have clarified the Indianapolis' arrival time. As a result, the surviving crew of the Indianapolis was left floating in shark-infested waters until 11am on Thursday, August 2, when Lt. Wilbur C. Gwinn, the pilot of a Ventura scout-bomber, lost the weight from his navigational antenna trailing behind the plane, a loss which was to save the lives of 316 men. While crawling back through the fuselage of his plane to repair the thrashing antenna, Gwinn happened to glance down at the sea and noticed a long oil slick. Back in the cockpit, Gwinn dropped down to investigate, spotted men floating in the sea, and radioed for help. At 3:30 that afternoon Lt. R. Adrian Marks, flying a PBY Catalina, was the first to arrive on the scene. Horrified at the sight of sharks attacking men below him, Marks landed his flying boat in the sea, and, pulling a survivor aboard, he was the first to learn of the Indianapolis disaster." ussindianapolis.org
Capt. William J. Toti, USN (Retired) describes the legal scandal that ensued: "The Indy controversy
erupted in August 1945, just after the atomic bombs were dropped. The American
public was outraged at the loss of more than 800 lives in the waning days of
the war, and a Navy court of inquiry was convened to investigate. Its recommendation
was that Captain McVay be court-martialed for hazarding his vessel by failure
to zigzag, but Admiral Chester Nimitz disagreed and instead issued the captain
a letter of reprimand. Admiral Ernest King later overturned Nimitz’s decision
and recommended a court-martial, which Secretary of the Navy Forrestal later
convened.
In doing so, King intervened directly
with the Secretary of the Navy to move forward with the court-martial in
parallel with an investigation by the Inspector General (IG). But a
court-martial is a trial, not an investigatory tool. If King’s problem was simply
a lack of information, why didn’t he allow the Inspector General to issue his
report before ordering the court-martial? Some believe it is because King was
not satisfied that the IG’s conclusions would support his decision to
court-martial.
The Navy Judge Advocate General also was
asked to review the referral. His response contained the curious statement that
the charges included in the initial referral were “the only ones that can be
supported,” as if an agenda was at work to establish a greater foundation for
prosecution. Whatever the truth, this statement certainly creates the
perception that the Judge Advocate General was under direction to discover more
charges to refer against McVay.
In the end, McVay was charged with two
counts: suffering his vessel to be hazarded by failing to zigzag, and failure
to order abandon ship in a timely manner. His counsel, reportedly hand-picked
by King, had never argued a case in court before. The court claimed that McVay was not
being charged for any deficiency that led to the sinking of his ship. They made
a strong case that the “Indianapolis was hazarded before she was ever detected
by I-58, and would have been hazarded if she had never been detected by I-58.”
In essence, McVay could have been found guilty in a court– martial even if his
ship had not been sunk. This is a meaningless legal distinction, however, since
absent the sinking, there would have been no way for anyone to know that the
vessel had been hazarded.
Hence, despite the fact that McVay was
convicted only on the first count—for suffering his vessel to be hazarded by
not zigzagging—there is no way to escape the fact that Captain McVay was
court-martialed for having his ship sunk. Put all these facts together, and it
is understandable why most of the survivors believe that Admiral King was doing
all he could to tilt the scales of justice against McVay. Even Admiral Nimitz
later would say to one survivor that the entire affair involving the
court-martial was a mistake and should never have happened."
From a statement submitted at a September 1999 Senate hearing by Paul J. Murphy, USS Indianapolis survivor: "The charge upon which he was convicted for failing to zigzag contained a phrase 'in good visibility.' The visibility that night was NOT good as all of us know who were there that night."
Like Murphy, many of Indianapolis's survivors said that McVay was not to blame for the sinking, the families of some of the men who died thought otherwise. One piece of mail read: "Merry Christmas! Our family's holiday would be a lot merrier if you hadn't killed my son." The guilt that was placed on McVay's shoulders mounted until he committed suicide in 1968, using his Navy-issued revolver. He was discovered on his front lawn with a toy sailor in one hand. He was 70 years old.
In 1996, sixth-grade student Hunter Scott began his research on the sinking of the Indianapolis, which led to a United States Congressional investigation. In October 2000, the United States Congress passed a resolution that Captain McVay's record should state that "he is exonerated for the loss of Indianapolis", which was signed by President Bill Clinton. The resolution noted that, although several ships of the U.S. Navy were lost in combat in World War II, McVay was the only captain to be court-martialed for the sinking of this ship.
In July 2001, the United States Secretary of the Navy ordered McVay's official Navy record cleared of all wrongdoing.
In July 2016, new details about the sinking emerged which helped lead to the wreck's discovery this month. Read about those details here: http://www.cnn.com/2016/07/29/us/uss-indianapolis-sinking-anniversary/index.html and the discovery here: http://www.bbc.com/news/uk-41041013
Credits to ussindianapolis.org and the U.S. Naval Institute for the information in this post.
Thanks for reading,
Delany (@DLeitchHistory on Twitter)
