Clearing Their Captain's Name
As the investigation begins into the tragic Feb. 9 accident involving a U.S. nuclear submarine and a Japanese fishing vessel, new interest has surfaced about a wartime action involving a Japanese submarine and an American naval vessel almost 56 years ago.
The sinking of the U.S. cruiser Indianapolis in the last days of World War II left almost 900 dead, a captain disgraced and a legacy of mystery and controversy that still continues, reports CBS News Correspondent Eric Engberg.
"Abandon Ship," a book by Richard F. Newcomb about the sinking of the American ship, has suddenly appeared on best-seller lists - 40 years after it was written.
The sinking of the cruiser has become more than a tragic account in a popular book.
”I became mesmerized by the story of this Japanese submarine and this American heavy cruiser,” said Peter Mass, author of "Serpico" and other best sellers. ”It seemed they were doomed to meet.”
Mass and survivors of the ship’s attack - considered the worst disaster at sea in U.S. naval history in which 880 people died - are championing a cause to clear the name of the doomed ship’s captain.
The Navy blamed the loss of the ship and the deaths on Capt. Charles McVay.
McVay was investigated and the Navy ordered a court martial for "hazarding" the ship. The fact that Navy intelligence had broken Japanese codes and knew the enemy submarine was in the area was withheld as top secret information during the trial. McVay was convicted.
”This man was not guilty of any crime. He was a scapegoat,” said Indianapolis crewman Harlan Twible.
And the burden, friends and Indianapolis sailors believe, eventually led McVay to take his own life.
The survivors in the crew - now mostly in their 70's - are fighting one last battle to clear their captain's name. Last year, at their urging, Congress passed a resolution asking the Navy to clear him.
So far, the Navy has refused. But the survivors aren't quitting.
”I see some hope here. I think maybe some new Navy thinking,” Mass said. ”I don't think everybody by a long shot in the Navy thinks the court martial was correct.”
Survivors floated in the Pacific Ocean for more than four days after a torpedo from a Japanese sub sent the ship to the ocean floor.
While floating in the ocean waiting to be rescued, sailors that didn’t go down with the ship found themselves facing enduring another horrific ordeal. Hundreds were attacked and eaten by sharks.
”We were out there four days and if it had been another day, I don't think they would have found a third of what they did,” said Art Leenerman an electrician on the ship.
Terrified of public reaction, the Navy hid the news until the day of the Japanese surrender.
The Indianapolis had sailed from California to the island of Tinian with the most valuable cargo of the war - the uranium fo the two atomic bombs to be dropped on Japan in mid 1945.
After delivering its destructive goods, the Indianapolis sailed to Guam and then the Philippines. The ship, which had no submarine detection equipment, went alone.
”When we asked for destroyer escorts they said you don't need them,” Twible said.
Twible said they were told by the Navy that there were no enemy ships or submarines along their sailing path.
But there were and the Navy knew it. A Japanese sub, the I-58, scored a bullseye with its torpedoes.
”The ship went down in 12 minutes,” Mass said. ”Three hundred men on board went down with her. Some 900 more leapt into an oil-coated sea in the middle of the night.”
And most of the U.S. sailors died in the water because no one noticed the ship was missing, although a message from the Japanese submarine commander - reporting his victory to Tokyo - had been intercepted by the U.S. Navy.
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