The U.S.S. Indianapolis Ship During WWII

Bombarding and exploding the bottom of the vessel was the last thing pressed against my mind as the ship began submerging into the water. I clung to life as if it was the last coconut on a small deserted island. I wanted to live. That’s all that I wanted. Japanese submarine missiles were the least of the worries for myself, since I had already survived what seemed to be the remainder of the bombarding. The vessel was sinking at a surprisingly rapid rate and what worried me was not only the ship and everything with it being at the bottom of the ocean, but what would be left for our own safety and even worse. The worst part being the shark infested waters that lay paved for our futures and whether we would survive or not. Vicious, blood-desiring sharks wanting to crunch their jaws on my bones with a smile across their face lay in the waters below the ship. The attack on Pearl Harbor was gruesome and shocking and the journey I had taken to locate me on this ship was far less interesting. The story to tell after this will be much more fascinating to hear, if I live to tell it. Only one ship can be known to have this terrible disaster and that was the ship I was on, and that was the U.S.S. Indianapolis, the ship that proved to be the United States’ worst naval disaster in history (Hickman, 1-2; DiConsiglio, 2).

To begin an introduction, is by explaining the background of World War II and the enemy. Technology was very limited, therefore communication and travel was limited as well. Information about the war was only found in places like magazines and quickly published books. That means that the people of America did not know of any possible danger they were in, who their enemy was, or even what to do in a crisis of something like a Se...

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...ondered why they had survived and what could they have done to help others who hadn’t. Either way a person can look at it, the loss of nearly three fourths of their crew was not a good way to end their adventure (Nelson, 93-101; Hickman, 3-4).

Personally, I enjoyed writing about this topic. I wish that I could’ve gotten to write more about the things that killed the crew like Pneumonia, bleeding out, being eaten by sharks, malnutrition and dehydration, and hallucinations. It was a quick paper to write as soon as I had started writing it, so it went very fast.

Bibliography

DiConsiglio, John. "Scolastic Scope." Rescue Mission 12 November 2003: 5. Online Magazine from SDLN.

Hickman, Kennedy. "World War II: USS Indianapolis." n.d. About.com: Military History. Internet Document. 18 February 2013.

Nelson, Pete. Left For Dead. New York City: Delacorte Press, 2002. Book.