巡洋艦インディアナポリス号の惨劇 (朝日文庫) [文庫]

Returning to America after delivering the fatal bomb for Gnola Gay, The USS Indianapolis was out of radio contact when it was torpedoed. Consequently its sinking remained undetected by the Navy for nearly five days as the 900 survivors of the impact were lost into the Pacific Ocean to face savage seas, hypothermia and sharks. Of the 1196 men on board, only 316 survived. Interweaving the stories of three survivors - the Captain, the ship's doctor and a young marine - this is an account of a little-known chapter in World War II history. --このテキストは、絶版本またはこのタイトルには設定されていない版型に関連付けられています。

太平洋戦争末期、日本軍潜水艦の魚雷を受けて沈んだ米巡洋艦。原子爆弾の部品を積み、密命を帯びた同艦の乗組員のうち300人は即死。海に投げ出された者にはさらに過酷な運命が待ち受けていた。低体温症、サメの群れ、飢え、乾き…紅蓮の炎と荒れる波間でいったい何が起こったのか。

On July 26, 1945, the heavy cruiser Indianapolis steamed into port at the Pacific island of Tinian, carrying a cargo that would end World War II: the uranium that would be dropped on Hiroshima just three weeks later. Having delivered its load without incident, Indianapolis moved on toward the Philippines to join the great armada moving in on Japan. Though intelligence reports assured Captain Charles McVay that the route from Guam to Leyte was safe, there were Japanese submarines active in the area. On the night of July 29, having detected with sonar the clinking of dishes aboard the Indianapolis from a distance of more than a dozen miles, the submarine I-58 sank the American ship, killing nearly 900 sailors in the explosion and its terrible aftermath.

Captain McVay was quickly court-martialed for having failed to follow evasive maneuvers, "the first captain in the history of the U.S. Navy," Doug Stanton observes, "to be court-martialed subsequent to losing his ship in an act of war." Although the sailors under his command would insist that McVay had been scapegoated, and although I-58's commander testified before the court that "he would have sunk the Indianapolis no matter what course she was on," McVay was never able to clear his name. He committed suicide in 1968.

Stanton captures the drama of these events in his vigorous narrative, which augments and updates Richard Newcomb's Abandon Ship!. Stanton observes that although McVay was exonerated by an act of Congress in 2000, the conviction still stands in Navy records. Stanton's book makes a powerful case for why that conviction should be overturned, and why the captain and crew of the Indianapolis deserve honor. --Gregory McNamee
--このテキストは、絶版本またはこのタイトルには設定されていない版型に関連付けられています。

Given the stringent precision of the U.S. Navy and military during wartime, how could a WWII battleship carrying over 1,000 men be torpedoed by a Japanese submarine and sink, leaving the survivors to bob in the Pacific Ocean at the mercy of elements and predators, without anyone realizing the loss for more than four days? Stanton not only offers a well-researched chronicle of what is widely regarded as the worst naval disaster in U.S. history, but also vividly renders the combatants' hellish ordeal during the sinking, and the ensuing days at sea as well as attempts to cope with the traumatic aftermath. Stanton documents the facts of the case, embellishing his story with lurid details gleaned from interviews with survivors. Though the ship's captain would become the first and only in U.S. naval history to be court-martialed for the loss of his ship, Stanton offers a solid body of evidence to justify the survivors' partially successful efforts to exonerate him. Stanton's omniscient narrative shifts among the individual perspectives of several principal characters, a successful technique that contributes to the book's absorbing, novelistic feel. Readers, of course, must trust Stanton and his research in order to be truly consumed, but the authority of his voice should win over all but the most obsessive skeptics. Illuminating and emotional without being maudlin, Stanton's book helps explain what many have long considered an inexplicable catastrophe. (May 21)Forecast: Following on the heels of the bestselling Abandon Ship, recently resurrected by Peter Maas, this book is unlikely to be ignored. A $150,000 marketing campaign includes a nine-city author tour, national print advertising, and target marketing to the military and naval market.

Copyright 2001 Cahners Business Information, Inc.

--このテキストは、絶版本またはこのタイトルには設定されていない版型に関連付けられています。

July 30, 1945. After completing a top secret mission to the island of Tinian to deliver parts of the atom bomb that would be dropped on Hiroshima, the battle cruiser USS Indianapolis was torpedoed in the South Pacific by a Japanese submarine. An estimated 300 men were killed on impact; close to 900 were cast into the sea. After five days, when the Navy accidentally realized the ship was missing, only 321 men were still alive, having battled hypothermia, sharks, and hallucinatory dementia. Four more would die in military hospitals shortly thereafter.

The highly unusual court-martial of the Indianapolis's captain, Charles Butler McVay, opened up the tragedy to scrutiny: How did the Navy fail to realize the ship was missing? Why was it traveling unescorted in enemy waters? And, perhaps most amazingly of all, how did these 317 men manage to survive?

In Harm's Way casts the tragedy of the USS Indianapolis not as a history of war, but as a portrait of men battling the sea. Interweaving the stories of three survivors--Captain McVay; the ship's doctor; and a young marine private--this astonishing human drama is brought to life in a narrative that is at once immediate and timeless.

--このテキストは、 カセット 版に関連付けられています。

A former contributing editor at Esquire and Outside, Doug Stanton is now a contributing editor at Men's Journal. He received an MFA from the Writers' Workshop at the University of Iowa. He lives in northern Michigan.
--このテキストは、 カセット 版に関連付けられています。

スタントン,ダグ
アイオワ大学にてMFA(Master of Fine Arts・美術学修士)を授与される。エスクァイア誌、アウトサイド誌の補助編集員を務め、現在はメンズジャーナル誌の補助編集員。米・ミシガン州在住

平賀 秀明
1956年生まれ。早稲田大学卒。中国通信社、共同通信社勤務を経て翻訳家に(本データはこの書籍が刊行された当時に掲載されていたものです)