Blood On The Sea: American Destroyers Lost In World War II - Softcover

Parkin, Robert Sinclair

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0306810697 ISBN 13: 9780306810695

Publisher: Grand Central Publishing, 2001

Synopsis

Seventy-one American destroyers went down during World War II, and this meticulously researched book describes the history of each—from launch to the ship's final hours. Through these stories we travel from the stormy North Atlantic to the calm Mediterranean, from the East Coast of the United States to the vast reaches of the Pacific, on destroyers from the USS Reuben James to the USS Callaghan. We join them—and their crews of young soldiers—as they engage the enemy and do pitched battle with German submarines, Japanese kamikaze pilots, or long-range cruisers. Filled with eyewitness accounts, precise statistics, and historical contexts for each battle and each ship sunk, Blood on the Sea serves as both a tribute to these lost ships and a critical reference guide for historians and veterans alike.

About this title

About the Author

Robert Sinclair Parkin spent decades, both during and after his twenty-year career in the U.S. Navy, interviewing veterans and collecting data on the history of American destroyers.

From Publishers Weekly

Seventy-one American destroyers were lost during WWII, 60 of them in confrontations with enemy ships, planes, shore batteries and mines, the other 11 to accidental groundings, friendly mines or severe storms. Parkin (Under the White Ensign) here compiles sketches of each destroyer's career from launch to destruction and a detailed description of the ship's final hours. He begins with an account of the sinking of the Reuben James in 1941 off Iceland, a U-boat victim and the first American warship lost in the war, and concludes with an account of the sinking of the Callaghan in a kamikaze attack in 1945, the 13th destroyer to go down in the waters off Okinawa. Included are descriptions of the capsizing of the Warrington in an Atlantic tempest, the loss of the Corry to German shore batteries on D-Day and the unequal fight between the Monssen and the Japanese battleship Hiei. One of the destroyers, the Stewart, was raised by the Japanese and commissioned into the Imperial Navy. Parkin's colorful style adds to the pleasure this meticulously researched book offers Navy buffs. Illustrations.
Copyright 1995 Reed Business Information, Inc.

Edition details

• Publisher: Grand Central Publishing
• Publication date: 2001
• ISBN 10: 0306810697
• ISBN 13: 9780306810695
• Binding: Paperback
• Language: English
• Number of pages: 408