The USS Indianapolis was commissioned on November 15, 1932. She was the first of what was to be called the Indianapolis class, although the only other Indianapolis class ship was the Portland. The Indianapolis has the distinction of being the first
major naval vessel authorized and completed since the London Treaty
of 1929. The London Treaty limited the amount of armament countries
could own and operate.During the first few years of her service, she had the honor of several different dignitary visits, including President Roosevelt ( see picture to the right) and Secretary of the Navy Claude A. Swanson. President Roosevelt made at least three different visits to the Indianapolis , including once in 1934 when he reviewed the fleet off of New York from her bridge.
The Indianapolis was 5oo miles west of Pearl Harbor on December 7, 1941, when the war began. She was practicing bombardment off Johnston Island. She immediately broke off and began searching for the Japanese battle group that led the strike.
During World War II, she had distinguished herself in many different theaters in the war of the Pacific. She is credited with sinking a Japanese ammunitions ship in the Aleutians, downing nine enemy aircraft, and bombardment of several key enemy installations.
The USS Indianapolis suffered severe damages during the bombardment of Okinawa. One of the Japanese kamikaze planes struck the ship, and the bomb that it was carrying left two wholes in the hull of the ship. She returned to Mare Island Navy Yard in San Francisco for repairs in April of 1945. While in port at the Navy yard, she took on many new, yet to be trained, crew members (almost half of the ship's compliment was new). They were scheduled to be in port for another six weeks, which would have allowed plenty of time to begin training the new crew, when Captain McVay III received his orders.
He was to detach from Mare Island immediately, and at high speed make way to Tinian, with one stop at Pearl Harbor, solely for dropping off passengers. After delivering the cargo to Tinian, they were to head to Leyte Gulf in the Philippines for training (see the map to the right). Captain McVay III was not told what his cargo was going to be, but that it should be guarded even above the safety of his ship. His orders went so far as to give instructions that in case the ship was lost, the cargo should be placed in a life raft if at all possible. The Cargo was to be guarded by the usual Marine Corps detachment aboard, led by Captain Edward L. Parke. To accompany this cargo, they were sending two Army Officers, presumably Army Artillery Officers.
The identity of the cargo was later known to be the core of the atomic bomb, Uranium 235. Since Uranium was scarce, the United States had just enough of it to make two bombs. The cargo of the USS Indianapolis was the core of one of these two. A cruiser was chosen as the delivery vessel because of its size to speed ratio, and the reason for the secrecy is obvious, if anybody had found out what the United States was in the process of doing, the Indianapolis would become the prime target of the entire enemy Navy.
The trip to Pearl Harbor went perfectly, and with the disembarking of the passengers, Captain McVay III began running the necessary drills to get the crew of the Indianapolis fully trained. By the time they reached Tinian, Captain McVay III was becoming more confident with the abilities of his new crew. Once in Tinian, the cargo was off loaded just as quickly as it was loaded, and the Indianapolis was left to business as usual.
The Indianapolis left Guam on July 28, 1945, she was bound for Leyte Gulf to receive further training. Before leaving port, the ship's navigator, Commander Janney made the usual rounds to file a planned course of travel, and gather intelligence about enemy activity along their proposed route. As part of the pre departure routine, Captain McVay III received the order to "zigzag" at his discretion.
Shortly after midnight on July 30, 1945, the USS Indianapolis was hit by two torpedoes from a Japanese submarine, the I-58 (see above: the actual submarine that sank the Indianapolis). She sank into the ocean, but not before about 900 of her crew were able to safely abandon ship. It took the United States Navy more than four days to find out that the ship had sunk, and five days to complete the rescue. By the time that a Navy ship arrived to pull the survivors out of the water, only 316 were still alive. The others had either died from exposure to the ocean, or been eaten in one of the many constant shark attacks that plagued those five days in the water.
For details on what went wrong, please see "The Controversy" page.