
“Fantastic Feat of Suicide Plane Sank USS Drexler” was the headline of the press release the U.S. Navy sent out on 12 August 1945, three days after the second atomic bomb had been dropped on Japan and two days before that country surrendered. The USS Drexler (DD-741) had gone down more than two months earlier, on 28 May, but because of the grievous losses—158 dead and 52 wounded out of a 350-man crew—notifying the next of kin doubtlessly had taken much time. Commissioned on 14 November 1944, the Drexler had sailed from Norfolk to Trinidad and then on to the… Read the rest of this entry »