Charles B. Mc Vay III - Controversy

Controversy

Captain McVay, commander of Indianapolis, was wounded but survived and was among those rescued. He repeatedly asked the Navy why it took five days to rescue his men, and he never received an answer. The Navy long claimed that SOS messages were never received because the ship was operating under a policy of radio silence; declassified records show that three SOS messages were received separately, but none were acted upon because it was thought to be a Japanese ruse.

There was much controversy over the incident. In November 1945, McVay was court-martialed and convicted of "hazarding his ship by failing to zigzag." Hashimoto, the Japanese submarine commander who had sunk the Indianapolis, was on record as describing visibility at the time as fair (which is corroborated by the fact that he was able to target and sink the Indianapolis in the first place). American submarine experts testified that "zigzagging" was a technique of negligible value in eluding enemy submarines. Hashimoto also testified to this effect. Despite that testimony, the official ruling was that visibility was good, and the court held McVay responsible for failing to zigzag.

An additional point of controversy is evidence that the admirals in the United States Navy were primarily responsible for placing the ship in harm's way. For instance, Captain McVay requested a destroyer escort for the Indianapolis, but his request was denied because the priority for destroyers at the time was escorting transports to Okinawa, and picking up downed pilots in B-29 raids on Japan. Also, naval command assumed McVay's route would be safe at that point in the war. Many ships, including most destroyers, were equipped with submarine detection equipment, but the Indianapolis was not so equipped, which casts the decision to deny McVay's request for an escort as a tragic mistake.

On 24 July 1945, just 6 days prior to the sinking of the Indianapolis, the destroyer Underhill had been attacked and sunk in the area by Japanese submarines. Yet McVay was never informed of this event, and several others, in part due to issues of classified intelligence. McVay was warned of the potential presence of Japanese subs, but not of the actual confirmed activity.

After the torpedo attack, no rescue was initiated, because of the Navy's failure to track the Indianapolis. As she was the flagship of the 5th fleet, this failure amounted to gross mismanagement by the Navy. The rescue operation started only after a bomber pilot on routine patrol spotted the crew.

McVay's conviction for "failure to zigzag" came despite the direct testimony by the commander of I-58, Mochitsura Hashimoto, stating that zigzagging would have made no difference.

Finally, although 700 ships of the U.S. Navy were lost in combat in World War II, McVay was the only captain to be court-martialed for the loss of his ship.

It was widely felt that he had been a fall guy for the Navy. Despite the fact McVay was promoted to rear admiral when he retired in 1949, the conviction effectively ended McVay's career in the Navy.

On 6 November 1968, McVay committed suicide by shooting himself with his service revolver at his home in Litchfield, Connecticut, holding in his hand a toy sailor given to him by his father. He was found just outside of his back porch by his gardener. Though a note was not left, McVay was known by those close to him to have suffered from loneliness, particularly after losing his wife to cancer. McVay also struggled throughout his life from vicious letters and phone calls he periodically received from grief-stricken relatives of dead crewmen aboard the Indianapolis.