Fate
From mid-December 1944 until late February 1945, Thornton was at Pearl Harbor. On the 22d, she got underway for operations to prepare for the assault on Okinawa. She stopped at Eniwetok early in March, and then moved on to Ulithi, the staging area for Okinawa. On 5 April 1945, while operating in the Ryūkyūs as part of the Search and Reconnaissance Group of the Southern Attack Force, Thornton collided with Ashtabula (AO-51) and Escalante (AO-70). Her starboard side was severely damaged and open to the sea. On 14 April, she was towed into Kerama Retto. On the 29th, a board of inspection and survey recommended that Thornton be decommissioned, beached, stripped of all useful materiel as needed, and then abandoned. She was beached and decommissioned on 2 May 1945. Her name was struck from the Navy List on 13 August 1945. In July 1957, Thornton's hulk was abandoned and donated to the government of the Ryukyu Islands.
Read more about this topic: USS Thornton (DD-270)
Famous quotes containing the word fate:
“This, indeed, has always been the fate of the few that have professed scepticism, that, when they have done what they can to discredit their senses, they find themselves, after all, under a necessity of trusting to them. Mr. Hume has been so candid as to acknowledge this; and it is no less true of those who have shewn the same candour; for I never heard that any sceptic runs his head against a post, or stepped into a kennel, because he did not believe his eyes.”
—Thomas Reid (1710–1796)
“The anvil of justice is planted firm, and fate who makes the sword does the forging in advance.”
—Aeschylus (525–456 B.C.)
“And last of all, high over thought, in the world of morals, Fate appears as vindicator, levelling the high, lifting the low, requiring justice in man, and always striking soon or late when justice is not done. What is useful will last, what is hurtful will sink.”
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)