At the start of the seventh and final installment of Ken Burns’ landmark documentary The War, Seaman First Class Maurice Bell, of Mobile, Alabama, describes in deep detail what it was like to be on the U.S.S. Indianapolis when it was struck by a Kamikaze, March 31, 1945, in the Pacific theater. Nine sailors died on the Indianapolis that day and twenty-nine others were wounded. The Indianapolis was sent to Mare Island off San Francisco for repairs.
Bell’s story, and the breathtaking footage of the Kamikaze strike that accompanies it, is just one of dozens of extraordinary events chronicled in Burns’ seven-part film. For many viewers, it will be the first time they hear a first-person account of the horror of a Kamikaze attack, but it was chillingly familiar to me. My next-door neighbor of the last ten years, Bill Wright, is another World War II veteran who survived a devastating suicide attack. He was serving his country on board the aircraft carrier U.S.S. Belleau Wood CVL-24 at the time.
Bill’s war story is one of thousands that are not included in Burns’ masterpiece. Of course, every person who served in World War II (and every person who waited for a beloved family member or friend at home) has many stories to tell about his or her experiences during that turbulent time. Many of those stories have already been lost, but as Burns’ film makes clear, it is critically important that as many as possible be documented and remembered by generations to come. (Certainly this is true of all war stories, including those of military personnel currently serving in Iraq.) We cannot do enough to preserve and honor as many of those stories as possible.
The War is largely structured around the personal stories of four WWII veterans (including Maurice Bell) and that’s what makes it stand out from the hundreds of documentaries about the same subject matter that have come before. Most stories about the Second World War are told from a broad point of view—detailed stories about individual valor are almost never heard. That’s due in part to the fact that so few veterans of the war ever speak about the things they saw or did while fighting for freedom. As the harrowing details of so many of the stories told in The War makes clear, wartime violence is more than anyone should ever have to endure or carry in their memory. For these and other reasons, most veterans of World War II chose never to speak about their experiences once they returned home.
Bill Wright, who is now eighty-two years old, has spoken very freely about his experience on the Belleau Wood during the decade I have known him, but he recently told me that he only started opening up about it when he was in his sixties. He didn’t talk about the attack on his ship for more than forty years. When I asked him why, his response was a simple, “I just didn’t.”
On October 13, 1944, Bill, a Seaman First Class and Aviation Metal Smith Striker, was on board the Belleau Wood when a Japanese fighter plane slammed into the deck of the U.S.S. Franklin, which was sailing alongside the Belleau Wood en route to Okinawa. The crew of the Belleau Wood swiftly launched six fighters of its own when another Japanese plane appeared. Seconds later it slammed into the after end of the Belleau Wood. There were 245 casualties by the time the inferno was extinguished, many of them severely burned. Ninety-seven men died.
Bill and one of his fellow seamen were at their stations in a small room below deck that housed controls for the ship’s sprinkler system, which happened to be very near the point of impact. Their petty officer had been killed when the plane hit. As the room began filling with smoke, the door opened and two officers appeared with a wounded seventeen-year-old seaman. Amid the chaos and the carnage, Bill was ordered to tend to the injured young man. He was eighteen-years-old at the time and had no medical training.
.gif){kind=icon}
