here is the full transcript of the monologue.

"Japanese submarine slammed two torpedoes into her side, Chief. We was comin' back from the island of Tinian to Leyte. We'd just delivered the bomb. The Hiroshima bomb. Eleven hundred men went into the water. Vessel went down in 12 minutes.

Didn't see the first shark for about a half-hour. Tiger. 13-footer. You know how you know that in the water, Chief? You can tell by lookin' from the dorsal to the tail. What we didn't know, was that our bomb mission was so secret, no distress signal had been sent. They didn't even list us overdue for a week. Very first light, Chief, sharks come cruisin' by, so we formed ourselves into tight groups. It was sorta like you see in the calendars, you know the infantry squares in the old calendars like the Battle of Waterloo and the idea was the shark come to the nearest man, that man he starts poundin' and hollerin' and sometimes that shark he go away but sometimes he wouldn't go away.

Sometimes that shark looks right at ya. Right into your eyes. And the thing about a shark is he's got lifeless eyes. Black eyes. Like a doll's eyes. When he comes at ya, he doesn't even seem to be livin' 'til he bites ya, and those black eyes roll over white and then ah then you hear that terrible high-pitched screamin'. The ocean turns red, and despite all your poundin' and your hollerin' those sharks come in and they rip you to pieces.

You know by the end of that first dawn, lost a hundred men. I don't know how many sharks there were, maybe a thousand. I do know how many men, they averaged six an hour. Thursday mornin', Chief, I bumped into a friend of mine, Herbie Robinson from Cleveland. Baseball player. Boson's mate. I thought he was asleep. I reached over to wake him up. He bobbed up, down in the water, he was like a kinda top. Upended. Well, he'd been bitten in half below the waist.

At noon on the fifth day, a Lockheed Ventura swung in low and he spotted us, a young pilot, lot younger than Mr. Hooper here, anyway he spotted us and a few hours later a big ol' fat PBY come down and started to pick us up. You know that was the time I was most frightened. Waitin' for my turn. I'll never put on a lifejacket again.

So, eleven hundred men went into the water. 316 men come out, the sharks took the rest, June the 29th, 1945. (missed it by a month)

Anyway, we delivered the bomb."

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So, eleven hundred men went into the water. 316 men come out, the sharks took the rest, June the 29th, 1945. (missed it by a month)

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Wow, the monologue is even better than remembered. The bold is almost certainly a typo, not a flub up per-se. It has to be. This is 1975 pre-Internet, and Shaw gets too much correct to get that wrong. Its dead-on, two torpedoes, not one or four, twelve minute sinking.

More forensic studies since indicate it may have been more like 800 going into the water, but he seems to be using a complement number instead like you would look up in a reference at the time.

Getting all that right, since June and July are even four letter adjacent months, in this case a typo almost certainly. Not that it matters. That was such a spooky scene when saw it in jr.high. Must have been one of the few that knew about those details as he said them, LOL.

Dan Carlin has one of his hard core history minis about the Indianapolis. Short 45 minute long episode. Great for a drive home from work.


Still a shame on the Navy that McVay was courtmartialed over this.

ETA: Hard Core History Addendum (September 2018).

I happened to go to church with Lt. McKissick. One of the nicest men I ever met and his grandson flies helicopters for the navy.

titan said:

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Quote:

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So, eleven hundred men went into the water. 316 men come out, the sharks took the rest, June the 29th, 1945. (missed it by a month)

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Wow, the monologue is even better than remembered. The bold is almost certainly a typo, not a flub up per-se. It has to be. This is 1975 pre-Internet, and Shaw gets too much correct to get that wrong. Its dead-on, two torpedoes, not one or four, twelve minute sinking.

More forensic studies since indicate it may have been more like 800 going into the water, but he seems to be using a complement number instead like you would look up in a reference at the time.

Getting all that right, since June and July are even four letter adjacent months, in this case a typo almost certainly. Not that it matters. That was such a spooky scene when saw it in jr.high. Must have been one of the few that knew about those details as he said them, LOL.

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He clearly says JUNE in the video clip; also click the CC button and you will see that he does in fact say June 29, 1945

ABATTBQ87 said:

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titan said:

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Quote:

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So, eleven hundred men went into the water. 316 men come out, the sharks took the rest, June the 29th, 1945. (missed it by a month)

---

Wow, the monologue is even better than remembered. The bold is almost certainly a typo, not a flub up per-se. It has to be. This is 1975 pre-Internet, and Shaw gets too much correct to get that wrong. Its dead-on, two torpedoes, not one or four, twelve minute sinking.

More forensic studies since indicate it may have been more like 800 going into the water, but he seems to be using a complement number instead like you would look up in a reference at the time.

Getting all that right, since June and July are even four letter adjacent months, in this case a typo almost certainly. Not that it matters. That was such a spooky scene when saw it in jr.high. Must have been one of the few that knew about those details as he said them, LOL.

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He clearly says JUNE in the video clip; also click the CC button and you will see that he does in fact say June 29, 1945

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Yes, but what I mean is its clearly a typo in the script. They did too good a job on the other details.

This is a side not but the Jaws scene inspired the scene below. Skip to 2:15 to skip one really messed conversation. Even notice the background of the window panes.