By courage, discipline and with the luck of calm weather, the U.S. Navy had performed a feat at sea. Last week it told the story: how it had rescued some 1,600 men from one of the sea's worst perils, a burning ship far from port, without losing a life.
It was 6:30 p.m. Sept. 3, sea calm, weather clear, when smoke plumed from the forward deck of what in peacetime was the liner Manhattan, now the busy transport Wakefield. The 24,289-ton ship was steaming westward with about 950 passengers (civilian and Army personnel from England) and 650 crewmen. In one of...
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