A couple of days ago I was "tagged" on facebook in a contest to name the 10 books that have "stayed with me". After giving it some thought I came up with the following list:
1. A Separate Peace; John Knowles
2. To Kill a Mockingbird; Harper Lee. No need to explain why this is on the list.
3. Killer Angels; Michael Shaara
4. War and Remembrance; Herman Wouk. I read a lot of books but I'm very VERY rarely "moved" on an emotional level by them. However, there was a passage in this book that did strike a very deep emotional cord with me. While this book is "historical fiction", there are several times during the novel where the author stops to narrate a point of historic interest. He did so when the book reached the point of the Battle of Midway. Midway, while being a tremendous victory for the Americans, also witnessed the type of self-sacrifice that makes me wonder where the courage came from. During the battle 41 American torpedo bombers, manned by two man crews, attacked the Japanese aircraft carriers. They had become separated from their fighter cover and went in unprotected. They were old, obsolete planes and the sky was filled with Japanese fighters, but they pressed the attack home. And they were slaughtered. 34 of the 31 planes were shot down. Of the 82 men in those planes, 14 survived. The squadron known at "Torpedo 8", from the carrier Hornet, lost every one of its 14 planes, and had only one man survive. None of the planes recorded a single hit on a Japanese ship during their attack. The sacrifice was not in vain however, as just at the moment the last of the torpedo planes was shot down or driven off, the American dive bomber squadrons arrived over the Japanese fleet. With the attention of the Japanese fighters fixed on the torpedo planes, the dive bombers had virtually no resistance as they attacked. They hit, and sank, 3 Japanese aircraft carriers that afternoon (one additional carrier was later sunk in a subsequent attack). "It was a perfect coordinated attack. It was timed almost to the second. It was a freak accident. Wade McClusky had sighted a lone Japanese destroyer heading north-east. It must be returning from some mission, he guess; if so, it was scoring a long white area on the sea pointing toward Nagumo. He had made the simple astute decision to turn and follow the arrow. Meantime, the torpedo attacks of Waldron, Lindsey and Massey had followed hard upon each other by luck. McClusky had sighted the Striking Force at almost the next moment by luck. The Yorktown's dive-bombers, launched a whole hour later, had arrived at the same time by luck. In a planned coordinated attack, the dive bombers were supposed to distract the enemy fighters, so as to give the vulnerable torpedo planes their chance to come in. Instead, the torpedo planes had pulled down the Zeroes and cleared the air for the dive bombers. What was not luck, but the soul of the United States of America in action, was this willingness of the torpedo plane squadrons to go in against hopeless odds. This was the extra ounce of martial weight that in a few decisive minutes tipped the balance of history. When telling the story Wouk included the following lines. "So long as men choose to decide the turns of history with the slaughter of youths-and even in a better day, when this form of human sacrifice has been abolished like the ancient, superstitious, but no more horrible form-the memory of these three American torpedo plane squadrons should not die. The old sagas would halt th tale to list the names and birthplaces of men who fought so well. Let this romance follow the tradition. These were the young men of the three squadrons, their names recovered from an already fading record". He then proceeds to list their names. Pilot followed by rear gunner. I've never forgotten that.
Torpedo 3 (Yorktown)
Lance Massey, Leo Perry; Richard Suesens, Harold Lundy Jr; Wesley Osmus, Benjamin Dodson;
David Roche, Richard Hansen; Patrick Hart, John Cole; John Haas, Raymond Darce';
Oswald Powers, John Mandeville; Leonard Smith, William Phillips, Curtis Howard, Charles Moore;
Carl Osberg, Troy Barkley; Wilhelm Esders (Survived); Robert Brazier (deceased);
Harry Cord (survived); Lloyd Childers (survived). 10 of 12 planes shot down. 21 of 24 airmen killed.
Torpedo 6 (Enterprise)
Eugene Lindsay, Charles Grenat; Severin Rombach, Wilburn Glenn; John Eversole, John Lane;
Randolph Holder, Gregory Durawa; Arthur Ely, Arthur Lindgren; Flourenoy Hodges, John Bates;
Paul Riley, Edwin Mushinski; John Brock, John Blundell; Lloyd Thomas, Harold Littlefield. Survivors:
Albert Winchell, Douglas Cossitt; Robert Laub, William Humphrey Jr.; Edward Heck Jr., Doyle L. Ritchey;
Irvin McPherson, Wililam Horton; Stephen Smith, Wilfred McCoy. 9 of 14 planes shot down. 18 of 28 airmen killed.
Torpedo 8 (Hornet)
John Waldron, Horace Dobbs; James Owens Jr, Amelio Maffei, Raymond Moore, Tom Pettry;
Jefferson Woodson, Otway Creasy Jr.; George Campbell, Ronald Fisher; William Abercombie, Bernard Phelps; Ulvert Moore, William Sawhill; William Creamer, Francis Polston, John Gray, Max Calkins;
Harold Ellison, George Field; Henry Kenyon Jr. , Darwin Clark; William Evans Jr., Ross Bibb Jr.;
Grant Teats, Hollis Martin; Robert Miles, Ashwell Picou; Robert Huntington (deceased). George Gay Jr (survived). 15 of 15 planes shot down. 29 of 30 airmen killed.
Total 34 of 41 planes shot down; 68 of 82 airmen killed.
5. A Stillness at Appomattox; Bruce Catton
6. Washington's Crossing; David Hacket Fischer
7. Enemy at the Gates; William Craig
8. The Stand, Stephen King
9. The Mysterious Island; Jules Verne
10. Pillars of the Earth, Ken Follett
I'll come back and add the reasons over the next few days (ok, the next few MONTHS).
