War at Sea #35

Casey Quinn enlisted in the Navy dreaming of shipboard duty, but instead found himself assigned to a beach party unit—combat sailors fighting alongside Marines in amphibious invasions across the Pacific. From Guadalcanal to Saipan, Casey and his hard-hat crew discover that the steel helmet they once hated becomes the one thing keeping them alive through ninety bitter days of island warfare. This is the true story of the men who fought in the hard-hat navy, carrying the fight to the enemy one beach at a time.

A U.S. Navy cruiser launches in 1940 bristling with firepower, and over the course of her service she's reportedly sunk not once, not twice, but three times—first by a Japanese cruiser, then by a German U-boat, and again in the Mediterranean. But each time, her resourceful captain uses damage control, deception, and quick thinking to keep her operational while the enemy celebrates premature victories. Now, undetected and moving through Atlantic waters, the ghost ship prepares for one final engagement against a new Nazi battleship.

In the years before World War II, the U.S. military introduced a revolutionary new helmet designed to protect combat personnel in the field. This compact account documents how the innovative headgear proved its worth time and again, becoming an essential lifesaver for American soldiers in danger zones across the war.

Blacky Cleek cracks under the relentless terror of combat when a German shell tears through his light cruiser's engine room, leaving him shaken and ostracized by his crew. But when enemy bombers return to the attack and the ship takes a torpedo hit that floods the engine room with flames, Cleek gets one desperate chance to prove that fear doesn't have to mean cowardice. Facing searing heat and the weight of his shipmates' lives, this "bilge rat" will discover what he's truly made of.