David Marshall “Carbine” Williams' story was made famous in the 1952 film starring James Stewart, but his legend has become somewhat larger than the real story. Still the unlikely story of “Carbine” Williams is history that deserves to be remembered.
Occurring just twelve days before the end of the war, the loss of the USS Indianapolis to torpedoes from the Japanese submarine I-58 represented the greatest single loss of life at sea in the history of the U.S. Navy. The event has been dramatized and eulogized, perhaps most famously in a chilling scene from the 1975 film Jaws. But in the face of mistakes and incompetence came self-sacrifice and heroism that deserves to be remembered.
A heroic battle, the longest dogfight in the history of US Naval aviation, was forgotten, buried among the closest held secrets of the cold war, for over sixty years.
On October 8, 1842 US Navy Captain Lawrence Kearny sent a letter to the Viceroy of Liangjiang urging that American merchants in China be granted the same treaty privileges as the British. The negotiation would set the tone of US China relations for the next hundred years, and establish a still recognized principle in world trade-. It was an extraordinary act, given Kearney’s limited authority.