The first U.S. hospital ship of World War II saw service in mid-1943. By war's end, the fleet had carried nearly 17,000 sick and wounded home. This richly illustrated work covers all 39 ships that served as U.S. Navy and Army hospital ships during World War II. Each ship's history is fully covered, concentrating on the ship's hospital service. Information is presented on each ship's personnel, the handling of patients, types of wounds and diseases encountered, and life aboard the ships. General layouts of the ships and technical data are also included. Biographies are provided on persons for whom ships were named.

"This book contains authentic photographs and salient facts covering 358 troopships used in World War II. In addition, other vessels of miscellaneous character, including Victory and Liberty type temporary conversions for returning troops, are listed in the appendices ..."--Pref.

No Time for Fear summons the voices of more than 100 women who served as nurses overseas during World War II, letting them tell their story as no one else can. Fessler has meticulously compiled and transcribed more than 200 interviews with American military nurses of the Army, Army Air Force, and Navy who were present in all theaters of WWII. Their stories bring to life horrific tales of illness and hardship, blinding blizzards, and near starvation—all faced with courage, tenacity, and even good humor. This unique oral-history collection makes available to readers an important counterpoint to the seemingly endless discussions of strategy, planning, and troop movement that often characterize discussions of the Second World War.

The story of hospital ships is a fascinating one indeed, about which little has been written except for isolated tragedies such as the sinking of the Centaur off the Australian coast in 1943.

The "Interim" LSM(R) or Landing Ship, Medium (Rocket) was a revolutionary development in rocket warfare in World War II and the U.S. Navy's first true rocket ship. An entirely new class of commissioned warship and the forerunners of today's missile-firing naval combatants, these ships began as improvised conversions of conventional amphibious landing craft in South Carolina's Charleston Navy Yard during late 1944. They were rushed to the Pacific Theatre to support the U.S. Army and Marines with heavy rocket bombardments that devastated Japanese forces on Okinawa in 1945. Their primary mission was to deliver maximum firepower to enemy targets ashore. Yet LSM(R)s also repulsed explosive Japanese speed boats, rescued crippled warships, recovered hundreds of survivors at sea and were deployed as antisubmarine hunter-killers. Casualties were staggering: enemy gunfire blasted one, while kamikaze attacks sank three, crippled a fourth and grazed two more. This book provides a comprehensive operational history of the Navy's 12 original "Interim" LSM(R)s.