Survivors remember WWII tragedy that was kept secret for years
Sixty years ago last month, members of the 66th Infantry Division boarded the USS George Washington and sailed through New York Harbor on their way to the war in Europe. The men went to England and prepared to cross the English Channel to engage in fierce fighting in Belgium's Ardennes Forest at the Battle of the Bulge.
The 2,235 men of the 66th Division sailed from Southampton Harbor, England, bound for Cherbourg, France, on Christmas Eve 1944. The Belgian ship SS Leopoldville, on its 25th crossing of the channel as a troop transport, was within sight of the lights of Cherbourg, only 5.5 miles from safe harbor, when disaster in the form of a German U-boat struck.
For at least 763 of the U.S. soldiers, this was as close as they would ever get to the Battle of the Bulge. Pierced by a torpedo, the Leopoldville sank in about two hours. The bodies of nearly 500 of the victims were never recovered.
Survivors and family members of those who perished visited Arlington National Cemetery in Virginia and laid a wreath at the Tomb of the Unknowns there Nov. 15 before holding a luncheon under the auspices of the White House Commission on Remembrance at nearby Fort Myer.
Even though the sinking was a disaster of monumental proportions, it received no news coverage. Families had not even been told how their husbands, fathers or brothers died. Many were listed as missing in action, even though some were buried in a cemetery at Normandy, France. Details of the incident were not declassified until 1959.
Allan Andrade, a former New York City police lieutenant of detectives, helped to unravel the mystery in his 1997 book, The SS Leopoldville Disaster Dec. 24, 1944. The former internal affairs investigator had seen references to the Leopoldville while researching another matter.
"I used my police background to track down hundreds of people all over the United States," Andrade said. "I tried to put faces on the statistics. It was classified; Murphy's Law -- there was so much that went wrong. The fellows that didn't drown either froze or were crushed while jumping to rescue ships. A lot of the families were told nothing. Some mothers went to their graves thinking their sons were wandering around Europe."
For more information, visit the White House Commission on Remembrance online at http://remember.gov/
George W. Reilly can be reached at VeteransColumn [at] verizon.net or by writing to the Providence Journal, 75 Fountain St., Providence, RI 02902