The final resting place of a few hundred American heroes has finally been revealed:
An American World War II warship sunk by Japanese forces in a fierce battle after the attack on Pearl Harbor has been discovered at the bottom of the Indian Ocean.
More than 200 American servicemen perished when the USS Edsall was brought down by Japanese forces on March 1, 1942. The Royal Australian Navy discovered the vessel last year some 200 miles east of Christmas Island, south of Java, but the announcement of the discovery was withheld to coincide with Veterans Day.
The Edsall, which had been laid down by the Philadelphia shipyard of William Cramp & Sons in 1919, was so good at avoiding Japanese fire that one of its opponents dubbed it the "Dancing Mouse." Amazingly the Japanese forces fired more than 1,300 shots and missed the ship in all but a few cases.
It ultimately didn't dance fast enough, however, and got sunk by Japanese fire after being immobilized by bombs dropped from aircraft.
It is somewhat unique among U.S. warcraft in that there is actual video footage of it going down, filmed by a Japanese observer:
Haunting imagery of the ship's final resting place, roughly 18,000 feet below the surface, was released by the Australian Navy, which reportedly discovered the ship by accident while on an unrelated mission:
There were reportedly numerous survivors from the wreck found by Japanese forces shortly afterwards, though apparently all of them were eventually executed by the Japanese military, with at least some buried in a mass grave in the East Indies.
U.S. Navy Chief of Naval Operations Lisa Franchetti underscored the hallowed character of the wreckage:
The wreck of this ship is a hallowed site, serving as a marker for the 185 US Navy personnel and 31 US Army Air Force pilots aboard at the time, almost all of whom were lost when Edsall succumbed to her battle damage ...
This find gives us the opportunity for today's generation of Sailors and Navy civilians to be inspired by their valor and sacrifice.
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