Come On, Texas: the USS Texas graphic novel, on Kickstarter Oct 27. Get notified →

Bravo Zulu: one true naval history story every day

BZ #180
1945

"This cruiser delivered the atomic bomb. On the way back, she was torpedoed. The Navy didn't notice for four days. Sharks did."

USS Indianapolis

Tap to find out

New here? Start with these

The three stories readers retell most.

The Night French Cavalry Rode Across a Frozen Sea and Captured a Fleet

The Night French Cavalry Rode Across a Frozen Sea and Captured a Fleet

In January 1795, French hussars wrapped their horses' hooves in cloth, crossed a frozen harbor, and boarded 14 Dutch warships. No shots fired. The only time in history cavalry captured a fleet.

5 min read
They Packed a Destroyer With Five Tons of Explosives and Rammed It Into a German Drydock

They Packed a Destroyer With Five Tons of Explosives and Rammed It Into a German Drydock

HMS Campbeltown was an old American lend-lease destroyer. The British disguised her as a German torpedo boat, filled her bow with depth charges, and drove her into the Normandie Dock at St Nazaire. The explosives went off ten hours later while German officers were inspecting the wreck.

6 min read
The Cruiser That Sailed Backwards Across the Pacific With a Bow Made of Coconut Logs

The Cruiser That Sailed Backwards Across the Pacific With a Bow Made of Coconut Logs

A torpedo blew off a third of USS New Orleans in 1942. The crew built a temporary bow from coconut trees and sailed her backwards 1,800 miles to Australia. Her original bow was found on the seafloor 83 years later.

5 min read

Latest stories

All 56 stories →
Jutland, 1916: The Gunner Who Kept Beatty's Flagship From Exploding

Jutland, 1916: The Gunner Who Kept Beatty's Flagship From Exploding

Three British battlecruisers exploded at Jutland and took more than 3,300 men with them. The flagship Lion took the same kind of hit and survived, thanks to a dying Royal Marine and a warrant officer who enforced the rules everyone else ignored.

6 min read
Leyte Gulf: Halsey Chased the Bait, and Taffy 3 Fought Yamato Alone

Leyte Gulf: Halsey Chased the Bait, and Taffy 3 Fought Yamato Alone

In October 1944 Japan sent a nearly empty carrier force to lure Halsey's Third Fleet away from Leyte. It worked. Off Samar, six escort carriers and seven small escorts faced four battleships, and a padded radio message asked the world's most famous question.

6 min read
AF Is Short of Water: The Fake Plumbing Problem That Won Midway

AF Is Short of Water: The Fake Plumbing Problem That Won Midway

In May 1942 US codebreakers knew Japan was coming for a place called AF. To prove AF was Midway, they had the island complain about its water supply over the radio. Japan repeated the complaint.

5 min read
Tsushima: The Fleet That Sailed 18,000 Miles to Lose in a Day

Tsushima: The Fleet That Sailed 18,000 Miles to Lose in a Day

Russia's Baltic Fleet spent seven months sailing around the world to fight Japan. At Tsushima on May 27-28, 1905, Admiral Togo destroyed it for the loss of three torpedo boats.

6 min read
A Biplane Jammed Bismarck's Rudder, and Sixty Years Later Nobody Could Agree Who Sank Her

A Biplane Jammed Bismarck's Rudder, and Sixty Years Later Nobody Could Agree Who Sank Her

In May 1941 Bismarck sank HMS Hood, leaving 3 survivors from her crew. Two days after that, a Swordfish biplane jammed her rudder, and the Royal Navy caught her. Whether British shells or her own crew sent her down was still being argued when James Cameron took submersibles to the wreck in 2002.

6 min read
Graf Spee at the River Plate: The Battleship Sunk by a Rumour

Graf Spee at the River Plate: The Battleship Sunk by a Rumour

In December 1939 three British cruisers fought the pocket battleship Admiral Graf Spee off the River Plate. Four days later her captain scuttled her in front of Montevideo, convinced by a fleet that was not there.

6 min read

Pick a war, a navy, a sea

World War II 30World War I 11Cold War and modern 8Age of Sail and Civil War 7US Navy 19Royal Navy 17German Navy 12Imperial Japanese Navy 9Russian and Soviet Navy 7Mysteries and disasters 14

Looking for a ship?

Every ship we have written about so far. Did someone in your family serve on one? Tell us their story.

Come On, Texas graphic novel cover
On Kickstarter Oct 27

Come On, Texas

The battleship that fought in both World Wars, from Veracruz to Normandy to Okinawa. A graphic novel about USS Texas and her crew.

Get notified at launch