Customer Reviews

Life and Death Aboard the U.S.S. Essex

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This is a fascinating reference book for Navy, WWII or war buffs. Streb was ON the Essex during WWII, and later he was a professor of history at Columbia University.

The book details the lives of the 16 men killed on November 25, 1944 when the Essex was struck by a kamikaze: 8 white, and 8 black--one of the first black gun crews.

The book also sets the records straight about many things...one of which: Streb was instrumental in seeing that the man who developed the angled flight deck receive the Navy Cross - FINALLY - in about 1999, the year the book was published.

Streb includes personal photographs taken aboard the ship, as well as numerous comments and personal reflections from others who served aboard the ship. Life and Death Aboard the U.S.S. ESSEX

Richard Streb was a remarkable teacher, a man of great learning, passion, drama and wit. Yet throughout the time I was his student he never mentioned his years in the US Navy during the Second World War. Indeed I would not have thought him old enough to fight, but it appears that he signed up very young. So it was a great surprise to learn about his book, a first-hand account of some of the fiercest action in the Pacific theatre - indeed his ship the USS Essex was the first to experience a Japanese kamikaze attack. Not only was Richard Streb there but it is typical of the man, of his curiosity and humanity, that years later he went to Japan and sought out the family of the kamikaze pilot - Streb needed to lift the pilot out of the oblivion of his act and give him a name, a face, a home, a story. He has done the same for the crew of the Essex who died that day, many of whom had the anonymity of being black and 'invisible' in the pages of American military history until Streb came along and tracked down their families too. All this is related in Richard Streb's book, a fascinating work of eyewitness history.

Dr. Streb passed away on November 21, 2007. What a great man he was. I was honored to be in the last class he taught at the end of his distinguished teaching career.