Late in the night of August 1, 1943, Lieutenant John F. Kennedy’s Patrol Torpedo boat, the PT-109, was attacked by a Japanese destroyer in the South Pacific.

The destroyer struck PT-109 in the darkness of the moonless night, ripping away the starboard side of the boat. The impact tossed Kennedy around the cockpit. Most of the crew were knocked into the water. The one man below decks, engineer Patrick McMahon, miraculously escaped, although he was badly burned by exploding fuel.

From the wreckage, Kennedy ordered the men with him, to identify the locations of their crewmates in the water.

Kennedy swam out to McMahon and Charles Harris. Kennedy towed the injured McMahon by a life-vest strap, and alternately cajoled and berated the exhausted Harris to get him through the difficult swim. Floating on and around the hulk, the crew took stock.

After a discussion of options, the men abandoned the remains of PT-109 and struck out for an islet three and a half miles away.

Kennedy had been on the swim team at Harvard; even towing McMahon by a belt clamped in his teeth, he was undaunted by the distance. Some of the other men were also good swimmers, but several were not; two, Johnston and Mauer, could not swim at all. These last two were lashed to a plank that the other seven men pulled and pushed as they could. Read more

Source: jfklibrary.org

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    even funny how much I love JFK
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    I’ve been reading this book on JFK and I’ve learned all about how successful he was with swimming even though his dad...
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