The four-stacked destroyer Jacob Jones was searching for a German U-boat in the predawn hours of Feb. 28, 1942, off Cape May. Unfortunately, the U-boat struck first, hitting the Jones with two torpedoes. The official U.S. Navy report reads, “One torpedo struck just aft of the bridge and apparently exploded the ship’s magazine. As a result of this explosion everything forward of the point of impact was sheered (sic) off.
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