British battleship HMS King George V and other units of the Third Fleet in Sagami Wan outside Tokyo Bay, Japan, late August 1945, with a destroyer under way at left. Click to view this image in more detail.

On 29 August 1945, I was on the USS Benner, DD 807, one unit of over one hundred Third Fleet warships anchored in Sagami Wan, with the great snow-covered Mt. Fuji in the distance. It was a beautiful day.      And at daylight, there was my old ship, the Nicholas, getting under way—honored to lead the entire armada, which stretched single file over the horizon into Tokyo Bay.      It was and is the most spectacular sight I ever saw. Jack Fitch, Ens., DesRon21 Staff on board Nicholas, 1943 — March 2002

Some fine writing is available regarding Nicholas. Here we present the following authors:

• Virgil Wing, from Nicholas’s forward fireroom, at commissioning and in action during 1942–43.
• Foster Hailey, correspondent from the New York Times, on board Nicholas in 1943.
• Joe Moll, Nicholas signalman throughout World War II, on the Battle of Kula Gulf with a rescue report by Jack Fitch.
• Warren Gabelman, Nicholas’s communications officer and GQ OOD, May 1943–45.
• Then-Commander Robert Taylor Scott Keith, Nicholas’s third commanding officer.
• Doug Starr, writing for his grandchildren and looking back at Nicholas in 1944–45.
• Doug Turpen, Nicholas’s navigator in 1944–45.
• Ralph Young, Nicholas’s engineering officer, writing home from Tokyo Bay the day after the surrender in 1945.
• Doug Starritt, Nicholas’s engineering officer in the late sixties.