 Words at War presents 83 Days, the story of Seaman Izzy. Oh, Izzy. Izzy? Uh-huh. Izzy, what? Just Izzy. It's my last name. Izzy. Some last name you got. What's your first name? Basil. Basil, huh? Your mother didn't like children, maybe, huh? Anyhow, take it easy, Izzy. Man, lie out flat. That's it. Yeah. Now, which of you guys is the Navy man? You, Izzy? Yeah, me. Seaman, second class is my rating. American gun crew and Dutch merchant ship. How long were you out there? Eighty-three days. What happened? We was torpedoed. About 4.30 in the afternoon of November 2, 1942, a fast Dutch cargo ship was torpedoed and sunk a few hundred miles off the coast of South America. Only a few of the 400 men on the ship survived, and one of them, Basil Dominic Izzy, Seaman's second class of the United States Navy, was found on a raft in mid-ocean nearly three months after the sinking. Tonight, the national broadcasting company, in cooperation with the Council on Books and Wartime, brings you the incredible saga of Seaman Izzy and his companions, who lived through almost three months on a raft in the South Atlantic. The book, 83 Days, The Survival of Seaman Izzy, by Mark Murphy. You was torpedoed, huh? Yeah. And what? Oh, nothing much. Nothing much we could do. We was off-watch when it happened. Me and Joudy, who was my buddy, and Jensen. Anyhow, we... We was playing poker. Jawbone poker. Jensen owed me close to a million bucks by then. How much? A million bucks, Yomi, and don't forget it. Come on, Izzy. Yeah, yeah, yeah. You're wearing a spot-saw of shoveling them. All right. Take it easy. I'm dealing, ain't I? I got to deal like my old lady. Yeah, don't forget the plot. Anti-up, anti-up. Gee, I forgot. Yeah, you forgot. For 3,000 miles, we have to tell him every time to anti-up. Sure. That's how we won the million bucks. Okay, Izzy. I open for three chips. Okay. How many do you want? Three. Okay. How about you, Jensen? I'm honest. Give me three cards. Okay. The dealer takes one. Oh, boy, oh, boy. You know, I'd laugh out loud if we got torpedoed now. With Jensen, oh, and Izzy, I... Torpedo! Right under us. A million bucks. So we caught a fish. That's what you call it, getting torpedoed. You call it catching a fish. Fish is a torpedo, see? Me and Jowdy hit the deck running and checked in at our gun stations, but it was no use. By the time we got there, the ship was so far down by the head we couldn't get elevation on the gun, so we took our shoes off and went over the side. It was cold. The water, I mean. Boy, was it cold. It's cold. Well, what do you expect? Steam heat? Izzy. Yeah? Thank you, Izzy. Yeah. Me and Jensen. Who's that? Me. Jowdy. Come over here. This way. Well, keep yelling until we find you. Okay. This way. Over here. Here I am. He was hanging onto a raft. Not really a raft, just some bamboo stick slashed together. We could hardly see Jowdy. The sea was running so high, but we finally got together all right. Then there wasn't much for us to do, but hang onto the raft. It wasn't big enough to climb up on, so we just hung on and watched the ship go down. There it goes. Yeah. All my clothes on it. I paid a hundred bucks for one of my suits. A hundred bucks. So much for a suit of clothes. Wow. Got dark. Then it was real tough. Real bad. Lots of men died that first night. All around us. We could hear him. Yelling sometimes and crying. I heard a man crying like he was a baby. After a while, he stopped. Drowned, I guess. I didn't wish him no harm, but I was glad when he stopped crying like that. It was a bad night. We lay there in the water, clutching onto the raft. It was a bad night. And finally, the sun came up. Yeah, it was tough enough in the night, but when the sun came up, you couldn't get away from it. You could turn your back to it, and then it would reflect off the water like from a mirror, and it would stab into your eyes like it was going to tear off the back of your head. All day long, it was like that. Just hanging on and cursing and dozing off once in a while. Then waking up at the edge of the raft, cutting into your belly, and a sun-making scrambled eggs out of your brain. Nobody said much that day. Nobody talked. Just hung on and puked and waited for the sun to go down. After that, things got worse. Everybody started seeing things, off the head, even me. I smelled smoke, and I noticed a big hole in the water, not far off, where guys were going down for cigarette. And I let go of the raft, and I started swimming away. Where is he going? Watch him. Where you going, is he? I feel like a cigarette. I'm going down for smoke. Down to where all those guys are coming up for smoke. Is he? Yeah? But they got hamburgers. You want us to bring you a hamburger, Jottie? No, is he? Later. Later. Come back. He brought me back to the raft. A half a dozen times he did that, and I kept seeing things and would swim off. All night it was like that, and the second night. Then when it got morning, I stopped seeing things. But not everybody did, not Jensen. Listen, you guys, there's a hill on the other side of the raft. Jensen. There's a hill on the other side. And I think there's some German spies who's got a place there. I'll bet they're pretty nice guys. Jensen. Sure. I'll bet they're nice guys, even if they are spies. We can get us plenty to eat from them. All fixed up. I'll be right back with it. Jensen, come back! Jensen! Just for that, Jottie, I won't bring you nothing. Jensen. Come back, Jensen. There's no hill there. I won't bring you nothing, Jottie. Only you and me, is he? Nothing but Jottie. Jensen! There goes my million bucks. So Jensen went off looking for the hill. Only there was no hill. It came morning again, and the sun came up. It was like the day before, only nobody had any beans left by them. Then I saw the raft. The big raft. The one we were hanging on it was just bamboo. It hardly floated. But this other one, it stuck up out of the water a couple of feet. It was about ten feet long. I told Jottie about it. I said we ought to go over there and get on it. Too far, you'll never make it. Come on, Jottie. No, it's too far. Come on, will you? Go ahead. You want to go drown yourself if you want to. It's your funeral. No, it's too far. I started out by myself finally. It was a long way off, and it felt like a year swimming toward it. After a while, I saw I couldn't make it the way I was going. And I swam to get in front of it and figure the current would bring it to me. Then I couldn't swim any more hardly. I just lay there in the water with my legs aching and my life jacket digging into my belly and giving me cramps. And all I could do was just lay there, wishing that big raft would come my way. Finally, it bumped into me. And I climbed up on it. There was four other guys on it just sitting there. For the first time in 48 hours, nearly I was out of the water. All the rest of that day, we tried to paddle a big raft over to where Jottie was. But it wouldn't go. It wouldn't go. Finally, I was so pooped out, all I could do was just lay there and look over to where he was. I lay there on the big raft, and I cried. Once upon a time, there were three bears. Mama Bear, Papa Bear, and a little baby bear. Like I said, there were four other guys in this raft, see? I knew Enzin Maddox, he was my gunnery officer on board ship. He was the only one I knew. Then there was Beasley, an American sailor, and Case Van Der Slot. He was a Dutchman that hardly speak good English. The fourth guy was a 17-year-old kid named Hoogendam. Hoogendam, that's right, Nico Hoogendam. Only, you can't go around calling a guy Nico or Hoogendam, so we just call him Junior. He was from Holland. He was crazy about American bedtime stories. All day long, you'd make Maddox tell him bedtime stories. Look, Junior, I've told you this one five times already for two weeks. Tell me about the three bears. Haven't you had enough yet? Oh, come on. I like it. Go ahead, please. The little baby bear tasted his porridge, and he said, my porridge is too hot. The first month went by fast. Then the days began to get funny. We were running out of food and water. There were 10 gallons of water and a big can of chocolate when we started, and we rationed it out until it was almost all gone. Then the days got funny. Mornings would go fast, and every afternoon was like a year, waiting for night to come so we could get our little piece of chocolate. And every day, Maddox would tell Junior a bedtime story. Once upon a time, three bears. Mama, Papa, baby bear. They tasted their porridge. No, no. You'll leave part out. A porridge. I could use some porridge myself, whatever it is. How is he? What's porridge? Porridge? I don't know. Oatmeal, I think. I don't know. And I wish you wouldn't ask me every time you tell that story. Oatmeal. I could use some oatmeal. You finished the story? No. No more. I'm not going to tell you any more bedtime stories. Me? Beasley was the first. After we ran out of food, we took the catch of little minnows that came alongside the raft. We'd eat them raw, bones and all. Only Beasley couldn't keep them down, so he started getting weaker. You could tell because it got so he couldn't hear. I can't hear. I can't hear, Mr. Maddox. What's the difference? There's nothing to hear anyway, so what's the difference, whether you hear or not? I can't hear. I can see your lips moving all right, and I know you're talking, but I can't hear you. What'd you say? After that, he started going blind. And it got worse and worse. I would come up to him and hold up four fingers in front of him and say, how many fingers can you see, Beasley? What'd you say? I said, how many fingers can you see, Beasley? Two. Is that right? No. I'm holding up four fingers. See? One, two, three, four. Can you see them now? I can only see two. December 3rd was my birthday. The day before I told the other guys about it. How I'd never been away from home before on my birthday. And here I am, hard on a raft and a middle of the ocean. The next day was my birthday. It rained. Hours went by, and we still talked about my birthday. And it kept on raining. It rained the hardest on my birthday that it ever did while we're out there. They try to cheer me up. Oh, never mind, is it? We'll be picked up tomorrow when the terror ship's cook yesterday was your birthday. What did he make you take just to say? Yeah. That afternoon, it rained so hard I couldn't see more than a few feet in front. And I cried. My head out in the rain and tears rolling down out of my eyes. Because I knew if a ship did come by, they couldn't see us. I was 20 years old that day. Christmas came. We were out 53 days on Christmas. At that time, we were all pretty far gone. I was so thin I could put my fingers all the way around my arm. Beasley was the worst. I'd like a cigarette, Alice, please. I'd just lay there and talk to himself for the people we didn't even know. He was dying. Case van der Slott, the oldest Dutchman, kept singing some kind of Dutch song. And he called the kid. He slept most of the time. Maddox sat on the edge of the raft, turning his head as far as it would go, from one side to the other, watching the horizon. Once in a while, he'd beat his hands against the edge of the raft. And after a while, he said, What's he singing? Case, I don't know. It's some kind of a Dutch song. I don't know. I don't like driving me nuts. I know the words that might not be so bad, but I don't know the words that drive me nuts. Shut up, Case. Me? What's the matter? I said shut up, Chris said. Yeah, yeah. Merry Christmas. Merry, merry Christmas. And a happy new year. Hey, you know what I'd do if I was a sure? Shut up. I'd walk down the street, store I come to, and I'd get me some fig squares. That's what I'd do. What is this, a fig square? They're little cookies. They've got ground-up figs inside. And the five and ten, they're always fresh. I never heard of a fig square. Sure, you know, they're kind of cut off at each end, and you can see the ground-up figs inside. Maybe you mean fig newtons. Luffy and Indiana, we call them fig newtons. Not where I come from. Where I come from, they call them fig squares. Oh, please, why don't you help me? Here I am over here, Alice. Can't you see me? On a sixty-six morning, when we woke up, Beasley was dead. His hands were out in front of him like he was grabbing for something, as teeth were showing. We knew he was dead, but we kind of watched him for a couple of hours, hoping he wouldn't move. But he didn't. And then we were sure he was dead. And we took off his dungarees and got ready to bury him. Somebody ought to say a prayer. There he is. How about you? You're a good Catholic. Okay, I'll say something. Oh, my God, I'm hardly sorry for having offended thee, and I detest all my sins, because I dread the loss of heaven and the pains of hell. But most of all, because they offend thee, my God, who are all good and deserving of all my life. I firmly resolve with the help of thy grace to confess my sins. I firmly resolve with the help of thy grace to confess my sins to the penises of men my life. Amen. When I say push, you guys push. Dear Lord, this is our friend. Take good care of him. Amen. Amen. It's probably going to a better place. May he rest in peace. Push. After Beasley died, nothing much happened for a long time. We had a couple arguments on the raft, and it got so Maddox wouldn't talk to Vanderslot, only to me and the kid, Nico. Vanderslot and the kid were sort each other too, so the only one on the raft who would talk to Vanderslot was me. When the others wanted to tell him something, they told me, and then I told him. Hey. Is he? Tell him this. Stop singing. Nick says to stop singing. Tell me. I said for him to jump overboard. He says for you to jump overboard. Tell him. I said no. He says no. Doesn't seem to bother you much, Mr. Maddox. What? I said it doesn't seem to bother you much. What doesn't? The Dutchman. Sing it. Sing it. What? Sing it. Good. Can't hear him singing? What did you say? Can't you hear him? Listen, can't you hear him? Go on, sing some more, will you? There. Did you hear him? Say. How many fingers am I holding up? How many? Yeah. Yeah, sure, two. That's right. But I was lying. It was four fingers I held up. Just like I used to for Beasley. Maddox was deaf already and was going blind, just like Beasley had. He was dying. Maddox lasted 10 days after Beasley, and we buried him at sea, too. This time, we watched his body. His hair was off along by then, and it floated out in the water, and we could see him drift past us, and then back, back 50 feet or so, his hair floated out in the water. And something jarred him. His hair flooded in the water, and we, we didn't see him anymore. And one morning, Vanderslaut woke up Nico and me. This is, this is you fellas. Listen. What? We can't hear anything. There it is. A plane, a plane. They started yelling at the plane, waving and standing up and then falling down. I just lay there, sick to my stomach. I couldn't hear the plane engines. I knew what that meant. I put up four fingers in front of my face. I could still see four, but they were blurred. I was next. He didn't see us. Well, anyway, where their planes are, maybe the next one, he didn't see us. We saw two more planes that morning. Just scout, not looking for us, just scout. And early in the afternoon, Vanderslaut, the Dutchman, he saw some smoke. He rubbed his eyes and he said, I don't know, but I think I see something on the horizon. We couldn't see anything. But later we saw it. We saw one ship and two ships and four ships, a convoy. It just went along the horizon. We just looked and then Vanderslaut said, if this misses us today, I jump overboard. There were planes flying around the convoy and the first ship was a destroyer. We wanted to try and stand up, but we kept falling down. The destroyer kept going fast around the convoy and then we noticed some smaller boats, some PC boats, subchases. Then a PC boat had a right for us. He was up here and they've deflagged him. Hold me up. They're coming closer. Tell me, tell me, should we? What are they doing here? What are they doing? What are they doing? What's happening? They're coming closer. What's happening? They see us. They see us. They're pushing us down. They're going to shoot us? No, no, they ain't. Look, they're flying an American flag. They're going to pick us up. We wound up the day in clean sheets. The 83rd day we were on the raft, three months. Later on, a guy from the Coast Guard came down to feed us. He fed us like we were babies with a spoon. Take it easy. Now, what's your name? Izzy. Izzy. Uh-huh. Izzy, what? Just Izzy. It's my last name. Izzy. Some last name you got. What's your first name? Basil. Basil, huh? Your mother didn't like children, maybe, huh? Yeah. Anyhow, take it easy, Izzy. Now, lie out flat. That's it. Yeah. How long were you out there? 83 days. What happened? I was torpedoed. As the 31st program of Words at War, we've brought you passages from the recently published book, 83 Days, The Survival of Seaman Izzy by Mark Murphy. This book tells the true story of Basil Izzy, Seaman Second Class, an ex-baseball player from Southbury, Massachusetts. The radio adaptation was by Edith Sommer. Seaman Izzy was played by Paul Mann. And others in the cast were Walter Burke, Milton C. Herman, Tony Berger, Maurice Minnick, Paul Gordon, Lon Clark, and Sam Wanamaker. The music was arranged and played by William Meader. The production was under the direction of Anton M. Lieder. Next week, Words at War will present a story of China at war, war tied by Lin Tai Yi. Words at War is brought to you in cooperation with the Council on Books in Wartime by the National Broadcasting Company and the Independent Radio Stations associated with the NBC Network. This is the National Broadcasting Company.