William A. Gay

Unseen Body Blows is the true story of life aboard one of the first World War 2 Tank Landing Ships as it operated in seven Pacific Campaigns. The story is about its crew that began service aboard LST 479 as a group of very inexperienced amateurs. The LST existed for 1,046 days and landed soldiers and Marines with their equipment at Kiska, Makin, Kwajalein, Hollandia, Guam, Leyte and Okinawa. The title is derived from comments in a postwar history written by an anonymous crewman: "Our ship slipped in those almost unseen body blows..." that led to the defeat of Japan.