Never to Return

by Randall Peffer, Robert Nersasian

Selected for the USCG Commandant's 2018 Reading List

Never to Return is the harrowing tale of the torpedoing and sinking of a Coast Guard ship and the loss of 171 Coast Guardsmen off the coast of Iceland during WWII.

The USS Leopold was a U.S. Coast Guard destroyer escort in a convoy of merchant ships carrying war materiel to England, on the lookout for the deadly U-boat wolf packs lurking in the North Atlantic. The Leopold was largely unarmored, lightly armed, and no match for the U-255’s torpedoes. Never to Return is the story of gunner Sparky Nersasian and his shipmates’ struggles to survive the Leopold’s sinking.

264 pages, Paperback

Published October 1, 2017

About the author

Randall Peffer is the author of over 300 travel-lifestyle features for magazines like National Geographic, Smithsonian, Reader's Digest, Travel Holiday, Islands and Sail; he teaches writing and literature at Philips Academy in Andover.

Reviews

[Anthony Bracciante · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is the very moving retelling of the loss of the Coast Guard Cutter Leopold, a WW II destroyer escort, on convoy duty in the frigid water of the North Atlantic near Iceland on March 9, 1944 to a single torpedo fired blindly by U-255 while crash diving in a desperate attempt to escape. most members of the crew perished in the frigid waters before they could be rescued bu their sister ship the Coast Guard Cutter Joyce. Twice the Joyce had to break off it's rescue attempts to evade what it thought were enemy torpedoes fired at it by an enemy U-boat but were actually torpedoes from the sinking Leopold. This story is well detailed and you come to know the crew of the Leopold personally both those lost and those that survive.

[TATreads · Rating 3 out of 5]

Well written history given limited primary sources.